Images

Image of Luccombe Down (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by A R Cane

First of the modestly sized and mostly flint, as opposed to chalk, barrows atop the Down.

Image credit: A R Cane
Image of Luccombe Down (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by A R Cane

Looking North East with Shanklin and Sandown in the distance.

Image credit: A R Cane
Image of Luccombe Down (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by A R Cane

Looking back across the site with the radio transmitters and radar station in the background.

Image credit: A R Cane
Image of Luccombe Down (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by A R Cane

One of the last barrows as you come to the end of Luccombe Down.

Image credit: A R Cane
Image of Luccombe Down (Barrow / Cairn Cemetery) by A R Cane

Not quite sure what this actually is or how old it might be. Simply one of many lumps and bumps.

Image credit: A R Cane

Articles

Luccombe Down

This site is of note simply because most of the barrows here seemed to consist of shards of flint rather than the more common chalk and turf barrows which proliferate throughout the rest of the island. I did wonder if there had perhaps been flint mining around here also but can’t find any evidence for it other than what’s visible. The other thing which strikes you is the lack of enclosures and hill forts on the island when, judging by the number of barrows, there must have been a considerable population. Possibly because it is a relatively small island and had good lookout positions scattered across it, it felt less vulnerable than other areas on the mainland and people could live in safety almost anywhere, though sadly today there’s not much trace of habitations.

Folklore

Luccombe Down
Barrow / Cairn Cemetery

Close by but now apparently dried up, Pastscape records the site of “St Boniface Wishing Well” (SZ 5676878118):

“St. Boniface Wishing Well”, a spring formerly much venerated, especially by seamen, because an impervious stratum caused it to rise high up on the side of a chalk down.

From “Undercliff of the IOW”, 1911, 118-9. (J.L. Whitehead)

From Ward Lock’s Illustrated Guidebook:

The Wishing Well is interesting to the geologist on account of its unusual height, and to the superstitious from the reverence formerly paid to it on account of a popular belief that if one achieved the difficult feat of climbing to the spring without looking backward, any three wishes formed while drinking its waters would be gratified.

invectis.co.uk/iow/wl_ventnor.html

Sites within 20km of Luccombe Down