home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- 1. Burial mound, usually composed of earth
- but sometimes of stones, examples of which
- are found in many parts of the world.
- The two main types are long, dating from the
- New Stone Age, or Neolithic, and round, from
- the later Mesolithic peoples of the early
- Bronze Age. Long barrows may be a mere mound,
- but usually they contained a chamber of wood
- or stone slabs in which were placed the
- bodies of the deceased. They are common in
- the southern counties of England from Sussex
- to Dorset, and seem to have been communal
- burial places of the long-headed
- Mediterranean race. Round barrows were the
- work of the round-headed or Beaker people of
- the early Bronze Age. The commonest type is
- the bell barrow, consisting of a circular
- mound enclosed by a ditch and an outside bank
- of earth. Many dot the Wiltshire downs in
- England. In historic times certain of the
- Saxon and most of the Danish invaders were
- barrow-builders.
-
- 2. Most northerly town in the USA, at Point
- Barrow, Alaska; the world's largest Inuit
- settlement. There is oil at nearby Prudhoe
- Bay.
-