Barrow at Wilmot's Pool and a cairn 45m to the north

Summary

A Bronze Age barrow with a small satellite cairn on its south-east side, and a further small cairn approximately 45m to the north.

Reasons for Designation

The barrow and associated small cairns at Wilmot's Pool are scheduled for the following principal reasons:
* Potential: they will contribute to our understanding of the social organisation and burial practices of the county's Bronze Age population;
* Documentation: archaeological survey has considerably enhanced our understanding of the form and survival of these monuments;
* Group value: with both the platform cairn 156m to the east and with other scheduled monuments which collectively provide evidence of a relict funerary landscape.

History

The main period of round barrow construction occurred in the Early Bronze Age between about 2200-1500 BC, although Neolithic examples are known from as early as 3000 BC. They were constructed as earthen mounds, sometimes ditched, which covered single or multiple burials, and occur either in isolation or grouped as cemeteries and often acted as a focus of burials in later periods. Round barrows and cairns on the Quantock Hills sometimes form mixed cemeteries which are concentrations of one or more round barrows in close proximity to two or more cairns.

The Bronze Age bowl barrow (ST15303813) adjacent to Wilmot's Pool and the small cairn 45m to the north are situated on an escarpment running north-west to south-east in the Quantock Hills. Wilmot's Pool (also known as Withyman's Pool) is depicted on a map of 1609 and is considered to have been a pond for watering stock during the medieval period, but its date and origin of construction are not known. The barrow on the south-east side of the pool is depicted on the first edition Ordnance Survey (OS) map of 1888 and is also shown on modern OS maps. It was identified on aerial photographs from 1946 during the National Mapping Project and was subsequently recorded during the archaeological survey of the Quantock Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) by English Heritage between 2002 and 2004. As with most of the larger barrows and cairns on the Quantock Hills, the barrow at Wilmot's Pool shows signs of antiquarian interest, however, there are no records of archaeological excavation, which is true of all barrows and cairns in the area.

Details

PRINCIPAL ELEMENTS: a large Bronze Age barrow with a small satellite cairn on its east side, situated on the south-eastern side of Wilmot's Pool, within a post-medieval field system. Approximately 45m to the north is a further small cairn.

DESCRIPTION: the barrow comprises a roughly circular mound that stands some 1.7m high with a diameter of 22m. There is no evidence for a surrounding quarry ditch, but ditches are rarely associated with barrows on the Quantock Hills and it is likely that the barrow was constructed from material derived from elsewhere. There is a circular depression in the centre of the mound, approximately 10m by 8m, and 1.5m deep. It may have been caused by antiquarian excavation or it is possibly the site of a beacon fire. A semi-circular bank on the south edge of the mound appears to have been formed by material from this hollow. On the south-east side of the barrow is a small satellite cairn roughly 4.5m in diameter and 0.6m high, while approximately 45m to the north (ST 1529638165) is a further small cairn with a 6m diameter and standing 1.2m high.

EXTENT OF SCHEDULING: the scheduling boundaries around both the barrow and the cairn to the north which has a separate constraint area each includes a 2m margin for their support and protection.

Sources

Books and journals
Riley, H, Historic Landscape of the Quantock Hills, (2006), 30-41

Other
HER entry: 10671 Bowl barrow, E of Wilmot's Pool, Over Stowey. Somerset Historic Environment Record,

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