Collared urn from Carneddau II excavations.

In the summer of 1989, the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust excavated a Bronze Age cairn, near Carno, to recover buried archaeological information in response to a forestry planting application.

The site proved to date to c. 1800 BC and to have had a complex history, undergoing several changes and additions. The burials and rituals carried out at the site also proved to be complex involving funeral pyres and cremation burials.

In 1990, further excavations were carried out on a monument which turned out to be another Bronze Age cairn. The cairn proved to be similar to that excavated in 1989 and covered a number of cremation burials placed in pits dug into the subsoil. Some of these burials were also placed in collared urns like the one shown here.

The top (collar) of the urn has been decorated with a twisted cord or string which has been impressed into the clay while the pot was still soft and wet. Charcoal from the contents of the urn has produced a radiocarbon date of c.1700 BC.

Description: Powysland Museum and Montgomery Canal Centre