IV.

NOTE ON THE ANTIQUITY OF THE WHEEL CAUSEWAY.
BY F. HAVERFIELD, M.A., F.S.A.

On 13th May 1895, Dr James Macdonald read to this Society a paper on the alleged Roman road in Roxburghshire, commonly called the Wheel Causeway. He admitted that the Causeway was a real road of some sort, but, for reasons which seem to me satisfactory, he denied that it possessed any claim to be considered a Roman road. He did not, however, go on to discuss its history, and his silence produced a doubtless unintentional impression that it might be a very modern affair, first dignified by some over-enthusiastic antiquary with the title Causeway. I was rash enough, myself, to suggest as much in an article which I wrote two or three years ago on the Maiden Way (Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Arch. Society, xiv. 432). A 'Wheelrig Head' and a 'Wheel Kirk' are close by, and Wheel Causeway might (I thought) have been named after them. This suggestion I find to be wrong: both road and name can lay claim to a respectable antiquity, and it may not be amiss to put together a few details about them. Though the road is not Roman, it was used in the Middle Ages as a pass from the headwaters of the North Tyne in Northumberland to the headwaters of the Jed and other tributaries of the Teviot.

The facts which concern us may be arranged in order of date, as follows:

A.D. 1296. In May 1296 Edward I. of England went from Roxburgh by way of Gardeford and Wyel (Wiel, Wiell, Wyell) to Castleton and back again, as is testified in his "Itinerary." This "Itinerary," which exists in two practically identical versions, the one French, the other English, has been printed three times. It was communicated to the London Society of Antiquaries on Feb. 9th, 1826, and printed in Archæologia, xxi. 495, and it was issued by the Bannatyne Club in the first volume of its Miscellany (i. 275) in 1827 and in the Instrumenta Publica or Ragman Rolls (p. 178), published by the same club in 1834. The names throughout the " Itinerary" are ill-spelt, but it is probable that Gardeford is Jedburgh, and Wyel is Wheel. No causeway is mentioned, but the route taken is significant. Edward travelled from the Jed water along the line usually assigned to the causeway till he

VOL. XXXIV.

I

descended into the valley at the top of the North Tyne, and thence he
went to New Castleton by the route which is followed to-day by the
North Tyne branch of the North British Railway.

A.D. 1348. A reference to the Capella of Whele occurs at this year in the
Rotuli Scotia (1. 724). I owe the reference to Mr R. B. Ärmstrong's
History of Lühlesdale (1883), p. 86.

A.D. 1533. In 1533 an English raid was carried into Scotland by the
Wheel Causeway, and a description of it by the then Earl of Northum-
berland, who was not himself present, exists among the MSS, of the
British Museum. The description is quoted by Sir Walter Scott in
his notes to the first canto of the "Lay of the Last Minstrel," and I need
not repeat it in full. The material passages state that the English
met "at Wawhope upon North Tyne water above Tyndaill, . . . and
so invadet Scotland at the hour of viij of the clok at nyght, at a place
called Whele Causay." They proceeded to burn Branxholm and other
neighbouring houses, and retired down Liddesdale. The account adds
that "Gedworth (i.. Jedburgh) is from the Wheles Causay vi myles.”
The topography is not quite accurately given, for Wawhope is not in
England, as is implied, but eight or ten miles north of the Border, and
Jedburgh is more than six miles from the Causeway, but these are
simple inaccuracies committed by a narrator who was not present and
did not know the ground. They need not disturb us.
A.D. 1590. A map, dated Dec. 1590, now preserved in the British
Museum and published in the London Archeologia (xxii. 161) shows
the Wheele Causey' on the watershed between the North Tyne and
Liddesdale, close to what is now called Deadwater; thence it passes
northwards out of the map in the direction generally given it. It is
plainly a route from the top of the North Tyne northwards into
Scotland.

A.D. 1600.

The Quheill in Liddisdale' is mentioned as belonging to
Jedburgh Abbey (Armstrong's Liddesdale, p. 86).

A.D. 1608. Timothy Pont in his map of Liddesdale marks the Wheele
Fell but no Cau-way.

