Monument record MNL 001 - Three Hills, Warren Hill, Mildenhall. (BA)

Three round barrows on eminence, about 70 feet in diameter and 9 or 10 feet high, each being fossed, were destroyed in 1866 (S1)(S6). Sub conical in form (S1). First record of excavation in 1728; each barrow was surrounded by a fosse `and that one hath been cut through halfway from the top, as if it were done with a saw, and from the outside to the inside and the piece is wanting' (R1). Marked on OS, 1836, 1st ed map (S10).
In about 1820 Sir H Bunbury cut 5 feet wide trenches, E-W through each barrow. Pottery found (S1).
1859: Tithe Map marks two barrows and records area as `arable'. 1866: Quarrying of centre barrow revealed grave, containing crouched inhumation of woman with food vessel (now in BSEMH), found under 18 red deer antlers, prongs upwards, lying in a heap 3 feet in diameter and 2 feet high (S1).
A second food vessel (now in BM) is recorded from another of the barrows (S6).
On 7th January 1976 nothing visible - area extensively disturbed by quarrying and is now afforested (S9).
The food vessel associated with the female inhumation is described as complete, 5 inches high, 8 inches exterior diameter at rim, 3 inches at base and has 6 peforated lugs. Internal rim bevel has four rows of twisted cord decoration, the body down to the lugs has incised herring-bone decoration. Below this is a zone of zig-zag incisions, below which are 2 rows of herring- bone incisions (S4, fig. 25,m).
A letter from R R Clarke to Basil Brown records:- `Today, 18/7/51 Mr J E Sainty of West Runton, Cromer, brought in for me to see a rim fragment of B Beaker, which he picked up at Warren Hill, Mildenhall' (S8).
See also Pal, Rom and Sax.

Norfolk Wildlife Trust have made habitat improvements at Warren Hill. Antiquarian discoveries have revealed a long history to this site from the Palaeolithic through to the Bronze Age and re-use in the Saxon period. The recent archaeological work included fieldwalking and trench monitoring. Seventy-seven struck flints were found on the site all of which are thought to date to the Neolithic or Early Bronze Age periods. Six probable cores were identified with most of the remainder being unmodified flakes. A few of the flakes had been retouched or utilised and include a knife, blades and a scraper. One clearly recognisable tool is a barbed and tanged arrowhead (Sutton type C, Green 1984, 29-30), (Fig. 8) of earlier Bronze Age date. All the finds were unstratified except for ten struck flints and a few sherds of pottery which were recovered from the fill of a small pit, the only feature recorded on the site. The flint from the pit includes a small multi-platform core, part of a blade struck from an abraded platform and several regular flint flakes while the pottery is Beaker in date.
Included in the Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and History annual round up of individual finds and discoveries for 2022 (S11)