Reasons for Designation
Bodmin Moor, the largest of the Cornish granite uplands, has long been
recognised to have exceptional preservation of archaeological remains. The
quality and diversity of the evidence is such that the moor has been the
subject of detailed archaeological survey and hence it forms one of the best
recorded upland landscapes in England. Of particular note are the extensive
relict landscapes of Prehistoric, medieval and post-medieval date. Together
these provide direct evidence for human exploitation of the moor from the
earliest Prehistoric period onwards. The well-preserved and often visible
relationship between settlement sites, field systems, ceremonial and funerary
monuments as well as later industrial remains provides significant insights
into successive changes in the pattern of land use through time.
Platform cairns are funerary monuments dating to the Early Bronze Age
(c.2000-700 BC), covering single or multiple burials. They were constructed
as low flat-topped mounds of stone rubble, up to 40m in external diameter and
sometimes supporting other features of heaped stone such as peripheral banks
and internal mounds. A kerb of edge-set stones sometimes bounds the edges of
the platform, bank or mound, or all three. Platform cairns can occur as
isolated monuments, in small groups or in cairn cemeteries. Due to their
comparative visual insignificance when compared to the larger types of round
cairn, few were explored by 19th century antiquarians. As a result, they
remain a poorly understood class of monument. Along with other funerary
monuments they illustrate the diversity of beliefs and burial practices in the
Bronze Age. Although no precise figure is available, current evidence
indicates that there are under 250 known examples of this monument class
nationally. As a rare class exhibiting considerable variation in form, a
substantial proportion of surviving examples are considered worthy of
preservation. This platform cairn on Caradon Hill is in a reasonably good
condition and has not been excavated; the stone-robbing activity has caused
only limited disturbance to the level of the old land surface and it is
considered that any funerary deposits covered by this cairn will have survived
intact. Its importance is enhanced by its position within a cairn group which
contains a variety of different types of burial cairn, demonstrating well the
diversity of burial practice during the Bronze Age.
Details
The monument comprises a large circular platform cairn with a peripheral bank,
part of a linear cairn group near the summit of Caradon Hill on SE Bodmin
Moor.
The cairn survives as a large, circular, flat-topped platform of heaped small
stones, 30m diameter and 0.4m high. The bank on the platform periphery starts
3m from platform edge, leaving a clear peripheral berm; the bank is also
composed of heaped small stones and survives 2m wide and generally 0.5m above
the platform level, rising to 1m high in the NW sector; it is visible around
the entire periphery except the disturbed S sector. The cairn interior bears
no trace of any internal mound, but has a number of hollows and hummocks from
limited stone-robbing from the cairn. One such hollow exposes part of a
recumbent slab, appearing 1m square, at the cairn's centre. The entry for
these activities has been from the S and SE sector, where the peripheral bank
and platform edge have been reduced. This cairn has been surveyed on several
occasions since 1907 but has not been subject to archaeological excavation.
It lies near the summit of Caradon Hill, at the W edge of a cluster of four
cairns at the NE end of a linear cairn group which extends to the SW along the
side of the hill's summit. This group contains ten recorded cairns of several
types typical of the Early and Middle Bronze Age (c.2000 - 1000 BC)
MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.
It includes a 2 metre boundary around the archaeological features,
considered to be essential for the monument's support and preservation.
