Wenallt Ucha round cairn

A round cairn from the late Stone Age and early Bronze Age stands on Wenallt Ucha hill near Risca in Caerphilly County Borough. It sits at grid reference ST256905 on open moorland above the Sirhowy Valley. The site consists of a circular mound of stones, built as part of burial rituals. Cadw recognises it as a scheduled ancient monument under SAM number MM046. Local people who raised the cairn also constructed chambered tombs, round barrows, stone circles and hillforts across the region. The Wenallt Ucha cairn was likely used for ceremonial gatherings linked to death rites. Its builders belonged to farming communities that spread across upland Wales in the third and second millennia BC. They left behind a landscape rich in burial mounds and ritual sites. The cairn’s simple form contrasts with more complex monuments such as ring cairns. Yet it remains an important link to prehistoric beliefs about the dead. Visitors reach the cairn by following farm tracks up Wenallt Ucha from the Sirhowy Valley. The final approach crosses rough grassland where sheep graze. From the top, views stretch across the valley to the Brecon Beacons. The stone circle stands exposed to wind and weather, its shape unchanged for thousands of years. The surrounding moorland holds other ancient earthworks, silent reminders of a long-vanished world.