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Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound is a prehistoric monument comprising a mound of fire-cracked stones and charcoal debris, situated in Wales and protected by Cadw under reference BR411. The site lies upon bedrock of Upper Devonian sandstone and conglomerate, formed during the Late Devonian period and interbedded in alternating layers. This ancient geology provided the raw materials that prehistoric inhabitants would have exploited for stone-working and water-heating activities.
Burnt mounds are among the most common prehistoric monuments in Britain and Ireland, typically dating to the Bronze Age. They were created through repeated cycles of heating stones in fire, then plunging them into water-filled troughs to heat liquids for cooking, bathing, or other domestic purposes. The fractured stones accumulated at these working sites, forming the distinctive mounds visible today.
The Devonian sandstone and conglomerate bedrock at Cefn Esgair-carnau would have provided abundant stone suitable for this heat-exchange process. The monument's survival to the present day preserves evidence of Bronze Age settlement patterns and daily practices in the Welsh landscape, offering insight into prehistoric subsistence and technological knowledge among communities who inhabited this region in antiquity.
Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound is a scheduled monument protected by Cadw under reference BR411. View the official record →
Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound is a prehistoric monument comprising a mound of fire-cracked stones and charcoal debris, situated in Wales and protected by Cadw under reference BR411.
Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound dates from the prehistoric period, and is classified as a burnt mound. It is one of over 32,000 scheduled monuments protected across the UK.
Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, legally protected by Cadw — the body responsible for designating and safeguarding heritage sites in Wales. The official designation reference is BR411.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including Pillow Mound at Bryn y Gwyddel (7.8 km), Iron Ore Scours and Patch Workings at Winch Fawr, Merthyr Tydfil (8.5 km), Site of Hirwaun Ironworks (8.8 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 13 strands of Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Cefn Esgair-carnau Burnt Mound stands on Upper Devonian Rocks (Undifferentiated), bedrock that formed in the Late Devonian. The rock here is sandstone and conglomerate, interbedded.