More Neolithic ditch

Time for an archaeological view: another stretch of Neolithic ditch from Andrew Powell. Professor Dixon identifies: "Cutting CIV, showing the ditch 603 looking south, partially excavated; bank on the right overlies the causewayed enclosure ditches." A somewhat higgledy-piggledy turf wall in the background: not one of our best efforts.

Outer Neolithic ditch

If you like your ditches Neolithic but not continuous, this one's for you: Andrew Powell, whose photo this is, thought this view of the outer segmented Neolithic ditch was possibly from 1972: Prof Dixon thought it might be 1974 or 1973 and then came down in favour of 1973. Cheltenham dimly in the distance.

Simple beauty

Dr Ferris and I walked through the beautiful cool beechwood together on Saturday morning after breakfast. We nearly lost hope that we would find a break in the trees to see the view that we knew must be there: a happy chance encounter with a kind woman walking her dog, just as we were about to give up, meant that we could ask the way: "Through this gate and down to the end of the field, there's quite a good view", said she.

And this is what we saw...

Current Archaeology 110 from 1988

Click on images to enlarge

My thanks both to 'Current Archaeology' and its publisher Rob Selkirk (Current Archaeology) and as ever to PWD for their kind permission to reproduce this abstract from CA 110 in 1988. It's rather longer than my usual posts but there wasn't really an obvious way in which it could be split into instalments.  

"Crickley Hill 1969 – 1987 by Philip Dixon

Crickley Hill lies on the edge of the Cotswolds, with magnificent views over the valley of the Severn.  The excavations began by investigating an Iron Age hillfort, but soon a Neolithic causewayed camp was discovered, and later a Dark age stronghold.  This view shows the Neolithic entrance passage, looking west.

Twenty years is a long time to spend on a single excavation, particularly when the site is hillfort of modest size.  But the excavations at Crickley will soon enter their third decade, and seem likely to continue for some years yet.  The site has proved to be remarkably rewarding, with a long and complex history: furthermore, no ploughing has damaged the deposits, so even ephemeral traces of past activity can be picked up in the soil.

The project was begun in 1969 with limited aims.  We wanted to dig the entrance and part of the rampart of an Iron Age hillfort, and to dig a few trenches in the interior to try and assess when the fort was built, and whether it was built for permanent or temporary occupation.  The wider aims were unrealistic, given the small scale of work at first, but by the end of the third season in 1971, we had answered most of the questions with which we had started: by then two superimposed hillfort entrances had been explored, and a system of phasing arrived at – a phasing sequence still in use on the site. The Iron Age defences were dated by pottery and metalwork, and soon by radiocarbon, too, to the period c. 700 to 450 BC.  Within the banks, trial holes revealed occupation debris post holes, dense in places, of broadly the same two periods as the defences.

Our problems, however, were just beginning.  Towards the centre of the hill, well within the Iron Age defences, lay a much eroded bank.  Cuttings across this area revealed unmistakably Neolithic assemblages – flint tools and waste flakes in large numbers, and pottery akin to that from the Windmill Hill excavations. Below this earthwork layer completely separate Neolithic bank and ditch, and even at this early stage it was apparent that these two Neolithic banks had been subjected to a whole series of alterations and reconstructions.

The site was clearly sufficiently complex, and well enough preserved to warrant a more thorough examination than was possible in a series of individual cuttings.  So in 1972 we began a programme of stripping, in a regular grid pattern across the top of the hill.  Over the seasons since then we have excavated some 160 10 x 10 metre squares, an overall total of about 17,400 square metres.

At first we were concerned that our returns would diminish as we knew more about the site.  Theory, after all, suggests that a site may satisfactorily be investigated by a limited, often small sample. This has not been our experience at all. Almost every season has produced something new (and has required the modification of our interpretations of other formerly-believed aspects of the site).  Even minor details are proved to have an added significance when seen in the total context of our growing knowledge of Crickley.

Our earliest horizon is a causewayed-enclosure of two circuits of ditches, with at least nine entrances. In comparison with the majority of Neolithic interrupted ditch enclosures, that on Crickley is tiny, no more than two acres in size.  Its history is complicated:  the outer ring was built first; the larger, inner, ring was contemporary with the second phase of the outer ring.  Both were subsequently abandoned and restored on at least two occasions, and in flimsier phase of reoccupation the inner ring alone was rebuilt.  While the relative sequence is clear, the time-span of all this is still doubtful.  Almost all our Neolithic assemblages fit into a single phase of Neolithic material culture.  At the moment, we are proposing a date range from c. 3000 to c. 2600 hundred BC for these enclosures.

