Small-scale rescue excavations during the course of pipeline construction have revealed a single Middle Bronze Age round-house, ring-ditch, and pits on a lowland site in the upper Severn valley with associated radiocarbon determinations which suggest a date within the range 1400–1170 cal BC. Associated finds include a large assemblage of charred naked barley and plain and decorated vessels of cordoned, bucket, and barrel urn traditions, together with a quern and a rubbing stone. The round-house, the first building of this date to be found in central Wales, can be paralleled with ones of similar date elsewhere, especially in southern England.

On Friday, October 6th, 1911, I received a message from Mr. Laughlin, of Messrs. Bolton & Laughlin, brickmakers, Ipswich, to the effect that one of his workmen, while removing some surface clay to get at the underlying glacial gravel, had turned out some human bones. I at once went down to the pit where the discovery had been made and found that a portion of a human skull attached to an almost complete cranial cast had been recovered. The workmen pointed out that two bones were protruding from the spot whence the skull had been derived, and so it was arranged for the remainder of the skeleton to be dug up on the following day. Messrs. Woolnough, Canton, and Snell accompanied me, and we afterwards drew up a short report of our observations. This report is as follows:—

“We, the undersigned, were present at, and superintended, the digging out of the human remains found at Messrs. Bolton & Laughlin's pit, Ipswich, on Saturday, October 7th, 1911. We all most carefully examined the section of decalcified Boulder Clay, under which the bones lay, before any digging commenced, and were absolutely convinced that no grave had ever been dug on the spot before.

In the autumn of 1920 some of the workmen on the Sewage Farm of the Newbury Corporation were engaged in levelling a low mound and depositing the soil in a hollow close by. During these operations hey came upon a few small pointed-butted celts and a number of lakes, most of which they threw away; one celt and a few flakes were taken the following April to the Newbury Museum. The site was inspected without delay, and resulted in the discovery of imilar flakes in a thick deposit of black soil immediately underlying he surface soil; the problem was, however, further complicated by the discovery of Romano-British potsherds in the same deposit.

Mr. Crawford and I resolved, therefore, to undertake a systematic exploration of the site, as soon as the crops were off the ground. In the meantime, while cultivating the land during the summer, the workmen recovered most if not all of the implements which they had discarded the previous autumn.

The history of early man in Uganda is bound up with that of the inland sea now familiar to Europeans as Lake Victoria or the Victoria Nyanza. The area of this great lake is given as 26,828 square miles (Handbook of Uganda, Ed. II., 1920, p. 26), or about the size of Scotland, but its maximum depth is probably some-what less than the height above ground of the cross of St. Paul's Cathedral. Lake Victoria, then, is just a gigantic puddle.

The history of the Lake is a long one. Beginning as a natural sump, as it probably did in Miocene times, it reached its maximum, in all probability, in the Pliocene, when its area was doubtless quite double that ot its present surface, while its depth was at least four times as great as that now registered.

The Norfolk Crag deposits bear a considerable resemblance to those of Suffolk, consisting, like the latter, of a variable group of shallow-water marine sands, pebbly gravels, and laminated clays, with occasional seams or patches of shells.

The chief differences appear to be:—

(1) The progressive lowering of temperature observed as the Suffolk beds are traced from south to north has continued still further, culminating in the “Tellina balthica” aspect of the Weybourne Crag.

(2) In every known exposure the Norfolk Crag rests directly on the chalk, not on a Tertiary clay.

(3) The Norfolk “Stone Bed” ıs much more closely packed with flints than the corresponding “Detritus Bed” of Suffolk.

(4) The “coprolitic” content is much less.

(5) The mammalian fauna presents some differences from that of the Detritus Bed.

(6) It is possible the latter deposit is of a greater age than the former.

The attention of students of Prehistory was first called to the Crag deposits by Reid Moir's discovery in 1909 of apparently humanly worked flints in the Detritus Bed at Ipswich. This discovery, though supported by W. G. Clarke's researches at Norwich, was hotly contested, and gave rise to one of the most prolonged and embittered controversies of recent times, the echoes of which, however, have by now almost died away. At the present time every outstanding authority, who has studied the deposits in person, has endorsed Reid Moir's views.

The parish of Barnham, in North-West Suffolk, a little over two miles from Thetford, has never been noted for its flint implements, and the few found there have for the most part gone unrecorded. The finding of some implements there in the early part of 1912 induced me to trace as many previous specimens as I could, and by the kindness of Mr. H. Muller (Eltham), Mr. G. J. Buscall Fox (Upper Tooting), Mr. C. F. Newton (Saham Toney), and Mr. H. Dixon Hewitt (Thetford), I have examined a series of implements of more than usual interest on account of the succession of periods which they represent.

