Details

The monument includes a bowl barrow situated east of Stonehenge Bottom, 300m
south west of New King Barrow cemetery. It occupies a prominent location on
the same hilltop as New King Barrows with views across Stonehenge, The
Avenue, The Cursus and related monuments. The barrow is now `D' shaped having
been cut on its south side by the A303. The barrow has a mound 32m in
diameter surrounded by a ditch from which material was quarried during the
construction of the monument. This has become infilled over the years but
survives as a buried feature some 5m wide. The barrow has been partially
excavated twice, once in the 19th century when a primary cremation together
with amber, shale and jet objects was found, and again in 1960 when bone pins
and other material was found.

MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.

Source: Historic England

Reasons for Scheduling

A small number of areas in southern England appear to have acted as foci for
ceremonial and ritual activity during the Neolithic and Bronze Age periods.
Two of the best known and earliest recognised areas are around Avebury and
Stonehenge, now jointly designated as a World Heritage Site.
The area of chalk downland which surrounds Stonehenge contains one of the
densest and most varied groups of Neolithic and Bronze Age field monuments in
Britain. Included within the area are Stonehenge itself, the Stonehenge
cursus, the Durrington Walls henge, and a variety of burial monuments, many
grouped into cemeteries.
The area has been the subject of archaeological research since the 18th
century when Stukeley recorded many of the monuments and partially excavated a
number of the burial mounds. More recently, the collection of artefacts from
the surfaces of ploughed fields has supplemented the evidence for ritual and
burial by revealing the intensity of contemporary settlement and land-use.
In view of the importance of the area, all ceremonial and sepulchral monuments
of this period which retain significant archaeological remains are identified
as nationally important. 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, normally 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 variety of burial practices. There are over
10,000 surviving bowl barrows recorded nationally and at least 320 in the
Stonehenge area. This group of monuments will provide important information
on the development of this area during the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age
periods.

The bowl barrow 300m south west of New King Barrows survives comparatively
well and is known from partial excavation to contain archaeological remains
and environmental evidence relating to the monument and the landscape in which
it was constructed.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Books and journals
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 151
Hoare, R C, Ancient History of Wiltshire, (1812), 159
RCHME, , Stonehenge and its Environs, (1979), -

Source: Historic England