It appears from these facts that the route of the Wheel Causeway was in use as early as 1296, and the name familiar in the sixteenth century. Dr Macdonald has told us that the roadway shows signs of intentional mending at various points, and we may therefore conclude that we have in it a mediæval moorland track. It would be idle to speculate on the derivation of the name. Obviously it may have been called 'Wheel' because it was comparatively adapted to wheeled traffic; on the other hand, 'Wheel' occurs by itself long before the term 'Wheel Causeway,' and it may be a place name of quite different significance.

V.

NOTICE OF THE DISCOVERY OF A CIST CONTAINING THREE URNS OF FOOD VESSEL TYPE AT DUNCRA HILL FARM, PENCAITLAND. BY JOSEPH ANDERSON, ASSISTANT SECRETARY AND KEEPER OF THE MUSEUM.

I first heard of this interesting discovery from Mr A. Agnew Ralston, factor to the Right Hon. the Earl of Hopetoun, on whose property the farm of Duncra Hill is situated. Mr Ralston kindly called here with one of the urns, suggesting at the same time that I should write to Mr James Elliot, the farmer, requesting him to bring in the other two that they

Fig. 1. Urn (No. 1) found in a cist at Duncra Hill. (3.)

might be all exhibited to the Society together and the description of the discovery placed on record in the Society's Proceedings. Mr Elliot was kind enough to comply at once with my request, and so far as he knew explained the circumstances of the discovery.

The place where the cist was found is a sandy knoll in one of the fields, and the cist was discovered when ploughing, the cover being only 11 ins. under the surface. Unfortunately Mr Elliot was not present when the discovery was made, but the urns were recovered entire and carefully preserved. The cist was of the usual type, the cover and sides

of flat undressed stones, and the bottom unpaved. There were few indications of the burial left, the only portion of the bones recognisable being the shafts of two femora. Besides the three urns, no other objects of an artificial character were found in the cist. The cist, though enclosing this unusual number of urns, was not of unusual size. It measured 3 ft. 6 ins. in length, the width at one end being 2 ft. 11 ins., and at the other end 2 ft. 5 ins., the depth being about 2 ft. Unfortu nately the relative positions of the urns were not noted at the time.

The largest of the three urns (fig. 1) is 51 ins, in height by 6 ins. diameter across the mouth. It has a slight shoulder at 2 ins. below the rim. Above the shoulder there is a very slight contraction towards the

Fig. 2. Urn (No. 2, from a cist at Dunera Hill. (.)

rim, and below it, the lower part tapers to a base of 34 ins. diameter. The rim is fully inch in thickness, slightly bevelled inwards, and is ornamented with four parallel rows of what look like impressions of a two ply twisted cord of coarse fibres, or perhaps hair, of which eight to twelve distinct impressions may be counted in each of the plies. The exterior is ornamented from lip to base with horizontal bands of impres sions of a thong, arranged three in a band, the hands alternating with single rows of impressions of the end of a cylindrical piece of wood or bone (more probably the latter) about inch in diameter, the impressions being about of an inch in depth, and showing the end of the cylinder as

neatly cut off and rounded as the flat end of a pencil. There are six of these bands and six rows of the circular impressions, and the part next the base has the width of the band of thong impressions increased to five. The bottom is plain and slightly concave externally.

The second urn (fig. 2) is similar in character and measures 43 ins. high by 6 ins. in diameter across the mouth. It is much the same shape as No. 1, but deeper in proportion to its width, and slightly more curved between the lip and the shoulder. The lip, which is bevelled inwards, is about half an inch in thickness, and is ornamented with a single

Fig. 3. Urn (No. 3) from a cist at Duncra Hill. (3.)

row of rather blunt impressions of an irregularly oval shape, which are repeated round the outer margin of the rim. The exterior of the bowl is also ornamented from lip to base with horizontal bands of two lines each, alternating with two rows of impressions of a squarish ended punch, apparently of a softish material, such as the end of the stem of a plant. The lines between appear to have been scored in the soft clay and not impressed. They are done in lengths, imperfectly joined, and occasionally with a very short length inserted between the ends of two longer lengths that have not joined fairly. The bottom is plain, 33 ins. in diameter, and slightly concave exteriorly.