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<< Our Photo Pages >> Ladle Hill - Hillfort in England in Hampshire

Submitted by JimChampion on Monday, 14 October 2002  Page Views: 24182

Iron Age and Later PrehistorySite Name: Ladle Hill
Country: England County: Hampshire Type: Hillfort
Nearest Town: Newbury  Nearest Village: Kingsclere
Map Ref: SU47885683
Latitude: 51.308580N  Longitude: 1.314489W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
 3 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
 4 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
 3 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
 5

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I have visited· I would like to visit

NDM visited on 17th Sep 2023 - their rating: Cond: 2 Amb: 3 Access: 3

Tomba visited on 1st Nov 2021 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 4 Access: 3 Flew an aerial (drone) survey of the site, to generate orthophotos and 3D models (point clouds, DSM, etc) for fun and interest. Will lookup a copy of the 1931 paper by Stuart Piggott in due course.

fibo74 visited on 6th Jul 2018 - their rating: Cond: 2 Amb: 4 Access: 3 Easy to recognise and stunning views and wildlife.

TheCaptain JimChampion myf have visited here

Average ratings for this site from all visit loggers: Condition: 2.67 Ambience: 3.67 Access: 3

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by JimChampion : View of the western side of Ladle Hill, taken with a long lens from Beacon Hill on the other side of the valley. (Vote or comment on this photo)
Unfinished Iron Age hillfort and Bronze Age barrows in Hampshire

A unique example of an 'unfinished' hillfort on the site of an earlier Bronze Age settlement. It shows features which would not be seen in a completed work e.g. marking-out trenches, partly dug sections of ditch and untidy spoil heaps. [source]

The patterns of lumps and bumps at the site make much more sense from aerial photographs - click on one of the aeroplane icons above for aerial photography.

Access The busy A34 road runs N-S in the valley to the west of Ladle Hill. Leave the A34 at the Beacon Hill junction and follow the signs east towards Kingsclere. After the hamlet of Sydmonton turn right at the crossroads, up the very steep narrow lane (Watership down on your left) and park at the top on the gravelly verge where the Wayfarer's Walk footpath crosses the lane. Follow the footpath to the west (field systems and round barrows on the way) for about a mile.

Further reading (recommended by s.t.champion) A good paper by Stuart Piggott in Antiquity 5, 1931, 474 ff. Brief details in James Dyers' Penguin Guide to Prehistoric England and Wales (Allen Lane 1981), pp 154 and 159-60. Cunliffe refers to in his Wessex to AD 1000 (Longman 1993), his Iron Age Britain (Batsford 1995), and to pre-hillfort features at Ladle Hill in his paper 'Before hillforts' in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology 9 (1990), 323-36.
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Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by TheCaptain : Ladle Hill defences seen here from the southeast. A rare sunny evening in July 2007 ! (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by TheCaptain : Ladle Hill seen here from the north, near Sydmonton. (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by TheCaptain : Ladle Hill seen here from the northwest near Old Burghclere. A rare July 2007 sunny evening. (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by NDM : Wet and windy day, unfinished hill fort but well preserved (Vote or comment on this photo)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by TheCaptain : The view east from Ladle Hill hillfort, looking along the Watership Down ridge. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by TheCaptain : Some of the northeastern defences of the unfinished Ladle Hill hillfort. Seen here looking in a northerly direction, with the village of Sydmonton down below on the right. (1 comment)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by TheCaptain : Ladle Hill hillfort seen here looking in a westerly direction along the top of the ridge of Watership Down.

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by JimChampion : Looking south at Ladle Hill. The clump of trees stand next to the northenmost part of the fort's unfinished defences. (3 comments)

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by JimChampion : Looking south at the tallest and lumpiest part of the unfinished inner bank on the eastern side of the hillfort.

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by JimChampion : A composite image of the southeastern corner of the unfinished hillfort. Some of the causeways across the unfinished ditch can be seen, and the inner bank has a very lumpy profile. The causeways in this picture are probably not intended to be intended entrances to the fort because a probable "marking out" trench cuts across them.

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by JimChampion : Looking north from within the unfinished hillfort. The most complete section of ditch (160m long) can be seen running from the left up to the clump of trees. The inner bank is not very large on this western side of the site. The uneven terrain to the right is where soil was dumped by the fort's constructors.

Ladle Hill
Ladle Hill submitted by JimChampion : Looking west at the Ladle Hill bell barrow beside the Wayfarer's Walk path on the way up to the hillfort. This scheduled barrow is nearly 20m in diameter and up to 1.6m high. Apparently there was once a saucer barrow on the other side of this barrow, but no visible traces of it remain.

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Nearby sites listing. In the following links * = Image available
 1.7km E 93° Nuthanger Down* Round Barrow(s) (SU49605676)
 2.0km W 275° Beacon Hill Barrow South Spur Round Barrow(s) (SU45865698)
 2.1km WNW 282° Beacon Hill (Burghclere)* Hillfort (SU45785727)
 2.2km SW 219° Great Licthfield Down Misc. Earthwork (SU46525513)
 2.3km SW 228° Seven Barrows (Hampshire)* Barrow Cemetery (SU462553)
 2.4km WNW 290° Beacon Hill Barrow North Spur Round Barrow(s) (SU45595762)
 2.5km WNW 290° Beacon Hill Cross Dyke Misc. Earthwork (SU45565764)
 3.0km WSW 240° Lower Woodcott Down* Misc. Earthwork (SU453553)
 4.2km SE 128° Polhampton Bowl Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (SU5123554299)
 4.7km E 91° Bowry Walls* Hillfort (SU52605676)
 4.7km SSE 159° Ridgeway Farm* Long Barrow (SU496524)
 5.0km S 183° Peak House Long Barrow* Long Barrow (SU47705179)
 5.0km S 183° Peak House Bowl Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (SU47645179)
 5.1km ESE 114° Tidgrove Warren* Round Barrow(s) (SU5253054807)
 5.1km SSE 147° Willesley Warren Long Barrow (SU507526)
 5.7km E 89° Cottington's Hill Bowl Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (SU53615695)
 6.2km SSW 195° Larks Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (SU46355082)
 8.4km NNW 344° Wash Common* Barrow Cemetery (SU45446484)
 9.3km SSW 192° All Hallows (Whitchurch) Early Christian Sculptured Stone (SU45994775)
 9.8km SSE 166° Abra Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (SU5030947359)
 10.1km SSE 165° Turrill Hill Bowl Barrows* Round Barrow(s) (SU5052247092)
 10.3km N 357° West Berkshire Museum Museum (SU472671)
 10.3km WSW 244° Severals Copse Bowl Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (SU38615227)
 11.0km E 87° Ramsdell Modern Stone Circle* Modern Stone Circle etc (SU5891457590)
 11.3km NNW 348° The Ladywell* Holy Well or Sacred Spring (SU454679)
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"Ladle Hill" | Login/Create an Account | 2 News and Comments
  
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Re: Ladle Hill by coldrum on Thursday, 30 June 2011
(User Info | Send a Message)
Pastscape entry.

http://www.pastscape.org.uk/hob.aspx?hob_id=232435
[ Reply to This ]

Re: Ladle Hill by Anonymous on Tuesday, 29 August 2006
Visited site 28/08/06 . Site is fenced off and gate padlocked. Very overgrown
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