Six bowl barrows and two disc barrows forming the majority of a round barrow cemetery 300m north west of Fargo Road ammunition compound

Overview

Heritage Category: Scheduled Monument

List Entry Number: 1009124

Date first listed: 12-Jul-1973

Date of most recent amendment: 23-Mar-1995

Location

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

National Grid Reference: SU 10321 44654

Summary

Legacy Record - This information may be included in the List Entry Details.

Reasons for Designation

A small number of areas in southern England appear to have acted as foci for ceremonial and ritual activity during the Neolithic and Bronze Age periods. Two of the best known and earliest recognised areas are around Avebury and Stonehenge, now jointly designated as a World Heritage Site. The area of chalk downland which surrounds Stonehenge contains one of the densest and most varied groups of Neolithic and Bronze Age field monuments in Britain. Included within the area are Stonehenge itself, the Stonehenge cursus, the Durrington Walls henge, and a variety of burial monuments, many grouped into cemeteries. The area has been the subject of archaeological research since the 18th century when Stukeley recorded many of the monuments and partially excavated a number of the burial mounds. More recently, the collection of artefacts from the surfaces of ploughed fields has supplemented the evidence for ritual and burial by revealing the intensity of contemporary settlement and land-use. In view of the importance of the area, all ceremonial and sepulchral monuments of this period which retain significant archaeological remains are identified as nationally important. Round barrow cemeteries date to the Bronze Age (2000-700 BC). They comprise closely spaced groups of up to 30 round barrows - rubble or earthen mounds covering single or multiple burials. Most cemeteries developed over a considerable period of time, often many centuries, and in some cases acted as a focus for burials as late as the early medieval period. They exhibit considerable diversity of burial rite, plan and form, frequently including several different types of round barrow and occasionally associated with earlier long barrows. Where investigation beyond the round barrows has occurred, contemporary or later 'flat' burials between the barrow mounds have often been revealed. Round barrow cemeteries occur across most of lowland England with a marked concentration in Wessex. In some cases they are clustered around other important contemporary monuments, as is the case both here and at Avebury. Often occupying prominent positions, they are a major historic element in the modern landscape, while their diversity and their longevity as a monument type provide important information on the variety of beliefs and social organisation amongst early prehistoric communities.

The round barrow cemetery 300m north west of Fargo Road ammunition compound will contain archaeological remains despite disturbance caused by recent military activity and the construction of The Packway. It contains examples of rare types of barrow, including disc barrows of which there are only 250 examples recorded nationally, and saucer barrows of which only 60 are known.

History

Legacy Record - This information may be included in the List Entry Details.

Details

The monument includes eight of the nine round barrows which make up a nucleated round barrow cemetery on Rollestone Bake Farm, 300m north west of Fargo Road ammunition compound. The cemetery contains six bowl barrows, arranged in a linear group aligned broadly north to south, two disc barrows and a saucer barrow. The saucer barrow forms an outlier to the cemetery and is the subject of a separate scheduling.

Of the bowl barrow mounds, only four are visible as earthworks, the other two having been levelled, possibly by recent military activity. The surviving mounds range in size from 15m to 20m in diameter and are up to 1m high. The southern side of the southern and south western bowl barrow mounds are cut by the line of the road. The remaining two barrows are known from early mapped representations.

The easternmost of the two disc barrows, some 100m east of the line of bowl barrows, is c.46m in diameter and includes a mound and surrounding berm or platform. Immediately to the west and almost adjoining this is the second disc barrow. This is now difficult to identify on the ground, being in an area of linear earthworks, probably representing modern military activity. Its extent and location are however recorded on early maps.

All the barrows are surrounded by ditches from which material was quarried during their construction. These have become largely infilled over the years but survive as slight earthworks in the case of the extant disc barrow and two of the bowl barrows. The remainder of the ditches survive as buried features. Surrounding the ditches of the two disc barrows are outer banks. On the extant example this survives to 8m wide and 0.25m high. The bank of the western disc barrow is known from maps to have been of similar size, though this has now been levelled.

The Packway which cuts the mounds of the southern and south western barrows is excluded from the scheduling although the ground beneath is included. The north-south and the east-west dirt tracks which cross the monument at the southern end are included in the scheduling.

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: 10233

Legacy System: RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 219
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 190
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 190
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 190
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 190
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 190
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 219
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 190
Other

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 Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.