Chellean.—In 1882, Mr. A. G. Wright obtained “two flint implements from the gravel near Barnham” (Geological Memoir of Ely, Mildenhall, Thetford,” p. 80). These are now in the possession of Mr. G. J. Buscall Fox. One is the broad end of an ochreous pear-shaped implement (2¾ in. by 2 in.)—apparently Chellean—and probably found in the gravel-pit east of the village.

The fullest credit must be given to our members, Mr. Reid Moir, F.G.S., and Mr. S. Hazzledine Warren, F.G.S. (and others also) for their efforts to solve this problem by experiment. This is obviously the right line to adopt, but, after all, experiments (including my own, for I have been experimenting for years on similar lines) are only proof that (given suitable conditions) the sharp edges of split flints will chip under “Force,” whether this is applied by Nature or Man. Experiments can prove the difference between the results of the forces of “Percussion” and “Pressure”: but it is doubtful, in my opinion, if it can be proved by experiments whether Nature or Man has applied the force, as the same forces are used by both Nature and Man, the only difference being the intensity with which the force has been used and the way that force has been applied.

The first early palaeolithic tools, i.e. tools older than the Riss glacial period, were found already in the 1950s as isolated finds on the outskirts of Brno, either in the clay pits of brickworks (at the Brno–‘Červený kopec’, Brno-Židenice, ‘Malá Klajdovka’ and ‘Růženin dvůr’ localities) or in gravel terraces (Brno–Židenice, Brno–Líšeň). All these finds were worked pebbles or flakes.

The research of the Lower Pleistocene palaeontological site ‘Stránská skála’, on the eastern fringes of the City of Brno, started in the early 1960s by the Anthropos Institute of the Moravian Museum and led by R. Musil, brought to the light the first collection of artefacts accompanied by fauna. Stránská skála is a rock of Jurassic limestones, its north-western slope covered with debris, loess and fossil soils. There is a very rich fauna of vertebrata and molluscs, especially in the complex of fossil soils, but also in the loess and in the numerous crevices, fissures and caves of the rock massif. They are classed as Upper Biharian and dated to the Cromerian period (Musil and Valoch 1968). In the loess below the soil complex was also located the Matuyama/Brunhes palaeomagnetic inversion (Bucha et al. 1975).

An unusual ⊏-shaped earthwork has been known for several generations (Nat. Grid. Ref. TA 099658) just over one mile to the south of the Wold village of Rudston, in the Western angle of two roads. It has often been interpreted as three contiguous long-barrows. Canon Greenwell described the site in 1877 as ‘two long mounds, almost parallel, their northern end gradually losing themselves in the surface-level, but connected together at the southern end by another long mound’. In 1958 when Messrs C. and E. Grantham of Driffield excavated a section across the western ditch, they appreciated that the western and eastern banks continued for a much greater distance than Greenwell had implied, travelling at least ½-mile downhill towards the village.

Aerial reconnaissance in 1961 by Dr J. K. St. Joseph established the existence of two long parallel ditches, extending intermittently for 1½ miles beyond the earthwork. The feature as a whole was recognizable therefore as a cursus, the earthwork being the squared southern end.

The Apennine Culture of the Middle and Late Bronze Age of Italy extended in space from the Po Valley to the Gulf of Taranto, and from the Gargano to Lipari, and in time from at least 1500 to 1000 B.C. It is represented in the museums by its pottery, and little else. Yet this is sufficient for an examination of it to reveal important regional and chronological variations, which form the subject of the present paper.

The pottery of the Apennine Culture consists of two distinct classes, both invariably hand-made. The first is a coarse, unburnished ware indistinguishable from the corresponding classes of pottery in preceding and succeeding periods. Decoration is common, consisting of cordons, plain or impressed, indentations of the rim and, rarely, applied knobs or bosses which merge imperceptibly into the form of the very common simple lug handles. Shapes include heavy jars of various sizes, from great pithoi for water, oil or grain storage, with lugs only, to smaller mug- or cup-like ones, often with single vertical strap handles. Smallest of all are miniature vessels, as little as an inch high, which may be votive (the Grotta Pertosa produced several hundred examples) or simply children's toys. The second, commoner, and much more important ware is a fine, medium, darkfaced, burnished one, and in this all the more characteristic forms were made. A bold decoration of bands, dotted, hatched, excised or void, is frequent though by no means universal.

This report should be read in conjunction with the report on the excavations in the interior of the fort (previous paper in these Proceedings).

The site of the hill-fort lies on the north side of the North Downs Trackway (National Grid Reference SU/614528). It is also on the southern edge of the Lower Thames valley. In this area there is a gap through the Hampshire Downs which connects the Thames valley with that of the River Test.

