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Fight to Protect Silbury Hill
English Heritage and landowner Lord Avebury are campaigning to protect the ancient site of Silbury Hill from ramblers.
By Holly Kirkwood
Monday, May 17 2004
A move to re-classify Silbury Hill, a manmade structure dating back to thousands of years BC, as a building to protect it from ramblers is being made today.
Silbury Hill has long been an object of fascination for archaeologists and historians, as the function and precise nature of the structure remains unknown.
It is a hill artificially built into the landscape in Wiltshire, and has been protected for years by the landowner Lord Avebury who owns the site it is built on. However, the re-mapping of land under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act is likely to classify the hill as open land, which would mean people could walk over it freely.
Lord Avebury meets today with the planning inspectorate to try and convince them that the site should be protected as a listed building is, as it is manmade.
English Heritage is supportive of the bid, saying: 'Silbury Hill is an ancient man made structure of international and national importance and as such has special needs for protection.
'We support the need to continue to restrict public access to Silbury Hill as the wear and tear this would cause could easily damage the valuable archaeology of the hill.'
The National Trust also agrees that the structure is too fragile to be walked over: 'The National Trust owns 1600 acres of land at Avebury, much of it of archaeological importance. A large part of this land is open for public access and visitors are encouraged to explore the wider countryside when they visit Avebury.'
'Silbury Hill is an isolated, man made structure. Due to its fragility (its archaeology is very near to the surface of the monument), the National Trust believes that uncontrolled public access could potentially damage its archaeology.'
The outcome remains to be seen, but whatever it is, it will be a telling ruling for many landowners who may have particular features they would choose to protect if they could.
Something is not right. This message is just to keep things from messing up down the road