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(Continued from previous page)
A radiocarbon date showed that they had lived around 3300 BC, during the period when the huge Cursus was being constructed. Perhaps we have here for the first time hard evidence for the movement of people required to help construct such massive earthworks. Continued excavation in the central pit uncovered a further astonishing feature – a 7m deep shaft cut into its Southern edge associated with a chalk rubble platform built around the Northern edge contained within the central pit (see images 6 and 10). This platform reached the edge of the pit on the South side, giving access to the mouth of the shaft. Stratigraphic relationships showed that this had been dug shortly after the completion of the central pit, completely altering the monument. What had happened to cause such a drastic remodelling? Perhaps some catastrophe had overcome the inhabitants and invoked the need to dig deeper into the earth to placate the gods of the underworld who controlled nature itself. Certainly a series of carefully placed deposits, recalling those already seen at Fir Tree Field and Wyke Down, were made at intervals within the shaft. These included an association of a cattle skull and red deer antler beam. Nearby lay a fragment of human skull and two exceptional arrowheads of chisel and leaf style. Additional deposits incorporated further animal bones and a number of natural although unusually shaped flints, which from their patina were clearly not found adjacent to the site.
Close to the base of the shaft lay a remarkable block of worked and decorated chalk. From its careful design it was clearly a special item, perhaps a cult object or totem . A 10cm deep, carefully smoothed hole, possibly a socket, had been cut into the unworked flat side of the block with the remaining worked surfaces bearing a series of pecked lines and arcs. This kind of decoration occasionally features on Neolithic stone tombs in Western Britain and Ireland and is sometimes described as 'passage grave' or 'Megalithic' art. This form of decoration may have been much more widespread on perishable materials such as the chalk plaster found at Wyke Down, and wood, but as these materials rarely survive, we are unlikely ever to know for sure.
The shaft base had been dug though a think seam of flint (see image 5) which was visible in the lowest level of the wall. The final surface of the floor was thus a 'natural' unmade surface as it bore the imprint of the removed flint. Revealing such surfaces as this and then leaving them unmodified is a feature we have seen before in the F1 pit through which the shaft was cut. Exposing such natural surfaces seems to have been a deliberate act.
The shaft walls close to the base bore tool marks of two distinct forms – long diagonal grooves and areas of shallow scalloping which were left by the use of a polished flint or stone axe. The former marks were too wide to have been produced by an antler and were most likely made by a pointed stake being hammered into the wall to lever out blocks. Animal bones, mostly derived from a single piglet, lay scattered on the floor. A few of these bore clear butchery marks from a flint knife and three larger vertebrae had been carefully tucked into the angle between the base and wall together with a worked sandstone 'ball'.
Examination of the platform within F1 showed it had been carefully constructed in at least four separate phases (see image 10). Initially a 2m wide dump of coarse rubble (L16), derived from the shaft, covered much of the remaining floor area of F1. This was perhaps left for a season for a thin weathering horizon to develop (L15A). Further rubble was then piled up (L14) and both these dumps were supported by a turf revetment (L15). This was then stabilised before the predominantly earthy layer 13 was added. The latter may represent cleaning out of topsoil that had fallen into the shaft from its Southern and Eastern sides. Finally a further layer of rubble (L12) was added which sealed the earthy layer 13 and increased the overall width to over 3m. The top of the platform maintained a width of about 1m and was highly compacted and puddled in nature. Around its Northern edge large quantities of animal bone, much burnt and with a high percentage of cattle, was uncovered. It seems likely that not only did the platform provide an access point to and from the pit, but it formed a focal area for ceremonial feasting and from which special offerings could be placed deep within the earth.
Earlier we saw how some of the outer pits contained large lumps of chalk that had been deliberately placed on their bases. This blocky chalk could only have come form the deeper levels exposed during the digging of the shaft; this strongly suggests the digging of the outer pits was contemporary.
Text © Martin Green.
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