Details

The monument includes two contiguous bowl barrows within Seven Hills barrow
cemetery, adjacent to and overlooking the A45 in a narrow belt of woodland
between the A1156, to the north, and the Ipswich-Felixstowe railway line to
the south. The barrows are visible as earthen mounds in a south-east to north-
west alignment, the first standing to a height of 1.2m and the second to a
height of 1.6m, covering overlapping circular areas which measure c.22m and
26m in diameter respectively. The combined length of the two barrows on the
south-east to north-west axis is c.46m. They lie c.40m north-west of the most
densely clustered group of barrows in the cemetery.

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 two contiguous barrows 460m south-east of White House Farm are components
of one of the best examples of a round barrow cemetery in Suffolk. Most such
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 different types of round barrow and, wherever large scale
investigation beyond barrows has been undertaken, revealing contemporary or
later 'flat' burials between the barrow mounds. The two barrows survive well
and will retain important archaeological information. Evidence concerning
their construction, the relationship between them, the manner and duration of
their use, and also the local environment, at and prior to the time of their
construction, will be preserved in the mounds and in the soils buried beneath
them. Seven Hills cemetery is part of a larger group of round barrows and
circular ditched enclosures which extend in a line to the south-east, over a
distance of 3km, to Levington Heath. The former parish boundary between
Nacton, to the south, and Bucklesham and Foxhall, to the north, follows the
same line, showing a relationship which is of particular interest for the
study of the prehistoric and medieval landscape history of the area.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Books and journals
Wodderspoon, J, Memorials of Ipswich, (1850)
Other
Suffolk SMR ACQ30, 31,

Source: Historic England