Henge Monument: OS Grid Reference – TM 0093 3277
Archaeology & History
Boxted Henge plan (Colchester Archaeology Group)
As with many sites in Southern England, intensive agriculture has taken its toll on the archaic monuments. The Boxted Cross henge is no exception and hardly any elements of it remains today. But it seems that it was an impressive fella in our more ancient heathen past.
The site was only rediscovered in the 1970s and was first described in Mrs Ida McMaster’s (1975) survey of crop-marks that had been revealed by aerial surveying in Essex and Suffolk counties. Her brief account of the monument told it to be,
“A Class II henge with a wide somewhat ploughed out ditch. Various linear ditches are near, together with prolific variegated ‘field outlines’ of glacial subsoil cracking which extends into the next field southwards. The ditch terminals of the southwest entrance to the henge appear to be wider than the general run of the ditch, say 4-5 metres.”
When Harding & Lee (1987) examined the site, they were a little more cautious in their interpretation of it being a definite henge, citing that there was “insufficient information, but cannot be ruled out as henge-related,” adding that it “could also be a mill.” This latter element seems unlikely, though a windmill may have been built onto the site at a later date.
More recently however the site has been categorized by Historic England as “a Late Neolithic henge.” The monument itself was defined by a broad circular ditch with two large opposing entrances to the north and south. The total diameter of the enclosure is 44 yards (40m) across; but with the surrounding ditch measuring 5½ yards (5m) across all around, the inner level of the henge was about 33 yards (30m) in diameter. Plenty of room for partying old-style!
References:
- Harding, A.F. & Lee, G.E., Henge Monuments and Related Sites of Great Britain, BAR 175: Oxford 1987.
- McMaster, Ida, “Crop Marks Selected and Plotted,” in Colchester Archaeological Group Bulletin, volume 18, 1975.
© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian