West Woods

West Woods is a wood about 2 1⁄2 miles (4 km) southwest of the market town of Marlborough in the English county of Wiltshire, United Kingdom. Its area is approximately 957 acres (387 ha).[1] It is open to the public, and is popular with visitors in the Spring, when bluebells cover the forest floor.

West Woods
Geography
LocationMarlborough, Wiltshire, United Kingdom
Coordinates51°23′47″N 1°46′36″W
Area957 acres (387 ha)

History

West Woods was once part of the Royal hunting forest of Savernake until the bounds were changed in the 1330s. West Woods is approximately one fifth of the size of Savernake and was clear felled in 1928 then replanted, mainly with beech.[1][2] The woods have been visited since before the Bronze Age, supplying flints and later charcoal facilities.[3]

West Woods long barrow

Archaeological interest

In July 2020, it was announced that West Woods was the most likely origin of most of the sarsen stones used to create Stonehenge.[4] Archaeologists analysed a core from one of the stones, taken in 1958, and compared it to samples from 20 sarsen outcrops around the country. The whereabouts of the core had been unknown until it was returned from the United States by Englishman Robert Phillips in 2019.[5][6]

West Woods also contains a Neolithic long barrow, approximately 40 metres long and 27m wide at the widest point, up to 3.5m high, and surrounded by a ditch on all sides.[7][8][9] The wood is bisected by an ancient earthwork known as the Wansdyke, dating back to the 5th or 6th century BC.[10]

In February 2007 the Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society conducted the first of a series of surveys which revealed considerable detail about West Wood and the surrounding areas, producing evidence covering a range of time periods including Mesolithic, Neolithic, and post-Medieval. The report discusses the findings of four seasons' worth of field work and includes maps and tables of discoveries.[11][12] Hugh Newman conducted a search of the West Woods area in 2020, discovering more details about the long barrow as well as the sarsen stones within the area, including evidence at Clatford Farm.[13]

References
  1. "West Woods". Woodland Trust. Retrieved 6 December 2020.
  2. "West Woods". www.wiltshirewalks.co.uk.
  3. "West Woods". 16 December 2016.
  4. "Mystery of origin of Stonehenge stones solved". BBC News. 29 July 2020. Retrieved 29 July 2020.
  5. "Missing part of Stonehenge returned". BBC News. 8 May 2019. Retrieved 29 July 2020.
  6. Hershberger, Scott (29 July 2020). "One Mystery of Stonehenge's Origins Has Finally Been Solved". Scientific American. Retrieved 31 July 2020. Detailed testing of the chemical signature of the Neolithic monument’s most prominent large stones pinpointed where they came from
  7. Historic England. "Long barrow in Barrow Copse (1012429)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 6 December 2020.
  8. "West Woods Long Barrow". The Megalithic Portal.
  9. Castleden, Rodney (24 October 2014). Neolithic Britain: New Stone Age sites of England, Scotland and Wales. Routledge. ISBN 9781317606666 – via Google Books.
  10. "Area 15: Savernake Forest and West Woods - Historic North Wessex Downs". www.historicnorthwessexdowns.org.uk. Retrieved 29 July 2020.
  11. "WANHS West Woods Part 1" (PDF). Retrieved 30 July 2020.
  12. "ADS Archaeology Data Service Amadio, L. (2011). West Woods, Wiltshire: An Archaeological Survey. Devizes: Wiltshire Archaeological & Natural History Society" (PDF). Retrieved 30 July 2020.
  13. Newman, Hugh (9 September 2020). "Exploring West Woods and the genesis of the sarsen stones". Megalithomania. YouTube. Retrieved 10 September 2020. Walk around West Woods and Clatford area searching for remains of sarsen stones
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