More information : (SU 11174283) Tumulus (AT). (1)
SU 11184285; Amesbury 54, a bowl barrow 6 ft high and 78 ft in
diameter, Wessex Grave 39 (2). Excavations by Colt Hoare (Barrow 39) located a primary inhumation with an 'A' beaker, a flint dagger and a polished stone object, and 2 secondary inhumations. The upper was accompanied by a drinking cup, and the lower, a female, with amber and faience beads and a "bason (sic) ornamented around the verge". (3)
Beaker, dagger and polished stone are in Devizes Museum (DM 477-9).
The stone (P280) is ungrouped and wrongly ascribed to barrow 39 in
the PPS. (4-5)
A bowl barrow 1.1m high. Published 1:2500 survey revised. (6)
Originally recorded as Amesbury 54 by Goddard and described by Maud Cunnington in 1913 as overgrown with bushes and nettles and much defaced by rabbits. (7)
The CBA Implement Petrology Committee lists the polished stone object as a siliceous hornstone hammer (Wilts. no. 63). (8)
The barrow falls within the area mapped from aerial photographs by both RCHME's Salisbury Plain Training Area NMP and EH's Stonehenge WHS Mapping Project. It has been included on the survey maps, but is covered by trees, and no further information could be added from aerial photographic evidence. (10)
The Bronze Age round barrow referred to above (1-10) survives as earthworks within Fargo Plantation and is located at roughly SU 1117 4283. It comprises an asymmetrical mound of two phases of construction which sits on a plinth and is surrounded by a ring ditch. The plinth is 0.35m high, the lower mound 0.85m high and the upper mound is 1m high. The southern ditch is 4.6m wide and 0.1m deep.
North from the approximate centre, the edge of the mound's summit is at 3m; the bottom of the upper mound at 6.8m; the top of the lower mound at 9m; the bottom of the lower mound at 12.2m; the top of the plinth at 14.3m, and the bottom of the plinth at 16m. South from the approximate centre, the edge of the mound's summit is at 3.4m; the bottom of the upper mound at 6.8m; the top of the lower mound at 9.2m; the bottom of the lower mound at 11.4m; the top of the plinth at 12.9m; the bottom of the plinth at 14.4m and the far side of the ditch at 19m.
The earthworks suggest its original form was more complex than a simple bowl barrow, although ploughing in the early 19th century and subsequent vegetation as part of the plantation have probably caused damage to the monument. The earthworks were observed by English Heritage in November 2010 during a rapid field investigation (Level 1 survey) of Fargo South as part of the Stonehenge WHS Landscape Project. (11-12)
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