202 PREHISTORIC INTERMENT NEAR WALTON-ON-NAZE.
may have been eaten with the rest. It is perhaps worthy of
remark, that the Atriplex is an edible plant, and one which
was formerly more largely eaten than it is to-day. One species
of the genus, in fact, is still cultivated as a garden vegetable
in France.2
1 think there must have been at least a pint, if not more,
of these seeds. This represents a very much larger volume of
berries, and I wondered if the man might have died from the
effects of dining well, rather than wisely, upon the enticing
fruit. Dr. Keith, however, does not support this view.
No archaeological relics were found in the grave. This is
unfortunate, but is no unusual thing in the case of prehistoric
interments.
Immediately over the site of the grave, and for a radius of
several yards around it, the ancient surface was occupied by a
considerable accumulation of prehistoric debris. This consisted
of worked flints, some very rude, although small, while others
were more finely worked, together with broken pottery, lumps
of burnt clay of from three-quarters of an inch to two inches in
diameter, and much charcoal disseminated through the mass
in small fragments.
It is possible that the apparent association of the interment
with this debris which overlies it in the ancient prehistoric
surface, may be purely accidental. At the same time, the
balance of the probabilities seems to me against such a view. I
think that it is more reasonable to assume that the two are,
in all probability, directly associated together.
This consideration receives support from the fact that, at
a spot some few miles from the interment, I found another
accumulation upon the Buried Prehistoric Surface composed
of precisely the same association of debris—namely, charcoal,
lumps of burnt clay, pottery and worked flints of the same types.
Now at a spot a little below the outcrop of this bed of debris as
seen on the slope of the shore, I found what I have little hesita-
tion in believing to be an interment by cremation. I saw what
2 The seeds may have been eaten accidentally with the leaves, or intentionally. Mr.
W. Cole points out to me that the flowers, seeds, etc., of many plants are both more
nutritious and more palatable than the leaves He thinks this may possibly be the case
with Atriplex. [In an article on plant products used for food and medicine among the
Gosiute Indians, inhabiting the desert region lying to the south west of the Great Salt Lake
in the State of Utah, by Mr. R. V. Chamberlin in the February part of the Proceedings of the
Academy of Natural Sciences, of Philadelphia (quoted in Nature, 18th May, 1911. p. 390), it is
stated . . . "Seeds are gathered from Salicornia herbacea, species of Atriplex and
Chenopodium, Sisymbrium canescens, various composites, Triglochin martimum, and Typha
latifolia . . . ." All these plants, excepting S. canescens, are common on the Essex
coast.- Ed]