The final Neolithic enclosure, a single-ring affair with few causeways, was built after a period of abandonment.  Its narrow entrances, strong fences (and the plentiful evidence from leaf arrowheads and widespread burning) indicate that it was intended for protection, and fell only after a serious assault (see CA 76, May 1981). After the results from Hambledon and Carn Brea, Neolithic defences in Britain can no longer be denied.  Though this enclosure has occasionally been singled out as the “Neolithic Fort” at Crickley, in its layout of entrances, banks and fences, it is not at all unlike the earlier Crickley causewayed-enclosures: these too have now produced leaf arrowheads in significant contexts, and their double rings would clearly provide a defence in depth more effective even than the more obvious “fort ”.  On the whole, then, it seems likely that all these neolithic enclosures provided a protection – and a protection, probably for a settlement, for several phases of roads, fences and houses have been uncovered in the interior.

During the final phase of the Neolithic enclosure a small plateau at the western end of the hill had been segregated from the rest of the site by complex series of fences (see photo opposite). It was approached by a narrow footpath, blocked by two gates, and at the further side of the tiny courtyard stood a small rectangular building, with a hearth in the opening front of it, and with low cairns containing bones, flint and pottery at the extremities of the platform.  Apart from these deliberate deposits, the whole of the area was kept scrupulously clean.  The arrangements resemble those in the Danish Neolithic shrines of Tustrup and Herrup and the Crickley building is provisionally identified as the shrine of the last Neolithic settlement: it was burnt at the same time as the settlement itself.

Sometime now passed – long enough for the Neolithic ditches to silt to about one third of their depth.  The footpath leading to the former shrine was buried in a massive cairn of small rubble, and apparently marked out by upright posts.  On top of the shrine a circle of small stones set upright as a kerb surrounded a huge burning slab, seen opposite.  In its final form, with western circle, long mound and kerb-stones, and a marker or totem at its eastern end, the monument was as long as 100 m, and was isolated from the surrounding countryside by a small trench, cut into the infilled ditches of the Neolithic enclosure. We still do not know when this ritual use of the site came to an end.  Its beginning was probably in the late Neolithic or early Bronze Age; it is possible that it continued in use until shortly before the reoccupation of the site during the building of the Iron Age hillforts.

These early phases of the site are fascinating, but very ticklish to interpret.  The hillfort, in contrast may seem straightforward.  The area of the occupation was more than twice that of the earlier enclosure, and the defence is tall, and military-seeming, with narrow in-turned gatepassage and timber-laced ramparts.

The settlement inside was of two periods.  The first was the more unusual, for it contains several rows of rectangular buildings (see plan, p. 75). These have a very early date, possibly in the 7th century BC, and they remain virtually unique in hillforts in Britain. There was also a series of clusters of small square buildings from which have come thousands of charred grains of cereal.  After a period of occupation only modest length, the fort and its buildings were destroyed by fire.

They were then reconstructed in a completely new arrangement.  The houses were by now the more usual roundhouses, with a particularly large one just inside the entrance (for the chief?).  There will also some 4-post granaries, and the defences were massively improved.  Work on them was still continuing, and an outer ring of vallation had only just been begun, when the fort was once again destroyed by a fire which consumed the roundhouses and granaries, and involved all the timber work in the new defences.  The date of this, the final destruction of the hillfort, seems to have been in the fifth century BC.

At the moment we have no clear evidence of any further occupation of the site for nearly a thousand years.  A change of use, however, came at the end of the Roman period.  At the end of the fourth or in the fifth century AD two separate settlements were built on top of the ruined hillfort about 200 m apart. One was sited close behind the collapsed Iron Age ramparts, and consisted of rows of small slightly sunken huts.  When we first explored them, we thought they were going to be platforms of Iron Age round huts, but they were dated by late Roman material (including a military belt buckle) and grass tempered wares.

Two hundred metres to the west, on the very tip of the promontory was another settlement, enclosed by a strong fence, and entered through a wide gate with a guard house.  It contained a series of buildings, including a granary and at least one substantial framed house.  This too was dated by late Roman material and grass tempered wares.

However there were considerable differences between them in layout and cleanliness; all the finds came from the rather dirty settlement behind the rampart, which we are thus identifying as a peasant village. The settlement on the end of the promontory was much cleaner (fewer fines), and we are thus identifying it as an enclosed high status site.  Both presumably belonged to a sub-Roman British group, perhaps even the descendants of the occupants of one or other of the nearby Roman country houses.  These settlements in common with almost all Crickley’s occupations over three millennia, seemed to have ended through an act of war, perhaps in the late fifth or sixth century.

