From the centre of the disc barrow, looking back towards the large bowl barrow. In the foreground is the small mound at the centre of the disc barrow. Much harder to see (I took lots of photos from every angle...) is a smaller secondary mound further away and to the right. That makes it north-west of the centre.
Just one part of the ditch around this whopper of a disc barrow.
Another clear pair of groovy grooves. Possibly others on either side too.
In at least three places on different sides of the sarsen there are these parallel grooves. Uncle’s hand (5’11”, pianist) is here to give you a sense of size. Glacial striations? Too regular I think, especially as they are on opposite sides of the stone. Perhaps they were made in ploughing up the stone, but again I’m not sure it would have been ploughed “over easy”. Any thoughts y’all?
To give you an idea of the size of the sarsen, and how lovely the place is in early summer sun, ahhh.
The Sarsen Stone.
The Sarsen Stone.
Visited 23.11.12
A weekend away in Winchester and a chance to knock another couple of E.H. sites off the list.
First ‘port of call’ is this lovely little Barrow Cemetery.
As is often the case with these smaller sites, there are no E.H. signs to help show the way for the unsuspecting traveller – luckily I have my trusty O/S map!
Actually, the site is easy enough to find being near the crossroads in the centre of the field. The closest we could find to park was in Chestnut Avenue (private road!) a two minute walk away.
There is an E.H. information board (even if the details are incorrect) which has a section in Braille which is a nice touch (excuse the pun)
Despite the wet grass it was a lovely blue sky day and as expected, I had the site to myself with just the sound of birdsong for company.
As you go through the gate the large sarsen stone is on your left and a large tree trunk on your right. It feels a bit like going through an ‘entrance’ into the cemetery – although obviously it isn’t really! The sarsen stone is nice and smooth, with white and green lichen growing on its northern side. The tree has been cut right back and is now not much more than a large trunk.
The Bowl Barrow has clearly been dug into and is about 1m high x 15m across
The Disc Barrow is superb – easily the best I have ever seen.
It is about 40m across and the bank is surviving to a height of about 1m.
This is an excellent place to visit and I would highly recommend it when in the area.
***
My mum passed away two weeks ago after a long battle against cancer which saw her slowly waste away in front of our eyes. My sisters and I cared for her at home for most of the year and myself and Dafydd were with her when she died. I know she would have liked to have known Dafydd was in the room as he has always been the ‘chosen one’ who could do no wrong! Dafydd knows his Nan is now a star who will watch over him and keep him safe. (I am having difficulty writing this but I think it is therapeutic?)
The funeral was yesterday and this trip away was planned/booked several months ago. I do not know if the timing has turned out to be a good or bad thing.
It certainly does make you think much more about the ‘rituals’ which would have taken place when loved ones were laid to rest.
This fieldnote is dedicated to my mum who although never seeing the attraction in ‘old stones’ always encouraged me to get out and ‘see the world’.
R.I.P. mam.
Dropped by last weekend in the sunshine with a couple of friends. I hadn’t been here for 15+ years and had forgotten just how big the disc barrow is. A nice peaceful spot though it is surrounded by housing. You can see the disc barrow clearly on take-off from Southampton airport, but that also means when you’re on the ground the peace is disturbed by a procession of noisy Fokkers overhead.
There are two bowl barrows between the road and the disc, one quite obvious and the other only a little mound about 0.3m high. The smaller one is the only that hasn’t been excavated in the past. Don’t be confused by the information board which gets bowl and disc mixed up!
Sarsen stones are comparatively rare in this district and I think this is the biggest, though who knows what is waiting for future generations waterlogged underneath St Mary’s Church in Twyford...
Access Park in lay-by at bottom of hill.
3 steps up through gate then level, rough grass.
Two barrows, once part of a larger group, in the village of Littleton nr. Winchester. The Disc Barrow is remarkably well preserved with finely defined ditch and bank. It is about 55M. diameter, crest to crest. Next door to the smaller Bowl Barrow is a Sarsen Stone, found in the early 20th C. in a farmers field nearby and moved here in the 1950s
Details of barrows on Pastscape
Three Bronze Age barrows, known as Flowerdown Barrows, situated to the northwest of Flowerdown House at Littleton, Hampshire. The group comprises a disc barrow and two bowl barrows, and was once part of a larger barrow cemetery group that may have acted as a territorial marker. The barrows may have been disturbed in the past, possibly by 19th century antiquarians. They are now in the care of English Heritage.
The barrows are particularly well-preserved, and the disc barrow has been described as the largest and finest barrow of its kind in Hampshire. Disc barrows are rare nationally with only about 250 examples known, and often only surviving as crop marks. They were constructed as a circular area of level ground surrounded by a ditch and external bank, with one or more low mounds covering burials within the central platform. The burials were usually cremations accompanied by vessels, tools, and personal ornaments. It is likely that the individuals buried within them were of high status. This disc barrow has a circular flat platform 28 metres in diameter on which lie two circular mounds. The central mound is 7 metres in diameter and has a central hollow. The other lies to the southwest of the centre and is 6 metres in diameter.
The larger of the two bowl barrows lies to the southwest of the disc barrow; it has a circular mound with a central hollow and is 20 metres in diameter and one metre high. The smaller bowl barrow abuts the outer edge of the disc barrow bank. Its mound is 8 metres in diameter and 0.3 metres high. Bowl barrows were usually constructed of a mound of turf, soil, or rock, covering one or more burials. This was usually surrounded by a circular ditch from which the mound material may have been quarried. The burials were either inhumations or cremation burials, sometimes with grave goods such as pottery vessels, weapons, flint tools, and jewellery.
