'Henge' at Hunstrete, Bath and North-East Somerset?

Home , Burh, Hunstrete, Marksbury, Priddy Circles, Wansdyke (earthwork)

assemblage 14 (2015): 12-24

A New ‘Henge’ at Hunstrete, Bath and North-East Somerset?

by NICK CORCOS

The identification of a historic fieldname at Hunstrete, near Marksbury in northern Somerset, has led directly to the discovery of a previously unknown circular feature, 70m in diameter, which geophysical survey has confirmed is almost certainly a Neolithic henge-type monument. The occurrence of the fieldname also made it possible clearly to identify the feature on modern satellite imagery, on which it had previously passed unnoticed and unreported. The background to the discovery is discussed, and the paper also stresses the crucial importance of the use of historical and linguistic evidence, in the form of fieldnames or so-called ‘minor’ place-names, for the discovery of archaeological sites.

Keywords: Hunstrete, henge, Neolithic, Somerset, historic field-name, Old English, toponymic evidence

Introduction sources, have to play in the identification of otherwise unrecorded archaeological sites This paper reports on the discovery of a (Corcos, u.d.). previously unknown field monument, surviving under certain conditions as a soil mark, immediately south of the hamlet of Hunstrete, Background in Bath and North-East Somerset District. At the time of writing (Autumn 2013), the feature In August 2012, Avon Archaeological Unit Ltd is completely undated; however, from what were commissioned to produce a commercial detail can be discerned in satellite imagery, its archaeological desk-based assessment relating morphological affinities at least appear to to a site about 800m south of the hamlet of place it firmly within that class of monument Hunstrete. The research for that commission, sometimes rather loosely described as and the production of the final report, were 'hengiform', if, indeed, it is not actually a undertaken by the present author. The area henge in the strictest modern definitions of lies in the south-west corner of the modern that term. I will return to this point again later civil parish of Marksbury, and is centred on on. NGR ST 65120 61623. It consists of two separate but adjacent parcels of land divided A central element of this discovery is the fact by the main A368 main road between that it stems directly from the identification of Chelwood and Marksbury, which runs north- a historic field-name which survived onto the west/south-east at this point (Figures 1 and 2). mid-19th century tithe map for Marksbury parish, in which Hunstrete lay. It proved Both parcels are irregular trapezoids in shape, possible to obtain an early 16th century with the larger, northern area containing spelling of this name which strongly reinforced 12.07ha, and the smaller plot, on the southern its historical and archaeological implications side of the main road, containing 5.21ha. They for the site, and the potential importance of occupy a small, level plateau, are currently which was completely vindicated by modern open farmland, and historically seem always to satellite imagery. Because Marksbury was, have been so. The land use both historically from before the Norman Conquest, a and at the present day is arable. possession of Glastonbury Abbey, it is very likely that even earlier spellings of the field- name survive among the vast archive of that institution, and an example from the early 14th Topography century, albeit somewhat problematic, is also presented here. Even the latter, however, The northern part of the site is effectively level, proves beyond doubt that the site was already, and represents the highest point of the small, by that date, subsumed within an open-field localised plateau on which it, and the fields of arable furlong. I hope that this paper will go which it is composed, sit. The highest point, at some way towards reinforcing the idea, 153m aOD, is found immediately outside the especially for prehistorians, of the absolutely extreme northern corner of the northern crucial role which field-names, as historical enclosure, which in fact represents the site’s

Nick Corcos – [email protected] ©Corcos 2015 ©assemblage 2015

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Figure 1 Location of the study area. Plans and maps based on the Ordnance Survey sheets are reproduced by the permission of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office.

sharply to the north, north-west and east, so that the northern corner effectively represents a prominent bluff or headland pointing north, surrounded by steep slopes on three sides, except to the south. I will suggest later on that it is explicitly this aspect of the local topography which has given rise to the second element of the place-name Hunstrete. In that direction (ie south), the ground continues to all intents and purposes as level, for a distance of over 800m, before beginning thereafter to climb gently towards Farmborough. A closed contour of 155m aOD occurs about 800m north-west of that village, although immediately south of the site’s southern Figure 2 Site location plan and boundary of enclosure, a spot height of 172m aOD provides the site area. a landmark along the line of the ancient parish

boundary in this south-west corner of

Marksbury parish, between Marksbury to the northern boundary, around virtually the whole north, and Farmborough to the south. As for length of which the ground then falls away 13