The destruction of the Dark Age sites at present seems to have been the end of serious occupation on our hill.  In the Middle Ages the top was used by grazing animals, and fragmentary hut on the side of the hillslope may have belonged to a shepherd.  When the agricultural improvements of the 19^th century came to the Cotswolds, Crickley was remote from the areas of arable farming around the villages, and so escaped that destruction by the plough that was so widespread in the region.  Until the start of our excavations it remained little visited, a place where (in Ivor Gurney’s poem about the hill)

The orchis, trefoil, harebells nod all day, /High over Gloucester and the Severn Plain."

Savage 1988 5: The Last Neolithic Fortress

My thanks to Richard Savage and the Crickley Hill Trust for permission to reproduce abstracts from Richard's 1988 booklet: here the Neolithic section as an Easter treat. Note the chilling last sentence.

A defended Neolithic village c.  2500 BC  

About 2500 BC the last Neolithic defence at Crickley was built following the line of the inner causewayed enclosure to the east but extending the defended area by 40 m to the west, to include the flat shelf above the tip of the promontory.  The new ditch was continuous, except where broad causeways gave three entrances -- north-east, south-east, and west - and provided the stone for a low wall, at most a metre high, carefully built with the internal walls packed with rubble in a cellular structure.  At the rear of the wall stood a wooden palisade.

The new ditch was built outside the ditch of the old inner enclosure on the east, following its line and so close to it that the quarriers of the new ditch twice broke through into the old one.  Each time, they re-sealed the gap with a miniature wall of stone, as though they were anxious not to release some force or entity believed to lurk in the old pits -- which they felt about strongly enough to undertake the tremendous labour of making a wholly new ditch in the living rock, instead of clearing the old one and re-using it and its stone.  The new wall in this sector was built over the old, filled pits.  Apparently their influence could be confined, and would not weaken it.

[Illustration: Bowman. C. Clark]

This new defence, and the settlement it protected, had much in common with its predecessors.  It east an entrances coincided with those of the causewayed enclosures, and the southeastern one gave access to a fenced road along which were aligned at least to two rectangular wooden houses.  60 m inside the entrance, the road turned north to the settlement on the high point of the hill which is marked by dense clusters of pottery, flint, post holes, stakeholes, and a flint-working area, to which the north-west entrances also gave access.  But where it turned north, a gate now controlled access to a narrow path continuing along the road's original westward axis but leading only towards a fenced area with no other entry, on the shelf above the tip of the promontory. 

[Illustration: Conjectural reconstruction of the last Neolithic fortress. The positions of the central houses are not yet known. R. Morgan]

On this shelf stood the  settlement's shrine, the entrance to its precinct guarded by diminutive upright stone and a wooden gateway or arch.  Although the stone is in the middle of the path, and only a few centimetres high, the wear of the cobbling shows that all the traffic passed to the south of it.  The rituals of the shrine involved fire, the burning of bone, perhaps in animal sacrifices, and apparently the gathering of pottery, flint, bone and antler in special places away from the centre of the precinct but overlapping its edges.

[Illustration: The shrine. C. Clark]

The position of the shrine is remarkable.  It is hidden from watchers on the main body of the promontory to the east by the swell of the highest point, unless they are placed exactly in the line of the natural hollows leading to it, while had overlooked a panorama of the Severn Vale and will have been visible from great distances to the north, south and west.

Access to the tip of the promontory and the path down to the Vale by this route was specifically denied, and a traveller entering the settlement from the south-east could only gain it by turning north outside the shrine, passing through the central settlement area and going out through the north-west entrance, from which the shrine was isolated by its fence.

This last Neolithic settlement ended in violence.  It was burnt - houses, gateways and all -  after an attack by bowmen whose flint arrowheads hungrily crowd the palisades and entrances.  Four hundred have been found at Crickley so far; they are the remnants are one of the first known battlefields.  To judge from examples preserved at waterlogged sites, the bows were large and powerful, not very different from the longbows of Crecy and Agincourt.  Flint arrowheads penetrate flesh better than steel ones, and are more likely to break off in the wound.

[Photographs and plan: Neolithic flint arrowheads (length 40, and 40mm), and their find-places in a 100m length of the neolithic defences]

The fabled Neolithic Causeway ...

I was so delighted to receive this photograph from Andrew Powell the other day: it shows a real Neolithic causeway, with its ditches either side.  Consultation with Professor Dixon tells me that this was Cutting K1 and L1 in 1974 (but which was also excavated in 1975).  My delight stemmed from the fact that, whilst I personally dug at Crickley between 1976 and 1983, and dug one or two Neolithic areas, most of my work happened to be in the Iron Age parts of the site and I've never seen, odd as it may seem, a photograph of the Neolithic ditches or indeed a causeway of the eponymous enclosures.  But now I have: and I'm very happy.  Aren't I easily pleased?

