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Cissbury Ring in LiDAR

Cissbury Ring is an Iron Age hillfort in West Sussex. Here it is in the Environment Agency's 1 m LiDAR, shaded so the shape of the ground stands out. Look for the oval rampart, ditch and counterscarp bank with gaps on the south and east, and a dense pock-marked patch of round flint-mine hollows.

What you can see

• Cissbury Ring is a roughly oval fort of about 24 hectares, lying north-east to south-west, defended by a bank, a ditch and a counterscarp bank. (Historic England)
• Neolithic flint mines survive as at least 270 roughly circular hollows, from 3 to 36 metres across and up to 3 metres deep. (Historic England)
• The fort had two gateways, on the south and east, shown by causeways over the ditch and gaps in the ramparts. (Historic England)
• Excavation suggests the hillfort was built in the Middle Iron Age, around 400 BC. (Historic England)

Visiting

National Trust site on the South Downs with no Trust parking; it is about a 20-minute uphill walk from the free Storrington Rise car park (not National Trust), with kissing gates and stiles. (National Trust)

Official record: Historic England list entry 1015817: Cissbury Ring hillfort, prehistoric flint mine and associated remains.

Look, don't detect or dig

Cissbury Ring is a Scheduled Monument, protected by law because it's of national importance. In England it's a criminal offence to use a metal detector on a Scheduled Monument without Historic England's written consent, and to remove any object of archaeological or historical interest found with one. Damaging a scheduled monument is an offence too, and works on one, including digging, need Scheduled Monument Consent first. More on Scheduled Monuments and the rules.

Keep to paths and open access land, and follow the Countryside Code.

More sites in LiDAR

Danebury · Old Sarum · Stonehenge · Knowlton · all sites