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the southern enclosure, while the area on its Historical Overview northern side, closest to main road, continues relatively level, the southern side of the field Marksbury appears always to have been a begins gradually to slope upwards to the south, member of the hundred of Keynsham (Thorn producing a gentle, north-facing gradient here. and Thorn 1980: 408-409, list and map of Somerset northern hundreds). It emerges into By and large, however, the overall effect of the the historical record as the subject of an Anglo- local topography is to provide a relatively flat, Saxon charter from the Glastonbury Abbey natural terrace, with Marksbury village occ- archive, which carries a purported date of 936. upying its north-eastern end, and running In Sawyer’s catalogue it is S431 (Sawyer 1968). north-east/south-west for a distance of about As with so many records of this type, there are 2km to Whidcombe Brake, immediately south- questions surrounding the charter’s exact west of the site’s southern enclosure. It is also provenance, date, and veracity, and these have important to note here that the feature which been authoritatively reviewed by Abrams is the main subject of this discussion lies close (1996: 166-167). Perhaps the most interesting to the lip of a scarp slope which drops away part of the charter, however, is the full set of sharply, although at only a moderate gradient, bounds, in Old English, which are attached immediately to its west; so that an observer thereto, and which give the outline of the standing on or close to the original earthwork estate probably as it was in either the would have enjoyed spectacular prospects in immediate pre-Conquest, or immediate post- that direction, towards the rather more vale- Conquest period. As is so often the case with like tract of country in which lies the village of later Anglo-Saxon charter boundary clauses, Chelwood, close by to the west. But the those of Marksbury are almost certainly later converse may not have been true, and a than the main body of the text itself, although traveller approaching from the west, going this is by no means to say that they do not eastwards, up the scarp slope along perhaps reflect the estate as it was in the first half of the roughly the line now occupied by the modern tenth century. A mention of a rabbit-warren A368 road, may well not have been aware of suggests that the bound in its surviving form is the feature's existence until they had breasted unlikely to be earlier than the 12th century the lip of the scarp, and were by then virtually (Costen 1983: 25).i on top of it. It is regrettable that the lack of LIDAR data for this area makes accurate Marksbury is one of those sets of Somerset viewshed analysis to and from the site, rather Anglo-Saxon charter bounds which were problematic, although of course digital terrain studied by G B Grundy in the mid-1930s modelling, based on more conventional (Grundy 1935). However, more recently, the elevation data, might well achieve the same text of the bound, along with others covering object (Figure 3) (see further below). neighbouring estates in the Bath area, has

Figure 3 Contour plan showing circular feature and steort of the place-name 'Hundestert'.

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been reassessed by Dr Michael Costen, who assessment at that date, 2½ hides were held has published a revised transcription based on by an unnamed thane as a separate manor, a re-examination of the sole surviving copy of and although this sub-holding is not identified the charter, of 14th century date, in the great by name, it is at least likely that it was cartulary of Glastonbury Abbey (Costen 1983: Hunstrete, a possibility first suggested by 25-27). Dr Costen has suggested that the Collinson (II, 1791: 426). The earliest historical bound of the late Anglo-Saxon estate followed reference to Hunstrete by name appears to be pretty much exactly the ancient ecclesiastical in a document dated 1130. This record parish boundary as shown on the Marksbury explicitly refers to Hunstrete as a ‘manor’, and tithe map of 1843 (SRO D/D/Rt/M/424); the place-name is given as Hundestert (Watkin indeed, this remained the parish boundary 1952: 551). The second element of this name until as late as 1933, when the eastern side of it can, it seems, only be Old English steort, ‘a tail was removed, and Stanton Prior was absorbed or tongue of land’ (Mills 2011: 524), and this into a new, and much larger civil parish of indeed perfectly describes the headland Marksbury (Youngs 1979: 1, 431, and 437). Dr formed by a northward facing point of higher Costen has used other late Anglo-Saxon ground, already noted, which lies immediately charter boundaries in the same area of NE south of, and prominently overlooks, Somerset (for Priston, Corston, and Stanton Hunstrete hamlet. It is this feature which is Prior) to suggest, among other things, that the occupied by the northernmost of the two plots southern part of Marksbury’s eastern boun- which together comprised the original study dary was drawn along the line of an ancient area (Figure 3). The first element is probably routeway which may have been used to convey an Old English personal name, Huna (pers salt from Mercia into Wessex; and the western comm, Dr M D Costen). part of the southern boundary follows a road, now part of the main A368 route, which is also It is quite clear, from Abbot Beere’s early 16th used as a boundary mark in the Marksbury century survey of Glastonbury estates, that in charter. the medieval period Marksbury operated a system of sub-divided open-field arable The place-name Marksbury is probably to be agriculture, based on two great fields, North interpreted as ‘the fortified site at the and South, and indeed this is an arrangement boundary’. Dr Costen’s view is that which seems to have been in operation by 1300 at the latest (Rippon 2008, 83)iii. We cannot, Marksbury contains -byrig [a though, state with certainty when it was fortified site] and that it refers to established; Steve Rippon has pointed out that the hill-fort [i.e. Stantonbury]. It part of the northern boundary of Marksbury’s does form a boundary point for charter of 936, takes a dog-leg course that is the surr-ounding estates, but I characteristic of having been drawn around an suspect that it is named because it interlocking pattern of open-field furlongs, stood on the boundary between suggesting that the field system must pre-date very early Somerset/Wessex and the charter (ibid). However, since, as already Mercia, when Bath was still in noted, the bound itself may not be 10th century Mercian hands. We are probably in date, but later, all we can say with certainty talking about the 7th century (M. is that the field system was in place by the time D. Costen, pers comm). that the bound in its surviving form was drawn up; and that may not have been till the It is notable that the West Wansdyke runs 12th century. Rippon has further suggested that west-north-west/east-south-east only about the pattern of boundaries in this area indicates 1.7km north of Marksbury, but whether, by the that prior to its being granted away to a 7th century, this would have been an active layman in the early 10th century, Marksbury boundary in this area that might have been was part of a larger territorial unit, with referenced in a place-name, is rather Farmborough to the south, and Compton problematic.ii Dando to the north. Rippon further shows a map of these three estates which attempts to At the time of the Domesday survey, reconstruct medieval and post-medieval land- Marksbury remained in the hands of use, and which shows, especially, areas Glastonbury Abbey and continued to be occupied by open-field furlongs. It will be assessed at 10 hides (Thorn and Thorn 1980); noted from this that both parts of the study indeed the manor remained in the Abbey's site fell within the medieval arable area, which, hands right up to the time of the Dissolution. bearing in mind its open, level topography, is However, DB notes that of the total not surprising (Rippon 2008: Fig. 3.8, 82).

