The Medway Megaliths, sometimes termed the Kentish Megaliths, are a group of Early Neolithic chambered long barrows and other megalithic monuments located in the lower valley of the River Medway in Kent, South-East England. Constructed from local sarsen stone and soil between the 4th and 3rd millennia BCE, they represent the only known prehistoric megalithic group in eastern England and the most south-easterly group in Britain.
They remain one of several regionally contained chambered long barrow traditions in Britain, although have certain precise architectural characteristics which mark them out as distinct from other groups. The purpose of these long barrows remains elusive, although some were used as tombs for the remains of a select group of individuals. It is also widely believed that they were places where religious rituals were performed. Many archaeologists believe that they reflect the process of Neolithisation of Britain, as hunter-gatherer populations were replaced by pastoralists.
Three chambered tombs have been identified to the west of the river: the Coldrum Stones, Addington Long Barrow, and Chestnuts Long Barrow. To the east of the river, another three chambered tombs have been identified: Kit's Coty House, Little Kit's Coty House, and Smythe's Megalith, although it has also been suggested that two nearby megaliths, the Coffin Stone and the White Horse Stone, are remnants of former chambered tombs. An Early Neolithic longhouse and causewayed enclosure have also been identified in the vicinity of the monuments.
The Medway Megaliths have become heavily damaged and dilapidated since original construction, largely due to an intentional program of destruction in the late 13th century CE. They began to attract the interest of antiquarians in the late 16th century, who developed a number of erroneous theories about their origin, before later being scientifically investigated by archaeologists in the late 19th century. Local folklore has also grown up around the monuments, which came to be interpreted and used as sacred sites by contemporary Pagans in the latter 20th century.
Background The Early Neolithic was a revolutionary period of British history. Beginning in the fifth millennium BCE, it saw a widespread change in lifestyle as the communities living in the British Isles adopted agriculture as their primary form of subsistence, abandoning the hunter-gatherer lifestyle that had characterised the preceding Mesolithic period. Archaeologists have been unable to prove whether this adoption of farming was because of a new influx of migrants coming in from continental Europe or because the indigenous Mesolithic Britons came to adopt the agricultural practices of continental societies. Either way, it certainly emerged through contact with continental Europe, probably as a result of centuries of interaction between Mesolithic people living in south-east Britain and Linear Pottery culture (LBK) communities in north-eastern France.
Between 4500 and 3800 BCE, all of the British Isles came to abandon its former Mesolithic hunter-gatherer lifestyle, to be replaced by the new agricultural subsistence of the Neolithic Age. Throughout most of Britain, there is little evidence of cereal or permanent dwellings from this period, leading archaeologists to believe that the Early Neolithic economy on the island was largely pastoral, relying on herding cattle, with people living a nomadic or semi-nomadic way of life. It is apparent that although a common material culture was shared throughout most of the British Isles in this period, there was great regional variation regarding the nature and distribution of settlement, architectural styles, and the use of natural resources. There is archaeological evidence of violence and warfare in Early Neolithic Britain from such sites as West Kennet Long Barrow and Hambledon Hill, with some groups constructing fortifications to defend themselves from attackers. Contemporary archaeologists have no direct proof of gender relations on the island at this time, although most believe that it was probably a male-dominated society, in keeping with all recorded societies that practice large-scale animal husbandry.
Britain was largely forested in this period, although did witness some land clearance. It remains unclear to what extent the Kentish area was deforested in the Early Neolithic, although it appears that widespread forest clearance only took place on the chalklands of south-east Britain much later, in the Late Bronze Age. Environmental data from the area around the White Horse Stone supports the idea that the area was still largely forested in the Early Neolithic, covered by a woodland of oak, ash, hazel/alder and Maloideae.
The tomb building tradition
Across Western Europe, the Early Neolithic marked the first period in which humans built monumental structures in the landscape. These were tombs that held the physical remains of the dead, and though sometimes constructed out of timber, many were built using large stones, now known as "megaliths". Individuals were rarely buried alone in the Early Neolithic, instead being interred in collective burials with other members of their community. The construction of these collective burial monumental tombs, both wooden and megalithic, began in continental Europe before being adopted in Britain in the first half of the fourth millennium BCE.
