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Semple, S. J. and Williams, H. W. (2001) 'Excavation on Roundway Down.', Wiltshire archaeological andnatural history magazine., 94 . pp. 236-239.

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236 THE WILTSHlRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL Al'-o'O NATURAL HISTORY MAGAZINE

Excavation on Roundway Downby Sarah Semple' and Howard Williams2

10 1840 a barrow on Roundway Down was openedrevealing a female inhumation in an iron bound coffinor chest, accompanied by a cabochon garnet and goldnecklace, a composite gold pin-suitc and a woodenbucket with bronze: mounts (Hughes 1843, 12f;Jackson 1851. 176-7; Mc:rc:wcthcr 1851.47-8;Akerman 1855, 1-2; Robinson 1977/8.191-5). TheRoundway burial is representativc ofa distinct groupof high-status female barrow burials. ascribed a late7th century context based on the stylistic dates givento the surviving artefacrual assemblages from theRoundway burial and the remarkable femaleinhumation from Swallowcliffe Down (Meaney andHawkes 1970.47-9; Speake 1989).

-Fig. 1. Loc~rioD ofRoUDdway Down b.urow opened jn J 840

The Roundway Project was devt'Joped as a meansofdrawing together all known evidence regarding theAnglo-Saxon burial and its loe.tion. In September2000 a programme of geophysical survey andexcavation was directed by the authors in thepresumed ana of the barrow opened in 1840 by LordColston and Stoughton Money. The reloeation and~cavationof the site was seen as a viral componentin a reconsideration of the chronology and social

significance of the phenomenon offemale high starusbarrow burial.

The project succeeded in locating the site and thus~turning the nationally significant grave assemblageto hs original funerary and landscape context.Furthermore, the project may have reunited theremarkable grave assemblage (housed at DevizesMuseum) with the skeletal remains they onceaccompanied.

A full publication ofme results including a detailedphasing, the result of radiocarbon analysis andspecialist repom is currently in progress.This purposeof Utis note is (0 draw attention to the ~cent workand briefly outline the results of the survey andexcavation.

LOCATION

The location of the barrow opened in 1840 wassuggcsted by Leslie GrinselJ as the denuded moundmarked on the OS 1:25,000 (SU 0059 6476). Thisidentification was later confirmed by Robinson in hisdetailed account of the Roundway burial andassemblage (1977/8, 193). Aerial photographs of thearea show an upstanding barrow during the 1940sand the National Monument Record in 1960dcsaibc. heaviJyplough damaged harrow 0.4Om highwith quantitics of Bronze Age ponery eroding fromthe eastern side. The romulus is marked on the mostrecent edition of the 1:25,000 as, but can no longerbe distinguished in the field. The barrow occupied ahigh position on the chalk downland (205m 00)500mWSW ofthe hiJ1fon ofOtivcr'. Castle and 1.71anNW of the village of Roundway (Figure 1).

METHODOLOGY ANDRESULTS

Geophysical survey was undertaken on behalf of theproject by Dr. Mike Hamilton (Univenity ofWalcs,Newpon). A grad.iometCf survey was undcnaken OYer

a 100m sq. area and a resistivity survey used provide

111lc Queen'. Collqc, Oxford, OX1 4AW I SdwoI of ArchacolocY,Trinity Collqt, CtrrnaTtben

NOTES AND SHORTER CONTRlBlTI10NS

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a more detailed image of the barrow over I 40 m sq.area. This revealed I double ring-ditcbed roundbarrow with a maximum diameter of 14m and acentral negative feature approximately 2 JC. 2m square.A 100m sq. arc. was field-walked on. 20m sq. grid

and a 40m sq. area encompassing the full monumentwas meta1~etected in advance of machine excavatiOD_FieldwaUcing identified a concenttation ofprehistoricpottery and flint, and Roman material was alsopresent. A sample 2m sq. test pit demoDStrated plough

238 THE '\lru..TSHJRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND NATIJRAL HISTORY MAGAZINE

damage to the depth of the natural chalk..Subsequently, a 20 x 30m area was machine strippedrevealing the ~stem half of the monument (Figure2). The trench was then extended by hand over thecentral fearure) and a 6 x 1.5m slot dug to sample thering-ditches in the south-castern portion of themonument and to investigate an anomaly Doted onthe gradiometer survey. A 2 x 4m area was opened atthe eastern comer of the trench to expose a poniODof the linear feature identified on both the gradiometerand resistivity surveys.

The excavations demonstrated a complexsequence of events between the early Bronze Age andthe Early Medieval period. Initial analysis indicatesthe primary monument comprised a segmented ring­ditch (6] with a minimum oCtwa causeways, c. 8m indiameter, encompassing a mound raised over a centralgrave. It has not as yet been otablished whether thesquare burial chamber ([21 J c. 2 x 2 x 2m) representsthe original Bronze-Age chamber or an enlargementin the Early Medieval period. It can however be arguedthat a central burial of Bronze Age date was removedor destroyed in the Early Medieval period. Thechamber backfill included Bronze Age pottery,cremated bone and a polished flint disc, materialsuggestive of a primary central burial, possibly ofBeaker date. Conremporary with the creation of themonument and cenual burial, an adult (burial 2) wasplaced in a crouched position on the chalk floor ofthe nonh-west terminal of the inner ditch (6] andcovered with chalk (62). A series of tiny shale beadswere found in the neck and wrist region of burial 2.

