The largest prehistoric man-made mound in Europe, a giant Neolithic hill of chalk raised beside the road below Avebury
Open accessfree to visit at any reasonable time
Earthworks onlybanks, ditches and platforms — read the ground, not walls
Silbury Hill is a massive Neolithic mound of chalk and earth in the Wiltshire countryside, the biggest artificial prehistoric mound in Europe. It stands roughly 30 metres high with a flat top, close to the River Kennet and a short way south of the village of Avebury. People built it in stages around 2400 BC, shifting an astonishing amount of chalk with antler picks and baskets, and it forms part of the same World Heritage Site as the great stone circle at Avebury.
The obvious question is what it was for, and no dig has ever settled that. People have tunnelled into Silbury Hill more than once looking for a burial at its centre and found nothing. Whatever the reason, it took a colossal effort from a farming people with no metal tools.
You can’t climb Silbury Hill — walking on it wears the ancient surface away, so English Heritage keeps people off — but you get a good look from the roadside pull-in and from the footpaths nearby. Most people fold it into a visit to Avebury village, where you can wander among the standing stones for free, or walk a stretch of the Ridgeway, the old chalk-ridge track that passes to the east.
More at the National Heritage List entry
