Neolithic and Early Bronze Age Settlement at Broom Hill, Michelmersh, Hants

1934 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 246-253
Author(s):  
S. T. Percival ◽  
Stuart Piggott
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
The West ◽  
Southern Boundary ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
Ancient Times ◽  
The Hill ◽  
Steep Slopes

Between the rivers Test and Itchen in Hampshire, to the west of Winchester, and to the north-east of Romsey, there is a tract of high ground, forming the watershed between these two rivers, rising at Farley Mount, close to the Roman road from Venta to Sorbiodunum, to a height of 500 ft. above the sea. A part of this tract, particularly the area above the 300-ft. contour, in the ecclesiastical parishes of Farley Chamberlayne and Braishfield, is specially rich in surface flint implements of Neolithic or Early Bronze Age. The Broom Hill site is at the southern boundary of this area, on the borders of these two parishes and in the civil parish of Michelmersh. The position is latitude 51° 2′ north, and longitude 1°27′ west. It happens to be marked on O. S. 6-in. xlix, NW., by a triangle, showing that the place was used as a trigonometrical station, and is, therefore, readily visible for some miles around. The height of the point above sea-level is 330 ft.Here at intervals, during the years 1932 and 1933, the writer discovered some neolithic pottery which will be described by Mr. Stuart Piggott. The site is approximately 150 yards wide from east to west, and some 250 yards long from north to south. It is a ridge of chalk, capped by a sandy clay, above which again is a rough pebbly gravel in which the pottery was found, about twenty to thirty inches below the turf. The fact that there is clay under the gravel causes the land below the hill to be exceedingly marshy, and this state of things was probably even more pronounced in ancient times. The site is a narrow neck ending in a broader portion, entirely surrounded, except at the southern end, by steep slopes or marsh. The form of the site cannot be judged from the shape of the 300-ft. contour on the map, for there is an under-feature which causes the site to assume the form of a peninsula jutting northwards. But at the narrow southern end there is no sign of any defensive bank, which might, perhaps, have been expected; but the site shows signs of having been under plough, though not in living memory.

Hadd Hajar, a clausura in the Tripolitanian Gebel Garian south of Asabaa

1980 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 45-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olwen Brogan
Keyword(s):  
Sea Level ◽  
East Side ◽  
The South ◽  
The West ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
South West ◽  
Narrow Valley ◽  
Pass Through ◽  
The Hill

In the Gebel Garian, about 20 kilometres south of Asabaa, the map-makers of 1964 indicated an ancient wall (Fig. 1) called Hadd Hajar (i.e. wall of stone) running south-west for six kilometres from Ras al Tays al Abyad (858 m; the Hill of the White Goat) on which stood a watch tower, to Ras al Said (764 m). The country crossed by Hadd Hajar is about 690-730 m above sea-level with a gently-undulating surface constituting a fairly open and level valley. The hills are covered with esparto-grass. On the west the Wadi Wamis winds among closely-set hills while, in the north-east, the wall is carried for a further three quarters of a kilometre across a narrow valley from Ras al Tays al Abyad to another hill Ras al Saqifah. An old track comes southwards down this valley flanked on the east side by a barrier of hills over 800 m high. Where the track crosses the wall there is a Roman building (Gasr al Saqifah) with traces of an archway for people and flocks to pass through. Two kilometres to the south is an old cistern (Majin Saqifah) presumably Roman. Beyond, the track continues about 25 kilometres to a large well, Bir al Shaqaykah (Sceghega), after which it is another 28 kilometres south-eastwards to Mizdah on the Wadi Sofeggin.

Pictures and people. Seals, figurines and Peloponnesian imagery

2010 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 185-218 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erika Weiberg
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
Initial Description ◽  
Seal Impressions ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
Coastal Settlement

The point of departure for this paper is the publication of two Early Helladic sealing fragments from the coastal settlement of Asine on the north-east Peloponnese in Greece. After an initial description and discussion they are set in the context of sealing custom established on the Greek mainland around 2500 BCE. In the first part of the paper focus is on the apparent qualitative differences between the available seals and the contemporary seal impressions, as well as between different sealing assemblages on northeastern Peloponnese. This geographical emphasis is carried into the second part of the paper which is a review and contextualisation of the representational art of the Aegean Early Bronze Age in general, and northeastern Peloponnese in particular. Seal motifs and figurines are the main media for Early Helladic representational art preserved until today, yet in many ways very dissimilar. These opposites are explored in order to begin to build a better understanding of Peloponnesian representational art, the choices of motifs, and their roles in the lives of the Early Helladic people.

