Robin Hood's Ball, causewayed enclosure

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

Overview

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1009593
Date first listed:: 29-Jul-1965

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1009593
Date first listed:: 29-Jul-1965
Date of most recent amendment:: 31-Jan-1990

Location

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

District:: Wiltshire (Unitary Authority)
Parish:: Figheldean
District:: Wiltshire (Unitary Authority)
Parish:: Shrewton
National Grid Reference:: SU 10225 45956

Reasons for Designation

The most complete and extensive survival of chalk downland archaeological remains in central southern England occurs on Salisbury Plain, particularly in those areas lying within the Salisbury Plain Training Area. These remains represent one of the few extant archaeological "landscapes" in Britain and are considered to be of special significance because they differ in character from those in other areas with comparable levels of preservation. Individual sites on Salisbury Plain are seen as being additionally important because the evidence of their direct association with each other survives so well.

Causewayed enclosures represent a major category of site during the neolithic, fulfilling a range of settlement and ceremonial functions. Causewayed enclosures are rare nationally and would normally be considered worthy of protection. Only a single example, Robin Hood's Ball, is recorded in the Salisbury Plain Training Area. The monument forms the focus of a series of prehistoric funerary monuments all of which are considered to be nationally important in their own right.

Details

A double ditched causewayed enclosure. It is irregular in plan with an inner area of c.75h acres. There is a rifle butt built into the south-west corner. Neolithic pottery has been found and excavation of the ditches took place in the 1950's.

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:: 10120
Legacy System:: RSM

Sources

Other
Trust for Wessex Archaeology, (1987)
Wiltshire Library & Museum Service, (1987)

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.