Causewayed Enclosures: Please See Our Website
Causewayed Enclosures: Please See Our Website
Causewayed Enclosures: Please See Our Website
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Introductions to
Heritage Assets
Causewayed
Enclosures
May 2011
Fig. 1. Reconstruction based on the excavated evidence from the causewayed enclosure at Orsett, Essex.
DESCRIPTION
Most causewayed enclosures are oval in plan, with some Most causewayed enclosures on higher ground are centred just
sufficiently close to a circle to suggest that the builders were off summits so that they have a distinct orientation, perhaps
aiming for this basic shape. Most comprise a single circuit of signifying a link with a particular area of lower-lying land. Some
discontinuous bank and ditch (Figure 3). Some have two or occupy striking landforms (Figure 4), while the so-called ‘tor
three concentric circuits; in many cases, it remains uncertain enclosures’ of the South-West have been named because most
whether all were created or used at the same time. Where surround or incorporate these prominent landmarks. Many of
double lines of ditch are closely spaced and run precisely the examples known through aerial photography are in lower-
parallel to each other, these may have provided material for lying locations, frequently close to rivers or streams. Here too,
a central bank, the two ditch circuits thus forming a single enclosures were often sited on sloping ground, so that in some
boundary. Most circuits are between 0.4 hectares and 3.0 cases, parts of the circuit were seasonally flooded.
hectares in internal area, but the largest is around 10 hectares.
In some cases, perimeters incorporate natural barriers such as Causewayed enclosures usually contain a sparse scatter of pits
rivers and steep slopes, while a few (often called cross-ridge and post-holes. They were probably not permanently occupied
dykes) span the necks of spurs and promontories. (Figure 5). Modern investigations have supported early
interpretations which compared them to fairgrounds: places
Individual ditch segments are generally up to 20m long, but the where dispersed social groups could gather episodically on
longest are much longer, while the shortest could be described neutral ground to reaffirm their sense of community through a
as pits. Analysis of the few examples where the bank survives range of activities including feasting, crafts, and the performance
as an earthwork show that gaps in the bank were less frequent of rituals associated with death. On occasion, certain enclosures
than those in the ditch and did not always line up precisely were briefly used for defence (Figure 6). But not all enclosures
with those in the ditch. Early theories that every causeway hosted the same activities and sometimes the evidence is
represented an entrance have therefore been revised. Indeed, difficult to interpret. Some experts see the creation of the
careful analysis of plans shows that many enclosures had one monument as an end in its own right, the construction project
causeway picked out by a slight in-turn in the flanking ditch itself serving to give the builders a common focus. This may
segments, suggesting it to be the main, or only, entrance. Study explain why some enclosures seem to have been deliberately
of the few examples that survive as earthworks suggests demolished – the banks being pushed back into the ditches –
that the flanking bank segments may also have been larger. immediately after they were built.
Excavation has shown that the banks were not necessarily
simple dumps of material cast up from the ditch. Lines of
post-holes and stake-holes have been recognised, suggesting
that timber revetments were sometimes built to give the bank CHRONOLOGY
an impressive façade. Free-standing palisades, also discontinuous, In a few cases where multiple circuits are not concentric, a
formed parts of some perimeters. These constructional relative sequence of development - though not the absolute
elements were combined differently at different sites and dates - can be inferred from the eventual plan. Where the
the forms of many individual enclosures were modified circuits are concentric, it is only possible to prove whether
episodically. The ditch segments in particular were repeatedly they were contemporary with each other, or whether they
changed, through cleaning, recutting and partial in-filling; special represent successive enlargements or reductions in the original
deposits, including feasting debris, stone axes and human skulls, area, through excavation and radio-carbon dating.
were sometimes carefully placed in the ditch, apparently to
commemorate the event.
