High resolution excavation and survey of early Neolithic ...
Early Neolithic 2013
15
Long barrows are ancient, communal tombs. They are elongated mounds, built of earth, or chalk and earth, covering a wood or stone ‘house’ for the dead. Recent research shows that burials typically took place over no more than three or four generations and perhaps as little as a decade. Over 300 long barrows have been found in Britain, with concentrations on the Wessex downs and the Cotswolds. They were often built on a prominent hill, some distance from where people were living. Perhaps they served as a territorial marker as well as a burial chamber.
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Transcript of Early Neolithic 2013
Long barrows are ancient, communal tombs. They are elongated mounds, built of earth, or chalk and earth, covering a wood or stone ‘house’ for the dead. Recent research shows that burials typically took place over no more than three or four generations and perhaps as little as a decade.
Over 300 long barrows have been found in Britain, with concentrations on the Wessex downs and the Cotswolds. They were often built on a prominent hill, some distance from where people were living. Perhaps they served as a territorial marker as well as a burial chamber.
"What did barrows look like when first raised? At Fussell's Lodge long barrow, near Salisbury, the discovery of post-holes in a lengthy, trapezoidal structure showed that initially there had been a structure resembling a Neolithic long house of the type found widely on the Continent. Subsequent long barrow excavations showed that this formula was widely followed. These surrogate long houses contained deposits of human bone that were added to and subtracted from, for more than a millennium, and rites pertaining to ancestors and fertility were no doubt performed. Long barrows, the long houses of the dead, should be regarded as shrines rather than mausolea."
"What did barrows look like when first raised? At Fussell's Lodge long barrow, near Salisbury, the discovery of post-holes in a lengthy, trapezoidal structure showed that initially there had been a structure resembling a Neolithic long house of the type found widely on the Continent. Subsequent long barrow excavations showed that this formula was widely followed. These surrogate long houses contained deposits of human bone that were added to and subtracted from, for more than a millennium, and rites pertaining to ancestors and fertility were no doubt performed. Long barrows, the long houses of the dead, should be regarded as shrines rather than mausolea."
Windmill Hill causewayed enclosure3800 BC3 concentric segmented ditchesCongregation point associated with seasonal rituals?Exchange/trading centre (like Mediaeval fairs?)
