Flint mines on Bow Hill

Reasons for Designation

Flint mines are found where, during Neolithic and Early Bronze Age times (c.3500-1200 BC), nodules of flint were extracted from underground seams within chalk deposits. There is no pattern or regular form to the arrangement of mine sites as the shafts, pits or open-cast workings are closely related to the underlying supplies of flint rather than an overall scheme of how the mine should be organised. In general, however, the shafts, pits and spoil heaps are closely packed together and sometimes even abut one another. In overall size, flint mines range from single shafts and associated works covering less than 1ha, to large mines of several hundred shafts spread over an extensive area. Flint mines provided high quality flint for implement manufacture in the millennia before the widespread availability of metal; the discovery of ceremonial deposits, including carved objects, in some shafts indicates the importance ascribed to them by early prehistoric communities. The workings were excavated by hand with antler picks and a selection of specialist bone, antler, wood and flint tools. Extensive flint knapping floors, areas where the mined flint was worked, are sometimes found within and around the mine area, along with hearths and traces of timber buildings. Evidence of secondary uses of abandoned flint mines is fairly common, and human burials dating from Neolithic times onwards are regularly found in the upper fills of pits and shafts. The hollows left in the tops of infilled shafts also provided suitable areas for occupation long after the mines themselves had gone out of use. The distribution of flint mines is largely dictated by the extent of the Upper Chalk, which is the geological band in which seams of flint occur. Flint mines are known in most areas of Upper Chalk outcrops and generally occur on the tops of hills or ridges, or along their flanking slopes, from Norfolk to Dorset. The earliest sites, dating to the Early and Middle Neolithic period, are clustered on the Sussex Downs. Flint mines are a rare monument type, with only around 20 examples known nationally. One of relatively few classes of monuments dating to all phases of the Neolithic period, they contain evidence relating to technology and work organisation in the period and represent the source of the most commonly used and widespread material available for making edged tools and implements. All well-preserved examples are considered to be of national importance.

Despite some damage caused by occasional trees and shrubs, and ground disturbance caused by rabbits and ants, the flint mines on Bow Hill are known from partial excavation to survive well and contain archaeological remains and environmental evidence relating to the monument and the landscape in which it was constructed. The mines lie just to the south of a group of three round barrows. These monuments are broadly contemporary and their close association will therefore provide evidence for the relationship between flint extraction and funerary practice during the period of their construction and use.

Details

The monument includes an area of prehistoric flint mines situated just off the summit of a ridge of the Sussex Downs. The flint mines are an area of irregular, hummocky ground covering c.0.5ha, made up of a series of roughly circular hollows up to 16m in diameter and surviving to a depth of between 2m and 3m. These are the partially infilled remains of pits dug into the ground to reach the underground seams of flint. The circular hollows are surrounded by overlapping spoil heaps surviving to a height of up to 1m. One of the hollows was excavated in 1933, when it was found to contain a sub-rectangular pit 4m by 3m wide and 2.75m deep. Prehistoric pottery sherds, nodules of worked flint and blocks of chalk with pick marks hacked into them were discovered in the pit.

MAP EXTRACT The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

24397

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Hamilton, B C, Sussex Notes and Queries in Suspected Flint Mines on Bow Hill, Vol. 4, (1933), 246-247

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.