Monument record MDO47541 - Earthwork on Mayne Down,

A small, sunken rectangular earthwork on Mayne Down was referred to by Warne in 1865, by which time it was apparently already destroyed. Warne described it as featuring three tiers of benches. Its precise location is not known.

A small rectangular earthwork on Mayne Down "with three tiers of benches", destroyed by the time Warne wrote, is listed by Allcroft as a Romano-British circus.

According to Mills 'Maine Down' (now lost) was situated at about SY 705853, and Warne's map shows the earthwork at aprpoximately this positon, to the north of the Ridgeway and east of two barrows. (It may have been the enclosure at Culliford Tree, SY 78 NW 29). <1-3>

Warne's sketch plan and the name Mayne Down would suggest somewhere in the vicinity of the Culliford Tree barrow group. It has been suggested that it could be the cropmark enclosure SY 78 NW 29, though this is highly speculative. The Culliford Tree barrow itself (SY 78 NW 180) was formerly the Hundred meeting place.

<1> Warne, C, 1865, Dorsetshire: it’s Celtic, Roman, Saxon & Danish vestiges, 48 and map (Monograph). SDO10243.

<2> Allcroft, A H, 1922, The Circle and the Cross, 173-215 (Monograph). SDO20354.

<3> Mills, A D, 1977, The place-names of Dorset, Part 1: the Isle of Purbeck, the hundreds of Rowbarrow, Hasler, Winfrith, Culliford Tree, Bere Regis, Barrow, Puddletown St George, 337 (Monograph). SWX972.

<4> National Record of the Historic Environment, 453974 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Dec 13 2023 4:55PM