Savage 1988, 4: The First Farmers

My thanks to Richard Savage and the Crickley Hill Trust for permission to reproduce these abstracts from his 1988 booklet.  

"Neolithic Villagers c. 4000 to 2500 BC 

The first farming communities, "Neolithic" or "new Stone Age", whose cutting tools were stone and flint, reached Britain from the continent in the centuries about 4000 BC, bringing with them forerunners of plants and animals whose management still supports us now: wheat, barley, cattle, sheep, and pigs.  They also brought the manufacture of pottery, from this time the archaeologists most consistent guide to cultural change and affinity.  They represented a way of life, with origins in the Near East six millennia earlier or more, which totally changed man's relationship with his environment. 

A hunter-gatherer community will probably move with the seasons as its resources change, and over-exploits them at its peril.  Its numbers must always be small.  A farming community on the other hand must be static in the medium term to protect its growing crops and granaries, and well stored grain will remain in good condition for long enough to feed it through the year.  Domestic animals efficiently convert grass, foliage and other rough vegetable matter to human use.  In the longer term, while there is new land to farm, ill-management or even an increase in population can be tolerated. 

The methods of these first farmers, which were efficient, will have been at their most effective of the light well-drained soils, either of the uplands - as at Crickley - or of the parts of the valleys lying on sand or gravel.  In Britain they enjoyed for many centuries a climate warmer and drier than our own. 

[Illustration: Neolithic Axe E. J. P. Wilczynska]

 The earliest farmers left their traces in two parts of Crickley Hill.  On the shelf above the tip of the promontory to the west, they built at least four small insubstantial huts, from 2 m x 1m to 3 m x 2 m in size, with no finds or hearths associated with them at all.  It is possible that they were shelters for hunters or herdsman, but they may even have served a ritual purpose, perhaps as spirit houses or something similar.  Near the highest point of the hill, and overlooking the Vale, they left a series of pits in a long oval surrounding a space about 10 m by 4 m which had probably carried a small mound. The mound was removed and the pits filled in.  This structure, too, may have served some ritual purpose.

 About 3500 BC an area of about four acres at the highest point of the hill was enclosed with a bank built of stone quarried with antler picks from a line of shallow pits immediately outside it.  Along the inside edge of the bank was a wooden palisade, but the bank was less than half a metre high and palisade less than 2 m, so that the physical barrier was not very formidable.  It would have served at best to protect the defenders of the enclosures against arrows and other missile weapons, and to force attackers to break step at the ditch.  It may also have provided a moral or psychological boundary. 

[Illustration: The Neolithic ditch was quarried with antler picks R. Bryant] 

It seems likely - not yet quite certain - that this enclosure defended a settlement on the highest part of the hill, for the Neolithic finds of flint and pottery are most due densely clustered there.  A second bank and palisade, quarried from deeper ditches, was later added about 30 m inside it, to defend the same central area.  The original outer defence had at least five entrances, three to the east to the west where the tip of the promontory runs down to the Vale, and four of these were now matched by entrances through the inner defences.  Post holes suggest that all the entrances had wooden gates, and in through the southeastern entrants led a straight, fenced roadway with at least one rectangular wooden house beside it.  This was at the edge of the settlement, in the natural hollows some 50 m from the dense finds scatter which marks the centre of Neolithic occupation.  We can recognize this as a house because it stands in bedrock eroded to small particles in which large post holes were easily dug, and preserved by silt washing down into the hollow.  The bedrock at the centre of occupation is stone, and the soil deposits are very thin; the shapes of individual houses are here much harder to make out. 

[Illustration: Conjectural reconstruction of the first Neolithic village. The positions of the central houses are not yet known. C. Clark] 

The inner and outer defences were demolished, with deliberate burning, and their stone was used to refill the quarry pits.  The stone was later in part extracted and the banks were rebuilt.  This process was repeated a number of times, and finds of arrowheads suggest that several times the defences were attacked by bowmen.  The sequence of methodical destruction and rebuilding is hard to account for on strictly practical grounds, though it is common among sites of this kind, the "causewayed" or "interrupted-ditch" enclosures, of which over 40 are known in the Neolithic of south Britain.  It may have had a religious purpose.  We are dealing with people who invested in ritual structures and effort comparable with that which the Iron Age was to spend on fortifications, and were unlikely to have seen them as less practical.  For them the symbol and ritual provided indispensable indispensable part of the mechanism of everyday reality.  But there is no reason to believe that the arrow-attacks at Crickley were anything but serious and effective. 

