GIB HILL BARROW – SK157634

Gib Hill barrow consists of one mound on top of another, there is a 27 x 24 metre round barrow and an earlier 44 x 27 metre long barrow. Although the name implies that the site was used for a gibbet there is no evidence of this.
Excavations in the early 19th century found human bones and Roman coins.
In 1824 William Bateman (the father of Thomas Bateman) excavated the site and it is probable that he owned the field as he is shown as the occupier of the land on the 1819 Enclosure Award for the parish.
The trench showed that the earlier long barrow was made of clay mixed in layers with charcoal and cremated human bones. A flint and what was probably a polished stone axe were found.
In 1848 Thomas Bateman excavated the site by digging a tunnel into the mound from the south. He found flints and scattered oxen bones in the lower clay. When he had almost completed the excavation a stone cist, which had probably been place on top of the long barrow when the round barrow was built, crashed through the roof of his tunnel. Bateman removed the cist and re-erected it in the grounds of Lomberdale House. Now it has been replaced in its rightful location and its capstone can be seen on the summit of the barrow.