Details

The monument includes South Lodge camp, a Bronze Age settlement enclosure
of Martin Down style, together with a round barrow cemetery containing six
barrows situated about 145m to the north, and the surviving portion of a
surrounding field system. The monument is situated on a gentle west facing
slope overlooking a dry valley.
The enclosure and barrows were excavated by General Pitt-Rivers between
1880 and 1893 and subsequently restored as earthworks. Pitt-Rivers
recorded only one lynchet but the field system was more extensively
surveyed in 1924 by his assistant, Toms. The enclosure, the field system
and three of the barrows were re-examined between 1977 and 1981 by Richard
Bradley and John Barrett.
The irregular rectilinear enclosure, little disturbed prior to the 19th
century excavations, is about 0.3ha in size with an entrance on the
western side. It was positioned in the corner of an existing field,
overlying two lynchets.
It was originally defined to the north and south by a steep-sided ditch,
on average 2.9m wide at the top, with a flat bottom, about 0.3m wide, and
about 2m deep. Inside the ditch was a slight bank, rising no more than
0.5m above the interior, defined on the eastern and western sides by the
positive lynchets of the earlier field and, on the northern and southern
sides, by banks of chalk derived from the ditch. Bradley and Barrett
suggested that the ditch was partially backfilled almost immediately and
the remaining chalk upcast spread over the interior of the enclosure.
Found within the enclosure was a mound of burnt flint, about 4m by 7.5m in
size and probably signifying a cooking area, which probably belongs to an
earlier phase of unenclosed settlement. The remains of two round timber
buildings were also identified in the interior, one apparently aligned on
the entrance, together with other post holes and pits. Finds include
fragments of pottery and worked flint as well as a few pieces of worked
bone and six bronze objects.
The lynchets of the field system are visible as slight earthworks, up to
0.75m high, surrounding the enclosure and barrow cemetery. They are
probably part of a more extensive field system, the full extent of which
is not known as it has been reduced by ploughing and forestry activities.
Two main phases of use were identified, the earlier represented by a short
stretch of lynchet extending north-south adjacent to the eastern side of
the most westerly barrow, pre-dating the cemetery. The main lynchets are
largely evenly spaced down the hillside running approximately north
west/south east, ending on the western side at the edge of a dry valley.
To the west of the enclosure, running parallel to it, is a short length of
double lynchet defining a trackway. A large pit on the edge of this
trackway, excavated in the 19th century, was a maximum of 7m in diameter
and 2.25m deep and contained fragments of a female skeleton and a
Neolithic polished flint axe fragment. The relationship of the pit and the
lynchet was not determined, making its exact date unclear. However, the
axe suggests that it was earlier than the field system.
The cemetery, known as the Barrow Pleck cemetery, originally contained six
closely spaced barrows, one of which Pitt-Rivers recorded had been
destroyed before he came to the estate. The remaining barrows were all
excavated and reconstructed by the General between 1880 and 1883. Three
barrows were partially re-examined in 1978 when sample areas around all
the barrows were also excavated. Originally the barrows ranged in diameter
between 7m and 17.2m and in height from less than 0.4m to 2.6m. All the
mounds were surrounded by quarry ditches from which material was derived
for their construction, ranging in width between 1m and 2.5m and between
0.25m and 0.9m in depth. Two of the barrows had causeways across the ditch
on the south east side of the mound. Three barrows had single cremations
placed beneath the mounds while one had nine recorded burials and one had
none. Cremations were placed in pits beneath the mounds and were sometimes
associated with pottery urns, within the ditches, on the causeway and
outside the ditch in at least two cases. At least 24 cremation burials
were identified, along with a crouched inhumation. All barrow ditches were
recut at a later stage and deposits of flint deliberately placed in them,
sometimes sealing cremation deposits. Other finds include fragments of
pottery and worked flints as well as a small fragment of twisted bronze
neck ring and the tip of a bronze spearhead, found with a cremation.
For display purposes Pitt-Rivers constructed concrete plinths to show the
positions of the cremations under the barrows and reconstructed the
enclosure bank and barrow mounds. In some cases the recreated earthworks
may be more substantial than they were in the Bronze Age.
The excavations identified a long history of activity at the site in the
Early and Middle Bronze Age, although most of the earthworks of this
monument date to the later part of that period. An open settlement, the
character of which is undefined, existed at the site prior to the first
phase of agriculture in which the lynchets began to form. The cemetery was
located in an uncultivated plot of land and the field system continued to
develop around the barrows. A sequence of barrow construction was
suggested by the 1978 excavators and the cemetery as a whole was used over
a long period of time, continuing during the occupancy of the enclosed
settlement. The enclosure, constructed over the boundaries of an earlier
field, marks the latest phase of occupation and the end of cultivation at
the site. Radiocarbon dates from the enclosure and the cemetery indicate a
date of occupation between about 1250 and 1050 BC.
All fence posts, walls, water troughs and pipes, road signs and the road
surface are excluded from the scheduling, although the ground beneath
these features is included.

MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.

Source: Historic England

Reasons for Scheduling

Cranborne Chase is an area of chalkland well known for its high number,
density and diversity of archaeological remains. These include a rare
combination of Neolithic and Early Bronze Age sites, comprising one of the
largest concentrations of burial monuments in England, the largest known
cursus (a linear ritual monument) and a significant number and range of henge
monuments (Late Neolithic ceremonial centres). Other important remains include
a variety of enclosures, settlements, field systems and linear boundaries
which date throughout prehistory and into the Romano-British and medieval
periods. This high level of survival of archaeological remains is due largely
to the later history of the Chase. Cranborne Chase formed a Royal Hunting
Ground from at least Norman times, and much of the archaeological survival
within the area resulted from associated laws controlling land-use which
applied until 1830. The unique archaeological character of the Chase has
attracted much attention over the years, notably during the later 19th
century, by the pioneering work on the Chase of General Pitt-Rivers, Sir
Richard Colt Hoare and Edward Cunnington, often regarded as the fathers of
British archaeology. Archaeological investigations have continued throughout
the 20th century and to the present day.

South Lodge camp is one of about 15 known Martin Down enclosures (named
after a typical example on Martin Down in Cranborne Chase) which survive,
mainly on the chalk downland of central southern England. It is typical of
its class being a sub-rectangular enclosure, about 0.3ha in size, bounded
by a low bank and/or fence, with a surrounding ditch with a single
causeway leading to an entrance. Dating to the later Bronze Age, the
enclosure was clearly the focus of a small domestic settlement. Martin
Down enclosures are one of a limited range of monuments dating to this
period and all examples with surviving remains are considered to merit
protection. The round barrow cemetery at South Lodge developed over a
long period of time, both pre-dating the enclosure and continuing in use
throughout its occupancy. It included burials both beneath the mounds and
`flat' burials just outside at least one of them. The barrows are
particularly representative of their period and a substantial proportion
of surviving or partly-surviving examples are considered worthy of
protection. The field system includes banks of rectangular fields, which
predated the enclosure and the barrow cemetery but also continued in use
throughout the period of occupation.
The monuments at South Lodge provide a rare survival of an unploughed
Bronze Age settlement complex and the association of settlement, cemetery
and field system at one site is an unusual survival. They contain
archaeological deposits providing information relating to all aspects of
Bronze Age society and the contemporary environment. The excavations of
the 19th century and 1978 present the most detailed and extensive
examination of this monument class in Wessex, providing information which
enhances knowledge of this settlement type and its place in the Bronze Age
landscape. The 19th century reconstructions represent pioneering attempts
at the display of archaeological sites.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Books and journals
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 143-183
Bradley, J, Bradley, R, Green, M, Landscape, Monuments and Society:The Prehistory of Cranborne Chase, (1991), 151
Pitt Rivers, A, Excavations in Cranborne Chase, (1898), 42-43
Pitt Rivers, A, Excavations in Cranborne Chase, (1898), 1-44
Pitt-Rivers, LG, Excavations in Cranborne Chase, (1888), 28-30
Pitt-Rivers, LG, Excavations in Cranborne Chase, (1888), 28-30
Pitt-Rivers, LG, Excavations in Cranborne Chase, (1888), 28-30
Pitt-Rivers, LG, Excavations in Cranborne Chase, (1888), 28-30
Kinnes, I, 'Occasional Paper No 7' in Round Barrows and Ring-Ditches in the British Neolithic: Occasional Paper No 7, (1979), 126
Toms, H, 'Procs Dorset Natural History and Archaeol Society' in Bronze Age or earlier lynchets, , Vol. 46, (1925), 88-100

Source: Historic England