Round barrow 500m south east of Painsthorpe Wold Cottages

Reasons for Designation

Bowl barrows, the most numerous form of round barrow, are funerary monuments dating from the Late Neolithic period to the Late Bronze Age, with most examples belonging to the period 2400-1500 BC. They were constructed as earthen or rubble mounds, sometimes ditched, which covered single or multiple burials. They occur either in isolation or grouped as cemeteries and often acted as a focus for burials in later periods. Often superficially similar, although differing widely in size, they exhibit regional variations in form and a diversity of burial practices. There are over 10,000 surviving bowl barrows recorded nationally (many more have already been destroyed), occurring across most of lowland Britain. Often occupying prominent locations, they are a major historic element in the modern landscape and their considerable variation of form and longevity as a monument type provide important information on the diversity of beliefs and social organisations amongst early prehistoric communities. They are particularly representative of their period and a substantial proportion of surviving examples are considered worthy of protection.

Despite disturbance in 1866 and partial excavation by Mortimer, this barrow survives reasonably well and will retain significant archaeological and environmental evidence. It is particularly unusual in that it was reused for at least one burial in the Saxon period. The monument is part of a wider group on Painsthorpe Wold, which together will increase our knowledge of both prehistoric and early medieval burial practices.

Details

The monument includes a Bronze Age round barrow on Painsthorpe Wold, one of a number of similar monuments in this area. The barrow mound is 1.75m in height and has a diameter of 20m. Although no longer visible at ground level, a ditch, from which material was excavated during the construction of the monument, surrounds the mound. This has become in-filled over the years but survives as a buried feature 3m in width. The barrow was partially excavated by J R Mortimer in 1877. He found that the mound had been disturbed some eleven years earlier when the farmer buried three cattle in the mound. Despite the 1866 disturbance, Mortimer found an Anglo-Saxon burial in the mound and a much earlier primary inhumation in a grave cut into the chalk of the wold.

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:

21099

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Mortimer, J R, Forty Years Researches in British and Saxon Burial Mounds of East Yorkshire, (1905)

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.