Reasons for Designation
The Isles of Scilly, the westernmost of the granite masses of south west
England, contain a remarkable abundance and variety of archaeological remains
from over 4000 years of human activity. The remote physical setting of the
islands, over 40km beyond the mainland in the approaches to the English
Channel, has lent a distinctive character to those remains, producing many
unusual features important for our broader understanding of the social
development of early communities.
Throughout the human occupation there has been a gradual submergence of the
islands' land area, providing a stimulus to change in the environment and its
exploitation. This process has produced evidence for responses to such change
against an independent time-scale, promoting integrated studies of
archaeological, environmental and linguistic aspects of the islands'
settlement.
The islands' archaeological remains demonstrate clearly the gradually
expanding size and range of contacts of their communities. By the post-
medieval period (from AD 1540), the islands occupied a nationally strategic
location, resulting in an important concentration of defensive works
reflecting the development of fortification methods and technology from the
mid 16th to the 20th centuries. An important and unusual range of post-
medieval monuments also reflects the islands' position as a formidable hazard
for the nation's shipping in the western approaches.
The exceptional preservation of the archaeological remains on the islands has
long been recognised, producing an unusually full and detailed body of
documentation, including several recent surveys.
Round cairns are funerary monuments of Bronze Age date (c.2000-700 BC). They
were constructed as mounds of earth and stone rubble, up to 40m in external
diameter, though usually considerably smaller, covering single or multiple
burials. A kerb of edge-set stones sometimes bounds the edge of the mound.
Burials were placed in small pits, or on occasion within a box-like structure
of stone slabs called a cist, set into the old ground surface or dug into the
body of the cairn. Round cairns can occur as isolated monuments, in small
groups or in larger cemeteries.
Round cairns form a high proportion of the 387 surviving cairns recorded on
the Isles of Scilly. Their considerable variation in form and longevity as a
monument type provides important information on the diversity of beliefs,
burial practices and social organisation in the Bronze Age and a substantial
proportion of surviving examples are considered worthy of preservation.
This round cairn close to the Carn of Works has survived well, with no evident
or recorded disturbance and it has not been excavated. The incorporation of
natural outcrops and slabs into the mound is a distinctive feature found in
certain other cairns on the Isles of Scilly but which is unusual and rare
nationally. The presence of this cairn in a group containing various other
classes of cairn shows the diversity of funerary activity during the Bronze
Age. The relationships between this and the other cairn group, the nearby
prehistoric field systems and the topography on this small island,
demonstrates well the nature of land use among prehistoric communities and the
organisation of funerary and farming activities.
Details
The monument includes a prehistoric round cairn situated on a slight natural
terrace on the upper north eastern slope of the Carn of Works eminence on the
southern part of Gugh, Isles of Scilly.
The round cairn survives with a grass-covered circular mound of heaped rubble,
6m in diameter and up to 1.25m high, incorporating a large natural granite
outcrop in its southern periphery. The outcrop, measuring 3m north-south by
2.5m east-west, extends 1.5m beyond the projected line of the mound's
perimeter.
This round cairn forms part of a larger, more dispersed, group of 22 cairns,
including two entrance graves, which occupy the southern part of Gugh. Twenty
of the cairns, including this monument, are located on or immediately north of
a low ridge which incorporates the Clapper of Works and the Carn of Works,
crossing the southern part of the island transversely. The other two cairns
are located south of the ridge. Part of a prehistoric field system is located
beyond the eastern limit of this cairn group on Dropnose Point, 140m
north east of this monument. Another large and diverse cairn group, partly
integrated with a prehistoric field system, occupies Kittern Hill on northern
Gugh, 475m to the north west.
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.
