Round cairn on Hameldon Pasture

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

Overview

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1008919
Date first listed:: 13-Feb-1929

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1008919
Date first listed:: 13-Feb-1929
Date of most recent amendment:: 23-Sep-1994

Location

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

County:: Lancashire
District:: Burnley (District Authority)
Parish:: Worsthorne-with-Hurstwood
National Grid Reference:: SD 89118 32597

Reasons for Designation

Round cairns are prehistoric funerary monuments dating to the Bronze Age (c.2000-700 BC). They were constructed as stone mounds covering single or multiple burials. These burials may be placed within the mound in stone-lined compartments called cists. In some cases the cairn was surrounded by a ditch. Often occupying prominent locations, cairns are a major visual element in the modern landscape. They are a relatively common feature of the uplands and are the stone equivalent of the earthen round barrows of the lowlands. Their considerable variation in form and longevity as a monument type provide important information on the diversity of beliefs and social organisation amongst early prehistoric communities. They are particularly representative of their period and a substantial proportion of surviving examples are considered worthy of protection.

Despite limited antiquarian investigation of the monument's centre, the round cairn on Hameldon Pasture survives reasonably well. This investigation located human remains and pottery, and further evidence of interments and grave goods will exist within the cairn and upon the old landsurface beneath.

Details

The monument includes a round cairn located on the western edge of a moorland plateau on Hameldon Pasture. It includes a circular mound of earth and stones 13m in diameter and up to 0.3m high. There are a some shallow hollows on the cairn's surface, the largest being at the centre and measuring approximately 2.5m by 1.5m by 0.3m deep. These hollows are a legacy of limited antiquarian investigation of the cairn in 1843 by Studley Martin of nearby Ormerod House who found an undecorated urn containing the cremated remains of an adult and a child located in a stone cist at the cairn's centre.

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:: 23722
Legacy System:: RSM

Sources

Books and journals
'Trans Lancs & Chesh Antiq Soc' in Proceedings. Extwistle Moor, Burnley, , Vol. II, (1893), 158
Edwards, B J N, 'Lancs Arch Bull.' in Burnley Area Prehistoric Sites, , Vol. 7 No.4, (), 53
Other
Darvill, T, MPP Single Monument Class Descriptions - Bowl Barrows, (1989)

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.