[Illustration: Flint brought from 50km away was worked on the hill. P. Saxby]

 A kilometre to the north of Crickley Hill (on private ground) stands the Crippets long barrow.  It is the nearest of these Neolithic burial mounds, and although no certain evidence links it to the Crickley community, we may wonder whether some of their dead lie beneath it.  It is placed near the edge of the scarp and would be visible from the Vale for many miles, but for a modern planting of trees.  A kilometre to the south, at the Peak, Birdlip, trial excavation has shown another causewayed enclosure, and there are at least two scatters of Neolithic flint near the scarp edge between Crickley and Birdlip.  It is likely that Crickley forms part of a well-developed Neolithic landscape, whose long-distance trading links are made clear by its abundance of good flint, imported from no nearer than 50 km away to the east and southeast, and by its finds of polished stone axe-heads from much further afield. 

Before 2500 BC the site was abandoned.  The pits of the outer defence had been refilled, and not re-dug, sometime before; now the inner one, too, was left filled, and silted up.

 [Photograph: The Crippets long barrow. This stands on private ground]"

Prehistoric flint, pottery and bronze objects with contemporary structures

(Click on the image to enlarge)

My thanks to Philip Dixon and the Crickley Hill Trust for permission to reproduce this figure and extract from "Crickley Hill and Gloucestershire Prehistory", 1977:  

"The first metals, copper and copper alloys, appeared in Britain about 2000 BC, apparently associated with the immigrant users of "Beakers", characteristically-shaped decorated vessels of fine pottery.  Iron came into common use in Britain much later, during the seventh and sixth centuries BC, and the sophisticated bronze-smiths and founders of the Late Bronze Age were re-placed as the providers of tools and weapons by blacksmiths.

After the abandonment of the Neolithic site Crickley seems to have lain deserted for over a thousand years.  The few fragments of Beaker pottery have been recognized in the excavations, and flint arrowheads of the same period suggest that the hilltop was then being used for little more than hunting.  The change came with the arrival of the hillfort builders."

Article from Gloucestershire and Avon Life July 1983

The following article, written by Richard Savage, was published in the now defunct "Gloucestershire and Avon Life" in July 1983.

" Fifteenth season at Crickley Hill.  Richard Savage issues an invitation to one and all to visit the Country Park that is the focal point of one of the region's most intriguing long-term archaeological digs.

On July 15 volunteers from all over the world will begin the 15th season of archaeological excavation at Crickley Hill, 4 miles south of Cheltenham.

The site is now a Country Park, a promontory of the Cotswolds Scarp with breathtaking views over the Severn Vale and into Wales.  Its prehistoric settlements are clearly marked, access and parking are easy, and visitors to the excavation of welcome during the hours of work 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily, including Saturdays and Sundays, but not Thursdays.  Ask at the finds hut if you would like a guided tour.

The season runs until August 25, and visitors are particularly welcome on the open days, Saturday and Sunday, August 13 and 14, when extra attractions are provided. The trust's splendid new mobile exhibition coach will be there at weekends.

As before the team of volunteers will be led by Dr Philip Dixon of the University of Nottingham. All are unpaid - in fact most pay for their own food - and while their ages range from 14 to 70, the majority are between 16 and 25.  More than 2000 have now worked at the site, the archaeological importance of which has attracted them from most of the countries in the Western World, and several from the Eastern bloc was well.  

Since 1976 their work has been sponsored and organised by the Crickley Hill Trust, an educational charity which must find the difference between volunteers' contributions and the true cost of the excavations.  The trust believes that the project offers an invaluable experience of physically and intellectually demanding teamwork, with important scientific results.

The first 14 years of work has shown an extraordinary series of settlements on the site, with great deal of Gloucestershire's past represented there.  Its earliest occupants were neolithic (New Stone Age) farmers, about 3500 BC, using only stone and flint tools.  They built rectangular timber houses on the hill in an enclosure defended by stone walls and ditches.

Their successors - about 2000 BC - were protected by a far stronger and better planned defences, but these did not avail them: they were attacked by bowmen, whose flint arrowheads are found concentrated along the walls and in the entrance, giving a dramatic picture of a New Stone Age battle which is at present unique.  The attackers were victorious, and the walls were destroyed.

After their destruction, a long earthen mound was built, incorporating at regular intervals flat slabs of stone, some of which cover deposits - presumably sacrificial - of butchered meat.  The Long Mound seems to have been used as a source of processional way, perhaps religious.