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toponymic evidence; and at the present state of In 1515, the name of the southern part of the knowledge, it could go either way. It is site was Stoweborowe furlong, which also perfectly possible to imagine that the circular confirms that in the early 16th century this area bank of a henge-type monument could be was indeed part of an open-field system, and mistaken by speakers of Old English for the Abbot Beere’s survey gives the additional remains of a defensive enclosure, which might information that Stoweborowe furlong lay in result in byrig; at the same time however, the South Field of Marksbury. This name is matters become somewhat complicated by the extremely significant, and it has been identification of slightly mounded interiors at suggested that it may mean ‘the barrow at the some sites which are otherwise identified as assembly place’ (Dr M Costen, pers comm), 'conventional' henges (Gibson 2012: 9), and with the implication that at least by the late which might well have resulted in the Anglo-Saxon period, this was a moot site. The attribution of a beorg, or 'barrow' name. All most extensive published study of stōw as a this aside, it seems very clear that the site was place-name element is that by Margaret part of an open-field, arable furlong by the Gelling (1982), and in reviewing that work early 14th century at the latest, and almost elsewhere she has stressed the particular certainly had been for many generations prior significance of this word: to that date. Long years of ploughing may well have already destroyed any above-ground Study of the whole corpus of vestiges by the time that Abbot Sodbury's names containing stōw suggests survey was undertaken, leaving only the that there is always something furlong name, its origin long forgotten, to special about a settlement attest to the former presence of a significant described by this term. It is used earthwork monument; and that alone makes it for sites associated with saints, highly unlikely that the name was a post- for secular meeting places, and Conquest coining. for markets […] stōw is very rarely used in minor place- As already noted, the first element of names, and there is reason to Stowborough has strong connotations of a believe that it always denotes a place where communities traditionally gath- place of special importance ered in the early medieval period for a variety (Gelling 1992, 58). of judicial, legislative and administrative reasons. Such sites were usually at major Its occurrence here then, as a field-name, a boundaries, or were meeting places for popular rare usage according to Dr Gelling, makes its assembly and judicial proceedings related to nature and provenance in this case particularly the hundred (Pantos and Semple 2004). intriguing. With regard to Stoweborowe itself, However, it is notable that, although the site is it has unfortunately not been possible to trace very close to Marksbury’s southern parish earlier occurrences of this name, in their boundary with Farmborough, there are no complete spellings, which might have given major boundaries nearby, and it is highly some clue about whether its second element is unlikely that this location represented a moot from OE burh/byrig, 'a fortified place', or site for the hundred of Keynsham. Dr Costen beorg, 'a small rounded hill or barrow'. As I suggests instead (pers comm) that a barrow or hope to show later on, it is possible that in this other significant, man-made landscape feature case, the former may actually be more likely, in this location was characterised as an but it is also worth pointing out that either assembly place (a stōw) simply because it may form is of crucial importance in terms of their have looked like other moot sites with which value as highly indicative archaeological mar- people were familiar; this in itself presupposes kers (a discussion of the issues which arise the very important point that whatever it was regarding the distinctions between these two that gave rise to this name must still have been words can be found in Corcos u.d.). It is, very evident on the ground in the late Anglo- however, worth noting that other examples of Saxon period. The name persisted into the this name occur in Somerset, exclusively as a 19th century and indeed into modern times; it minor name.iv occurs as Stawborough on the tithe map for Marksbury (SRO D/D/Rt/M/424, 1840), and While it is highly likely that earlier, medieval was applied by this date to two enclosures forms of Stoweborowe do survive somewhere on the southern side of the A368 road.v within the voluminous Glastonbury archive, it is disappointing that we cannot say more about the morphology of the original, standing earthwork as inferred directly from the

