EARLY MAN
EARLY MAN The form of the horse's figure as represented on the ancient British coins is known to be a debased copy of the elegantly depicted animals represented on the beautiful pieces struck by Philip II of Macedon, but it shows, like the Uffington White Horse, a certain artistic power on the part of the ancient British artificers to whom both works may reason- ably be attributed. It is very difficult to explain the purpose of these gigantic hill-side figures. In Buckinghamshire they take the form of crosses. At Cerne Abbas (Dorset), and at Wilmington (Sussex) there are very large human figures represented in the same way on the hill-sides. They seem always to have been so placed as to be visible over a considerable district, and although there are certain slight variations perhaps, the rule seems to have been for them to occupy the side of a hill which faces in more or less of a northern direction. Usually a prominent spur of a range of hills has been selected for the purpose, and it is quite clear that it was part of the purpose, whatever that purpose may have been, for the figures to be clearly seen from great distances. The selection of chalk hills, again, and the removal of the turf so as to leave the chalk bare, are indications which point to the conclusion that these figures had some close connexion with the people of the districts in which we find them. It is almost impossible to doubt that they were more or less intimately related to the religion of the ancient Britons. The periodical scourings or weedings to which the White Horses were subjected at a somewhat later date, and the cudgel-playing and other rural sports and festivities which always followed, may very well be the modern survivals of periodical religious gatherings when the inhabitants of the Vale of the White Horse met for religious rites or ceremonies. The explanation suggested by the Rev. Francis Wise, and offered in a well-known book' on the subject, that the White Horse at Uffington is a memorial of the great battle in which Ethelred and Alfred defeated the Danes in 871, is not now generally accepted. ANCIENT BRITISH COINS The ancient British coins found at various times in Berkshire can hardly be described as numerous, but they are of great variety and interest. At Weycock, associated with Roman remains was found a small coin of tin, without inscription, but bearing on the obverse a very rude representation of the human head, possibly meant to appear helmeted, and on the reverse a long-bodied animal probably intended for a horse. The attenuated body and neck of this animal are almost suggestive of that ancient White Horse on the hill-side at Uffington which gives its name to the valley already mentioned which it overlooks. Another coin of unusual beauty is that inscribed (obv.) CUIMOB, and (rev.) TASCIIOVANTIS, of which specimens have been found at Sandy 1 T. Hughes, The Scouring of the White Horse. 191
