Archaeological Sites

Stonehenge

Neolithic & Bronze Age, c.3000–1500 BC

The world's most celebrated prehistoric monument — a circular arrangement of standing stones on Salisbury Plain.

Roman

Hadrian's Wall

Northumberland & Cumbria

The northern frontier of the Roman Empire — 73 miles of wall, forts and watch-towers stretching coast to coast across northern England.

Roman, AD 122–410

Avebury

Neolithic, c.2850–2200 BC

The largest prehistoric stone circle in the world — a Neolithic henge enclosing a village, with avenues of standing stones extending across the downland.

Neolithic, c.3180–2500 BC

Skara Brae

Orkney

Europe's most complete Neolithic village — eight stone-built houses preserved beneath Orkney sand dunes for 5,000 years.

Silbury Hill

The largest prehistoric artificial mound in Europe — a vast flat-topped chalk hill of unknown purpose built with extraordinary engineering precision.

Neolithic, c.2400 BC

Neolithic & Iron Age, c.3500 BC–AD 43

Iron Age

Maiden Castle

Dorset

Britain's largest and most impressive Iron Age hillfort — an immense system of ramparts and ditches enclosing 47 acres of Dorset downland.

Bryn Celli Ddu

Anglesey

Wales's finest passage tomb — a Neolithic burial chamber built over an earlier henge, aligned to admit the light of the midsummer sunrise.

Neolithic, c.3000 BC

Neolithic, c.2500–2000 BC

Ring of Brodgar

Orkney

The northernmost of Britain's great stone circles — 60 standing stones encircled by a rock-cut ditch on the windswept isthmus between two Orkney lochs.

Roman

Fishbourne Roman Palace

West Sussex

The largest known Roman residence in Britain — a palatial complex of courtyards, mosaic floors and formal gardens at the head of Chichester Harbour.

Roman, c.AD 75–270

Early Medieval & Medieval, c.AD 700–1539

Medieval

Glastonbury Abbey

Somerset

England's oldest and most legendary monastery — the supposed burial place of King Arthur and the heart of Christian Britain for over a thousand years.

Early Medieval, c.AD 784–796

Early Medieval

Offa's Dyke

Wales–England Border

A massive earthwork frontier constructed by King Offa of Mercia — 177 miles of bank and ditch defining the border between England and Wales.

Neolithic, c.2900–2600 BC

Callanish Stones

Isle of Lewis

A dramatic cruciform stone setting on the west coast of Lewis — thirteen standing stones in a circle with radiating avenues, aligned to the movements of the moon.

Neolithic to Medieval, c.3000 BC–AD 1020

Iron Age

Cadbury Castle

Somerset

A powerful Iron Age hillfort in Somerset long associated with King Arthur's Camelot — refortified in the post-Roman period at exactly the right time for a historical Arthur.

Neolithic, c.2600–2300 BC

Grimes Graves

Norfolk

Britain's only Neolithic flint mine — over 400 shafts sunk into the Norfolk chalk to extract the finest flint for tools and weapons.

West Kennet Long Barrow

Neolithic, c.3650–2500 BC

One of Britain's largest and most impressive Neolithic chambered tombs — a massive chalk mound with stone-lined passages used for ancestral burials for over a thousand years.

Medieval

Caerphilly Castle

Caerphilly

The largest castle in Wales and the second largest in Britain — a masterpiece of 13th-century concentric castle design with revolutionary water defences.

Medieval, AD 1268–1326

Mesolithic, c.9000–8500 BC

Mesolithic

Star Carr

North Yorkshire

Britain's most important Mesolithic site — a lakeside settlement where Britain's earliest known house was built and shamanic headdresses of red deer antler were made 11,000 years ago.

Early Medieval, c.AD 575–625

Early Medieval

Sutton Hoo

Suffolk

Britain's most spectacular early medieval burial ground — including a ship burial of a powerful East Anglian king whose treasure transformed understanding of the 'Dark Ages'.

Iron Age

Old Sarum

Iron Age to Medieval, c.400 BC–AD 1220

A hilltop site occupied for two millennia — from Iron Age hillfort to Roman town to Norman castle and cathedral, before the medieval city of Salisbury replaced it.

Bronze Age, c.1350–900 BC

Bronze Age

Flag Fen

Cambridgeshire

A Bronze Age causeway and ritual platform in the Fens — where thousands of precious objects were deliberately thrown into the waters as offerings over 500 years.