Urban Development in Central Transcaucasia in Anatolian Context: New Data

2011 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vakhtang Licheli
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Asia Minor ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Southern Slope ◽  
Eastern Slope ◽  
The North ◽  
Lower Terrace ◽  
The Hill ◽  
Northern Wall ◽  
North Western

Abstract The settlement and necropolis of Grakliani Hill are located in Central Transcaucasia, Georgia. Excavations of the settlement on the eastern slope and the necropolis on the south-western part of the hill demonstrated that the site had been occupied between the Chalcolithic and the Late Hellenistic periods. The most interesting remains of buildings belong to 2nd and 1st millennium BC. Several sanctuaries of this period were excavated. A monumental altar was discovered in the eastern part of the settlement. The altar was located in the north-western corner of a building. On its eastern side there was an ash pit with a platform along the northern wall. The platform was used for placing offerings, including a South Mesopotamian seal. An architectural complex of the following period (450-350 B.C) was discovered in the western part of the lower terrace. It consisted of three main rooms and three store-rooms. Burials of various periods were discovered in the western part of the hill’s southern slope. The earliest one is a pit-burial dating to the Early Bronze Age, the latest one belongs to the 2nd century BC. After analyses of the finds several directions of cultural and commercial links were identified: Colchis, Persia, Phoenicia, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Asia Minor.

The Bronze Age Round Barrows of Wessex

1941 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 73-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. V. Grinsell
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Northern Limit ◽  
Distribution Maps ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
Important Extension ◽  
The One ◽  
The Bronze Age

The area covered by this survey, which epitomizes the writer's work on Wessex barrows since 1929, is limited on the west by a line drawn from Weston-super-Mare to Bridport, on the east by a line drawn from Dorking to Arundel, on the north roughly by the northern limit of the chalk downs south of the Thames, and on the south by the sea. It encloses the great majority of bell, disc, and saucer barrows, all of which appear to be expressions of Piggott's Wessex Bronze Age culture. It should be noted however that elements of this culture are found outside the area dealt with, notably at various places to the north-east. Nearly all of these are so close to the Icknield Way as to make it certain that this was the means of communication linking the one with the other. Another, though less important, extension of the Wessex Bronze Age culture is represented by a few sites, some of them doubtful, within a short distance of the course of the Upper Thames, and it is probable that the river was the means of communication used.Here it is well to point out the respects in which the boundaries of Bronze Age Wessex, as determined by my own distribution-maps of barrows, differ from those adopted in the O.S. Map of Neolithic Wessex, and by Mr Stuart Piggott in his recent paper, ‘The Early Bronze Age in Wessex.’

Unpublished material from the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut and the British School at Athens and its Contribution to a Better Understanding of the Early Bronze Age settlement pattern on Lesbos

1997 ◽  
Vol 92 ◽  
pp. 73-107
Author(s):  
Kyriacos Lambrianides ◽  
Nigel Spencer
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
First Generation ◽  
East Coast ◽  
Settlement Pattern ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
British School ◽  
New Material ◽  
Material Evidence

This paper presents previously unpublished material from the archives of the DAI and BSA, assessing its contribution to a better understanding of the settlement pattern on the north-east Aegean island of Lesbos in the Early Bronze Age, a period known only in terms of the single excavated sites of Thermi on its east coast. Using this new material evidence, the study places Thermi in its wider context within EBA Lesbos, demonstrating that several other EBA sites co-existed with Thermi, not only on the coast but also inland. It then places EBA settlements on the island in their west Anatolian context through an examination of ceramic parallels and affinities with mainland sites. It is argued: (1) that in view of the extensive distribution of EBA sites on Lesbos, colonization of the island must have begun long before the emergence of Thermi; (2) that several sources and mechanisms of colonization were involved in the process of settlement, which may be reflected in the fact that at least two distinct groups of sites can be identified on the island; and (3) that some of these sites appear to have relied upon agriculture rather than marine resources. Such inland agricultural sites may represent the first generation of purely endogenous communities which emerged on the island after its colonization.

