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Norton Down long barrow is a scheduled monument located in Wiltshire, England, at grid reference ST 92592 45961. The site covers a scheduled area of 0.36 hectares and is protected by Historic England under reference 1009895. Long barrows of this type date to the Neolithic period and served as communal burial monuments for the earliest farming communities in Britain.
The monument sits on bedrock of White Chalk, a formation dating to the Maastrichtian period, which characterises much of the Wiltshire chalk downlands. This geology provided both the landscape setting and practical material for construction and farming in the prehistoric period. The chalk subsoil would have been exposed through the deliberate scraping and quarrying required to build such monuments, creating the distinctive earthwork forms visible today.
Norton Down long barrow represents an important record of Neolithic settlement and ritual practice in Wiltshire. The scheduled protection recognises its archaeological significance and ensures the preservation of evidence relating to early British burial customs, the communities that created these monuments, and the changing relationship between people and the chalk landscape during the Neolithic period.
Norton Down long barrow is a scheduled monument protected by Historic England under reference 1009895. View the official record →
Norton Down long barrow is a scheduled monument located in Wiltshire, England, at grid reference ST 92592 45961.
Norton Down long barrow is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, legally protected by Historic England (NHLE) — the body responsible for designating and safeguarding heritage sites in England. The official designation reference is 1009895.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including Pair of bowl barrows 1050m NNW of Pertwood Wood (8.5 km), Bowl barrow 500m north of Starveall (8.5 km), Long barrow in Barrow Clump, Stockton Down (9.2 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 15 strands of Norton Down long barrow'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.
Norton Down long barrow stands on White Chalk Subgroup, bedrock that formed in the Maastrichtian. The rock here is chalk.