Newsletter 43 - Spring 2005

Rainbow Bar, Hill Head; Final Thoughts.

Brian Hack

The littoral Stone Age site at Rainbow Bar, Hill Head, was discovered 55 years ago by Chris Draper. He recognised that some of the artefacts he was recovering were of very archaic appearance. He transmitted details of his discoveries to various learned bodies and subsequently published a short illustrated account (Draper, 1951).

The site at Rainbow Bar is currently below the surface of the Solent for most of each 24-hour period. It is accessible approximately four hours after high-water, and is seen to best advantage in Spring Tide conditions. This difficulty of access accounts for the lack of any serious attempts to work the site. This is unfortunate as the artefacts of early type at Rainbow Bar are not found in the low-level gravel cliffs, which are a feature of the immediate coastline, nor are they to be found on other shoreline gravel exposures in the area.

During the Holocene and preceding Pleistocene periods climatic and geological disturbances caused immense changes to our land and seascapes. Some land surfaces have been subject to repeated coverage and exposure by the sea. The unravelling of the Rainbow Bar geological sequence is impossible at the present time.

The most relevant exercise is to make a typological comparison between flints from Rainbow Bar and those from across the English Channel. Examples are quoted by Roe (1981) and ApSimon (1982) and artefacts found at St Colomban and published by Monnier (1986) bear striking similarities to some of the Rainbow Bar material.

References

• ApSimon, A M, 1982, Proc Prehist Soc 48,pp526-8.
• Draper, J C, 1951, The Stone Industries at Rainbow Bar, Arch Newsletter 3 (9) 147-9.
• Monnier, J L, 1986, in The Palaeolithic of Britain and its nearest neighbours; recent trends. (ed S.N. Collcutt). Sheffield, p 44:
• Roe, D A, 1981, The Lower Palaeoloithic and Middle Palaeolithic periods in Britain, RKP, p150.

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