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Description

Summary The buried remains of a Neolithic long barrow visible as a partial cropmark. Reasons for Designation The long barrow 135m north of Middle Farm, near Wispington, is scheduled for the following principal reasons: * Survival: the remains of the barrow have been confirmed to survive as a buried feature from geophysical survey, and it is visible as a clearly defined crop mark; * Potential: for the buried archaeological deposits which retain considerable potential to provide evidence relating to social organisation and demographics, cultural associations, human development, disease, diet, and death rituals. Buried environmental evidence can also inform us about the landscape in which the barrows were constructed; * Period: as one of very few monument types dating to the Neolithic, it is highly representative of the period; * Rarity: as an example of a monument type which is rare nationally, and one of very few monument types to offer us insights into the lives and deaths of early prehistoric communities in this country; * Group value: for its close proximity to other contemporary or spatially related scheduled monuments, particularly the two long barrows 500m west of Field Farm, West Ashby, 6km to the north-east (NHLE 1013915). The barrow forms part of the nationally significant group of Neolithic long barrows in the Lincolnshire Wolds. History Long barrows and chambered tombs are the main forms of Neolithic funerary monument, constructed from before 3800 BC with new monuments continuing to be built throughout the 4th millennium BC. Where they are precisely dated it appears their primary use for burial rarely lasted longer than about 100 years. Generally comprising long, linear earthen mounds or stone cairns, often flanked by ditches, they can appear as distinctive features in the landscape. They measure up to about 100m in length, 35m in width and 4m in height, and are sometimes trapezoidal or oval in plan. Earthen long barrows are found mostly in southern and eastern England and are usually unchambered, although some examples have been found to contain timber mortuary structures. Regional variation in construction is generally a reflection of locally available resources. Megalithic or stone chambered tombs are most common in Scotland and Wales but are also found in those parts of England with ready access to the large stones and boulders from which they are constructed, especially the Cotswolds, the South-West and Kent. There are around 540 long barrows recorded nationally. Long barrows of the Lincolnshire Wolds have been identified as a distinct regional grouping of monuments in which the flanking ditches are continued around the ends of the barrow mound, either continuously or broken by a single causeway towards one end. A small number survive as earthworks but the majority are known from crop marks and soil marks where no or very low mounds are evident on the surface. Not all Lincolnshire long barrows had mounds and our current understanding of Neolithic mortuary practices in this part of the country is that the large barrow mound was in fact the final phase of construction which was not reached by all monuments. Previously many of the sites where only the ditched enclosure is known have been interpreted as a barrow where the mound has been degraded or removed by subsequent agricultural activity. In some cases the ditched enclosure (mortuary enclosure) represents a monument which never developed a mound. The long barrow 135m north of Middle Farm was first identified as a partial crop mark on low quality aerial photographs taken in 1959. It was confirmed as surviving and defined more accurately by geophysical survey in December 2018 as part of the Lincolnshire Long Barrows Project. The barrow sits within an area of medieval ridge and furrow which changes direction at the edge of the monument suggesting the barrow was visible as an earthwork at that time. Details PRINCIPAL ELEMENTS A Neolithic long barrow aligned north-north-west to south-south-east. The barrow is defined by a partial ditch with only the west side visible as a crop mark. It has internal dimensions of 53m by approximately 19.5m in width. The mapped barrow lies 1.1km to the east of Wispington and 135m north of Middle Farm on level ground on or near the crest of the valley side. The valley slope is very gentle and falls to the south and west of the barrow which sits at 33.5m AOD. DESCRIPTION The geophysical survey confirmed the location of the incomplete ditch of the north and west sides of the long barrow corresponding to the mapping of the crop marks from aerial photographs. The eastern continuation of the barrow, not visible as cropmarks, was not detected using magnometry. The eastern side may have been masked by the former field boundary (visible on previous versions of the Ordnance Survey (OS) map or ploughing in this field may have been more rigourous than in the western field. Valuable archaeological deposits will be preserved on the buried ground surface and in the fills of the ditch. These will provide rare information concerning the dating and construction of the monument and the sequence of mortuary practices at the site. The same deposits will also retain environmental evidence illustrating the nature of the landscape in which the monument was set. The long barrow forms part of a wider significant group of long barrows in the Lincolnshire Wolds. Other features nearby include a pit of unknown date lying 4m west of the barrow. Approximately 95m east of the barrow is a ditched trackway of possible Iron Age or Roman date. To the north of the trackway is a series of rectilinear enclosures also thought to be of Iron Age or Roman date. These features are not included in the scheduling. EXTENT OF SCHEDULING: The scheduling includes a 5m buffer zone around the barrow which is considered necessary for the support and preservation of the monument. Sources Books and journals Field, D (Author), Earthen Long Barrows, The Earliest Monuments in the British Isles, (2006) Last, J (Editor), Beyond the Grave, New Perspectives on Barrows, (2007) Woodward, A, British Barrows A Matter of Life and Death, (2000) Jones, D, '‘Long Barrows and Neolithic Elongated Enclosures in Lincolnshire: An Analysis of the Air Photographic Evidence' in Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 64, , Vol. 64, (1998), 83-114 Websites HER record, Lincolnshire Heritage Explorer, accessed 18 January 2024 from https://heritage-explorer.lincolnshire.gov.uk/Monument/MLI43649

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