MEM23805 - Prehistoric cairn on Monkham Hill (Monument)

A cairn was noted during a visit to the site in early 2017. It is approximately 0.4 to 0.5 metres high and 6 metres in diameter. [1][2] A cairn in a plot of mature conifers was discovered [] by Nick Salter, at SS 99226 39293. This is a flat-topped, very stony mound, 11m N/S, 9.5m E/W and up to 1m high. Damage to the west side by a vehicle has exposed some of the stone making up the mound. This cairn, together with the large round barrow (SM 1021227, MSO7443) and the probable ring cairn (SM 1021231, MSO7442) form a group of three distinct types of funerary monuments in a prominent location on the NE edge of the Exmoor escarpment, looking out north across the Bristol Channel and east towards the Quantock Hills. These structural differences may well relate to the different way that the sites were used: cremation, perhaps on the site of the platform cairn, followed by the interment of the ashes in the barrow, and the disposal of the cremation pyre within the embanked platform cairn [3]