Details

The monument is located on a gentle, north facing slope to the south of
Babingley River, and it includes a bowl barrow and an adjoining section of a
later boundary bank and ditch which cross the southern edge of the barrow. The
barrow is visible as an earthen mound with a ditch around it. The mound,
which stands to a height of c.1.5m, was originally probably circular in form,
but now covers an oval area measuring c.34m east-west by 27m. The surrounding
ditch, from which earth was dug and used during the construction of the
barrow, has become largely infilled but is marked by a hollow c.4m wide
and up to 0.4m deep in the ground surface around the north, west and east
sides of the mound. The subsequent digging of the linear boundary ditch on
the south side of the mound has obscured and partly removed the original
barrow ditch in that area, and also accounts for the truncated form of the
mound itself. This later ditch and the associated slight bank which runs
along its southern edge probably mark a wood boundary. The ditch measures
c.0.5m in depth and between 4m and 5m in width, and the bank measures c.2m in
width.

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

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.

The bowl barrow 700m south of Mill House survives well and will retain
archaeological information concerning its construction and the manner and
duration of its use. Evidence for the local environment prior to and during
that time will be preserved also in soils buried beneath the mound and in the
fill of the barrow ditch. The monument lies c.360m south west of another bowl
barrow, and the two are among a small number of round barrows sited near the
low escarpment of the Greensand Belt, overlooking the eastern edge of the Fens
and the marshes bordering the Wash to the west. As a group, these barrows
provide some evidence for the character and density of prehistoric settlement
in the area.
Prehistoric barrows were sometimes reused as markers or points of alignment in
much later boundaries, and the relationship between this barrow and the linear
ditch and bank which cross its southern edge is thus of particular interest
for the study of local landscape history.

Source: Historic England