Monument record MDO722 - Settlement, Cerne Abbas

There are possible settlement remains in a ploughed field on Weam Common Hill at ST 652016. Circular marks, not visible on the ground, slight scarps facing E and W and a ploughed down cross ridge dyke with associated sinkings indicate a possible settlement area.

The cross ridge dyke is virtually destroyed but must have been 600ft long with a ditch on the west side save at the south end where it faced east.

At ST 656016 two adjoining sides of a square enclosure consisting of banks and ditches, almost 800ft long on each side and having traces of an internal ditch with rounded corners, may relate to stinting animals on the Common but are of unknown date and use.

A track, 35ft wide and bounded by ditches, runs E-W and is aligned to the settlement on one side and the Cerne Giant (ST 60 SE 39) on the other, affording such a fine view of the Giant as to suggest that it was intended for the Giant to be viewed from the ridge of the settlement on Weam Common Hill. <3>

There are now no remains of a settlement. Field banks and lynchets, up to 1.5m high, were reported by the OS Field Investigator in 1955 extending over about 30 hectares of the top and the N side of the spur. Since then ploughing has destroyed all but about 4.0 hectares on Weam Common Hill, centred ST 65600160.

The poorly defined rectilinear fields, approximately 100m by 50m (0.5ha), are bounded by banks 0.3m high and lynchets up to 0.5m high. There is slight evidence of a bivallate trackway between ST 65580168 and ST 65800174, mainly visible as a soil mark on the OS air photograph. The area is overlaid by low banks and ditches of post-Medieval fields (partly shown on the OS 6" 1962).

The ditch suggested as a cross-ridge dyke is now destroyed but seems to have extended for 300m down the N side of the hill, not across it, and is visible as a soil mark (and former hedge) on the OS AP where it appears similar to the post Medieval enclosure banks. <4>

<1> Ordnance Survey, Ordnance Survey 25-inch map, 1902 (Map). SDO10373.

(ST 65560167) Camp (NR) (ST 65110160) Ditch (NR)

<2> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments England, 1952, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume I (West), 84 (Monograph). SDO97.

‘(35) SETTLEMENT, on Weam Common Hill about 1,100 yards W.N.W. of the church, is much less defined than those described above. There is, however, an extensive Celtic field-system with traces of a roadway running E. and W. Immediately to the S. of the bank shown on the O.S. are remains of a hut-circle and some other sinkings.’

<3> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, RCHM Ms File (unpublished revision of Dorset 1) (Unpublished document). SDO17382.

<4> Quinnell, N V, Various, Field Investigators Comments NVQ, F1 NVQ 19-OCT-76 (Unpublished document). SDO11903.

<4.1> Ordnance Survey, OS 74/088/149 (Aerial Photograph). SDO18900.

<5> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, Externally held archive: RCH01/088 RCHME Inventory: Dorset I (West) and Revision (Unpublished document). SDO17367.

<6> National Record of the Historic Environment, 199104 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Aug 16 2024 10:41AM