Two bowl barrows known as Hawling Downs round barrows, 610m north east of Slade Barn Farm

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

Overview

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1017037
Date first listed:: 09-Oct-1981

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Scheduled Monument
List Entry Number:: 1017037
Date first listed:: 09-Oct-1981
Date of most recent amendment:: 13-Oct-1999

Location

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

County:: Gloucestershire
District:: Tewkesbury (District Authority)
Parish:: Hawling
National Grid Reference:: SP 06933 21903

Reasons for Designation

Bowl barrows, the most numerous form of round barrow, are funerary monuments dating from the Late Neolithic period to the Late Bronze Age, with most examples belonging to the period 2400-1500 BC. They were constructed as earthen or rubble mounds, sometimes ditched, which covered single or multiple burials. They occur either in isolation or grouped as cemeteries and often acted as a focus for burials in later periods. Often superficially similar, although differing widely in size, they exhibit regional variations in form and a diversity of burial practices. There are over 10,000 surviving bowl barrows recorded nationally (many more have already been destroyed), occurring across most of lowland Britain. Often occupying prominent locations, they are a major historic element in the modern landscape and their considerable variation of form and longevity as a monument type provide important information on the diversity of beliefs and social organisations amongst early prehistoric communities. They are particularly representative of their period and a substantial proportion of surviving examples are considered worthy of protection.

Despite some disturbance by cultivation, the two bowl barrows known as Hawling Downs round barrows, 610m north east of Slade Barn Farm survive reasonably well and lie within an area of significant prehistoric activity with a number of round barrows within 2km in all directions. The barrow mounds will contain evidence for primary and secondary burials, along with grave goods, which will provide information about prehistoric funerary practices and about the size of the local community at that time. The barrow mounds will also preserve environmental information in the buried original ground surface, predating the construction of the barrows and giving an insight into the landscape in which the monument was set. The mounds and their surrounding ditches will contain environmental evidence in the form of organic remains, which will relate both to the barrows and the wider landscape. In addition the area between the mounds will also contain information in the form of satellite burials, grave goods and other artefacts which will provide further insights into prehistoric burial rituals.

Details

The monument includes two bowl barrows aligned north west to south east, located just below the crest of a hill in the Cotswolds, 610m north east of Slade Barn Farm. The northern barrow has a mound which measures about 25m in diameter and about 0.07m high, while the southern barrow mound is about 27m in diameter and 0.05m high. Each mound is surrounded by a ditch from which material was excavated during the construction of the barrows. These ditches are no longer visible at ground level, having become infilled over the years, but survive as buried features about 2m wide.

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:: 32368
Legacy System:: RSM

Sources

Books and journals
O`Neil, H E, Grinsell, L V, 'Proc of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Arch Soc' in Gloucestershire Barrows, , Vol. LXXIX, (1960), 118

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.