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047-120 section 2.qxd 6/21/05 4:18 PM Page 43 the Stonehenge Cursus is recorded by Grinsell as being 80m long, 21m wide, and originally over 1.1m high (1957, 137). Excavations by John Thurnam revealed at least three burials, but details are scant (Thurnam 1868). The excavation of a single section across the eastern ditch, berm, and mound edge in 1983 revealed evidence for at least two phases of construction but no evidence for absolute dating was recovered (Richards 1990, 96–109). A second well-known long barrow is at Long Barrow Crossroads (Winterbourne Stoke 1; Illustration 26). Grinsell records this example as being 73m long by 21m wide and originally over 3m high (Grinsell 1957, 146). There have been no modern excavations here, and the work carried out by John Thurnam in 1863 is inadequate for anything more than a very superficial understanding of the site. What appears to have been a primary burial was represented by the remains of an adult male in flexed position and accompanied by a flint implement. Six probably secondary burials were discovered. Other long barrows include Winterbourne Stoke 71, Milston 1, Figheldean 31, and the destroyed Figheldean 36. Lukis (1864, 155; Grinsell 1957, 137) records what may be a chambered long barrow at West Amesbury (Corcoran 1969, Illustration 26 (top) Winterbourne Stoke 1 long barrow at Long Barrow Crossroads. (bottom) Bowls Barrow. [Photographs: Timothy Darvill. Copyright reserved.] 43
047-120 section 2.qxd 6/21/05 4:18 PM Page 44 294: WIL 13) that was destroyed prior to the mid nineteenth century (but see also Bonney 1981). Whether all of these long barrows belong to the earthen long barrow tradition (Ashbee 1984b) is far from certain given the nature and extent of recorded excavation. Russell (2002, 25–70) proposes the reclassification of some long barrows as structured mounds. In view of the apparent poverty of remains from early excavations it is possible that some of the long barrows around Stonehenge fit within a group of chamberless mounds in central southern England typified by South Street, Wiltshire, and others (Ashbee et al. 1979; Darvill 2004b, 113–14). In 1865 John Thurnam proposed the identification of oval barrows as a distinct class of Neolithic monument on the basis of his excavations at Winterbourne Stoke 53 (Thurnam 1869). Although this is sometimes regarded as simply the short end of the overall spectrum of long barrow sizes, recent work in Sussex (Drewett 1986) and Oxfordshire (Bradley 1992) has endorsed Thurnam’s original proposition and shown the class to be long-lived through the fourth and third millennia BC. Such barrows (also known as ‘short’ long barrows – see also McOmish et al. 2002, 21–31 on Salisbury Plain examples) are generally less than 45m long and rather squat in outline with curved side ditches. There are more than a dozen scattered across the Stonehenge Landscape (Map G), mainly between the Till and the Avon. From what little information about internal structure and date can be obtained from antiquarian excavations it seems that not all belong to the fourth millennium BC and some may well have been built in the third millennium BC (Illustration 27). Excavations at the Netheravon Bake oval barrow yielded a date of 3710–3350 BC (OxA-1407: 4760±90 BP) from antler from the base of the phase I ditch (Richards 1990, 259), but further details of this site remain to be published. Immediately south of the Stonehenge Landscape the oval barrow Woodford G2 was fully excavated by Major and Mrs Vatcher in 1963 (Harding and Gingell 1986, 15–22) and perhaps shows what might be expected at some of the examples noted above. Rather surprisingly, none of the investigated round barrows in the Stonehenge Landscape shows conclusive evidence of an early or middle Neolithic construction date, despite the occurrence of a few such monuments elsewhere in southeastern England (Kinnes 1979). A crouched inhumation in a circular grave that was loosely associated with early Neolithic pottery in the fill was found in 1932 at Woodhenge, Totterdown. It may have been the focus of a round barrow (RCHM 1979, 7), but equally it may be a pit grave, a type also distinctive of the period although little studied (Kinnes 1979, 126–7). The long enclosure tradition found widely across Britain in the fourth millennium BC is well represented in the Stonehenge Landscape. At the small end of the sizespectrum is the long mortuary enclosure on Normanton Down excavated by Mrs Vatcher in 1959 (Vatcher 1961). Approximately 36m long by 21m wide the enclosure is defined by a discontinuous ditch and an internal bank. The remains of a structure, possibly a portal of some kind, lay inside what appears to be an entrance through the earthwork at the southeast end. A radiocarbon determination from antler in the ditch fill suggests a date of 3550–2900 BC (BM-505: 4510±103 BP). Rather larger is the so-called Lesser Cursus. Levelled by ploughing between 1934 and 1954, this monument was originally bounded by a ditch with an internal bank. Sample excavations in 1983 showed that there were at least two main phases to its construction. Phase I comprised a slightly trapezoidal enclosure 200m by 60m whose ditch may have been recut more than once. In Phase 2 this early enclosure was remodelled by elongating it eastwards Illustration 27 Oval barrows in the Stonehenge Landscape. A: Woodford G2. B: Netheravon Bake. [A after Harding and Gingell 1986, figure 7; B after McOmish et al. 2002, figure 2.8.] 44
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