Project Timescape

Bronze Age Burials

• Bronze Age people buried their dead in a crouched position beneath round barrows, or at a later stage cremated them.
• In the early Bronze Age, burial mounds appear in the local landscape around Northfield Farm. These were the burials of important individuals, probably the leaders of the tribal community.
• Later Bronze Age Cremations with urns have been found below Round Hill and at the Brightwell Barrow.

Iron Age Burials

• Iron Age dead were inhumed in pits or exposed on excarnation platforms with some body parts buried separately. In the Late Iron Age cremated remains were buried under small square barrows.
• Purpose-dug graves were used for burials in the Early Iron Age, and men, women and children were buried in Middle Iron Age pits in the hill fort interior.

Roman Burials

• The Romans introduced cemeteries and buried their dead in coffins.
• Burial in the Roman period in the local area presents some interesting contrasts. On the one hand, cremations, inhumations and finds such as bronze bracelets found at the hill fort show that Castle Hill remained a local burial place throughout the Roman period. At least one Roman inhumation burial has also been found in the adjacent settlement.
• Around Dorchester-on-Thames there were several large cemeteries alongside the roads.

Saxon Burials

• We do not know the nature of early Saxon activity either within the hill fort or in the settlement outside. The presence of pottery in both suggests some continuity of use. It is likely that the eventual break with this traditional burial site was brought about by the advent of Christianity in the 7th Century.
• The burial ground by the church was the focus for a parish, almost certainly a smaller community than that using the hill fort. During the medieval period, the manor was owned by Abingdon Abbey. After the Dissolution, however, the new manorial owners, the Dunches, lived and were mostly buried at Little Wittenham Church. The significance of the church and burial ground has declined again since. The burial ground now has at least 1,000 years of use.

Modern Burials

• More recently, people are known to have scattered the cremated ashes of loved relatives at the site of The Clumps.