GM578

Llanmadoc Hill, cairn on W end of  

16/03/2004  

Designated  

Swansea  

Llangennith, Llanmadoc and Cheriton  

242977  

192419  

Religious, Ritual and Funerary  

Round Cairn  

Prehistoric  

The following provides a general description of the Scheduled Ancient Monument. The monument comprises the remains of a large burial cairn, probably dating to the Bronze Age (c.2300 BC - 800 BC) and situated within open moorland on the summit of the ridge of Llanmadoc Hill. The stone built cairn is circular on plan and measures about 17.5m in diameter and up to 0.2m in height. The cairn has been disturbed in the past, with the addition of a walker's cairn; it now comprises a grass and heather covered stony circular platform. It may indeed have originally been a platform cairn (see nearby Rhossili Down round cairns, SAM GM194). The monument is of national importance for its potential to enhance our knowledge of prehistoric burial and ritual. The monument is an important relic of a prehistoric funerary and ritual landscape and retains significant archaeological potential, with a strong probability the presence of both intact burial or ritual deposits and environmental and structural evidence, including a buried prehistoric land surface. The area scheduled comprises the remains described and an area around them within which related evidence may be expected to survive.