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Discovery of the Stoweborowe prehistorians have begun recently to argue ‘Feature’ quite strongly that the term 'henge' has outlived its usefulness; and while reports of its The identification of, initially, Stawborough death may at present be said to have been in the mid-19th century, and subsequently greatly exaggerated, it nonetheless remains the of its likely early (i.e. medieval or earlier) case that the perceived descriptive value of the provenance, immediately flagged up its word has been massively undermined by a new potential as an archaeological marker of the appreciation of the extremely wide range of first importance. A check of historic aerial divergent monument types which appears to photography covering the site at the be encompassed by it. In other words, we are National Monuments Record in Swindon becoming progressively less certain about how appeared to draw a blank. Ultimately far our theoretical construct of what a henge however, the answer came from Google was, had any meaning whatsoever in the real Earth. A satellite image taken in 2005 shows world, especially to the communities who very clearly, as a moderately strong soil actually built some of these monuments. The mark, a circular feature with what appears increasingly sceptical perspective relating to to be an external bank and internal ditch, henges has been conveniently summarised and the area within this circuit appears recently by Alex Gibson, who has commented, pretty undifferentiated (Figure 4). It lies on among many other things, on the interpretive the south side of the main A368 road, and difficulties presented by what has always been exactly coincides with the historic field seen as a defining characteristic of the true names. An area amounting to probably henge, that is, the relationship between bank rather less than a quarter of the northern and ditch: part of the circuit has been truncated by the road, and may extend underneath it into the It now seems that there is a southern edge of the field on the other side. distinct dichotomy within the As closely as can be judged from the image, henge classes. A long-lived and the centre of the feature lies at about NGR varied tradition of single- ST 64999 61585. The soil mark is not well entranced enclosures with a much enough defined to reveal the presence or more chronologically defined and otherwise of 'structural' elements within the morphologically homogeneous feature, most notably entrances through the group of double-entranced enc- bank, and/or causeways across the ditch. In losures […] Not only are there terms of size, from external edge to edge of henges with internal and external the bank represents a diameter of about banks, but there are 'henges' with 70m, so that the entirety of the feature as a no banks at all […] the only whole probably occupies an area of consistent features then seem to something in the order of just under 0.4ha. be a ditch and a tendency towards There can really be little doubt that it was circularity. Indeed non-existent explicitly this site which, presumably as an banks […] or irregular banks […] upstanding earthwork, gave rise to the name suggest to the present writer that Stoweborowe. The key question of exactly it is the ditch that is the important what this feature might be is addressed in feature […] surely it is time to the following short discussion represents, stop shoe-horning diverse sites to which attempts briefly to review the main an outdated and now inadequate possibilities. vi class of monument. The henge has served us well but it may be time to put it to rest […] [and] the The Nature of the Hunstrete present writer advocates the ‘Feature’ abandonment of 'henge' (Gibson 2012: 17). The known plan form of the feature, and the fact that the legacy of an early 14th century Gibson has been an early, although by no furlong name leads us clearly to the view that it means exclusive exponent of this perspective must have been in existence by the late Anglo- (e.g. Gibson 2004), and makes the important Saxon period at the latest, points strongly point in his 2012 paper that specialists have, towards a prehistoric origin; and one's intermittently, been voicing their misgivings in immediate sense, if the attribution of a bank this respect for many years. As this view passes and ditch is correct, is that it is a Neolithic increasingly into received orthodoxy, so by henge. We may, however, need to consider this definition does the specialist literature which further, apart from anything else because some embraces it also grow. All that can be done

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Figure 4 Extract from Google Earth image, April 2005, showing soil mark of circular feature (circled in red) within the southern half of the study area, south of the main A368 road. Contrast and colour saturation have been manipulated to enhance the image. The feature is about 70m in diameter, and although now ploughed out, what are probably an external bank and internal ditch are clearly visible. Whatever its exact nature, this is almost certainly the stoweborowe which gave its name to a medieval open-field furlong here. here is to draw readers' attention to some of palpably in order. It is clear that the henge as a the more recent and authoritative narratives concept is at present in a state of flux and of that can help to provide some context. Among reconstruction; this does not mean, however, the more notable are Josh Pollard (2012), that at least elements of existing, specifically for the Wessex chalklands; 'conventional' perspectives are not proving Edwards 2004 for a regional example and rather tenacious, but the problem is that, critique in the far north of England; Watson viewed critically, at almost every turn the 2004 for a suggestion of how a landscape henge utterly defies generalisation. For exa- phenomenological approach to henges might mple, earlier work dating back to the 1950s has assist with problems of definition; for a review been invoked to reinforce some degree of of the Irish evidence, especially as regards the status quo, and to underpin attempts to dating and morphology of sites to which the construct a new orthodoxy; but the type term 'henge' or 'hengiform' has been stubbornly continues to defy pigeon-holing, traditionally applied, see O'Brien 2004; and even when dealing with such a relatively for the likely dramatic changes in sensory modest example of an apparently henge-like perceptions of the landscape arising from (or more strictly 'hengiform') feature as that extensive woodland clearance in the Neolithic, presented here. Watson, for example, has and its probable effect as a catalyst of pointed out that monument-construction, see Tilley 2007. Writing in 1951, Richard Atkinson In any event, when Stonehenge itself, the very suggested that the topographic typesite of the form, lies outside the context of henges might be conventional definition, by virtue of its bank significant. In particular, he noted being inside its ditch, then a rethink is a tendency towards low-lying

