Long barrow 500m north of Lugbury Farm

Reasons for Designation

Long barrows were constructed as earthen or drystone mounds with flanking ditches and acted as funerary monuments during the Early and Middle Neolithic periods (3400-2400 BC). They represent the burial places of Britain's early farming communities and, as such, are amongst the oldest field monuments surviving visibly in the present landscape. Where investigated, long barrows appear to have been used for communal burial, often with only parts of the human remains having been selected for interment. Certain sites provide evidence for several phases of funerary monument preceding the barrow and, consequently, it is probable that long barrows acted as important ritual sites for local communities over a considerable period of time. Some 500 long barrows are recorded in England. As one of the few types of Neolithic structure to survive as earthworks, and due to their comparative rarity, their considerable age and their longevity as a monument type, all long barrows are considered to be nationally important.

The 180 long barrows of Hampshire, Wiltshire and Dorset form the densest and one of the most significant concentrations of monuments of this type in the country. The Lugbury Farm barrow is important as, despite partial excavation of the site on two separate occasions and cultivation of part of the barrow mound, much of the monument survives intact, in particular the buried ground surface and ditches. The site therefore has potential for the recovery of further archaeological remains as well as environmental evidence relating to the period in which the monument was constructed. The importance of the site is enhanced by the survival of numerous Bronze Age burial monuments in the immediate area. Combined, these give an indication of how settlement of the area continued between the 5th and 2nd millennia BC.

Details

The monument includes a long barrow set on level ground above the valley of By Brook, a tributary of the River Avon. It is orientated east-west and appears rectangular in shape. The monument measures 56m long, 38m wide and 1.5m high. Towards the eastern end of the mound are the remains of a limestone chamber comprising a capstone, 3m by 2m in size, leaning against the western side of two large uprights which measure 2m by 1m. Flanking ditches, from which material was quarried during the construction of the monument, run parallel to the north and south sides of the mound. These have been infilled over the years but survive as buried features c.3m wide. The monument was partially excavated by Colt-Hoare in 1821 and again by Scrope in 1854/5. Finds included twenty-six skeletons in four limestone chambers.

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:

12290

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Wiltshire Archaeological Magazine in Wiltshire Archaeological Magazine, Vol. 49, (1958)

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