144 PILE-DWELLING SITE AT SKITT'S HILL, BRAINTREE.
stream were greatly increased, after which the normal conditions
are resumed, and a further 12 inches of fine clay is deposited.
Again at b (I., Fig. 4) comes a seam of very black earth,
eight to ten inches deep, largely composed of organic matter,
which shows that the stream had assumed lacustrine conditions,
either through a lowering of the level of the land or the passage
of the stream having become obstructed. This state of things
must have lasted for a considerable period for such a depth of
leaf mould to accumulate, even allowing for the probable greater
luxuriance of the vegetable growth of that time.
This period of quiescence was followed sharply by one of
activity, which suggests the bursting of a dam, for the top of the
black earth was covered with a thin layer of sand and pebbles
to the thickness of an inch. Overlying this, the fine clay is again
regularly laid, followed eventually by the brick-earth and surface
soil.
The uppermost deposit of clay is broken at the side of the
stream by the irregular and mixed deposit, considered to be the
artificially constructed platform of the pile-dwelling community.
This contains stones and other objects which seem to be beyond
the carrying power of the normal stream at the time, judging by
the portion of the deposit at the same level, but nearer the centre
(see section, Fig. IV.) unless we are to regard this irregular
deposit as a buried channel, the result of excessive flood, cut in
the regularly laid clay. The probability of this view is increased
by the sandy nature of the lower portion of this deposit.
Although the examination here recorded has not given
definite evidence of the pile-structures, it serves to throw some
light on the age to which the relic-bed belongs by the addition
of the underlying deposits to the section.
The relic-bed having previously been supposed to rest
directly on the base of the old river, it was concluded that it
represented the entire accumulation since the silting up of the
stream bed. Owing to this it was further held to have been
occupied by man as a dwelling site from Neolithic times down
through the bronze and early iron ages.4
From this misconception of the actual facts Mr. Kenworthy
was led to say: —
"I think that the silting up has been much more rapid since the occupation
by the Romans, owing probably to the destruction of the forest and its under-
4 Essex Naturalist, Vol. xi., p. 116.