Excavations in Caria

1887 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 64-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. R. Paton
Keyword(s):  
Great Part ◽  
The West ◽  
The Road ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Hill ◽  
To Receive ◽  
The Way

Mr. Newton in his History of Discoveries, p. 583, gives the following account of an excursion to the peninsula which lies to the west of Budrum (Halikarnassus) where he was then excavating:—We next proceeded to examine the hill with the level top. This hill is called Assarlik.Ascending from this gateway we passed several other lines of ancient walls, and on gaining the summit of the hill found a platform artificially levelled. There are not many traces of walls here. The sides of the hill are so steep on the north and east that they do not require walls. The platform terminates on the north-east in a rock rising vertically for many hundred feet from the valley below. The top of the rock is cut into beds to receive a tower. The view from this platform is magnificent.[After brief mention of several tombs passed in the way down, Mr. Newton proceeds:]The acropolis which anciently crowned the rock at Assarlik must have overlooked a great part of the peninsula and commanded the road from Halicarnassus to Myndus and Termera. From the number of tombs here, and their archaic character, it may be inferred that this was a fortress of some importance in very early times.

scholarly journals Two Notes on Pylos and Sphacteria

1907 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 274-283
Author(s):  
W. C. Compton ◽  
H. Awdry
Keyword(s):  
The West ◽  
Low Level ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
Open Sea ◽  
The Hill ◽  
North End

Thucydides (iv. 36) describes the last phase of the long contest which led to the surrender of the 292 surviving Spartans on Sphacteria.They had gradually retired to the summit of the hill at the north end of the island,—an altitude of something under 500 feet, and were making their last stand in the neighbourhood of the παλαιὸν ἔπυμα mentioned by Thucydides, which had once defended this summit, and of which small fragments are yet to be seen. These fragments are still there, for since prehistoric times this practically waterless island has probably never had inhabitants except a few nomad goatherds.The ground,—working round west, north, east, south,—is as follows, and, the photographs reproduced will help to make it clear (Fig. 1, and Plan) To the S.W. is the long slope up which the Spartans had been slowly retiring from their camp on the low level in the centre of the island. To the west the hill falls, not very steeply, to a saddle; and from this and all sides except (as they thought) the east, the Spartans were exposed to attack; then comes a shoulder before the ground slopes away westward to the open sea.

scholarly journals Le Bosquet del Vau un établissement du néolithique final

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
heller frederic
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
The West ◽  
North West ◽  
Northern Side ◽  
Western Side ◽  
The One ◽  
The Hill ◽  
Steep Slopes ◽  
Made In

Summary:The Neolithic site of the Bosquet del Vau is located in the Brabant Province in Belgium. Two different rescue excavations took place on the site both in 2006 and 2007 : the first was subsequent to a housing project of about 110 houses, the latter to the building of the R.E.R. (Express Regional Transportation System).The site was discovered in the 1980 by a group of three teenagers going flint tools hunting all around Waterloo and Braine l’Alleud. Flint tools pertaining to the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age were recovered on site as well as some Mesolithic flint tools.The site is located on a small sandy hill and covers 2.5 hectares. Steep slopes surround it to the west and north-west and gentler ones to the northeast and south, an isthmus exists to the east linking it o the plateau.The settlement is protected by a palisade to the east and south, a wide ditch links the palisade to the nearly valley to the west. The western side of the hill has seen its slope artificially steepened as did part of the northern side. No palisade was found on either of those two sides.Part of one house and a complete second one were discovered in 2006 and 2007. They are aligned north to south, 18 meters long and 4.5 meters wide. A narrow ditch houses the post holes, posts are maximum 0.30 m in diameter and spaced evenly. Central posts suggest a two-sloped roof. No hearth was found inside of the first house, the one of the second has yet to be associated with the house.A phosphate map was made in both cases, evidence points to a house divided into three parts, with maybe a cattle area next to the second one.Potsherds recovered in two postholes of the 2007 house fit together and could be dated to the Late Neolithic Period.Flint tools are mostly micro-denticulates though a few polished axes fragments have been discovered as well as arrowheads and a beautifully knapped flint knife.The various types of stones used: from black flintstone to Parisian flintstone and phtanite suggest here again a Late-Neolithic dating.

