The circular excavation scar, filled with snow.
Image credit: A. Brookes (15.2.2009)
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I have walked and ridden these woodlands for over 40 years now and one day I would love to be buried here. It is such a beautiful place but I do struggle with so called preservation and conservation. For me digging up a burial is not conservation, its simply curiosity of a later generation, "being nosy", to put it bluntly.
This i,mag shows a depression and interference by humans who have taken digging tools to this monument.
The reason I have commented is in another image on this site it is stated that mountain bikes have "Badly Eroded" the tump. To me this is just a personal feeling and totally over exaggerated beyond of reason.
The image shows a trail, around a foot wide, with no depression more than an inch or two, which if left vanishes from view, in fact now in 2024 you cannot see a thing. Animals also develop these types of trail, in fact this trail was created by following an animal trail.
As a regular visitor to these woods I find the amount of hypocrisy by so called conservation groups staggering. Most drive to the woods with chainsaws, tools to clear what THEY regard as ok to do. Painswick Beacon is currently being felled and the wood burnt, despite Climate change screaming at us to stop. So I really struggle with all this.
Walking, cycling, horse riding do not cause environmental damage. Vehicles and giant wood chopping machinery does.
OK I'll stop now, you may detect I am very pationate about nature and our planet.
Thanks for your comment. The destructive excavations carried out on this and many other prehistoric sites by amateurs and treasure hunters mostly happened during the 18th and 19th centuries. We wouldn't condone this now, but we can't change what's happened.
However, I've personally witnessed mountain bikers riding along the top of this long barrow and the one at Randwick, leaving tyre tracks gouged into the surface. That's happening now, not 200 years ago, when people should really have a better understanding of preserving ancient monuments than they did then. You'll also see plenty of criticism of farmers and other landowners who wilfully damage or dump rubbish on ancient monuments on this website. I see no contradiction or hypocrisy in calling out ongoing damage, whoever is causing it. I have no idea what the actions of people driving around with chainsaws have to do with this website though, or what 'conservation' groups you're referring to in your comment. If they're causing damage, then I'd bracket them with anyone else who is doing so, whether they be landowners, self-styled conservationists or mountain bikers.