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settings and proximity to water more celebrated cousins on the Wessex that was not shared by other chalklands, despite the fact that its Great kinds of Neolithic monument […] Circle is second only to Avebury in size, and the situation of henges within the massive, concentric timber structure that valleys has since been confirmed preceded the stone circle, discovered by by other studies […] and it has geophysical survey in 1997, is the largest of its been calculated that 90% of kind yet known from the British Isles (David et 'classic' henges lie below 125m al 2004). For present purposes however, the […] (Watson 2004: 85). most telling, although less well-known point about the Stanton Drew complex is that it is This may be true in many cases but it is also home to a henge monument, in the form palpably not so for the Hunstrete feature, of a massive ditch surrounding the Great which apart from occupying a relatively Circle, now totally invisible on the surface but elevated site, is nowhere near a water source also revealed during the 1997 geophysical of any kind; a slightly wider regional work. It is also possible that there was perspective will help to put this non- originally a bank, but the geophysics is rather conformity into its correct context, using, very more ambiguous in that respect, and even if a briefly, the two best known examples from bank did exist, its position in relation to the northern Somerset. ditch is also uncertain; at the least, however, it appears on the face of it as if Stanton may be The four Priddy Circles, on the high plateau of one of those sites which tends to vindicate Alex west Mendip, can hardly be said to be close to Gibson's focus on the primacy of the ditch as any source of flowing water, although it is also the defining element of the monument. Later the case that a major part of their raison d'être survey, in 2010, identified what may be, in may well be found in the numerous natural addition, part of a ditch around the western swallet holes which both surround them and side of the south-south-west stone circle, but which, crucially, they also enclose within their this is much more problematicvii. This second circuits; the mysterious disappearance of Stanton Drew survey, carried out by Bath and surface water within these features, otherwise Camerton Archaeological Society in presumably quite inexplicable to the world collaboration with Richard Sermon at B&NES, understanding of the Neolithic mind, may have covered a far more extensive area than the made this area an especially important one in original work, and included a resurvey of the terms of focusing and anchoring, in the day to Great Circle. The new campaign proved day landscape, activities intended to bring ground-breaking in several respects, not least people much closer to an otherwise invisible of which was producing very strong, although supernatural dimension. And like Stonehenge, as yet not quite definitive, evidence that The the Priddy Circles are not actually henges Cove actually represents the remains of a sensu stricto, according to historic orthodoxy, Cotswold-Severn type early Neolithic long because in all four cases, the banks lie inside barrow, and if so, is likely to be the very the ditches. The ground-breaking work of Drs earliest element of the entire monument Jodie Lewis and David Mullin has been crucial complex at Stanton (Oswin, Richards and in the recent construction of new perspectives Sermon 2011). relating to the Priddy Circles. This research has seen their elevation from a status as So at the present state of knowledge, Stanton inconsequential regional aberration, playing a seems only to conform to 'henge' orthodoxy in distinct second fiddle to, and at the peripheries one particular: namely, that it occupies a low- of, a vigorous Neolithic culture the core of lying site in the valley of the River Chew, very which lay much further to the east on the close to the river itself although for the most Wessex chalklands, to survivals of central part just above the general flood level. importance in their own right, crucial to our understanding of the western Neolithic For a very basic context against which to set tradition; indeed the Circles are now viewed in these sites, we will now turn briefly to consider some quarters as, on certain levels, actually Somerset as a whole, in terms of the raw more significant than some of the iconic numbers of what are, at present, notionally Wessex sites, most notably Stonehenge itself identified as 'henge' or 'hengiform' features (Lewis 2007: 12-14; 2011: 100-104, especially within the county HER, as its boundaries are at 102-104; Lewis and Mullin 2011; and David presently constituted. The reason for this is et al 2004). that this exercise was only easily possible for Somerset itself; the area of the historic county Stanton Drew, just north of Mendip, is another is encompassed within the modern local site which has suffered in comparison with its authority areas of Somerset; North Somerset;

