The Modern Antiquarian. Stone Circles, Ancient Sites, Neolithic Monuments, Ancient Monuments, Prehistoric Sites, Megalithic MysteriesThe Modern Antiquarian

Wor Barrow

Long Barrow

Miscellaneous

Details of long barrow on Pastscape

Neolithic long barrow located near the crest of Oakley Down, orientated roughly northwest-southeast. Listed by RCHME as Sixpenny Handley 29 and by Grinsell as Handley I. Excavated totally by Pitt Rivers in 1893-4, prior to excavation it comprised a mound 150 feet long, 75 feet wide and 12 feet high. It was surrounded by a ditch which proved to be steep-sided, flat-bottomed, and interrupted by a single causeway at the northwest end and three at the southeast end. The ditch varied in width from 10 feet to 25 feet, and was up to 13 feet deep. The excavations showed that the mound was preceded by an earlier monument on the same alignment, suggested by Barrett et al (1991) to be a sub-rectangular post-built structure, the posts perhaps revetting a mound up to 1.5 metres high. A porched entrance faced southeast, and just inside it was the main burial area. Bracketed by 2 D-shaped pits and flanked by a stone bank were the disarticulated remains of 3 males and the articulated skeletons of 3 others, all covered by a low mound of soil. The ditch surrounding the later, enlarged mound featured a lengthy sequence of deposits, beginning with Early Neolithic plain bowl sherds plus antler radicoarbon dated to the early to mid 4th millennium BC in the lowest fill. Above these layers, but below those containing Peterborough Ware, were 2 crouched inhumations (1 adult, 1 child) with a large flint arrowhead against the west terminal of the entrance. Higerh layers contained Peterborough Ware pottery, while the uppermost featured some beaker sherds and Roman pottery. Seventeen possible late Saxon burials had been inserted into the ditch. In later prehistory, Wor Barrow appears to have been separated from cultivated fields by an irregulalr ditched enclosure (see SU 01 NW 12). Wor Barrow is closely associated with two later Neolithic round barrows (SU 01 NW 13 and 15). The site was reconstructed, after a fashion, by Pitt Rivers.
Chance Posted by Chance
28th May 2014ce

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