from the Dorset echo.......................................................
Bridport Bronze Age monument to be excavated
1:30pm Wednesday 18th May 2011
ARCHAEOLOGISTS are to excavate historic burial mounds at Golden Cap before they are lost to the sea.
A team from the National Trust is holding a dig at the Bronze Age monument on the cliff top near Bridport.
They will probe three of the five earthworks – which are 4,000 years old – amid fears that they will fall victim to landslips.
National Trust archaeologist Martin Papworth said: “These Bronze Age round barrows are important features of the landscape of Dorset and have a valuable story to tell but the archaeological information contained in these burial mounds can only be preserved through excavation and record.
“Total loss of the group through cliff collapse is expected in the next 50 years.
“The barrows are scheduled monuments and English Heritage has granted permission for the National Trust to excavate the most vulnerable parts of the barrow group.”
There are five burial mounds visible as earthworks on the summit of Golden Cap, which is the highest point of the coast path through Dorset.
The two furthest from the cliff will not be excavated this time but the three closest to the near vertical cliff must be archaeologically recorded.
The National Trust says that although erosion rates on the Dorset coast will have varied over the past 4,000 years, it is thought the barrows would have been about two miles inland at the time they were built.
The work started on May 16 and will continue for three weeks.