Nemesis: A Mycenaean settlement near the Menidi Tholos Tomb

1959 ◽  
Vol 53 ◽  
pp. 292-294
Author(s):  
R. Hope Simpson
Keyword(s):  
Ground Level ◽  
The West ◽  
North West ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
South West ◽  
Original Size ◽  
The Hill ◽  
East West ◽  
Ancient Remains

The site to be described lies on a low hill a little to the north of the small village or suburb of Nemesis, about 150 metres to the west of the main road from Patisia to Koukouvaounes, and 1 kilometre to east-south-east of the Mycenaean tholos tomb at Λυκὸτρυπα, which was excavated by the German Institute in 1879, and is usually called the Menidi Tomb. The site at Nemesis is visible from the tholos tomb, and is separated from it by a gentle valley through which run, in a southerly direction, two streams with steep banks. The eastern stream is the river Kephissos, whose name goes back at least as far as the classical period.The hill of Nemesis stands about 15 to 20 metres above the level of the surrounding land, and measures about 160 m. north-west to south-east × 120 m. north-east to south-west. The hill is an isolated outcrop of conglomerate rock, thinly covered with stony brown earth. It has been eroded over an area about 250 m. north-south × 50 m. east-west, so that its original size was considerably larger than at present, in all about 30,000 square metres. Mycenaean sherds were found over the whole of this area, though mainly in the eroded part, among the lumps of fallen earth and rock. Remains of rubble walling together with several Mycenaean sherds were found here, and also in the steep cliffs formed by the erosion on the west and south sides (this part of the hill has been undermined by recent excavation of the beds of grey clay, which here lie at between 2 and 3 metres below the original ground level). The ancient remains are particularly noticeable in the south-west angle of the cliffs (roughly in the centre of the part of the hill shown on Plate 71a), where there is a greater depth of earth above the rock than is visible elsewhere on the hill.

Excavation of Four Barrows, and a Middle Bronze Age Cremation Cemetery, at Heatherstone Grange, Bransgore, Hampshire

2018 ◽  
Vol 73 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-89
Author(s):  
Richard Massey ◽  
Elaine L. Morris
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
The South ◽  
The West ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
South West ◽  
Middle Bronze Age

Excavation at Heatherstone Grange, Bransgore, Hampshire, investigated features identified in a previous evaluation. Area A included ring ditches representing two barrows. Barrow 1.1 held 40 secondary pits, including 34 cremation-related deposits of Middle Bronze Age date, and Barrow 1.2 had five inserted pits, including three cremation graves, one of which dated to the earlier Bronze Age, and was found with an accessory cup. A number of pits, not all associated with cremation burials, contained well-preserved urns of the regional Deverel-Rimbury tradition and occasional sherds from similar vessels, which produced a closely-clustered range of eight radiocarbon dates centred around 1300 BC. Of ten pits in Area C, three were cremation graves, of which one was radiocarbon-dated to the Early Bronze Age and associated with a collared urn, while four contained only pyre debris. Barrow 1.3, in Area E, to the south, enclosed five pits, including one associated with a beaker vessel, and was surrounded by a timber circle. Area F, further to the south-west, included two pits of domestic character with charcoal-rich fills and the remains of pottery vessels, together with the probable remains of a ditched enclosure and two sets of paired postholes. Area H, located to the north-west of Area E, partly revealed a ring ditch (Barrow 1.4), which enclosed two pits with charcoal-rich fills, one with a single Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age potsherd, and the other burnt and worked flint. A further undated pit was situated to the east of Barrow 1.4. The cremation cemetery inserted into Barrow 1.1 represents a substantial addition to the regional record of Middle Bronze Age cremation burials, and demonstrates important affinities with the contemporary cemeteries of the Stour Valley to the west, and sites on Cranborne Chase, to the north-west.

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