Windmill Hill Causewayed Enclosure, Avebury, Wiltshire
This is a reconstruction drawing of Windmill Hill. It is a Neolithic causewayed enclosure. It is part of a landscape that includes an early prehistoric field system and group of eight Early Bronze Age round barrows. It is on a hill north west of Avebury Stone Circle. It has 3 sets of banks and ditches. The ditches are interrupted by causeways. These are the gaps between each section of ditch. Radio-carbon dates tell us that the enclosure was in use from about 3000BC to around 2500BC. The site was excavated by H.G.O Kendall in 1922-3, Alexander Keiller in 1925-9, I. F Smith in 1957 and A. Whittle in 1990. The finds uncovered included Neolithic flint artefacts such as arrowheads, axe-heads, a sickle blade and scrapers. Numerous animal bones and skulls as well as 'ceremonial chalk cups' were also found. A type of Neolithic pottery found on sites across Wessex was first identified here and has hence taken the name of the site: Windmill Hill type pottery. The excavation work by Kendall and Keiller was the first time that an earthwork enclosure was shown clearly to have Neolithic origins. Keiller's extensive excavations, coupled with the work of Stuart Piggott on the pottery in particular, meant that for a long time (until the 1960s), Windmill Hill was regarded as the type-site for the Neolithic of southern Britain. Read detailed archaeological description.
