Avebury

Avebury is a Neolithic henge monument with three stone circles around the village of Avebury in Wiltshire. It stands on a low chalk ridge above the Upper Kennet Valley, about 10 to 11 kilometres from Marlborough and Calne. The site covers nearly 23 square kilometres and includes a large outer stone circle and two smaller inner circles. It is part of a wider prehistoric landscape with nearby monuments like West Kennet Long Barrow and Silbury Hill. The area was once dense oak woodland, later cleared for grassland by early farmers. The monument was built over several hundred years in the third millennium BC but fell out of use by the Iron Age. Local people later removed many stones, though antiquarians John Aubrey and William Stukeley recorded what remained in the 17th and 18th centuries. Archaeologists such as Harold St George Gray and Alexander Keiller later restored parts of the site. It is now managed by the National Trust and is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and World Heritage Site. Visitors walk among the standing stones and along the grassy banks of the henge. The village of Avebury sits within the monument, with cottages and a church surrounded by the ancient stones. The landscape of chalk downland and seasonal watercourses stretches out to the Marlborough Downs. The site offers a quiet place to reflect on the distant past and the people who built it.