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Pen Lan round barrow cemetery is a prehistoric burial monument located in Wales, protected by Cadw under reference CM313. The site consists of round barrows, earthworks characteristic of Bronze Age funerary practice in Britain. These distinctive mounded structures served as communal or individual burial places, constructed by communities across the British Isles between approximately 2200 and 1200 BCE.
The barrows at Pen Lan sit upon bedrock composed of Llandovery Rocks, an undifferentiated sequence of mudstone, siltstone and sandstone formed during the Llandovery period of the Palaeozoic era. This foundation of relatively soft sedimentary rock would have provided accessible conditions for barrow construction, allowing prehistoric communities to modify the landscape for their funerary practices. The geological substrate has influenced both the monument's preservation and the character of the site across millennia.
Round barrow cemeteries such as Pen Lan represent concentrated foci of burial activity, indicating territories maintained by Bronze Age populations. The clustering of barrows across the landscape demonstrates the sustained importance of particular locations as burial grounds and reflects the social and ceremonial organisation of prehistoric Welsh communities. Today, the monument remains a significant archaeological record of Bronze Age burial customs in Wales.
Pen Lan round barrow cemetery is a scheduled monument protected by Cadw under reference CM313. View the official record →
Pen Lan round barrow cemetery is a prehistoric burial monument located in Wales, protected by Cadw under reference CM313.
Pen Lan round barrow cemetery 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.
Pen Lan round barrow cemetery 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 CM313.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including Pen y Gaer (2.2 km), Pant-Teg Standing Stone (2.9 km), Derlwyn round barrow cemetery (3.6 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 13 strands of Pen Lan round barrow cemetery'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.
Pen Lan round barrow cemetery stands on Llandovery Rocks (Undifferentiated), bedrock that formed in the Llandovery. The rock here is mudstone, siltstone and sandstone.