NHER 36737 (Cropmark and Earthwork record) - Site of probable Bronze Age linear barrow cemetery, Beeston St Lawrence

18 July 1996. NLA air photography (S1).
2 ring ditches visible, possibly prehistoric. Additional linear features are likely to be field/land boundaries of unknown date.
M. Brennand (NLA), 3 December 2001.

June 2007. Norfolk NMP.
NMP mapping has led to the alteration of the central grid reference of the site from TG 3362 2183 to TG 3353 2195. The linear features described above are now recorded as part of NHER 18230.

The two ring ditches described above, together with a third 220m to their northwest, are visible as cropmarks on aerial photographs (S1)-(S4). They are presumed to represent the sites of Bronze Age round barrows (although this is not certain), and appear to be arranged to form a linear barrow cemetery oriented approximately northwest-southeast, between TG 3347 2210 and TG 3358 2183. Two pit-like cropmarks are also visible, the size, shape and strongly contrasting tone of which suggests that they are man-made features. Given their context, these too might be prehistoric ceremonial/funerary features; they might have been used for votive deposits, for example. It is notable that the cemetery overlies the parish boundary between Ashmanhaugh and Barton Turf. The presence of a possible palaeochannel to its west (not mapped by the NMP) may also be significant.

The three ring ditches form a linear cemetery 300m long. All the ring ditches are approximately circular in plan. The northwesternmost measures 18m in diameter. The ditch circuit on its northeast side is rather unclear. The central ring ditch measures 16.5m in diameter. The southeasternmost is the largest, measuring up to 26m in diameter. Possible internal pits are evident within all three ring ditches, although it should be noted that the background geology is conducive to the formation of pit-like cropmarks. If they are archaeological in nature, the pits could have held burials, or in the case of the southeastern ring ditch they perhaps represent post holes for some kind of structure.

It should be noted that due to an inadequate number of control points, rectification of the oblique aerial photographs of the site was poor, and this is likely to have affected the accuracy of the mapping, perhaps distorting the shape of the ring ditches.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 7 June 2007.