How to infer the subject matter for innumerable trains of unfathomable thought? Set up a few mounds of earth and let them consolidate for a few millennia, become one with the landscape they were once superimposed upon. Guess the insight required was where to place them...
Collectively these round barrows do form a quite iconic skyline...
The iconic skyline... an interesting juxtaposition of ancient and modern power, perhaps?
This is Bincombe Down from the sister site ‘barrowcemeteriesfromsupermarketcarparks.wordpress.com’, photographed from a Co-op just outside Weymouth.
These are very substantial round barrows.... as emphasised by the human figure just beating the auto-timer’s metronomic pulse. Just. Really, it was a privlege to share a couple of hours of these barrows’ existence.
Looking north-west up the line....
Charlbury is seen behind the right hand pylon... the indignity!
After viewing from Charlbury last summer... I had to come and take a look at surely one of England’s most iconic line of round barrows? The most north-westerly is left of image.
Bincombe 31 from the Ridgeway barrow to the west.
The haunting profile of the barrow cemetery from the western flank of Charlbury hill fort.
Iconic..... with great big bells on. Bell barrows, that is.
A very large bell barrow, on the left, and a smaller bell on the right, taken from the south.
The southern most barrow in the group, this is closest to the village of Bincombe, just north of the hill called the Knoll.
The six Bincombe “Bumps” from the south west, covered in sheep.
The whole of the group from the east, near sunset.
The second barrow from the top of the first.
The central barrow of the triple, the most damaged in the group.
The central barrows in the group.
The fourth of the group from the top of the third.
The large western barrow, showing the large chunk dug out of it.
The Triple barrow from the east, the centre barrow has been extensively dug out in the past.
The Triple barrow.
The large western barrow of the Bincombe Bumps group.
The field side of barrow 31 showing the plough damage.
This is possibly the most bably damaged barrow I’ve seen, the field side is almost entirely ploughed away and the road has cut away a large section of the mound. This is numbered as Bincombe 31 (Grinsell et al.)
One of the most westerly of the group, this has been much reduced by ploughing.
The Bincombe “bumps” barrows from the south east.
Two large, low round barrows north of the long barrow, which can be seen in the darker grass.
(3) A close up of the berm at the base of the large barrow.
(2) both barrows looking west.
(4) The east barrow from the top of the west barrow.
(5) The eastern of two large bowl barrows.
(1) the very big western barrow, the berm can be clearly seen at the base.
A low barrow which looks to have been ploughed for many years, with Came woods in the background. There is a pair to this one closer to the woods in even poorer condition.
Bincombe bumps from the came bank barrow.
dec 1 2002
At last I found the time to visit the “bumps”. They are just off the inland coastal path on top of a very steep hill. There are six barrows in this group, three large bowl barrows and what looks to me like three conjoined, into a triple barrow.
All of these barrows have been excavated, the biggest and most westerly has a huge crater in it’s summit and the middle of the triple has been completely flattened. The first two bowl shapes have seperate ditches, but share a bank between them.
These six mounds diminish in size from west to east. The biggest is on the crown of the hill, with the others running slightly downhill.
The “bumps” are a distinct set of 6 barrows on the south side of the Ridgeway just above the hamlet of Bincombe, Grinsell goes up to 60g in numbers for the parish of Bincombe. Some these have now been destroyed or largely ploughed out.
These fieldnotes relate to the barrows in the pictures numbered 1 to 5. They are situated between Came down golf course and Bincombe hill barrows. These are one large bowl barrow, the western bell barrow about 90 feet in diameter and 20 in height, the eastern about 60 by 15 feet.
The west barrow has distinct platform or berm about 10 feet wide around the base, a ditch about 2 feet deep surrounds the whole monument. It is rather unkempt and has some damage from rabbit holes, it has also been excavated at some stage.
The eastern barrow looks to be in better condition, however it has been ploughed in the past and has lost it’s outer ditch.
I have included these here as they don’t really make sense on their own, they seem to be part of a huge barrow cemetery which covers the hillside in this area, including both Came sets , Bincombe and West/East hills.
Bronze Age barrows on the down are known as the music barrows, and are traditionally thought to be home of the fairy folk. According to folklore it was possible to hear the fairy revelry if you placed your ear to the barrows at midday.
This site is known locally as ‘Bincombe Bumps’.
