Grim's Bank, Padworth, Berkshire

Antiquity ◽  
1943 ◽  
Vol 17 (68) ◽  
pp. 188-195
Author(s):  
B. H. St. J. O'Neil

The immediate environs of Silchester consist of fields, which are either now under plough or else have been arable for many years in the recent past. Consequently there are few, if any, traces there of the Roman roads which led from the various gates to Dorchester, Speen and Cirencester, Sarum, Winchester, and London. A mile or more to the north and northwest of the Roman town, however, there is a belt of land, which is largely heathland except where trees have been planted. Here there are clear indications of the line of two Roman roads, one from the west gate, west-northwest to Speen and Cirencester, the other from the north gate to Dorchester (Oxon.)The road to Speen (FIG. I) was formerly thought to follow closely the modern road along the northern side of Silchester Common and thence to run along the straight county boundary between Berkshire and Hampshire. In recent years, however, Mr O. G. S. Crawford has shown that the road, instead of following this traditional line, ran west-northwestward to cross the river Kennet near Brimpton Mill. It is traceable as a raised camber or a deep hollow way from Catthaw Lands Copse, about half-a-mile from the west gate of Silchester, to the western side of Hungry Hill. Further west, in Decoy Plantation, and again beyond the road from Padworth Common, i.e. in Keyser's Plantation, it is clearly seen as a broad cambered way (o.s. 641-1. Berkshire XLIV, SE, Hampshire IV, SE). Beyond this point the present writer has not followed it, but Mr Crawford has noted its continuation.

1865 ◽  
Vol 2 (16) ◽  
pp. 440-442
Author(s):  
A. H. Green

In the number of the GeologicalMagazine for last August, in a letter from Mr. Mackintosh, there is a notice of some markings, supposed to be glacial, on a rock known as ‘The Bloody Stone’, between Cromford and Bonsall, in Derbyshire. Mr. Mackintosh's language is not very clear, but I rather gather that he has doubts whether these markings were really made by ice: nor does he seem to be aware of the great interest that would attach to the discovery, if it could be proved beyond question that we have here a true ice-marked surface of rock. It is, I believe, very generally the case that the deposits and, so to speak, footmarks of the Glacial epoch are found on the western side of the central axis of the north of England in much greater force than on the eastern side. Thus much I can say from personal observation: in North Staffordshire and Lancashire, boulder-clays and gravels are found stretching from the plains far up the hill-sides, and erratic blocks lie here and there upon the moors to a height of 1,400 feet above the sea. On the other side of the socalled Pennine Chain, however, the case is widely different: through-out the whole of North Derbyshire and the adjoining uplands of Yorkshire there is nothing that can be safely set down as Drift, and certainly no blocks or pebbles of foreign rocks over the country to the north of the Wye. The valley of that river cuts right across the Great Saddle; and along it, and to the south of it, we do find stray patches of clay with ice-scratched boulders, mostly of limestone, but here and there of granite, greenstone, and other strangers, which seem to have found their way from the west along this sole opening in the barrier which elsewhere blocked up their path. ‘The Bloody Stone’ is just a case in point, lying as it does in the valley of the Derwent, about seven miles below the junction of the Wye with thatriver. I was, therefore, extremely glad to see Mr. Mackintosh's letter just in time to pay a visit to the spot, and I shall tell as carefully as I can what I there saw, in hopes that more experienced ice-men, if they cannot go to see for themselves, may be enabled to decide whether we can fairly refer the markings in question to the action of ice.


1923 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Mitchell Ramsay

In a footnote in J.H.S. 1918, p. 144, I stated the view that the battle (319 B.C.) in which Antigonus defeated Alketas and the associated generals took place in the αὐλὼν which leads from the N.E. corner of the Limnai towards Pisidian Antioch, carrying the southern or Pisidian road across Asia Minor eastward. This important route, regarded as a highway from the west coast to the Cilician Gates, is a recent discovery, though parts of it have been often described and traversed. In J.H.S. 1920, p. 89 f., I have argued that it was the road by which Xerxes' great army marched from Kritalla to Kelainai.There are two authorities on whom we depend for details of the battle of 319 B.C., Polyaenus Strat. 4, 6, 7 and Diodorus 18, 44; but both of these gather all their information from that excellent military writer Hieronymus of Cardia, the friend and historian of Eumenes. Polyaenus tells the story with soldierly brevity, relating only the chief military features: Diodorus diffusely and at great length; but so that we can recognise Hieronymus behind and beneath, and restore the full account as given by that writer.


