Gorley Hill Hillfort : The Megalithic Portal and Megalith Map:

<< Our Photo Pages >> Gorley Hill - Hillfort in England in Hampshire

Submitted by JimChampion on Sunday, 23 April 2006 Page Views: 9689

Iron Age and Later PrehistorySite Name: Gorley Hill
Country: England County: Hampshire Type: Hillfort
Nearest Town: Fordingbridge Nearest Village: Gorley
Map Ref: SU164113
Latitude: 50.900946N Longitude: 1.768154W
Condition:

5	Perfect
4	Almost Perfect
3	Reasonable but with some damage
2	Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1	Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0	No data.
-1	Completely destroyed

Destroyed Ambience:

5	Superb
4	Good
3	Ordinary
2	Not Good
1	Awful
0	No data.

no data Access:

5	Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4	Short walk on a footpath
3	Requiring a bit more of a walk
2	A long walk
1	In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0	No data.

4 Accuracy:

5	co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4	co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3	co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2	co-ordinates of the nearest village
1	co-ordinates of the nearest town
0	no data

3

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davidmorgan JimChampion have visited here

**Gorley Hill** submitted by JimChampion : Panoramic view of the southwest corner of Gorley Common, looking south. The hill fort once occupied this area, but gravel extraction in the 1950s and 1960s removed any evidence of the earthworks. A well-grazed plateau remains, surrounded on some sides by large embankments (the original ground level); the birch trees in the distance are growing on such a bank, and the corner of a bank protrudes fro... (Vote or comment on this photo)

Site of a destroyed hillfort on the western edge of the New Forest, overlooking the Avon valley.

An iron age promontory fort once occupied the southwestern corner of Gorley Common on Gorley Hill - a gravel-capped spur that points southwest into the Avon valley between Fordingbridge and Ringwood. The earthworks were destroyed in the 1950s and 60s when the common's new owners carried out large-scale gravel extraction works, effectively "scalping" the hill. The tall linear earthen banks present on the hill, mostly covered with silver birch trees, are a relic of the quarrying process and not prehistoric in origin.

For some reason the hillfort's northern rampart (with a single entrance) is still shown on the modern 1:25000 Ordnance Survey map, along with the legend 'fort', as it was in the 1940s OS map. There are certainly no remains of this earthwork on the common, just well grazed grass and the occasional gorse brake at a level a few metres below the original plateau. The site is mentioned in the Hampshire Treasures online resource, and Heywood Sumner carried out some excavation at the site which was published in his 1917 book "Ancient Earthworks of the New Forest". [source]

Access The destroyed fort is part of Gorley Common, which has been managed by Hampshire County Council since it purchased the site from the quarry operators in 1995. There is a gravel car park at the northeast corner of the common (grid ref SU168119) at a sharp bend in the Hyde-Ogdens minor road.
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Nearby Images from Geograph Britain and Ireland:

SU1611 : Gorley Common, New Forest by Jim Champion — by Jim Champion
©2006(licence)

SU1611 : North Gorley, track by Mike Faherty — by Mike Faherty
©2009(licence)

SU1611 : North Gorley, polytunnels by Mike Faherty — by Mike Faherty
©2009(licence)

SU1611 : Fields and house below Gorley Hill by David Martin — by David Martin
©2022(licence)

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