There are only hints of human activity on the hill from then until the beginning of the Iron Age, when, about 600 BC, a substantial village of long timber houses was built and defended by majestic stone wall and ditch.  This, too, was destroyed after a battle, and replaced by a village of round houses, with defences rebuilt and strengthened.  In its turn, this was destroyed and abandoned about 500 BC.  Even in periods not notable for their tranquillity, Crickley Hill seems to have had more than its fair share of violence.

Until 1982, the destruction of this second Iron Age village seemed to mark the end of permanent occupation on the hill.  But last year excavation just inside the Iron Age wall at its southern end showed that a small village, probably of earth houses, had huddled there after the end of the Roman occupation of Britain.  It is one of the windiest and least sheltered parts of the hill, and there must have been a compelling reason for the villagers to avoid more comfortable areas. Perhaps they chose to place least visible from the Vale, at a time of lawlessness and hunger when a few hovels or even a wisp of smoke might have invited attack.

In the coming season Dr Dixon and his team intend to examine this post-Roman settlement further, to establish its date and nature.  They will also investigate the Long Mound, in the hope of finding out more about the date and purpose of this odd structure, at the point where it crosses the ditch and bank of the first New Stone Age enclosure.

With the help of sponsors, the trust has fitted out the mobile exhibition to make the results of the work easily available to schools and the public.  In scale models, photographs, drawings and finds from the site, the exhibition shows the successive occupations on the hill and the archaeological methods used to examine them.  It has proved very popular at schools, and is a big attraction at charity fairs, fêtes and similar events.  If you would like it to visit you, contact the author, Richard Savage, at Jarolen House, Old Rectory Close, Walkley Hill, Stroud, GL53 3TY."  

(The captions to the photographs read as follows: (Top) drystone walling two 2,500 years old dominates this picture of volunteers at work on the Iron Age defences of Crickley Hill; (above) new this season is a well equipped mobile exhibition aimed at spreading word of the project far and wide.)"

Alas, I fear that the yellow bus went to meet its maker long since, so cannot come to your fête ... 

Fourth Report 1972, part II : the Neolithic Enclosures

Thanks again to PWD for permission to post these extracts from his 1972 Fourth Report - click on the images to enlarge:

"The Neolithic Enclosures (Figures 2 – 4)

Two cuttings, CIII and CIV, were placed adjacent to the areas excavated in 1971; they confirmed the phasing established in 1971.

The two period bank identified in CII (Dixon, 1971) continued across cutting CIII (see figure 2).  In its latest phase, now called 1d, the bank was surmounted by a fence, the burnt traces of which were visible without a break as far as the north section of CIII. both phases of bank contained quantities of Neolithic pottery and worked flint, of types comparable to those found in 1971.

In the flat area behind the bank two hearths were uncovered.  These, and another in CII, are perhaps to be associated with post holes which may have supported screens, for no enclosed structures here can yet be identified.  At the southwest corner of CIII a pit contained only heavily burnt slabs similar to those of the hearths, which resemble in their construction the hearths, possibly of Period 3, found near the roundhouse and the hearth in CIV.  The design, however, is rudimentary, and in the absence of dating evidence any period ascription would be unwise. It is thus still unclear whether any of the structures behind the banks can be attributed to a Neolithic occupation.

The Period 1d ditch in CI continued without interruption across CIV (Ditch 304/603).  Some 45 m of this ditch have now been examined; the material from it and its bank is Neolithic throughout, including a fragment of a polished stone axe, but there is by now some doubt that it is in fact segmental, and the description "causewayed enclosure" seemed inappropriate for phase 1d.  Below the 1d bank ditch 853 (of Period 1b) formed a further section of ditch segment 384; at the northern side of the cutting the 1d bank has not yet been removed, and may conceal a causeway, but it is still possible that 853/384 is the same ditch segment as Ditch 319 which was exposed in cutting CI; thus the causeways uncovered in 1971 remain the only causeways across the two inner ditches.  From the primary silt of 853 came two decorated sherds kindly identified by Mr Humphrey Case as similar to material from the causewayed enclosure at Abingdon.

Towards the eastern end of CIV two segments of the ditch line (ditches 612 and 699) continued the outer ring of ditches excavated in 1971.  The broad causeway between 612 and 699 was matched by gap in the bank on their west sides. Through Across this area ran a structural weakness in the hill (a "gull"), filled with eroded limestone which had the consistency of concreted sand.  Unlike the normal oolite laminae elsewhere on the site, the material in the gull retained the impressions of stake holes, but the interpretation of the structures represented here and in the corresponding part of CIII was complicated not only by the continuing leaching of limestone into the gull but also by the activity of tree roots and rabbits which had taken advantage of the softer rock.  At least two phases were distinguishable (see figure 4).  The latest consisted of a hearth (628) set in a hard-trodden floor (629) of gull material mixed with earth and charcoal dust.  To the south and east the floor merged into a layer of clean yellow dissolved limestone; to the north it had been eroded by activity in the gull.  As a consequence it could not be established which postholes within the gull had been sealed by the floor.