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Bath and North-East Somerset; and Exmoor There are, of course, other possibilities for the National Park, the latter of which, rather nature of this site, if we just allow for the inconveniently, operates its own, separate moment that it is likely to be of prehistoric HER. Of these, the only one which is fully and date; and most prominent among the rather freely accessible online, is Somerset; North disparate range of usual suspects is a class of Somerset's more recent, and almost entirely monument identified only relatively recently excellent online HER, does show sites on an as requiring a separate category to itself. Late interactive map, and gives details of individual Bronze Age ringworks were for long sites, including bibliographical references, but overlooked by specialists precisely because unlike the Somerset system, it is not possible they were taken for Neolithic henges, so to search by type of site. The Exmoor National superficially similar to the latter did they Park HER is accessible via the online Heritage appear on the aerial images through which so Gateway, but consists only of a straightforward many prehistoric sites are initially revealed. and completely unsearchable list of sites, These sites are generally circular (or at least, presented in no apparent logical order or curvilinear) in plan, sometimes with multiple, arrangement whatsoever. No part of the concentric arrangements of banks and ditches, B&NES HER is currently accessible online. and a variable number of multiple entrances, to the extent that some examples can look like The Somerset HER lists 16 sites which it small causewayed enclosures. When first identifies as either certain or possible 'henges', recognised however, dating was problematic, although four of those are, of course, the and in the mid-1970s, they were even Priddy Circles, and another is Gorsey Bigbury, characterised by one specialist as a kind of also on Mendip (the Mendip henges as a group Iron Age 'henge'. Their chronology is now are discussed in Lewis 2011, 100-104.); an rather more secure, and most are attributed to example thrown up by the search term 'henge', the period 1100 to 700BC. Their function is actually considered to be the site of a Second appears to have been as fortified occupation World War barrage balloon anchorage area sites, with excavated examples having (PRN 44211). A further single record (11888) is contained timber buildings at their centre, returned by a search on the word 'hengiform', some of which were certainly dwellings. There although again, the actual date and nature of is debate about whether they encompassed the site are entirely problematic, and the site is private elite residences, or represented public known only from aerial images. The Somerset spaces for communal assemblies. portion of the Exmoor HER, under PRN Archaeological evidence attests that some were MEM22323, records a single possible feature certainly in the latter category. In any event, which is described as 'hengiform', near Court they are now known to have been widely Plantation in Exford parish, but again, it was distributed in Britain, including Wessex, and identified only from “poorly defined” aerial perhaps the Hunstrete feature is an outlying imagery, and its nature and affinities are quite example (Bradley 2007, 206-210). unknown. In B&NES, and excluding Stanton Drew itself, its HER notes only two or three All this being said, we should also at least other possible henges or hengiform sites consider the possibility that Hunstrete is not of within its catchmentviii. In North Somerset prehistoric, and explicitly Neolithic or Bronze district, the HER lists not a single known Age date, but much later; although in monument of henge or hengiform type (pers conceding this point, it seems reasonable to comm Vince Russett). admit to scrutiny only those types of feature which are most likely, on superficial This is of course an unsophisticated and examination, to be mistaken for henges on somewhat rough exercise, but in terms of the morphological grounds alone. It seems to me fundamental magnitude of the figures, its basic that most notable amongst this group is a message seems clear enough. That for an area series of features known as Highworth Circles, of its size, extending to something over from the type-site at Highworth in Wiltshire, 4,000km², the historic county of Somerset somewhat less than 9km north-east of could not be said to possess one of the Swindon, and first identified in print in 1935. country's major groups of known or suspected Morphologically, these sites bear a very henge or 'hengiform' monuments. This makes striking resemblance to henges, being circular it doubly important that proper investigation in shape, and having, generally, external banks of the Hunstrete feature (ie at least surrounding wide, albeit apparently rather geophysical survey) should proceed if at all shallow ditches, and single, narrow entrances. possible. They have now been defined as a coherent group with an extremely localised distribution within the historic Hundred of Highworth,

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where lie 38 of the 41 known examples. Only a major, upstanding earthwork monument in single example, at Stratton St Margaret near the late Anglo-Saxon period, had not been Swindon, has been subjected to modern taken at that time for something more akin to standards of archaeological investigation, from an Iron Age hillfort. This reciprocity of the evidence of which the excavators understanding between the archaeological and concluded that that example at least was the historical linguistic evidence is something medieval in date, probably of the 13th or 14th to which, as landscape archaeologists, we century, and that as a group they are most really need to be far more alive. likely to have functioned as stock enclosures (Gingell and Gingell 1981).

In relation to the Hunstrete feature, however, Bibliography the toponymic evidence argues very strongly against a medieval origin. The affinities of the Abrams, L. 1996. Anglo-Saxon Glastonbury: name Stowborough, as I hope I have Church and Endowment. Woodbridge: Boydell demonstrated from a sample of the available Press. early spellings, are firmly Old English, and it seems to me that one can construct, from a BGS. Geology of Britain Online Viewer. variety of perspectives, a fairly strong case that British Geological Survey this name had been coined and was in use by http://mapapps.bgs.ac.uk/geologyofbritain/ho the late Anglo-Saxon period, and that it was an me.html explicit reference to a then still upstanding field monument that local folk considered to Bradley, R. 2007. The Prehistory of Britain be either a barrow or a defensive fortification and Ireland. Cambridge: Cambridge of some kind. University Press.

It would, then, surely be apt if archaeological Carley, J. P., 1988. Glastonbury Abbey: The investigation of this intriguing site, initially Holy House at the Head of the Moors identified from toponymic evidence, were to Adventurous. Woodbridge: Boydell and Guild throw light back onto the question of exactly Publishing. which of these two possibilities was the more likely. Cleal, R. and Pollard, J. (eds.) 2004. Monuments and Material Culture: Papers in Honour of an Avebury Archaeologist: Isobel Author’s Addendum Smith. Gloucester: Hobnob Press.

Just as this paper was about to go to press, I Collinson, Revd. J. 1791. The History and was informed of the successful completion of a Antiquities of the County of Somerset, 3 vols. geophysical survey at the site which has been the subject of this discussion, carried out by a Corcos, N. J. (u. d.). “Field-Names and team from the Bath and Camerton Archaeology: A Review and Guide for Archaeological Society, led by Marek Lewcun. I Archaeologists”, online article at am very grateful to Marek Lewcun for giving www.wikiarc.org/fieldnames, moderated me sight of the full results of the survey prior academic website. to their publication in a forthcoming edition of the Society's own journal, Camertonia. Costen, M. D. 1983. Stantonbury and District in the Tenth Century. Bristol and Avon This work has shown pretty much beyond Archaeology 2: 25-34. doubt that, with the presence of a large bank and ditch, and with the ditch inside the bank, David, A., Cole, M., Horsley, T., Linford, N., the feature is indeed almost certainly a Linford, P., and Martin, L. 2004. A rival to Neolithic henge monument. This finding is Stonehenge? Geophysical Survey at Stanton doubly gratifying as it casts a light back onto Drew, England. Antiquity 78: 341-358. the original meaning of the place-name through which this monument was discovered Edwards, B. 2004. A Henge Too Far?: in the first place; because we can now be Reinterpreting the Neolithic Monument absolutely certain that the second element of Complex at Milfield, Northumberland. the name was Old English byrig, ‘a fortified Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 73: 59- site’. And indeed it would be a major surprise 73. if the massive, circular bank and ditch of a Neolithic henge, doubtless still surviving as a 21

