The exact position in which the bodies had been deposited was by no means evident; the bones, without being scattered, were further apart than usual, as if the chalk rubble had fallen down gradually on the decaying bodies and separated the bones.Below: John Aubrey’s sketch of West Kennet Long Barrow, circa 1660.Looking south west from the eastern entrance stones.The long barrow at West Kennet from a sketch by John Aubrey, circa 1660.West Kennet Long Barrow, Wiltshire. Fancy visiting something unusual? The crowns of the large teeth were slightly eroded. urial Barrow at Waylands Smithy. You are now following the course of the West Kennet Avenue. The essential features of a long barrow are:The burials inside these mounds are usually disarticulated inhumations of human remains, with the corpses having been placed in the entrance way first, and then bit by bit as the body decays get moved further and further back in the barrow, allowing for more room for the induction of new burials.We have also been recommended for educational use by the following publications:What is clear, given the evidence, is that these monuments, regardless of which group they belonged to, were more than just prehistoric cemeteries intended just for the deposition of the dead, but were instead involved in a whole series of ritual practices designed to bring in the whole community.Our latest articles delivered to your inbox, once a week:Some Rights Reserved (2009-2020) under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license unless otherwise noted.The chambers within a long barrow are located in one of two areas.
Carefully cross the road into the National Trust car park.Archaeologist's highlight: "It always gives me pause for thought that West Kennet Long Barrow had already stood for over a thousand years by the time the Great Pyramid in Giza was built. You may spot flint nodules that have cracked, creating sharp edges and exposing the dark colour of the stone inside.Bring a torch to help you explore the chambers inside the tombWhy does a Wiltshire field near Stonehenge contain a river of stones?Local legend tells of a white robed ghost and his red eyed hound who enter the tomb at dawn on Midsummer’s DayThe stones form a very dramatic backdrop – but what you’re looking at now is actually two phases of activity. The wisdom teeth had not penetrated the gums. There were also some of the bones of a badger, an animal still sometimes eaten by the peasantry.Ground plan of the chamber and gallery.Below: A ground plan of the gallery and westernmost chamber excavated by John Thurnam in the Autumn of 1859, included in his subsequent report.No.1. Between and behind the two last skeletons, close to the middle of the west wall of the chamber, were parts of the skeleton of a man of middle age, consisting of the occiput, temporal bones, lower jaw, cervical vertebrae, sternum and bones of the arm. There are a number of regional groupings that can be recognised as being long barrows, on the basis of concentrations in the distributions of these monuments, and the use of particular architectural stylings. As the path flattens out on the top of Overton Hill, look over the hedge to the right.