Welsh Journals

THE HILL CAMPS OF MONTGOMERYSHIRE EAST OF THE SEVERN.* IEUAN T. HUGHES, Eso, B.A., F.R.G.S. Hill-top Camps have no distinguishing marks about them to enable us at a glance to state their origin with any degree of certainty. Hasty generalisations must be avoided because the needs of the people who built earthworks were much the same in all ages, and their practices therefore followed much the same course. Shape is not always a sure indication of their age. It is doubtful whether a classification on such a basis is of any value except for pufposes of description. In general, square camps have been ascribed to Roman times, but those of Dorsetshire have been established to belong to the Late Bronze or Early Iron Age.1 It has been the custom, too, to label the square camps of Wales as constructions in a period of Roman occupation. But so much has been written on this with reference to the Montgomeryshire examples2 that it is unnecessary to enter into that phase of the problem here. Certain features, however, have been noticed in the Continental camps which have been proved to be of an early age, viz.: great size end absence of a citadel. In later times camp building became a fine art and the elaborate earthworks of Gaul at a period preceding the Roman invasions betrayed a distinctive urban life. In the early ones there may be many outworks but the inner area is single and simple with a large extent of bank to be defended. At the same time, it cannot be ignored that in some less favoured and more remote regions the chances are that simple types persisted down to comparatively late times. My best thanks are due to J. B. Willans, Esq., Dolforgan, Kerry, who has given me every assistance. 1 Excavations of Cranbourne Chase,-Pitt-Rivers. Ancient Britain, — Hon. John Abercrombie. 2 Past volumes of Montgomeryshire Collections.