The Early Neolithic people of Britain placed far greater emphasis on the ritualised burial of the dead than their Mesolithic forebears had done. Many archaeologists have suggested that this is because Early Neolithic people adhered to an ancestor cult that venerated the spirits of the dead, believing that they could intercede with the forces of nature for the benefit of their living descendants. It has furthermore been suggested that Early Neolithic people entered into the tombs – which doubled as temples or shrines – to perform rituals that would honour the dead and ask for their assistance. For this reason, historian Ronald Hutton termed these monuments "tomb-shrines" to reflect their dual purpose.
In Britain, these tombs were typically located on prominent hills and slopes overlooking the surrounding landscape, perhaps at the junction between different territories. Archaeologist Caroline Malone noted that the tombs would have served as one of a variety of markers in the landscape that conveyed information on "territory, political allegiance, ownership, and ancestors." Many archaeologists have subscribed to the idea that these tomb-shrines served as territorial markers between different tribal groups, although others have argued that such markers would be of little use to a nomadic herding society. Instead it has been suggested that they represent markers along herding pathways. Many archaeologists have suggested that the construction of such monuments reflects an attempt to stamp control and ownership over the land, thus representing a change in mindset brought about by Neolithicisation. Others have suggested that these monuments were built on sites already deemed sacred by Mesolithic hunter-gatherers.
Archaeologists have differentiated these Early Neolithic tombs into a variety of different architectural styles, each typically associated with a different region within the British Isles. Passage graves, characterised by their narrow passage made of large stones and one or multiple burial chambers covered in earth or stone, were predominantly located in northern Britain and southern and central Ireland. Alternately, across northern Ireland and central Britain long chambered mounds predominated, while in the east and south-east of Britain, earthen long barrows represented the dominant architectural trend. These earthen long barrows were typically constructed of timber because building stone was scarce in southern Britain; archaeologist Aubrey Burl argued that these timber tombs might have been "even more eye-catching" than their stone counterparts, perhaps consisting of "towering carved poles, flamboyantly painted", but that evidence of such sculptures has not survived. The Medway Megaliths represent just one of these regional groups within the wider West European tradition of tomb building in this period.
Description
Although now all in a ruinous state and not retaining their original appearance, at the time of construction the Medway Megaliths would have been some of the largest and most visually imposing Early Neolithic funerary monuments in Britain. Grouped along the River Medway as it cuts through the North Downs, they constitute the most south-easterly group of megalithic monuments in the British Isles, and the only megalithic group in eastern England. Archaeologists Brian Philp and Mike Dutto deemed the Medway Megaliths to be "some of the most interesting and well known" archaeological sites in Kent, while archaeologist Paul Ashbee described them as "the most grandiose and impressive structures of their kind in southern England". The BBC Countryfile website notes that although none of the monuments are on the same scale as Stonehenge, they are "really quite impressive" when taken collectively, describing them as "the east of England's answer to the megaliths of the Salisbury Plains".
They can be divided into two separate clusters: one to the west of the River Medway and the other on Blue Bell Hill to the east, with the distance between the two clusters measuring at between 8 and 10 km. The western group includes Coldrum Long Barrow, Addington Long Barrow, and the Chestnuts Long Barrow. The eastern group consists of Kit's Coty House, Lower Kit's Coty House, the Coffin Stone, and several other stones which might have once been parts of chambered tombs. It is not known if they were all built at the same time, or whether they were constructed in succession, while similarly it is not known if they each served the same function or whether there was a hierarchy in their usage.
The Medway long barrows all conformed to the same general design plan, and are all aligned on an east to west axis. Each had a stone chamber at the eastern end of the mound, and they each probably had a stone facade flanking the entrance. The chambers were constructed from sarsen, a dense, hard, and durable stone that occurs naturally throughout Kent, having formed out of silicified sand from the Eocene. Early Neolithic builders would have selected blocks from the local area, and then transported them to the site of the monument to be erected.
Such common architectural features among these tomb-shrines indicate a strong regional cohesion with no direct parallels elsewhere in the British Isles. For instance, they would have been taller than most other tomb-shrines in Britain, with internal heights of up to 10 ft. Nevertheless, as with other regional groupings of Early Neolithic tomb-shrines (such as the Cotswold-Severn group), there are also various idiosyncrasies in the different monuments, such as Coldrum's rectilinear shape, the Chestnut long barrow's facade, and the long, thin mounds at Addington and Kit's Coty. This variation might have been caused by the tomb-shrines being altered and adapted over the course of their use; in this scenario, the monuments would represent composite structures.