XVI.
matter of some importance if their complete and
thorough investigation should ever be undertaken by
any scientific society or individual. It is somewhat
curious that they should be quite peculiar to our own
coasts, and they are entirely different from the
"kitchen-middens" of Denmark and Scotland.
It is very difficult to determine the original outlines
of the mounds. One in Mersea is fairly circular, with
a diameter of about ninety yards, and several give
indications of having been round, but as so many have
been partially carried away for agricultural purposes
it is of course quite possible that the original outline
is in no case preserved.
There can be little doubt about the antiquity of
these mounds: the chief questions are as to their
origin and precise age. Two of them at least were
cultivated during the Heptarchy, and possibly many'
others. One has yielded traces of Roman pottery,
and upon another a worked flint scraper has been
picked up.
Traditions and popular opinions about these mounds
vary greatly, as one would expect, nor do they throw
much, if any, light upon the subject. Some say that
they were Saxon or Danish potteries ; others that they
were Roman brickyards. Others again maintain that
they indicate camp-sites of Boadicea, Queen of the
Iceni, who was so cruelly defeated not far off, or of
Alfred the Great when stationed there to resist the
Danes ; while others assert that the Danes brought
their dead to be buried there, and that the broken
pottery consists of the shattered vessels of the departed
heroes. All these fancies are equally unsatisfactory.
In the catalogue of the glass at the South Kensing-
ing Museum is the following notice : "In 1295, Eng-
lish records speak of the glass-painters being among
the chief tradesmen, particularly at Colchester, where
the sand is of a suitable kind, and the salt marshes
would furnish an abundance of plants whose ashes
yield the necessary alkalies," This is an interesting
instance of an extensive industry going on in the
marshes long ago, but it is hard to think it has any-
thing to do with the formation of the mounds, as they
give many indications of being much older ; yet, per-
haps, it is a fact not altogether to be lost sight of.
Two suggestions as to the origin of the mounds have
been made to me. One is by Mr. Dalton, F.G.S.,
that they were campsites, when the surrounding
country was densely covered with forest, except the
belt between normal high water and the storm range
of spring tides. The other is by the Rev. J. C.
Atkinson, of Danby-near-Zarm, who regards them as
being the relics of numerous salt works, similar mounds
having been proved by him and Canon Greenwell to
have been the sites of old salt works at Redcar and