Postholes 879, 615, and 880 can be associated with the hearth and floor, and a further small posthole between 615 and 880 was only doubtfully sealed;  within the gull postholes 640 and 621 resembled the former postholes in size; to this group posthole 860 seems an obvious addition, but this was larger and shallower than the others, similar in fact to postholes 861 and 858; posthole 858 predated 640 and it is possible 861 and 858 were earlier postholes in the group, replaced during a renewal of the structure by the adjacent postholes 640 and 621.  In either case the resultant plan would be a small boat-shaped house with a slightly eccentric hearth.  Daub was found in a hollow, 877, and some of the stake holes may have supported wattled screen wall.

Floor 629 merged eastwards into clean material ultimately derived from the gull.  This stratum overlay the edge of ditch 699, and a laid stone platform, 622, perhaps paving outside the house, similarly overlay the edge of bank 697 but neither ditch nor bank can confidently be placed in the overall phasing of the site; the absence of the causeway in 1d ditch 304/603 to the west perhaps would make otiose a gap here in the outer ring unless the latter pre-dates Period 1d, and ascription of the outer ring to 1b, or even as a single ring to the so far unenclosed period 1a and 1c, may be strengthened by consideration of the extreme erosion of the outer bank, which survived to a height of only 10 cm.  But with no general agreement about the function of causewayed enclosures the argument is weak.  The house itself could well belong to the hillfort occupation, and may be compared with the structures to the south of House 4, and perhaps should be associated with occupation debris, including a shard from a pot with a rounded shoulder decorated with finger tipping, in the upper levels of ditch 699.

Seal below floor 629 two large post holes, 878 and the complex around 884 and 879, can be linked with the ditches.  They sit midway between the bank terminals and were substantial enough to serve as supports for double or triple posts of a small gate; to the north postholes 894, 895 and 898 would then form a fence, but no corresponding postholes were found to the south, beyond the line of the gull.

The group of postholes cut pass into the sides of ditch 603 and part into the infill certainly belonged to the hillfort occupation of the site.  No posthole was found as a pair to posthole 654 but it should have lain entirely within the ditch and could easily have been overlooked in the rubble infill.  Spacing of posts exactly corresponded with that of the Period 2 longhouses and the house and its hearth, centrally placed at the top of the ditch infill, should be attributed to Period 2.  Beyond the crest of the bank in CIII four postholes of similar size and spacing to those of House 7 cut through the 1d bank, and perhaps formed a slightly trapezoidal structure of Period 2.  Immediately to the east of House 7 lay a palisade trench (617) from which the only find was an intact Neolithic arrowhead.  It lay parallel to the Period 1d ditch; equally, therefore, it aligned with the Period 2 house, and its date is uncertain.  A similar slot (682) to the east of ditch 612 belonged to the phase of the outer ditches.

Thus the inner bank excavations, in addition to producing problems about the interpretation of the Neolithic enclosures, have shown that the longhouse settlement, and perhaps the Period 3 settlement, continued at least 130 m within the rampart on the line of the hillfort entrance."

And Merry Christmas too from Squadron Leader Wingham

This is, alas, the last shot I have of Crickley taken by Harold Wingham and thanks to English Heritage National Monuments Record for the permission to reproduce it on the blog.  You can find the others by clicking on the "Wingham Collection" label either on the left hand side of the blog or at the bottom of this post. Ditches, ramparts, causewayed enclosures, quarry pits, ramparts and the Long Mound, all beautifully visible.

I must hop off and bake some bread and make a raspberry, blueberry and mango clafoutis to take to the friends I'm going to later for lunch (just in case the Christmas pudding isn't enough, and anyone's still feeling peckish you understand!).  While I'm slaving over the ovens, there's a rather natty feature in the Blogger software that lets you write a post and then schedule its release at a given time, so I've prepared a few Christmas treats which will automatically post themselves on the blog during the course of the day.  A very Merry Christmas to all my readers. 

