Description

Summary: 1 beaker found full of shells, bone and a tooth, from inside barrow G.25 (11), near Ablington, Figheldean, Wiltshire, excavated by Lt Col G W Hawley, 1932.

Research results

An Early Bronze Age beaker excavated by Lt. Col. William Hawley probably between 1895 and 1898. The beaker, which dates to the earliest phase of the Bronze Age in Britain, was found with a primary crouched inhumation described by Hawley as an 'old man' in bell barrow Figheldean G25, more recently better known as Barrow Clump. Recent excavations carried out by English Heritage and Operation Nightingale have added further detail to our understanding of the site, showing that this burial belonged to an initial barrow probably constructed c. 2200-1950 BC, and then subsequently enlarged some time later in the following centuries. These excavations also identified a second beaker burial, that of a child.

This vessel was re-examined and illustrated as part of Wessex Archaeology and Operation Nightingale's publication of excavations at Barrow Clump (2003-2014). These excavations revealed a complex, multi-phased site with occupation spanning the Early Neolithic to Early Bronze Age, which was subsequently reused as the focus of an Early to Middle Anglo-Saxon cemetery.