Details

The monument includes five bowl barrows and two saucer barrows forming a round
barrow cemetery on Winterbourne Stoke Down. The monument is situated some 300m
north west of the Winterbourne Stoke crossroads round barrow cemetery, on a
high plateau.
The two saucer barrows form the northern limit of the cemetery. Each has a
mound 15m in diameter, surrounded by a ditch and outer bank, with overall
diameters of 30m for the western barrow and 31m for the eastern. The five bowl
barrows have mounds which range from 8m to 20m in diameter and from 0.4m to
2.25m in height. The mounds are surrounded by ditches, from which material was
quarried during their construction. These have mostly become infilled over
the years and survive as buried features, but the ditch of the southernmost
bowl barrow is visible as an earthwork 3m wide and 0.4m deep.
All the barrows were partially excavated in the 19th century. Six of the
mounds produced primary cremations, two with pottery vessels, and the seventh
barrow, the most south easterly, produced primary and secondary inhumations.
The track, now little used - which crosses the monument is included in the
scheduling. The eastern grass verge of the A360 is included in the scheduling.
All fence posts are excluded from the scheduling, but the ground beneath these
features is included.

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

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.
Round barrow cemeteries date to the Bronze Age (2000-700 BC). They comprise
closely spaced groups of up to 30 round barrows - rubble or earthen mounds
covering single or multiple burials. Most cemeteries developed over a
considerable period of time, often many centuries, and in some cases acted as
a focus for burials as late as the early medieval period. They exhibit
considerable diversity of burial rite, plan and form, frequently including
several different types of round barrow and occasionally associated with
earlier long barrows. Where investigation beyond the round barrows has
occurred, contemporary or later 'flat' burials between the barrow mounds have
often been revealed. Round barrow cemeteries occur across most of lowland
England with a marked concentration in Wessex. In some cases they are
clustered around other important contemporary monuments, as is the case both
here and at Avebury. Often occupying prominent positions, they are a major
historic element in the modern landscape, while their diversity and their
longevity as a monument type provide important information on the variety of
beliefs and social organisation amongst early prehistoric communities.

Bowl barrows, the most numerous form of round barrow, are funerary monuments
dating from the Late Neolithic period to the Late Bronze Age. They were
constructed as earthen or rubble mounds, normally ditched, which covered
single or multiple burials. Often superficially similar, although differing
widely in size, they exhibit regional variations in form and a variety of
burial practices. The burials, either inhumations or cremations, are
sometimes accompanied by pottery vessels, tools and personal ornaments. There
are over 10,000 surviving bowl barrows recorded nationally and at least 320 in
the Stonehenge area.

Saucer barrows are funerary monuments of the Early Bronze Age. They occur
either in isolation or, as in this case, in round barrow cemeteries. They were
constructed as a circular area of level ground defined by a bank and internal
ditch and largely occupied by a single low, squat mound covering one or more
burials, usually in a pit. The burials, either inhumations or cremations, are
sometimes accompanied by pottery vessels, tools and personal ornaments. Saucer
barrows are one of the rarest recognised forms of round barrow, with about 60
examples nationally, most of which are in Wessex. At least ten examples are
known from the Stonehenge area.

The round barrow cemetery on Winterbourne Stoke Down survives well and is an
outstanding example of its type. The five bowl barrows and two saucer barrows
are 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), 201
Grinsell, LV, The Victoria History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume V, (1957), 224
Hoare, R C, Ancient History of Wiltshire, (1812), 121

Source: Historic England