Details

The monument includes a long barrow orientated roughly northwest to southeast
and situated on level ground 230m east of Chewton Plot. It is visible as a
barrow mound 28m long by 12m wide and c.2.5m high when viewed from the north.
Although no longer visible at ground level, two parallel ditches, from which
material was quarried during the construction of the monument, lie on either
side of the mound to the north and south. These ditches have become infilled
over the years but survive as buried features c.3m wide.

MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.
It includes a 2 metre boundary around the archaeological features,
considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.

Source: Historic England

Reasons for Scheduling

Long barrows were constructed as earthen or drystone mounds with flanking
ditches and acted as funerary monuments during the Early and Middle Neolithic
periods (3400-2400 BC). They represent the burial places of Britain's early
farming communities and, as such, are amongst the oldest field monuments
surviving visibly in the present landscape. Where investigated, long barrows
appear to have been used for communal burial, often with only parts of the
human remains having been selected for interment. Certain sites provide
evidence for several phases of funerary monument preceding the barrow and,
consequently, it is probable that long barrows acted as important ritual sites
for local communities over a considerable period of time. Some 500 long
barrows are recorded in England. As one of the few types of Neolithic
structure to survive as earthworks, and due to their comparative rarity, their
considerable age and their longevity as a monument type, all long barrows are
considered to be nationally important.

The long barrow 230m east of Chewton Plot survives well and contains
archaeological and environmental evidence relating both to the monument and
the landscape in which it was constructed.
The monument is a rare example of a long barrow in an area which otherwise
contains a concentration of later burial monuments.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Books and journals
Grinsell, L, 'Proceedings of the Somerset Archaeology and Natural Hist Soc' in Somerset Barrows Part II, , Vol. Vol 115, (1971), p. 101
Other
23252, (1991)

Source: Historic England