The enclosure at Windmill Hill, near Avebury in Wiltshire, causewayed enclosures has grown erratically and currently
which has been extensively excavated, has three widely-spaced stands at nearly 80, the biggest jump occurring after the 1950s
circuits which were very probably constructed over a period due to increased aerial survey. This new technique revealed
of between 5 and 80 years in sequence from inner to outer. many low-lying causewayed enclosures whose earthworks had
They were eventually used together to define three separate, been erased by later ploughing (which in some cases began in
concentric spaces where different kinds of activity took place. prehistory). It is now clear that the few causewayed enclosures
Here, and elsewhere, the outermost circuit was a considerably still visible as earthworks have only survived because they
bigger earthwork, suggesting a change in the function of lie on high ground, above the ‘high-tide mark’ of later arable
the enclosure. agriculture, and that the true picture of Neolithic land-use is
virtually the reverse of what Curwen envisaged. Only one of
Sophisticated mathematical calibration of radiocarbon dates his original list, an enclosure discovered by chance through
available from excavated sites has recently transformed excavation in the 1920s at Abingdon in Oxfordshire, lies on
archaeologists’ perception of causewayed enclosures. The early lower ground, occupying a low promontory between two
Neolithic was once regarded as a period of revolutionary streams. This location, which Curwen regarded as anomalous,
change, but scholars from the 1980s onwards stressed the can now be seen to be typical, reflecting the relatively intensive
long time-span over which new items and concepts were use of river valleys in the Neolithic. However, analysis of
probably introduced, thus portraying the period as an evolution, biases inherent in the distribution pattern derived from aerial
not a revolution. The newly available dates, however, seem to survey, such as those caused by woodland cover and geology
necessitate a return to the earlier view that the period was unsuitable for the production of cropmarks, suggests that more
one of rapid change, for causewayed enclosures seem to have examples await discovery, perhaps through other prospection
sprung up throughout the British Isles within a period of only techniques. Excavation and geophysical survey in advance of
250 - 300 years, between about 3,800 and 3,500 BC. The modern construction projects - in other words, effectively
timespan over which individual monuments were used appears random sampling – occasionally lead to surprise discoveries.
to vary, with some perhaps being used for a single gathering
and others for several generations, undergoing remodelling at Many of the key excavations from which the interpretations of
each successive visit. causewayed enclosures derive have taken place on the chalk
hills of southern England, amongst the most important being
those at Windmill Hill in Wiltshire, Hambledon Hill (Figure 8)
and Maiden Castle in Dorset, and Whitehawk Camp in East
DEVELOPMENT OF THE ASSET TYPE Sussex. Excavations of low-lying enclosures, such as those at
AS REVEALED BY INVESTIGATION Etton and Haddenham in Cambridgeshire, where waterlogged
conditions sometimes preserve organic materials, have offered
In the 1920s, Alexander Keiller and O G S Crawford excavated different insights into the complex use of these monuments.
a causewayed enclosure on Windmill Hill, research which Even so, relatively few examples have been extensively
was eventually published by Isobel Smith in 1965 (Figure excavated using modern techniques, so much remains unknown.
7). A search for comparable sites began and in 1930, based
partly on Crawford and Keiller’s work, E C Curwen correctly
identified ten causewayed enclosures, all but one surviving in
earthwork form on the chalk hills of southern England. Curwen ASSOCIATIONS
inferred from this, and the comparable distribution of surviving
Associations with other prehistoric monuments enrich the
long barrows, that high ground was favoured for Neolithic
understanding of both causewayed enclosures and the
settlement, while the lowlands remained marshy and blanketed
monuments associated with them.
in impenetrable woodland. The number of certain or probable
Causewayed enclosures were associated with two other types have served to offer increased protection to the underlying
of early Neolithic monument: long barrows and cursuses. At Neolithic remains, making such associations important in terms
Hambledon Hill, a long barrow was built in the space between of preservation. Various accidental associations with later
the main circuit and one of the outlying causewayed cross-ridge monuments, from medieval chapels to 18th-century
dykes, while another occupied a spur on the opposite side of eye-catchers, exemplify the richly interwoven character of
the enclosure. These associations reinforced the excavators’ view the English landscape.
that the causewayed enclosure was linked with ritual practices
surrounding death. At Maiden Castle, the causewayed enclosure
is overlain by the tail of an extraordinary long mound, also of
Neolithic origin. Recent scientific dating shows that causewayed
enclosures and cursus monuments overlapped chronologically,
and in some cases physically (Figure 9).
Fig. 10. The Trundle West Sussex, as photographed in 1928. An Iron Age hillfort surrounds Fig. 9. At both Fornham All Saints, Suffolk, and Etton, Cambridgeshire, aerial photography
and partly overlies a larger causewayed enclosure with perhaps as many as five circuits. has revealed causewayed enclosures with several cursus monuments in close proximity.
CREDITS
Author: Al Oswald
Cover: The Trundle, West Sussex, as Figure 10
Figure 1: © Essex County Council/Frank Gardiner
Figures 2-5 and 7-10: © English Heritage
Figure 6: © after Philip Dixon