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Erskine, J. 2007. The West Wansdyke: an Lewis, J. 2007. Experiencing the Prehistoric appraisal of the dating, dimensions and Landscape of Somerset. In: M. Costen (ed.). construction techniques in the light of People and Places: Essays in Honour of Mick excavated evidence. Archaeological Journal Aston. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 1-22. 164: 80-108. Lewis, J. 2011. On Top of the World: Gelling, M. 1982. Some meanings of stow. In: Mesolithic and Neolithic Use of the Mendip Susan Pearce (ed.). The Early church in Hills. In: J. Lewis (ed.). The Archaeology of Western Britain and Ireland: studies Mendip: 500,000 Years of Continuity and presented to C. A. Ralegh Radford, BAR 102: Change. Oxford: Heritage and Oxbow Books, 187-196. Oxford: Archaeopress. 93-117.

Gelling, M. 1992. A Chronology for Suffolk Lewis, J. and Mullin, D. 2011. New Place-Names. In: Martin Carver (ed.), The Age Excavations at Priddy Circle I, Mendip Hills, of Sutton Hoo: The Seventh Century in North- Somerset. Proc. University of Bristol Western Europe. Woodbridge: Boydell, 53-64. Speleological Soc. 25(2): 133-163.

Gibson, A. 2004. Round in Circles. Timber Mills, A. D. 2011. A Dictionary of British Circles, Henges and Stone Circles: some Place-Names (2nd edn). Oxford: Oxford possible relationships and transformations. In: Reference. Cleal and Pollard (eds.): 70-82. Mullin, D. 2011. Barrows and Bronzes: The Gibson, A. (ed.) 2012a. Enclosing the Bronze Age of Mendip. In: J. Lewis (ed.). The Neolithic: Recent Studies in Britain and Archaeology of Mendip: 500,000 Years of Europe, BAR International Series 2440. Continuity and Change. Oxford: Heritage and Oxford: Archaeopress. Oxbow, 119-137.

Gibson, A. 2012b. An Introduction to the Study O'Brien, W. 2004. (Con)fusion of Tradition? of Henges: Time for a Change? In: Gibson, A. The Circle Henge in Ireland. In: A. Gibson and (ed), 2012a. Enclosing the Neolithic: Recent A. Sheridan (eds.). From Sickles to Circles: Studies in Britain and Europe, BAR Britain and Ireland at the Time of International Series 2440. Archaeopress. Stonehenge. Stroud: Tempus, 323-338.

