We have no written records of Man as he first lived in our land long
ages ago. Writing was an unknown art, and records--even if they had
existed--could not have survived to come down to us. We therefore
speak of this period as the Prehistoric--the time when the people of
the past were unable themselves to record their story. Yet, though
these sources of information are closed to us, we are able from the
relics they have left behind them--the implements and weapons that
they used, the bones of the animals they fed upon, the structures
they erected--to form a fairly clear idea of these early peoples.
But this Prehistoric period, vast in its extent, has for convenience
sake been further subdivided. At first the metals were unknown, or at
least unused, and this period is spoken of as the Stone Age, for it
was of flints and other stones that weapons and domestic implements
were mainly fashioned. Later, man learnt how to get the easily-worked
ores of tin and copper from the rocks and by their admixture to form
bronze. From this, beautiful weapons and other articles were made,
and from the time of the discovery we date what is known as the
Bronze Age. Doubtless the ores of iron had long been known, but how to
smelt them was another matter. At length the method was discovered,
and mankind was in possession of hard metal implements having great
advantages for all purposes over those previously employed. Thus the
Iron Age began, and the early inhabitants of Britain had arrived at
this stage of civilisation when the Romans came to our land.
We may now turn to a consideration of these various epochs in their
order. Firstly the Stone Age. This, though a convenient term as
covering all the period before the advent of the Metal Ages, is
too indefinite both as to time and race, and hence it is usual to
speak of the Palaeolithic or Old Stone Age, and the Neolithic or
New Stone Age. The people of these two Ages were very distinct, and
most authorities hold that--at all events in our land--a vast gap of
time separated them, though no such gap occurred between the later
Ages. Palaeolithic man, from various causes, ceased to inhabit what
we now call Britain, and when the country was re-peopled it was by
Neolithic man. Palaeolithic man lived in the days when the mammoth,
reindeer, and hyaena roamed over our country; made leaf-shaped
roughly-flaked flint weapons which were never ground or polished;
cultivated no plants and tamed no animals; and built no monuments,
graves, or houses. Neolithic man, on the other hand, learnt how to
grind and polish his implements; was both a farmer and a breeder of
stock; had many industries; and built megalithic monuments, houses,
and graves--the remains of which survive to the present day.
The earliest signs of the existence of man in Berkshire are, as we have
said, the implements of stone, mostly flint, found in the gravels;
and the implements of the Palaeolithic Period take us back to a very
old time, so old that the surface features of our district were then
quite different from what we see now.
There is a fine series of Palaeolithic implements in the Reading
Museum, and most of them have been found in gravel-pits near the
river Thames in the Reading and Twyford district, or in the Cookham
and Maidenhead district. The implements occur in the gravel in such
a way as to prove that they were brought into the position in which
we find them at the same time and in the same manner as the other
stones in the gravel, and the men who made them consequently lived
at or before the date of the making of the beds of gravel. All the
gravels in question were made by our rivers, and as the places where
we find the implements are in some cases from 85 to 114 feet above
the present level of the river, we infer that the valley has been
deepened as much as from 85 to 114 feet since the time when the men
who made the implements lived.
We now come to the Neolithic Period when, as we have seen, man was a
much more civilised person than the earlier man is believed to have
been. Some of his burial mounds still remain, and being oval in plan
are known as long barrows. Wayland Smith's Cave, a mile to the east
of Ashbury (p. 83), is composed of some 32 stones, the remains of a
long barrow of Neolithic times.
Neolithic implements are of stone, but in many cases they are unlike
the older implements in being of polished stone. In the Reading
Museum there is a fine polished flint chisel from Englefield, and also
polished axes from Broadmoor, from Pangbourne, and from the beds of the
Thames and Kennet. In the British Museum there is a beautiful dagger
of flint from a barrow on Lambourn Down. Pretty little arrow-heads have
been found at many places on the downs and in the Wallingford district.