1938 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Corder ◽  
I. A. Richmond

The Roman Ermine Street, having crossed the Humber on the way to York from Lincoln, leaves Brough Haven on its west side, and the little town of Petuaria to the east. For the first half-mile northwards from the Haven its course is not certainly known: then, followed by the modern road, it runs northwards through South Cave towards Market Weighton. In the area thus traversed by the Roman road burials of the Roman age have already been noted in sufficient quantity to suggest an extensive cemetery. The interment which is the subject of the present note was found on 10th October 1936, when men laying pipes at right angles to the modern road, in the carriage-drive of Mr. J. G. Southam, having cut through some 4 ft. of blown sand, came upon a mass of mixed Roman pottery, dating from the late first to the fourth century A.D. Bones of pig, dog, sheep, and ox were also represented. Presently, at a depth of about 5 ft., something attracted closer attention. A layer of thin limestone slabs was found, covering two human skeletons, one lying a few feet from the west margin of the modern road, the other parallel with the road and some 8 ft. from its edge. The objects described below were found with the second skeleton, and the first to be discovered was submitted by Mr. Southam to Mr. T. Sheppard, F.S.A.Scot., Director of the Hull Museums, who visited the site with his staff. All that can be recorded of the circumstances of the discovery is contained in the observations then made, under difficult conditions. ‘Slabs of hard limestone’, it was reported, ‘taken from a local quarry of millepore oolite and forming the original Roman road, were distinctly visible beneath the present roadway—one of the few points where the precise site of the old road has been located. On the side of this… a burial-place has been constructed. What it was like originally it is difficult to say, beyond that a layer of thin … slabs of limestone occurred over the skeletons. This had probably been kept in place or supported by some structure of wood, as several large iron nails, some bent at right angles, were among the bones.’ If this were all that could be said about the burials, they would hardly merit a place in these pages. The chief interest of the record would be its apparent identification of the exact course of the Roman road at a point where this had hitherto been uncertain. Three objects associated with the second skeleton are, however, of exceptional interest.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
А.В. Субботин

В статье излагаются результаты инструментальной съемки и шурфовки на раннесредневековом городище, выявленном в начале 1970-х гг. Х. Х. Биджиевым. Городище и связанное с ним селище занимают высокое мысовое плато над каньоном левого берега р. Кумы в Карачаево-Черкесии. Площадь укрепленного городища – 4 га, селища – немногим меньше. С трех сторон городище абсолютно неприступно, с четвертой, западной, надежно защищено высоким валом и глубоким рвом. На городище и селище зафиксирован ряд западин, которые, скорее всего, являются заросшими остатками построек. Содержимое шести шурфов – каменные развалы фундаментов (?) строений и фрагменты сосудов. Керамика может быть датирована VII–X вв. н. э. Памятник являлся одним из звеньев в цепи достаточно известных (несколько десятков) укрепленных крепостей данного времени в предгорьях и горах Северного Кавказа. Строительство сети сложных оборонительных сооружений свидетельствует о высокой строительной культуре и социальной дифференциации общества в это время. The article presents the results of instrumental surveys and pitting at an early medieval site, identified in the early 1970s by Kh.Kh. Bidzhiev. The investigated site and the settlement associated with it occupy a high cape plateau above the canyon of the left bank of the river Kuma in the Karachay-Cherkess Republic. The object of study is located in 2.4 km south-west of the southern outskirts of the village Krasnovostochny. The area of the fortified site is 4 hectares, the area of the settlement is slightly less. On three sides, this site is absolutely impregnable. On the forth western side,on its western slope, it is reliably protected by a rampart of up to 6 to 7 m high and a moat of1 to 2 m deep. On the outside of the southern part of the rampart, a small outcrop of masonry constructed of the large blocks of limestone formed in the dry stone wall was discovered. The gates to the site were most likely located on the northern side of the rampart, in the place where a slight decrease was discovered, not at the southern end of the rampart (according to Bidzhiev) because no sign of an entrance was found there. The site revealed several shallow depressions of a sub-square, sub-rectangular or oval shape with a noticeable roller along the contour. There are at least 7 such depressions in the sectional area from 8 to 15 m. Probably, these depressions are the overgrown remains of the foundations of some buildings in the central part of the site. The content of 6 pits made on the territory of the site and the settlement are stone remains of the foundations (?) of ancient buildings and fragments of vessels. The collection of ceramics consists of medium-sized fragments of the walls of pottery (?) vessels, or vessels that are corrected on a wheel. The ceramics are diverse in the color of clay, density of the paste, firing, and impurities. According to the character, paste and collar shapes, ceramics can be dated to the last third of the 1st millennium AD, which does not contradict the opinion of the site’s discoverer on this issue (7th to 10th cent. AD). The examined site was one of the links in the main chain of fairly widely known (several dozen) fortified stone fortresses of this time in the foothills and mountains of the North Caucasus. Specialists know more than 130 similar stone sites, sometimes located in groups in the foothills and mountainous regions: settlements with defensive stone walls. Such small fortresses were built every 2 to 3 km along the tip of the cape above the river. The construction of a network of complex defensive structures indicates a high building culture and a social differentiation of society at the time.


