Long barrow on Redhill

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1008289
Date first listed:: 29-Apr-1955

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1008289
Date first listed:: 29-Apr-1955
Date of most recent amendment:: 20-May-1994

Location

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

District:: North Somerset (Unitary Authority)
Parish:: Wrington
National Grid Reference:: ST 49956 63603

Reasons for Designation

Long barrows were constructed as earthen or drystone mounds with flanking ditches and acted as funerary monuments during the Early and Middle Neolithic periods (3400-2400 BC). They represent the burial places of Britain's early farming communities and, as such, are amongst the oldest field monuments surviving visibly in the present landscape. Where investigated, long barrows appear to have been used for communal burial, often with only parts of the human remains having been selected for interment. Certain sites provide evidence for several phases of funerary monument preceding the barrow and, consequently, it is probable that long barrows acted as important ritual sites for local communities over a considerable period of time. Some 500 long barrows are recorded in England. As one of the few types of Neolithic structure to survive as earthworks, and due to their comparative rarity, their considerable age and their longevity as a monument type, all long barrows are considered to be nationally important.

The long barrow on Redhill survives well and contains archaeological and environmental information relating to the monument and the landscape in which it was constructed.

Details

The monument includes a long barrow orientated east-west and situated just below the crest of Redhill. The barrow has a mound c.53m long, c.11m wide and c.0.6m high. Both ends are rounded, the eastern end being higher than the west. Flanking either side of the mound are side ditches from which material was quarried during the construction of the monument. These are not visible at ground level as they have become infilled over the years, but they survive as buried features c.3m wide. The field boundary which runs across the monument at right angles c.4m in from the western end is excluded from the scheduling, although the underlying ground is included.

MAP EXTRACT The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract. It includes a 2 metre boundary around the archaeological features, considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:: 22820
Legacy System:: RSM

Sources

Other
Dimensions of long mound,

Legal

This monument is scheduled under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 as amended as it appears to the Secretary of State to be of national importance. This entry is a copy, the original is held by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.