Avebury Stone Circle
Avebury in Wiltshire contains the largest stone circle in the world, a Neolithic monument of such extraordinary scale that the village of Avebury itself sits within the outer boundary of the henge, its pub, church and houses enclosed within the massive earthwork banks and ditches of a prehistoric ceremonial complex that dwarfs the more famous Stonehenge to the south in sheer extent. The outer circle at Avebury originally comprised approximately one hundred sarsen stones, some weighing over forty tonnes, arranged within a roughly circular bank and ditch enclosure that stretches 420 metres across. The site dates from around 2600 to 2000 BC and represents one of the greatest achievements of Neolithic monument building in Europe.
The approach to Avebury along the ancient West Kennet Avenue, a processional route of paired standing stones that once connected the henge to the Sanctuary monument nearly two kilometres to the southeast, provides the most atmospheric introduction to the site. Walking this avenue with the great stones standing at intervals on either side and the henge earthworks rising ahead gives the visitor a sense of the scale and intention of the original monument complex that no amount of aerial photography or reconstruction drawing can fully communicate. The avenue itself is only partially restored, with marker posts indicating where missing stones once stood, but enough remains to make the experience powerful.
The surrounding landscape contains additional monuments of the same period and tradition that together constitute one of the most important Neolithic and Early Bronze Age ceremonial landscapes in the world. Silbury Hill, the largest prehistoric man-made mound in Europe, stands just to the south of the henge and remains largely unexplained in terms of function despite extensive archaeological investigation. The West Kennet Long Barrow, a chambered tomb dating from around 3700 BC and one of the finest megalithic burial monuments in Britain, is a twenty-minute walk from the main site.
The village of Avebury offers excellent facilities for visitors including the Alexander Keiller Museum, which presents the archaeology of the monument complex in depth, the National Trust-managed Avebury Manor and Garden, and the opportunity to explore the stone circle at close quarters in a way that is no longer possible at Stonehenge.