Porth Hellick Down

Porth Hellick Down is located on the island of St Mary's in the Isles of Scilly, overlooking Porth Hellick Bay. The Neolithic and Bronze Age monument encompasses a large cairn cemetery containing several burial cairns, including at least six entrance graves. It also includes an ancient linear boundary and a prehistoric field system, which stretches across the northern and north western section of the Down. It is the largest surviving group of entrance graves in the world.

The largest and best preserved entrance grave on the ancient site is a Bronze Age grave (2000-1500 BC) located on the northwestern slope of Porth Hellick Down. The burial monument is situated close to the boundary of a prehistoric field system. The site was excavated by the antiquarian, George Bonsor in 1899. He named the entrance grave, "The Great Tomb". Earlier unrecorded excavations at the site had left the burial chamber empty, except for a piece of pumice and a few remnants of late Bronze Age pottery fragments. Bonsor's excavation is the first excavation in Scilly to be recorded in detail. The entrance grave sits on a low, circular platform. It consists of a mound that is 12.25 m in…