Neolithic long barrow 750m SSW of Cabourne Vale

Summary

Neolithic long barrow 750m south-south-west of Cabourne Vale surviving as a cropmark and soilmark.

Reasons for Designation

The long barrow, 750m SSW of Cabourne Vale, is scheduled for the following principal reasons:

* Survival: the buried remains of a long barrow visible on aerial photography as a clearly defined crop mark and soil mark;

* Potential: for the buried archaeological deposits which retain considerable potential to provide evidence relating to social organisation and demographics, cultural associations, human development, disease, diet, and death rituals. Buried environmental evidence can also inform us about the landscape in which the barrows were constructed;

* Period: as one of very few monument types dating to the early prehistoric, it is highly representative of the period;

* Rarity: as an example of a monument type which is rare nationally and one of very few monument types to offer insight into the lives and deaths of early prehistoric communities in this country;

* Group value: as one of a number of Neolithic and Bronze Age funerary sites associated with the prehistoric trackway now formalised as High Street, which indicate the ritual significance of the location. The frequency of these monuments has wider implications for the study of Neolithic demography and settlement patterns in the region. The nearest spatially related scheduled monument is the long barrow 940m NNW of Mount Pleasant to the south, and the three separately scheduled bowl barrows, further to the south.

History

Long barrows and chambered tombs are the main forms of Neolithic funerary monument, constructed from before 3800 BC with new monuments continuing to be built throughout the 4th millennium BC. Where they are precisely dated it appears their primary use for burial rarely lasted longer than about 100 years. Generally comprising long, linear earthen mounds or stone cairns, often flanked by ditches, they can appear as distinctive features in the landscape. They measure up to about 100m in length, 35m in width and 4m in height, and are sometimes trapezoidal or oval in plan. Earthen long barrows are found mostly in southern and eastern England and are usually unchambered, although some examples have been found to contain timber mortuary structures. Regional variation in construction is generally a reflection of locally available resources. Megalithic or stone ,chambered tombs are most common in Scotland and Wales, but are also found in those parts of England with ready access to the large stones and boulders from which they are constructed, especially the Cotswolds, the South-West and Kent. There are around 540 long barrows recorded nationally.

Long barrows of the Lincolnshire Wolds have been identified as a distinct regional grouping of monuments in which the flanking ditches are continued around the ends of the barrow mound, either continuously or broken by a single causeway towards one end. A small number survive as earthworks but the majority are known from cropmarks (an area of enhanced crop growth caused by higher moisture levels retained by the fills of underlying archaeological features) and soil marks where no or very low mounds are evident on the surface. Not all Lincolnshire long barrows had mounds and our current understanding of Neolithic mortuary practices in this part of the country is that the large barrow mound was in fact the final phase of construction which was not reached by all monuments. Previously many of the sites where only the ditched enclosure is known have been interpreted as a barrow where the mound has been degraded or removed by subsequent agricultural activity. In some cases the ditched enclosure (mortuary enclosure) represents a monument which never developed a mound.

The long barrow 750m south-south-west of Cabourne Vale was visible as a cropmark on 1979 oblique photographs. The eastern end of the barrow was truncated by a gas pipeline in 1993, three years prior to scheduling, though the level of destruction to this end of the barrow is unknown.

Details

Principal elements: the monument includes the buried remains of a Neolithic long barrow located 120m above sea level, on the eastern slope of the valley of the Nettleton Beck, some 750m SSW of Cabourne Vale. It is near the crest of the hill at the north-east part of the valley head over Tugdale Wood where a spring issues that joins Nettleton Beck to the south-west.

Although the monument cannot be seen on the ground, it has been recorded on aerial photographs as cropmarks and soilmarks representing the buried features, including a mortuary enclosure encircled by a ditch.

Description: the ditched enclosure of the long barrow, centred at TF 1280 9966, measures approximately 45m by 23m. The central mound is visible as a soilmark on vertical photographs, measuring 39.5m by 17.3m, and is elongated approximately west-north-west to east-south-east. The surrounding ditch, visible as a cropmark on 1979 oblique photographs, is rectangular in plan with rounded ends, that to the north-west being slightly flattened.

The central enclosure was set aside for funerary activities and defined by an unbroken ditch which may have supported a palisade and facade or an arrangement of posts. Structures and deposits associated with these activities will survive as buried features. Some Lincolnshire long barrows were elaborated by the construction of large earthwork mounds during the final ritual phase. The material for such mounds was quarried from encircling ditches which are characterised by single causeways. However, the unbroken nature of this ditch indicates that this was a form of long barrow which, when the mortuary rituals were complete, was given a low covering of scraped earth rather than a high mound. The monument is one of a number of scheduled long barrows associated with the Nettleton Beck.

Although the long barrow is not visible on the ground, it will retain valuable archaeological deposits on, and in, the buried surface of the mortuary enclosure and in the fills of the ditch. These will contain evidence of the monument's dating and construction, and the sequence of mortuary ritual. Environmental evidence preserved in the same deposits will contain information on the nature of the landscape in which the monument was set. The monument is one of a number of long barrows which are associated with the Nettleton Beck and with High Street which originated as a prehistoric trackway. These associations pose wider questions concerning riverine and land communications, and have interesting implications for the study of demography and settlement patterns during the prehistoric period.

Extent of Scheduling: the scheduling includes a 5m boundary around the archaeological features, considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.

The eastern end of the barrow, within the scheduled area, is partially truncated by the course of the Skitter-Hatton Pipeline.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

27857

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Field, D, Earthen Long Barrows, The Earliest Monuments in the British Isles, (2006)
Woodward, A, British Barrows A Matter of Life and Death, (2000)
Last, J, Beyond the Grave, New Perspectives on Barrows, (2007)

Other
Jones, D. 1998 ‘Long Barrows and Neolithic Elongated Enclosures in Lincolnshire: An Analysis of the Air Photographic Evidence.’ Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 64, 1998, pp83-114
Oblique monochrome photographs, Everson, P, 2977/18-20 (1979)

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