1960 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 98-148 ◽  
Author(s):  
John X. W. P. Corcoran

This paper is devoted to a study of the horned-cairns of the North-east of Ireland and their associated artifacts. The term ‘horned-cairn’ is used to describe those segmented gallery-graves set in a long cairn and entered from a semi-circular forecourt delimited by an orthostatic facade. It is realized that this term is not altogether satisfactory, but it has the virtue of brevity and its usage is now well established. Some contemporary Irish prehistorians, notably Professor Ruaidhrí de Valéra, have suggested the term ‘court-cairn’ for all the manifestations in Ireland of the segmented gallery-grave having elaborate structural forecourts. This would include cairns in the West of Ireland with completely enclosed courts (described as court-cairns in this paper) as well as horned-cairns proper. The confusion which might arise from the use of such terms as ‘full court-cairn’, ‘half court-cairn’, ‘forecourt-cairn’ and the like have decided the present writer to retain in this paper the simple terms ‘horned-cairn’ and ‘court-cairn’.This study is divided into two main sections. The first is descriptive, being concerned with horned-cairns and associated artifacts and the second attempts to place the Carlingford Culture as a whole in its context in prehistory. In view of the paucity of detailed information about court-cairns, particularly the almost complete lack of excavation, no detailed study is made of these. At the time of going to press it is understood that a paper by Professor de Valéra on the court-cairns of the west is about to be published in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy.


Author(s):  
Peter Thomson

The Barguzin River flows out of the Barguzin Mountains, through the town of Barguzin and then the coastal community of Ust-Barguzin before it finally loses itself in a broad cove of Baikal known as Barguzin Bay. The only way across the river for miles upstream from the lake is a ramshackle little wooden ferry with a tiny, corrugated steel shed with a wood stove in it and room on its deck for about half a dozen cars. The ferry slips noiselessly away from the end of the road on the south bank, and looking west toward the lake, two ghostly, rusting timber loading cranes loom on the horizon while the river spills over into a grassy marsh on its north bank. Turning back to the east, there’s a small motorboat laboring to get upstream—laboring because it’s attached to a tow rope, which is attached to the ferry. The ferry, it turns out, is just a hapless little barge, at the mercy of the river without the guidance of the motorboat pilot on the other end of the towline. Our crossing takes less than five minutes, and connected to it by nothing but that single strand, the pilot directs the barge into place perfectly on the far side. But the deckhand fails to secure it, the ferry swings wide in the current, spins ninety degrees, and slams butt-end into the dock. The pilot scowls as he turns the motorboat around and uses its blunt bow, covered in a tractor tire, to push the barge back into place, where the deckhand finally lashes it to the dock. The Barguzin is Baikal’s third largest tributary, after the Selenga to the south of here and the Upper Angara to the north. It carries about six percent of the water flowing into the lake, along with migratory fish like omul and sturgeon, born in the shallow gravel beds upriver before wandering downstream to spend most of their lives in the lake. And even though it flows through only two towns between its headwaters and the lake, the Barguzin carries a significant pollution load into Baikal, as well, especially organic chemicals from timber operations.


1764 ◽  
Vol 54 ◽  
pp. 198-200

South Weald is a village in Essex, about eighteen miles distant from London, and two to the north west of Brentwood. In the road from London there is an almost continual ascent for the last four or five miles, which makes a considerable eminence above any parts of the neighbouring country. On the highest part of it stands the church, which has at the west end a tower, and in one corner of this there is a round turret, being a continuation of the stair-case, about four feet wide, eight feet high, and the walls of it one foot thick. In the top of the wall of this turret, which was leaded, are fixed several iron bars, that are bent so as to meet in the middle and support a weather-cock, which was put up about sixteen years ago.


1907 ◽  
Vol 4 (12) ◽  
pp. 537-538
Author(s):  
T. C. Cantrill

The fossils which Mr. V. M. Turnbull has collected from supposed Slade Beds on the “roadside near St. Martin's Cemetery, Haverfordwest,” were obtained along the north side of a road leading westward from St. Martin'ls Cemetery to Portfield House, on the west aide of the town. About half-way between the Cemetery and Port-field House the road is crossed by a by-road known as Jury Lane; one of the fossiliferous localities lies 110 yards east of Jury Lane crossing, another is 100 to 150 yards west of it. The area in question is contained in the Old Series one-inch Geological Survey map, Sheet 40, the New Series one-inch map, Sheet 228, and in the six-inch map, Pembrokeshire, Sheet 27 N.E.