There was in Berkshire a long interval between the Palaeolithic and
the Neolithic Periods, but so far as we know there was no such break
between the Neolithic Period and the Bronze Age. All we can say is
that there was a time when the inhabitants of our district began to
use implements of copper, or of copper alloyed with tin, i.e. bronze,
for some purposes, but they still continued to use implements of stone,
and it is not always possible to say whether a stone implement belongs
to the Neolithic Period, to the Bronze Age, or to an even later date.
Many remains of the Bronze Age have been found in burial-mounds or
barrows, and the barrows of this period are circular, with a diameter
of fifty to one hundred feet, and hence termed round barrows. Many
pieces of sepulchral pottery of this age from Berkshire will be found
both in the British Museum and the Reading Museum. A considerable
number of bronze implements were found in one place at Yattendon,
and another hoard of them was discovered at Wallingford. A great many
bronze swords, daggers, and spear-heads have been found in the river
Thames, and are to be seen in the Museums.
A cemetery of this period was found at Sulham, and many earthenware
urns from it are in the Reading Museum. There are also in the Museum
some urns from Neolithic barrows at Sunningdale.
The extensive deposits of peat at and around Newbury show that it was
a marsh and lake district until historical time, and remains of pile
dwellings have been found in the market-place, in Bartholomew Street,
and in Cheap Street. Their date cannot be fixed with certainty,
but they are almost certainly prehistoric in age.
The substitution of iron for bronze indicates a considerable advance
in knowledge, for, except in meteorites, pure iron is not found in
nature, and no small skill is required to separate the metal from
the earth or rock in which it occurs. There is, however, no definite
division between the Bronze and the Iron Age, for implements and
ornaments of both bronze and stone continued to be used. Nor is there
any definite end to the Iron Age: it passes onwards into the period
of written history.
A number of bones and various objects found in a grave on Hagbourne
Hill seemed to show that a man, a horse, and possibly also a chariot
had been buried there.
Ancient British coins have been found at Brightwell, Newbury,
Wallingford, and at other places in Berkshire. Many of them bear on one
side a rude representation of a horse, probably an imitation of the
horse on the gold stater of Philip II of Macedon, who became king in
B.C. 359. These gold coins, known as Philips, were current in Greece
and in the East for a long period, and have been occasionally found
in circulation even in modern times. The White Horse, which is cut
in the turf on the chalk hill above Uffington, bears a considerable
resemblance to the horse on the British coins, and may very probably
be of the same date.
There are a great number of mounds and earthworks scattered over
Berkshire, and it is exceedingly difficult to assign to them their
proper dates. We have already mentioned Wayland Smith's Cave as
the remains of a long barrow of the Neolithic Period, and we have
also referred to the round barrows of the Bronze Age. Some of the
fortifications may date from these early times but many are probably
of later date. It was for a long time needful to provide defence for
the dwellings, not only against men, but also against wild animals,
and the earthworks were no doubt used over and over again by successive
peoples.
As we have said, the chalk district was at one time the most populous
part of the county, and we consequently find the downs dotted over with
mounds and earthworks of very ancient date. Perhaps the best known of
these is the fine earthwork named Uffington Castle on White Horse Hill
(see p. 7). Alfred's Castle is a circular earthwork close to Ashdown
Park and three miles south-west of Uffington Castle. Letcombe Castle
is another fair-sized work on the Ridge Way, rather more than five
miles east of White Horse Hill. There is a large earthwork called
Danish Camp on Blewburton Hill to the south of Didcot.
There are a few old earthworks in the Vale of White Horse district. One
crowns Badbury Hill near Faringdon. Cherbury Camp is a large oval work
on low ground near Buckland. Sinodun Hill to the north of Wallingford
has evidently been fortified in early times, and Wallingford itself
has the remains of an old and extensive earthwork round the town.
Passing to the Forest District we find many mounds and banks on the
heaths, and there is one very fine earthwork known as Caesar's Camp
near Easthampstead. It was very likely used by the Romans, but is
almost certainly of still older date. Finally it is highly probable
that Windsor Castle stands on the site of an old fort.