BOOKS OF THE DAY
Maiden Castle
Maiden Castle, Dorset. Reports of the Research Committee of the Society of Antiquaries of London, No. 12. (Oxford University Press. Milford. 25s.) Agents : Messrs. Quaritch.
AFTER Stonehenge, Maiden Castle is probably the prehistoric monu- ment best known to the present inhabitants of Britain. The lovely situation of this great hill-fort, the staggering size and elaboration of its defensive earthworks, and the Hardy associations have all a share in a merited fame which led tens of thousands. of visitors to Dr. Wheeler's excavations during the four seasons 1934-37. The super- ficial magnificence of a site need not mean that it will yield what the archaeologist most desires, material contributing to his reconstruction of ancient history. But here the results outdid all reasonable hopes. These Iron Age Forts were often only refuges for times of sudden danger, with no permanent dwellings, but here there was not only a substantial Iron Age town, but remains of far earlier and later periods as well. In such unexpected rewards lies much of what is known as the " romance " of excavation.
Briefly, this is the story which Dr. Wheeler and his army of helpers dug from the Dorset chalk. It begins rather-before 2000 B.c., when New Stone Age peasants crowned part of the hilltop with an oval enclosure, probably intended mainly for the protection of their live- stuck. They belonged to tribes which, crossing from northern France, had recently introduced mixed farming into these islands, hitherto the preserve of savage hunters and food-gatherers. Their enclosure was already abandoned and overgrown when a later neo- lithic people chose the hill for one of the most macabre burials ever discovered in Britain. Under a " long barrow," which reached the fantastic length of one-third of a mile, lay a body from which head and limbs had been nacked shortly before burial. An attempt had also been made to cut open the skull. The explanation of this discovery is not certain, but the most likely, as well as the most picturesque, is that it represents a ritual feast. During the Bronze Age the hill was virtually deserted, the construction of Maiden Castle itself beginning in about 30o B.c., roughly two centuries after the invasions which brought the first iron-users to this country. At this time a relatively small space was enclosed within a single stout rampart, vertically faced with stone masonry, and it was not until some 200 years later that, m a new form, it was extended to include approximately the present area of 46 acres. Inside, the inhabitants built their huts and sank storage pits deep into the eaalk. The next great development took place when fresh invaders—perhaps Venetic tribes driven from Brittany by Julius Caesar—arrived with a new weapon which demanded new methods of defence. Their weapon was the sling, and to keep defenders beyond its range ramparts were multiplied. It was these Venetic tribes who ultimately brought the Maiden Castle defences to their present almost megalomaniac pro- portions.
This population had been augmented by some Belgic settlers, per- haps driven westward by the ambitious exploits of King Cunobelin (Cymbeline) of Colchester, before the Roman conquest brought about the most dramatic incident in the known history of Maiden Castle. The Roman H Legion, almost certainly under the personal com- mand of the general who was to become the Emperor Vespasian, stormed this British stronghold after first putting down " a barrage of iron-shod ballista arrows." There followed a massacre of men and women. alike. 'That night the surviving inhabitants must have crept out to bury their dead in a great cemetery ; haste and dark- ness made the interments haphazard, but almost every body was provided with the customary food and drink. When the skeletons were uncovered many were seen- to bear marks of slashed wounds, while lodge I in the spinal column of one was a Roman arrow-head of iron. In this cemetery Maiden Castle has provided the only evidence of its kind for the countless savage encounters between Britons and Romans which marked the gradual advance of the legions. Within :lighted defencei a number of natives struggled on for a few decades, but by A.D. 70 the last had migrated to the new Roman town established on the site of modern Dorchester. The story, however, is not quite at an end, for in the fourth century a pagan temple and Priest's house were built within the ramparts, and a few hundred years later still the body of a Saxon invader was laid near the spot where the neolithic burial had been 'Made 21 millennia before.
The sensibilities of many were outraged when the sacred turf of Maiden Castle was mutilated by Dr. Wheeler's spades. Now, when the scars are all but healed with new grass, it is to be hoped that they may be reconciled and will welcome this monumental Report, lucidly written and magnificently illustrated, which has made such a vivid addition to the rapidly mounting knowledge of early British
Previous page