The stratigraphic sequence indicates that a secondouter ditch [5] was constructed at a latcr stage afterconsiderable erosion and filling of the inner ring-dirch.A crouched juvenile burial (burial 1) was recoveredfrom the upper fill (19) afthe south-west terminal ofthe inner ring-ditch [6J. The burial was made after aconsiderable: length of time had elapsed since theconstruction of the primary monument butsubsequent to the cutting of the outer ditch. Theskeleton was tightly flexed and placed on its back.

Two secondary cremations were located to the westof the monument. Cremation 1 {7] was insened mtothe outer ditch and was heavily ttuncated by ploughing.Cremation 2 [9] was insened into the nonh-westterminal of the inner ditch. Both cremations were un­urned and unaccompantcd by artefactS. These may becontemporary with (36] a sub-rectangular pitimmediately outside the outer ring-ditcb to the south­west..The pit was filled with a mass ofcremated remains,including animal and human bone and three largeportions of charcoal. The feature was capped with a

layer of tigbuy pacl<ed burned cbalk (37). 1llis featuremay reprnmt the sweepings from a cremation pyre,or perhaps several cremation events, deliberatelyburied as part of the post-eremation rites.

During the Early Medieval period, the barrowwas used again. A considerable portion of the moundwas opened revealing the central prehistoric grave.At this point the chamber (21] was eitherconstructed, d~troyinga Bronze Age central burial,or was discovered and entirely emptied and thefemale high-stuus burial insened (orieoted ean­west). In either case, some anentian was clearlypaid to the position oCthe earlier grave.The contentsof the prehistoric burial were removed and at leastpartially broken up, a residue thrown in with thegrave backfill. This practice of re-using not onJy amound, but also burial chambers finds a closecomparison with the SwaJlowcliffe Down femalesecondary barrow burial, of 7th-century date(Speake 1989). Although an extensive area to thewest of the barrow was stripped, there was noindication of fW'ther Early Medieval graves in theenvirons, suggesting the barrow may have been re­used exclusively by this single, central grave. ratherthan acting IS a focus for a communal cemetery.

Excavation of the central chamber indicated thegrave h.ad been broken open twice in recent times.The first was the documented excavation in 1840(108). Subsequently, an undocwnented intrusion badhalted abrupuy when it was clear the chamber badalready been emptied [83]. A collection ofdisarticulated hwnan bone, including parts of8 pelvisand skull, upper and lower ann bones, upper andlower leg bones, vertebrae and collarbone, wererecovered from rhe 1840 hacldill (82, 99) and fromthe later disturbance (20). These may represent theprimary burial (Bronze Age), the secondary (EarlyMedieval) burial, or a combination of both. AMSdates are currently awaited. A small portion of theEarly Medieval grave fill survived (100) from whichsmall fragments of human bone and ponery wererecovered through sieving.

WIDER IMPUCATIONS

The Roundway female burial is a site of nationalsignificance. It represents one of. distinct group ofhigh-status female barrow burials dated to the late7m centw"y, based largely on the srylistic amibutesof the andacrual assemblage (Meaney and Hawkes1970,47-9). Other eumples from Wiltshire includethe SwaUowclilIe Down female hurial and a number

NOTES AND SHOInCR CONTR.IBtrl10NS

of burials from Derbyshire, including Galley Lowand White Low (Ozanne 1962-6). Accounts of the19" cmrury investigations at Roundway arc fraughtwith ambiguities and contradictions and until noweven the location of me barrow opentd in 1840 wasunctrtain. The proj«t has lucceeded in relocatingthis important site and has returned the graveassemblage to iu original funerary and landscapecontext, demonstrating the Roundway female burialwas a secondary burial ~usingan ancient monument.The project has also potentially reunited the anefactswith the skeletal remains. Osteological studies willcontribute to our understanding of the buriedindividual and most importantly, the use of theasscmblag-c as an intcgraJ component ofme argummtfor presenting a 7tb-eenrury date range for femalehigh-status barrow burial can DOW be testedscientifically. The dating of the recovered bone willhave national implications for our understanding ofthe social and political makeup of the 7th and 8th

centuries and for widening our understanding of thesymbolic use of ancient monuments for high-starosmortuary purposes.

ACKNOWUDGEMENTSThe Project was generously supponcd by grants fromthe Research Fund of the School of Archaeology,Trinity College, Carmarthen; The Comminee forArchaeo)ogy, Oxford University; The MeyersteinAwards, Oxford Univcnity and The Eric fletcherFund, Society for Medieval Arcbaeology. Our thanks10 to Mr. J. Butler and Carter Jonas Associates forpermission to undertake the acavarioD and to Dr.Paul Robinson for first suggesting the project and forhis continutd interest and advice, Particular thanksgo to Dr. Mike Hamilton for conducting the

239

geophysical survey, to Dr. John Blair and Dr. TrevorKirk for their invaluable assistance throughout andto Duncan Cae for his interest and helpful advice.Our t:hanb also go to all the acavation team and inparticular to Alex Langlands (University CoUegeLondon) and Marion Manwaring (University ofWales, Cardiff) for their assistance in running theleason. Finally we would like to thank Alan Aldridgefor his time and the loan of his eqwpmcnt and AnnJarvis for arnnging our accommodation and faciliriesat Bishop's Cannings,

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