244 THE WILTSHIRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY MAGAZINE 
Woodhenge, where there is evidence for open 
country before the construction of the bank and 
throughout the secondary fill of the ditch. 
The large, well-known henge monument of 
Durrington Walls appears to have been in use in the 
period c. 2800-2100 cal BC, while that of the 
neighbouring Woodhenge probably falls within the 
second half of the third millennium (2500-2000 cal 
BC; Burleigh et al. 1972; Evans and Wainwright, 
1979; Richards 1990, table 137 and fig. 156). Other 
activity within the area is indicated by the 
following: 
e Four pits and a probably later Neolithic ditch at 
Larkhill Married Quarters (Wainwright 1971), 
immediately south-west of Durrington Walls, 
containing Grooved Ware, struck flint, bone 
artefacts, animal bone and a single limpet shell. 
e Structure A: 19 pits or postholes covering an area 
approximately 18m by 11m, 64m to the south of the 
henge bank excavated during the main campaign of 
excavations Durrington Walls in 1966-7 
(Wainwright and Longworth 1971, 44—7). 
e Structure B: a shallow ditch terminal, which cut an 
artificial hollow, produced plain body sherds and 
fragments probably of later Neolithic date from its 
upper fill. It was interpreted as possibly part of a ring- 
ditch similar to those excavated by Mrs Cunnington 
to the south (Wainwright and Longworth 1971, 47). 
e Four pits in the garden of Woodlands, 274m to the 
south-east of the centre of Woodhenge, which 
contained Grooved Ware, struck flint, part of a Graig 
Lwyd axe (Group VII), bone artefacts and animal 
bone, antler, and marine shells (Wainwright and 
Longworth 1971, 48). 
e Three small Grooved Ware sherds found with a 
cremation in a pit within the ring-ditch Circle 2, 
south of Woodhenge. The ring-ditch, which is 
interpreted as one of four ploughed-out barrows, 
appeared to cut a rectilinear setting of stakeholes 
(Cunnington 1929; Wainwright and Longworth 
1971, 3). Grooved Ware was also recovered from the 
ditches of Circles 3 and 4 (Cunnington 1929). 
e A series of small flint mines was discovered to the 
north-east of Durrington Walls during trenching 
operations through the gardens of the houses to the 
north of Larkhill Road. Three shallow pits and three 
pit-shafts were recorded. The flint was of poor quality 
and extraction was abandoned, presumably fairly 
quickly. A chisel arrowhead of Clarke’s type D 
(Clarke 1934) lay on the base of pit-shaft 5, indicating 
a later Neolithic date for the pits (Booth and Stone 
1952). 
¢ Grooved Ware was found redeposited in Ditch A, a 
ditch almost certainly of Middle Bronze Age date 
immediately to the east of the Packway enclosure 
(Wainwright and Longworth 1971, 310). 
e Four plain sherds of Grooved Ware recovered at 
Totterdown from spoil thrown out from a pit that 
contained a crouched skeleton (Wainwright and 
Longworth 1971, 293). 
Further afield, approximately 1.6km to the 
south-east of Woodhenge, Grooved Ware was 
recovered from Ratfyn, Amesbury. Excavation 
revealed four pits, three of which were considered 
to be contemporaneous. Only one pit contained 
pottery, and also a total of 519 flints, a scallop shell, 
and the bones of red deer, roebuck, cattle and pig. It 
is also notable for a single brown bear scapula 
(Stone 1935). A recent radiocarbon date indicates 
that deposition of the material was probably 
contemporary with the latest use of Woodhenge, 
rather than with the main use of Durrington Walls, 
as its calibrated range lies around the turn of the 
third millennium cal BC (see Allen 1997). 
The Amesbury area is well-known for its 
Neolithic monuments and, to some extent, also for 
smaller sites such as the pits at Woodlands, the type 
site for the Woodlands sub-style of Grooved Ware 
(Wainwright and Longworth 1971) and at Ratfyn. 
The known sites have been, on the one hand, 
obvious and large (Durrington Walls, Woodhenge), 
or small and unrecognised until found fortuitously 
(the pits at Larkhill Married Quarters, Woodlands, 
Ratfyn) and because of this it has been difficult to 
gauge the density of smaller sites. To some extent 
the construction of the pipeline has helped to 
establish the density of Neolithic sites within the 
area, in that it provided a swathe of stripped surface 
over 5km long which was subject to professional 
archaeological observation. 
The results have added considerably to the 
known pattern in that they suggest a more 
widespread use of the area to the north and north- 
west of Durrington Walls than was previously 
attested, while the lack of sites in the river valley 
suggests that the lower ground may not have been 
occupied on the same scale. There was little 
alluvium exposed within the pipeline easement, but 
elsewhere in the valley it is possible that alluvium 
masks Neolithic material. That the lack of sites can 
be attributed to wet conditions during the 
Neolithic is also unlikely to be correct, as peat 
formation was very limited within the pipeline 
trench, and it seems likely that much of the valley 