Gingell, C. J. and J. H. 1981. Excavation of a Oswin, J., Richards, J., and Sermon, R. 2011. Medieval 'Highworth Circle' at Stratton St Stanton Drew 2010: Geophysical survey and Margaret. Wiltshire Archaeological Magazine other archaeological investigations. Bath and 74/75: 61-68. Camerton Archaeological Society and Bath and North-East Somerset Council. Grinsell, L. 1971. Somerset Barrows: http://www.bathnes.gov.uk/sites/default/files Supplement. Proceedings of the Somerset /sd_2010_report_low_res.pdf Archaeological and Natural History Society [Accessed 12/5/2013]. 115. Pantos, A. and Semple, S. (eds.) 2004. Grundy, G. B. 1935. Saxon Charters and Field- Assembly Places and Practices in Medieval Names of Somerset. Somerset Archaeological Europe. Dublin: Four Courts Press. and Natural History Society. Pollard, J. 2012. Living with Sacred Spaces: Harris, K. 1991. Glastonbury Abbey Records The Henge Monuments of Wessex. In: Gibson at Longleat House: A Summary List. (ed.) 2012a: 93-107. Somerset Record Society 81. Reynolds, A. and Langlands, A. 2006.“Social Kellaway, G. A. and Welch, F. B. A. 1948. Identities on the Macro Scale: A Maximum British Regional Geology: Bristol and View of Wansdyke. In: Wendy Davies, Guy Gloucester District (2nd edn). Institute of Halsall and Andrew Reynolds (eds.). People Geological Sciences. and Space in the Middle Ages, 300-1300. Begijnhof: Brepols, 13-44. Kelly, S. (ed.) 2012. Anglo-Saxon Charters: The Charters of Glastonbury Abbey (volume Rippon, S. 2008. Beyond the medieval village: 15 in this series). Oxford: Oxford University the diversification of landscape character in Press for the British Academy. southern Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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source; I am very grateful to him for allowing Sawyer, P. 1968. Anglo-Saxon Charters: An me to use his unpublished survey of this Annotated List and Bibliography. Royal material for the purposes of the present paper. Historical Society. He advises me that Stowborough, and related forms, is found as a field name in Priston (tithe Somerset HER. www.somerset.gov.uk/her 81), Dunkerton (tithe 325), and Upper Stawcombe (tithe 62). The name also occurs Stacey, N. E. 2001. Surveys of the Estates of twice in the West Harptree tithe survey (tithe Glastonbury Abbey, c. 1135-1201, Records of 629 and 634); and this latter example (known Social and Economic History 33. Oxford: usually as Stow Barrow) is in fact the well Oxford University Press for the British known Late Neolithic to Bronze Age bowl Academy. barrow which, with a mound of about 35m in diameter, Grinsell describes as one of the Thorn, F. and Thorn, C. (eds.) 1980. largest on Mendip, and which from at least Domesday Book: Somerset. Stroud: the 12th century, has marked the parochial Phillimore. boundaries between, at various times, West Harptree, Priddy and Blagdon (Grinsell 1971, Tilley, C. 2007. The Neolithic sensory 123); Stow Barrow is catalogued by Grinsell as revolution: monumentality and the experience West Harptree 12; the general background to of landscape. In: A. Whittle and V. Cummings and affinities of the Mendip barrows have been (eds.). Going Over: The Mesolithic-Neolithic the subject of a recent survey by Dr David Transition in North-West Europe. Oxford: Mullin (2011, 121-125). The very fact of this Oxford University Press for the British established and long-standing association Academy, 329-345. between a surviving prehistoric monument and a Stowborough-type name, even in this Watkin, A. (ed.) 1952. The Great Cartulary of single case, must allow us to infer at least the Glastonbury Abbey, Vol. II. Somerset Record possibility of archaeological significance in the Society 63. other known examples. The overwhelmingly northern Somerset bias of this, admittedly Watson, A. 2004. Monuments that Made the small group is intriguing but it would require World: performing the Henge. In: Cleal and far more detailed work to determine whether Pollard (eds.) 2004: 83-97. or not it is actually more apparent than real. However, the one exception to this distribution Youngs, F. 1979. Local Administrative Units: may well lie at Stowborrow Hill, now in West Southern England. Royal Historical Society. Quantoxhead parish (at NGR ST 120417). A closed contour here of 275m aOD encloses a Acknowledgments spot height of 279m, and it is possible that the name originated as an explicit reference to a I am very grateful to Andrew Young, Principal 'tumulus', marked on modern maps, and Archaeologist of Avon Archaeological Unit Ltd, standing just below, and to the north-east, of for his kind permission to use text and the crest of the hill. This is a classic 'false crest' illustrations from the DBA as the basis of the location. Like the Mendip Stow Barrow, this present paper. feature is formally classified on the Somerset HER as a bowl barrow (PRN 33253). As well as I am very grateful to Richard Sermon, this monument, Stowborrow Hill forms the Archaeological Officer for Bath and North-East focus of finds of scatters of flint tools, cairns, Somerset Council, for valuable insights into and even a Bronze Age settlement (Somerset recent geophysical investigations at Stanton HER). In addition to landscape archaeological Drew, and the possible nature of the wider investigation, a key focus of any further monument complex. research on this corpus of Stowborough-types names would be to establish early forms of as I am very grateful to Catherine Dove, many of them as possible. Conservation Advisor for the Exmoor National Park Authority, and Richard Sermon at B&NES, for supplying raw figures for the occurrence of these monument types within their respective HERs. i The publication of Kelly 2012 has now provided a much-needed modern, critical Dr Costen has collected an extensive corpus of review and edition, of the texts of all the field names from the historic county of surviving pre-Conquest Glastonbury charters Somerset, using the tithe surveys as his main

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up to and including the reign of Cnut, and numbering sixty-one in all. ii As might be expected, Wansdyke has generated a voluminous literature, although much of the older material can no longer be regarded as entirely reliable. For recent reviews dealing with, respectively, theoretical approaches to interpretation of the monument in a social context, and its archaeological context, see Reynolds and Langlands 2006 and Erskine 2007. iii The original manuscript of the great survey of Glastonbury estates ordered by Richard Beere (Abbot from 1493 to 1524; Carley 1988, xxv) is at the British Library, where it is Egerton MS 3134. A microfilm copy can be found at the SRO under the reference T/PH/Wat/1. It was the latter which was used for the purposes of the original research on which this paper is based. The first occurrence of the name Stoweborowe in this document appears on f237. v Tithe plot numbers 183 and 184. It is fortunate that because these fields became part of the Popham estate, centred on Hunstrete House, in the post-Dissolution period, there survives a series of 18th and earlier 19th century maps, and associated apportionments or field books, which also record the Stowborough name. See specially, for 1759, SRO D/D/PO/67; and 1825-28, SRO DD/PO/82 (map), and DD/PO/81 (apportionment).

vi The site has now been accessioned onto the B&NES HER, where it has the catalogue number MBN30394, and for which the summary describes it as a “cropmark identified from AP; may indicate the site of a previously unknown barrow or henge”. I am very grateful to Richard Sermon for giving me sight of this record for the purposes of this paper.