The derivation of the place name Winklebury is not entirely clear. Medieval spellings, e.g. Wiltenischebury, c. 1290; Wyltenysshbury, 1407; Wynnyshbery and Wynlysbery, 1443, suggest that the name may be of Anglo-Saxon derivation and mean the ‘fort or stronghold of the people of Wilton’, i.e. the fort owned, occupied or built by the Wiltshiremen. However, Wiltonish occurs as a surname in Romsey in the 1289 Assize Rolls, in Walter le Wyltenysshe, and thus the site name may have evolved in the 13th century through associations with this family.

Building development threatened the north side of the hill-fort in 1959. Excavations were accordingly carried out by the Ancient Monuments Inspectorate of the then Ministry of Works (now the Department of the Environment), under the direction of the writer in July and August of that year.

Late in November 1981, Mr M. Wright of the Danywenallt Centre, Talybont, noticed fragments of prehistoric pottery and an associated cremation burial in an area eroded by walkers in the pathway on Fan y Big (SO 03712057; fig. 1). The site lies at a height of 655 m on one of the denuded spurs of the northern escarpment of the Beacons (pl. 12). The find itself lay next to a small dry-stone beacon about 1 m high, on the knife-edge of the spur and less than 10m away from the precipitous cliffs which drop away for about 100 m to either side. Behind the spur, to the south, is a slight plateau covered in eroding peat hags with a little cotton grass.

The ground was frozen at the time of the discovery to a depth of about 3 cm, and the obvious vulnerability of the pottery to destruction by the weather or the passage of human feet necessitated immediate action to preserve it. A small excavation team supervised by C. S. Briggs was hastily assembled to undertake this task in bitter weather several days later.

The results are presented of a comprehensive petrographic study of 82 Bronze Age cinerary vessels from the Isle of Anglesey, Wales. Petrographic analysis is particularly appropriate when applied to this island location with its diverse and well defined geology. The pottery is characterised by a distinctive range of clasts, of which the most characteristic are varieties of igneous rocks and sandstone. The clasts can be matched to outcrops on the island with one exception which could have been derived from a known mainland source. The particular rock types seen in the pottery are not common in the island's alluvial and glacial sediments and it is therefore concluded that the potters showed a strong preference for specific dark coloured igneous rock types as added filler, in common with other Bronze Age potters in Britain. Although typology implies some extraneous influences, petrography indicates that the pottery was made on the island. However, despite the varied geology, the widespread distribution of many of the crucial rock types (dolerites, lithic sandstones) across the island means that individual production centres cannot be distinguished, a difficulty exacerbated by the lack of known habitation sites and associated domestic pottery. The question as to whether specifically designed pottery or redundant domestic pottery was used for burials is discussed, but remains unresolved.

The choice of the Gebel Akhdar region of Cyrenaica for study arose partly from its geographical position midway between the Atlas and the Levant. At the same time the topography, with a range of considerable hills close to the coast, must at all times have provided a rainfall very appreciably superior to that of the surrounding low-lying territories. The area is thus a strategic one in which to examine the problems of the relationship between these two main areas of settlement in the Southern Mediterranean. The topography also affords exceptional opportunities for the preservation of a detailed geological record of changes in the relations of land and sea during Pleistocene and Recent times.

The collections of Marischal Museum, University of Aberdeen include three jadeite axeheads (Fig. 1) which probably come from prehistoric Scottish contexts. This short note aims to bring them to the attention of others interested in these spectacular objects, in the hope that further work will help their place in Scottish prehistory to be better understood.

One of the axeheads (ABDUA:39404) has already been published (Murray, 1994, 104; Batey & King 1994, 25) and has been allocated number 107 by Murray (op. cit.) in the scheme set out by Jones et al. (1977). Under the Treasure Trove procedure it was allocated to Marischal Museum in 1994. The other two axeheads were only recognised after the acquisition of this specimen. One of these (ABDUA: 37080) was given to the museum by Sir Alexander Ogston in 1928. Previously it was in the collection of Dr Garden of Alford, having been found in the parish of Strathdon, Aberdeenshire. Since its discovery, this axehead has been hafted, probably by Ogston who presented nine other prehistoric implements with modern hafts to the museum.

This paper, written at the kind invitation of the Honorary Editor of our Proceedings, has as its original aim the review of activity in Irish prehistory during war-time, thus to provide a résumé such as has already been furnished by other writers for other countries in Europe. It has, however, been agreed that a slight extension of the range of the period has in this case certain advantages, since an admirable summary of the position of Irish prehistory was provided in 1937 by Dr Mahr's Presidential Address to the Prehistoric Society (Mahr, 1937). The present paper cannot aim to give as full a treatment as did Mahr's, which has in many aspects served as a summary text-book of Irish prehistory, nor can it devote lengthy space to any theory—new or otherwise—as Mahr did for his Riverford Culture, yet it must be its aim to summarise the work which has been done since the publication of his ‘New Aspects,’ and to indicate as far as possible, the advances and modifications of outlook which have resulted during the intervening years.