Monument record MDO8063 - Earthworks on Worbarrow Tout, Tyneham

Settlement on Worbarrow Tout, SY870796. There are signs of a double bank across the neck of the promontory, with an entrance at the south end, and five hut circles in sheltered positions. <1>

Earthworks, on Worbarrow Tout (870796), of unknown origin, were recorded in the 18th and 19th centuries but are now partly destroyed. (a) A rampart, on the seaward side of the low isthmus joining the small peninsula to the mainland, survives near the foot of a 14 degree slope as a ditch or berm about 16ft across behind a low downhill bank circular embankment on the summit of the peninsula, about 100 ft. above the sea, was apparently slight and was re- formed and made into a kind of battery in the 18th or early 19th century; it was destroyed in the war of 1939-45. (W. Miles, Deverel Barrow (1826), 35; Hutchins I 619.) <2>

Papworth, M D J, Trust for Wessex Archaeology, 1983, Isle of Purbeck Survey (Index). SDO147.

‘Worbarrow Tout is covered in rough grassland and colonized by low shrubs. On a promontory surrounded by cliffs. 7/7/B.’

<1> Pybus, B, 1974, Oral: B Pybus, Glebe Garage, Sherfield English, 10 January 1974 (Verbal communication). SWX2509.

<2> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1970, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume II (South East) Part 3 (Monograph). SDO150.

<3> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, Externally held archive: RCH01/093 RCHME Inventory: Dorset II (South-East) (Unpublished document). SDO17434.

<4> Historic England, National Record of the Historic Environment, 455099 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Apr 30 2026 1:32PM