The barrow stands high, and is about in diameter. It was recorded as high around 1907, but, in 1923, as high. It is covered in trees, likely planted in the nineteenth century, and surrounded by a high dry stoneretaining wall. The presence of Romano–British grey wares in its soil, like the downward sloping surrounding land, suggests that it may have been constructed by scraping up the surrounding topsoil. The land around the barrow is cultivated up to its edges; in 1992, it was planted with barley crops. Originally the barrow probably stood larger; in 1923 an elliptical section surrounding the southwest circumference was recorded as approximately higher than the field, suggesting that it was once a part of the barrow. That the barrow's finds were not in the centre of its present dimensions also suggests that its original dimensions were somewhat different. Slippage of the barrow's soil may also help explain the changed dimensions, and the recorded reduction in height over time.
Excavation
The barrow was excavated in August 1923, and again in 1924, by George Bowles, the brother in law of the second Baron Redesdale, who owned the land. Permission to excavate had been unsuccessfully sought in 1872, on behalf of George Rolleston. The 1923 excavation was overseen by Bowles, although actually carried out by a Tom Arnold and five helpers. Bowles was also aided by Edward Thurlow Leeds, then assistant keeper at the University of Oxford's Ashmolean Museum; Leeds offered suggestions, visited the site, and published the main discoveries. He published the 1923 excavation along with an excavation plot by Bowls in The Antiquaries Journal in April 1924, and briefly discussed the 1924 excavation 15 years later in a chapter of A History of Oxfordshire. Both excavations are also plotted, probably by Leeds, on a piece of blue linen held by the Ashmolean. Bowles dug an irregular, seven-cornered polygonal trench in 1923, and in 1924 added a rectangular trench to its side, along with four 18-inch-square trenches in the area of the raised surrounding soil. He began by sinking a shaft 12 feet square and 12 feet deep; to this he added several subsequent extensions, each to the level of the field or below. He labeled the corners A–H on his plot, omitting the F. Bowles determined the barrow to be undisturbed and to consist of earth mixed with stones, along with the occasional sherd of Romano–British pottery. The surface level was coated in yellowish clay, perhaps brought up from the River Windrush nearby. This faded away toward corner B, Bowles noted, but was prevalent around corner G, the southern limit of the excavation. Atop the clay Bowles found an abundance of charcoal and ashes, six inches thick in places, and forming only a thin covering elsewhere. Bowles also recorded a large charred timber, between points G and H. The barrow contained a large assemblage of items, of a quality indicating the high-status nature of the burial. There were at least seven vessels: three pottery, two hand-made jars, a Merovingian bottle, and a small silver bowl or cup. Fragments of foil, five of which were stamped with zoomorphic interlace patterns, suggest the burial of a decorated drinking horn, and a pear-shaped mount was both patterned and gilded. Other items appear to have been made of bone, and were likely pieces from a gaming set. The finds were donated to the Ashmolean.
