Cairn
Bronze Age 2500 to 800 BC
During the Bronze Age the dead were normally cremated and the remains placed in a pottery vessel (funerary urn) which was set into the ground beneath a circular mound.
Cairn means simply a ‘stony mound’, and they are the upland equivalent of the earth and stone round barrows of the lowland zone. Cairns may incorporate a variety of ‘architectural’ features such as cists and kerbs, and excavation shows that they often went through a series of developments to reach the final phase visible today.
Usually found in prominent locations on hilltops and ridges they are often incorporated into wider landscapes and monument alignments.
Examples to visit
Ballowall
Barrow and statue menhir, St. Martins
In 1948, the Reverand HA Lewis discovered and reported the head of a menhir broken off from its original base near an alleged stone row. Lewis then set the menhir up on a nearby cairn. Over time the menhir was again lost, but was rediscovered in 1988.
The cairn and the menhir are on the eastern headland of St. Martin's overlooking the island of Nornour.
Rillaton Barrow
Showery Tor
Bronze Age 2500 to 800 BC
During the Bronze Age the dead were normally cremated and the remains placed in a pottery vessel (funerary urn) which was set into the ground beneath a circular mound.
Continue readingCairn means simply a ‘stony mound’, and they are the upland equivalent of the earth and stone round barrows of the lowland zone. Cairns may incorporate a variety of ‘architectural’ features such as cists and kerbs, and excavation shows that they often went through a series of developments to reach the final phase visible today.
Usually found in prominent locations on hilltops and ridges they are often incorporated into wider landscapes and monument alignments.
Examples to visit
Ballowall
Barrow and statue menhir, St. Martins
In 1948, the Reverand HA Lewis discovered and reported the head of a menhir broken off from its original base near an alleged stone row. Lewis then set the menhir up on a nearby cairn. Over time the menhir was again lost, but was rediscovered in 1988.
The cairn and the menhir are on the eastern headland of St. Martin's overlooking the island of Nornour.