1990 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 342 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stig Jonsson ◽  
Per Holmlund

Scharffenbergbotnen is a 3 × 6 km large basin of interior ice drainage on the north-western side of Heimefrontfjella in Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. The elevation at the bottom of the depression is 1142 m a.s.l., while bedrock immediately to the south-east of this point rises to more than 2750 m. Ice enters the basin mainly from a low ice divide (1250 m a.s.l.) in the west but also through a 400 m high icefall in the east. Two separate blue-ice areas constitute approximately half the surface of the basin, while the other half is snow-covered. As part of SWEDARP (Swedish Antarctic Research Programme) 1988 a research project to study the origin and mass balance of this basin has been initiated. A net of 28 stakes has been established for studies of ablation and ice movement (Fig. 1). The ice thickness was measured by radio-echo sounding (Fig. 2) and particular care was devoted to get the correct ice depths at the entrance to the basin. The ice thickness along a central section of the basin varied from 1000 m in the west to 400 m at the bottom of the depression. In order to explain the ablation two automatic weather stations (Aanderaa 2700) were operated during the field season (mid-January to mid-February 1988). One was placed in the bottom of the depression, the other 13 km to the west in an area where a small net accumulation took place during the field season. The latter station should record “normal” weather. Sensors registering wind speed, wind gust, wind direction, incoming solar radiation, air temperature and relative humidity were installed at both weather stations, while reflected solar radiation, net radiation and air pressure were measured only at Scharffenbergbotnen. All sensors except the air pressure sensor were placed 270 cm above the ground, and all were read every 10 minutes. Ablation measurements were carried out between 16 January and 18 February on 24 of the stakes. 12 of these stakes were standing in snow. All but one recorded ablation and, as no signs of melting could be seen, all ablation must be due to evaporation and perhaps for the snowy areas some wind erosion. The average ablation rate for the whole field season was 0.7 mm w.eq. per day with a standard deviation of 0.3. Stakes in blue ice showed slightly higher values than those in snow. For January, when air temperatures always were above −10°C, the average ablation rate was 1.2 mm w.eq. per day. A regional difference in ablation rate across the depression was also measurable. Maximum ablation took place immediately below the arête forming the north-eastern boundary of the basin and diminished towards south-west. Below the arête the ablation rate was above 1 mm w.eq. per day for the whole field season and more than 2 mm w.eq. per day during January. A comparison of weather data between the two stations showed the following main differences. In the depression the temperature showed no daily variation and relative humidity varied between 40 and 60%. The weather at the other station was characterised by colder nights and weaker winds as well as by a relative humidity between 60 and 80%. The reason for the regional variation in ablation can be explained by almost constant easterly winds during January and the drop in altitude (between 300 and 500 m) along the north-western arête. On 11 February 1988 the weather station at Scharffenbergbotnen was converted into a system for satellite (Argos) transmission of weather data to Europe. The transmission seems to have been successful but the data are not yet processed. At present (January 1989) one of us is remeasuring the stakes (ablation and ice movement) during SWEDARP 1989. Preliminary results sent by radio point towards a yearly net ablation rate of 120 mm w.eq. for the blue-ice area in the bottom of the depression. 25% of the ablation took place during the field season 1988, but 75% has evaporated between 18 February 1988 and mid-January 1989. Probably most of the evaporation took place during December 1988 and January 1989, which means a very high daily evaporation rate (2.5 mm w.eq. per day).


1963 ◽  
Vol 58 ◽  
pp. 53-67
Author(s):  
W. G. Forrest

The plains of Pyrgi, Kalamoti, and Dotia, in the south-east corner of Chios, form a single geographic unit, bounded in the east by the hills which run inland from the promontory of Agridia, in the west by the low range of Kampia, Aradhopetra, and Kakopetria, and in the north by the more formidable barrier of the central mountains of the island. In them there are traces of several ancient sites, at Pindakas, Dotia, and elsewhere, but these appear to have been little more than isolated farmhouses or small sanctuaries and it is almost certain that most of the inscriptions from the area came originally from the major sites at Emporio and Phanai. From these they have been transported, some as far as Chios town, most to other local sites, to country churches or to the medieval towns of Pyrgi and Kalamoti. In many cases it is now impossible to trace their origin (even those which have reached the comparative safety of the Museum are often without record of their provenance), and it would therefore be pointless to try to isolate the inscriptions of any one ancient centre. For this reason I have collected here, in addition to the few inscriptions discovered in the British School excavations at Emporio, all the other material known to have been found in the area. For convenience I reproduce all but the most accessible texts in full. Generally it has been possible to check earlier readings on the stone (in which case the text is my own without any note of alterations unless they are significant); those which I have not seen are marked with an asterisk.


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