Page:Prehistoric Britain.djvu/229

Rh materials quickly decayed, the pits became filled up with silted material, and subsequent cultivation obliterated nearly all traces of their former existence. Stone implements were frequently gathered in localized spots on ploughed fields, suggesting the sites of some kind of dwellings, but little information can be got from such surface finds.

Mr. George Clinch, who has excavated many prehistoric pit-dwellings of this type on Hayes Common, West Wickham and other localities, within an area of some four miles near the boundary between Kent and Surrey, has put on record the result of his experience, as regards their structure and classification. He divides them into three types, viz.:

1. Large circular pits from 3 to 10 metres in diameter and from 15 to 90 centimetres deep, and surrounded by a well-defined mound. These pits showed no evidence of fire.

2. Large circular pits, similar in every way to those of the first type, but with a low conical mound in the centre, supposed to be for a central pillar to support a roof.

3. Small circular pits, 35 centimetres deep, containing reddened pebbles, charred wood, and other marks of fire—supposed to be for cooking purposes.

Only stone implements were found in the course of his operations, as all articles made of bone, horn, wood and other organic tissues had completely decayed. The flints consisted