Scheduled MonumentsWalesNant-Gronw Round Barrows
Prehistoric · Round Barrow

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows

Carmarthenshire, Wales
Cadw SAM CM109
Period
Prehistoric
Site type
Round Barrow
Broad class
Religious, Ritual and Funerary
Nation
Wales
The designation
Reference
Cadw SAM CM109
Authority
Cadw
Designated
1951-07-04
Boundary

Scheduled area

© Mapbox · © OpenStreetMap contributors · Boundary data © Cadw

Overview

History & significance

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows is a prehistoric round barrow located in Wales and protected as a scheduled monument by Cadw under reference CM109. The site sits upon Ashgill Rocks, an undifferentiated sequence of mudstone, siltstone and sandstone deposited during the Ashgill period of the Ordovician era. This solid bedrock foundation would have presented considerable challenges to Bronze Age communities constructing burial mounds across the landscape, requiring significant labour to excavate and move earth and stone for the barrow's construction.

Round barrows of this type typically served as burial monuments for individuals of social standing within their communities, constructed over several centuries during the Bronze Age. The Ashgill geology underlying Nant-Gronw would have influenced both the character of the surrounding terrain and the construction methods employed by monument builders, who necessarily worked with locally available stone and soil.

The monument's continued survival and formal protection reflects its archaeological significance as evidence of early burial practices and social organisation in prehistoric Wales. Its preservation enables ongoing study of Bronze Age settlement patterns, funerary customs and the relationship between communities and their landscape during this formative period of Welsh prehistory.

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows is a scheduled monument protected by Cadw under reference CM109. View the official record →

About this monument

Questions & answers

What is Nant-Gronw Round Barrows?

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows is a prehistoric round barrow located in Wales and protected as a scheduled monument by Cadw under reference CM109.

What period does Nant-Gronw Round Barrows date from?

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows dates from the prehistoric period, and is classified as a round barrow. It is one of over 32,000 scheduled monuments protected across the UK.

Who is responsible for protecting Nant-Gronw Round Barrows?

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows 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 CM109.

What other scheduled monuments are near Nant-Gronw Round Barrows?

Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including Cynwyl Elfed Anti-invasion Defences (5.8 km), Defended Enclosure 300m W of Pen y Gar (6 km), Bwlch-Bychan Round Barrow (6.7 km).

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Everything a full report reveals about Nant-Gronw Round Barrows

This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 13 strands of Nant-Gronw Round Barrows's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:

Overview
An interactive map of the location with every monument and battle plotted, and a plain-language history built only from what the record holds.
Monuments
The legally protected scheduled monuments around the location, each with its period, type and significance.
Battlefields
The battles and sieges fought on this ground, mapped and set on a timeline of the wider conflict.
Roman Britain
The Roman roads, forts and towns near here, and the Iron Age people who held the land before Rome arrived.
Civil War
The Civil War fighting, garrisons and recorded militaria in this area, woven into the arc of 1642 to 1651.
Geology
The bedrock beneath the site, its age and rock type, reaching back hundreds of millions of years.
Local Names
What the street and field names around here actually mean, and the history buried inside them.
Historical Maps
Ordnance Survey maps from the 1800s, layered over the location as it stands today.
Literature
The books, county histories, charters and archives that mention this place, quoted with their sources.
Legal
The protected sites nearby and the metal-detecting, access and treasure laws that apply to this ground.
Spotlight
A deep dive into the most remarkable, lesser-known history of the place, traced back to the record.
Target Zones
For detectorists: the most promising ground to search nearby, ranked by confidence, with what to expect.
Timeline
The whole story of the location told era by era, from prehistory to the present day.
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The ground beneath

The bedrock under Nant-Gronw Round Barrows

Nant-Gronw Round Barrows stands on Ashgill Rocks (Undifferentiated), bedrock that formed in the Ashgill. The rock here is mudstone, siltstone and sandstone.