Details

The monument includes a platform barrow set on a gentle south facing slope in
an area of chalk downland. The barrow consists of a central flat topped mound
or platform 18m in diameter and standing to a height of 0.6m. Around the
platform is a ditch from which material was quarried during the construction
of the monument. This has become partly infilled over the years but survives
to the south of the platform as a depression 3.5m wide and 0.4m deep and to
the north as a buried feature c.3.5m wide. Beyond the ditch are the remains
of the outer bank which survives as a spread concentration of chalk c.4m wide
and which in 1934 was recorded as being a broad low bank.

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.

Source: Historic England

Reasons for Scheduling

Platform barrows, funerary monuments dating to the Bronze Age (2000-700 BC),
are the rarest of the recognised types of round barrow, with fewer than 50
examples recorded nationally. They occur widely across southern England with a
marked concentration in East and West Sussex and can occur either in barrow
cemeteries (closely-spaced groups of barrows) or singly. They were constructed
as low, flat-topped mounds of earth surrounded by a shallow ditch,
occasionally crossed by an entrance causeway. None of the known examples
stands higher than 1m above ground level, and most are considerably lower than
this. Due to their comparative visual insignificance when compared to the
larger types of round barrow, few were explored by 19th century antiquarians.
As a result, few platform barrows are disturbed by excavation and,
consequently, they remain a poorly understood class of monument. Their
importance lies in their potential for illustrating the diversity of beliefs
and burial practices in the Bronze Age and, due to their extreme rarity and
considerable fragility, all identified platform barrows would normally be
considered to be of national importance.

Despite some disturbance to the Bepton Down monument by cultivation, it
survives comparatively well and has potential for the recovery of
archaeological remains and environmental evidence relating to the landscape in
which the monument was constructed.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Books and journals
Grinsell, L V, 'Sussex Archaeological Collections' in Sussex Barrows, , Vol. 75, (1934)

Source: Historic England