The Fourth Report 1972:

By kind permission of PWD, extracts from the 1972 report. Figure 1 above shows the area excavated during the 1972 season. An aerial photograph taken during the season I posted earlier here:

"Summary

In the fourth year of excavations the area behind the hillfort entrance was stripped.  Here were found traces of six long aisled houses, arranged either side of the road from the entrance and associated with the first defences.  During the second period of fortification a large roundhouse was built in the same area.  Cuttings across the inner bank exposed more of the Neolithic enclosure, and showed that this part of the site was also occupied during the period of the hillfort.  Evidence from the pottery found so far suggests that the site was abandoned before the fifth century BC.

The work was again made possible by the generous support of the Gloucestershire College of Art and Design, in Cheltenham, and we are thanks to the owner of the land, County Councillor Tom Morris, for permitting us to excavate.  Muir-Hill Ltd, of Gloucester, lessees of the quarry, kindly allowed us access through it to the fort, and were most helpful to us.

We are most grateful to the County Valuer's Department of the Gloucestershire County Council for permitting us to live in the County Training Centre, Ullenwood, during the excavation, and to Mr and Mrs Marcinkiewicz for their constant kindness to us during our stay there.  We would like to take this opportunity of expressing our gratitude to the local and other firms who have helped us in various ways, including Chelhire Limited, its proprietor Mr E E Jasper, and Mr John Kear, whose special skill as a JCB operator has relieved that of many worries.  Bowring's of Cheltenham, printers of the text of this and other papers issued by us; Holton Studios in their careful preparation of the litho plates and illustrations; Fred Stephens Ltd; J. Jones and Son; Sharp and Fisher (Builders Merchants) Ltd; Central Motors, Gloucester; A.C. Hands Ltd; G. A. Willetts Ltd; Swanbrook Transport. All these have made our work considerably easier.

The success of the excavation depends on volunteers and adequate financing.  We should be most grateful to any contributions to supplement the generous help from the Gloucestershire College of Art and Design.  Any donations should be made out to the Crickley Hill Excavation Fund, and sent to the Secretary of the excavations, Mr R D A Savage, Gloucestershire College of Art and Design, Pittville, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL52 3JG, from whom further copies of these notes, and copies of the note on previous seasons, may be obtained (1969, 15p 1970 and 1971, 25p all plus 5p for postage etc).  Persons interested in taking part in future seasons of excavation in this series should get in touch with Mr Savage at the address given (telephone Cheltenham 32501).

Crickley Hill

Fourth Report 1972

The fourth season of excavations at Crickley Hill took place between the 30th June and 13th August, 1972.  During this period work was carried on by an average of 80 volunteers a week, and I am most grateful for their efforts both to them and to my site supervisors, Clive Anderson, Simon Bruton, Terry Courtney, Janet Dixon, Chris Gingell, Mike Hall, and Alice Pandrich, whose initials appear on the drawings for which they were responsible.

The Site

Crickley Hill is a spur of the Cotswold escarpment, about 4 miles south of Cheltenham and a mile to the north of Birdlip.  The flat-topped hill is bounded on two sides by cliff edges, and forms a roughly triangular area, whose third side is cut off by a rampart about 300 m long.  The excavations of 1969 on the area of the entrance through this rampart revealed four main periods of occupation: the rampart itself belonged to the second and third of these periods, and was accordingly identified as a Period 2 and Period 3, the latter subdivided because of reconstruction into Period 3a and Period 3b.  Period 4 described intermittent occupation until modern times after the abandonment of the hillfort as a fortification; structures below the first rampart were ascribed to Period 1.  The investigations of 1971 in the eroded bank about 120 m within the rampart compelled the formulation of a separate division into periods of both this area and the interior of the hillfort.  One result of the 1972 season has been to allow correlation of the periods across the site, and in the following account a revised system is adopted.

Phasing of the Site (1972)

Neolithic          

1a        Occupation, revealed by post holes, before the building of the first Neolithic bank

1b        The first enclosure (ditches 309, 311, 319 and 853 = 384)

1c        Occupation, revealed by post holes and a fragment of walling in the filled in Period 1b ditches.

1d        The second enclosure (ditch 304/603).

1e        Occupation, revealed by post holes below the first hillfort rampart.  This period may be identical with any of the preceding periods or maybe a separate occupation between the end of the second enclosure and the founding of the hillfort.

Hillfort

2          The first rampart, built with timbers lacing together the drystone walling, and an inturned entrance passage defended by two gates.

3a        After destruction by fire, the entrance was repaired and the front of the rampart rebuilt.

3b        The entrance was reconstructed to produce a much more formidable defence.

4          And the fort was again burnt, and abandoned; subsequent occupation involved no significant building.

...  this scheme is only interim, and may well be complicated by further digging."

There was a little bit more digging to be done... but only more than twenty seasons' worth...

To be continued/