Details

The monument includes an enclosure, known as a Highworth circle, located 350m
north east of Common Farm.
The enclosure is sub-rectangular with rounded corners and survives partly as a
low earthwork which includes a ditch surrounded by an outer bank. The
remainder of the circuit is visible on aerial photographs which allows a
length of 99m and a width of 64m to be calculated.

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

Highworth circles are a type of earthwork enclosure found mostly in north east
Wiltshire, with a few outliers north of the Thames in Oxfordshire. Although
they are known as `circles' their form varies from circular or sub-circular,
with diameters of between 40m and 90m, to sub-rectangular. All have a wide
flat bottomed ditch with an external bank. Despite limited fieldwork and
excavation their date remains uncertain. Although sharing characteristics with
henge monuments of Neolithic date Highworth circles, located almost entirely
within the Hundred of Highworth, may be suggested as being of medieval date,
possibly constructed for stock management. Over 40 examples have been
recorded, many of them reduced by modern cultivation.
All examples exhibiting significant survival of archaeological remains will
normally be identified as nationally important.
Despite surviving incompletely, the Highworth circle 350m north east of Common
Farm will contain archaeological remains and environmental evidence relating
to the monument and the landscape in which it was constructed.

Source: Historic England