Rectangular earthwork on Nebsworth

Summary

English Civil War fieldwork 300m south-east of Woodmeadow Farm.

Reasons for Designation

English Civil War fieldworks are earthworks which were raised during military operations between 1642 and 1645 to provide temporary protection for infantry or to act as gun emplacements. The earthworks, which may have been reinforced with revetting and palisades, consisted of banks and ditches and varied in complexity from simple breastworks to complex systems of banks and inter- connected trenches. They can be recognised today as surviving earthworks or as crop- or soil-marks on aerial photographs. The circumstances and cost of their construction may be referred to in contemporary historical documents. Fieldworks are recorded widely throughout England with concentrations in the main areas of campaigning. Those with a defensive function were often sited to protect settlements or their approaches. Those with an offensive function were designed to dominate defensive positions and to contain the besieged areas. There are some 150 surviving examples of fieldworks recorded nationally. All examples which survive well and/or represent particular forms of construction are important. Despite some cultivation and burrowing animal damage the English Civil War fieldwork 300m south east of Woodmeadow Farm survives comparatively well and will contain archaeological and environmental evidence relating to its construction, function, longevity, social, strategic, political and military significance and overall landscape context.

History

See Details.

Details

This record was the subject of a minor enhancement on 2 June 2015. This record has been generated from an "old county number" (OCN) scheduling record. These are monuments that were not reviewed under the Monuments Protection Programme and are some of our oldest designation records. As such they do not yet have the full descriptions of their modernised counterparts available. Please contact us if you would like further information.

This monument includes an English Civil War gun emplacement or fieldwork situated on the upper north-east facing slopes of the very prominent hill called Nebsworth overlooking the valleys of several tributaries to the Small Brook. The gun emplacement survives as a square earthwork which measures approximately 36m long and wide and is defined by a buried outer ditch, a slight bank of from 0.6m up to 0.9m high with a central hollow, and a further slight hollow of 3m wide to the north east. Alternatively identified in the past as a possible Roman farmstead or medieval enclosure, its similarities to the English Civil War gun emplacement excavated in Skipton in 1968 seem to confirm its present definition.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

WA 115

Legacy System:

RSM - OCN

Sources

Other
PastScape 330780
Warwickshire HER 2704, 9199 and 9200

End of official list entry

All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.

Print the official list entry