Sibertswold Downs Grave 18

Pretty large tumulus; the grave was full five feet deep. The bones were remarkably firm; and the teeth were very white, sound and even, as of a young person. The coffin seemed to have been very thick and much burnt. Near the skull was a large brass acus crinalis, or pin for the hair [M 6451]; the top of it, which is a little wrought on one of its flat sides, seems to have been intended to represent two small animals, like monkeys,[1] sitting upright on their posteriors, taking hold of each other's fore paws and kissing each other: it is two inches and a half long. Near the neck were fourteen amethyst beads [M 6452], much like those found by me heretofore, and described at their proper places, except that these are somewhat larger and of a finer colour; one large and one small bead; a piece of thin silver ornament or pendant for the neck; an iron instrument nine inches long exclusive of the ringle, exactly like several others which I found at Kingston and Ash, and never but in women's graves; a pair of iron shears, as at No. 2; and the blades of two knives. A woman's grave.[1]Mr. Fairholt, as the engraving referred to will shew, has seen this hair-pin with an eye somewhat less imaginative.- C.R.S.