Avebury

Avebury: Bigger Than Stonehenge, Better Than Stonehenge, and You Can Touch the Stones

Stonehenge is famous. Avebury is larger, older in parts, and you can walk freely among the stones rather than viewing them from behind a rope. Both are UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Stonehenge has become a managed experience; Avebury remains a living village with prehistoric stones in the gardens, in the churchyard, propping up a pub car park. The contrast tells you something about how England values the two kinds of heritage differently.

The Avebury complex is the largest stone circle in the world: an outer ring of approximately 98 sarsen stones enclosing around 11.5 acres, with two smaller inner circles, built around 2500 BCE. The individual stones weigh up to 40 tonnes. The full monument complex – including the Kennet Avenue, which ran for over a mile to a separate stone circle at Overton Hill – was one of the most significant ceremonial landscapes in prehistoric Europe. Much of it was deliberately buried or destroyed in the medieval period when Christianity regarded it as pagan, and many of the stones were simply rolled into pits. Excavation in the 20th century by Alexander Keiller restored what could be recovered.

What to See

The main stone circle is the starting point. You enter from the National Trust car park and walk directly into the monument. The stones vary enormously in shape: some are pillars, some are diamond-shaped, some are simply large boulders. This irregularity is deliberate – the distinction between tall columnar “male” stones and broader “female” stones appears repeatedly in the layout. Spend 45 minutes walking the outer circuit before exploring the inner rings.

West Kennet Long Barrow, 1.5 kilometres south, is a Neolithic communal tomb dating to around 3650 BCE. The entrance is a low stone passage leading into a series of stone chambers where at least 46 individuals were buried over generations. The roof slabs are massive. You duck inside and your eyes adjust and the space feels properly ancient in a way that the open-air stone circle does not. No ticket required. One of the best Neolithic experiences in England, and typically very quiet.

Silbury Hill, 0.75 kilometres south of Avebury, is the largest prehistoric artificial mound in Europe: 130 feet high, built around 2400 BCE, and entirely unexplained in terms of purpose. It required an estimated 18 million work-hours. It is currently closed to climbing due to structural concerns but it dominates the surrounding landscape from the road and from the West Kennet Long Barrow.

The Alexander Keiller Museum on the High Street covers the excavation history and has a good collection of finds from the site.

Practical Notes

Entry to the stone circles and the Avebury grounds is free; the National Trust asks for parking charges. The Red Lion pub, inside the stone circle (genuinely: the pub is within the outer ring), serves food and local ales. Nearby Marlborough and Devizes have more accommodation options. Stonehenge is 30 kilometres south.

Best times to visit: early mornings before the coach groups arrive, or winter weekdays when you may have much of the monument to yourself. The equinoxes and solstices bring pagan revival groups in numbers that you may find either enriching or distracting depending on your tolerance for drumming.