Introduction to the Belle Tout Complex 

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The Belle Tout earthworks lie upon a chalk plateau which rises to a maximum height of 80m OD. The site overlooks the English Channel at NGR TV 56209570, some 3km West of Beachy Head and 2km south of East Dean in the parish of East Dean and Friston, Wealden District, East Sussex.

 
The chalk downland coast between Eastbourne and Brighton is the last remaining undeveloped chalk cliff coastline in the south-east of England. The significance of this natural resource is underlined by the number and diversity of conservation measures currently applicable: the grassland has the status of a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) and an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB), and is also partly managed by Eastbourne Borough Council as an Environmentally Sensitive Area (ESA). The area was designated as a Heritage Coast in 1973. Belle Tout today is split into two portions by two different landowners: The National Trust and Eastbourne Borough Council.
      Three earthwork enclosures, all now seriously affected by coastal erosion, have been recorded from Belle Tout Hill. Only two (A and C) survive today. The largest earthwork (enclosure A), which today covers an area in excess of 20 hectares, may originally have enclosed the entire headland. The earthwork consists of a earth bank surrounded by an continuous pit-linked ditch. The smaller earthwork (C), lies within A at the very edge of the cliff line. Both C and the now lost B have been interpreted as Late Neolithic / Early Bronze Age agricultural settlement enclosures. A series of round barrows, presumably of  Bronze Age date, are also recorded from the headland.

The earthworks recorded from Belle Tout, though archaeologically examined on a number of occasions, remain poorly understood and largely undated. The site, which is at present eroding into the sea at a rate of around 0.5m a year, represents an area of considerable archaeological potential, a study of which is considered all the more urgent due to the constant pressures of coastal erosion. The aim of the 1995 excavations was to help resolve the interpretational, environmental and contextual problems regarding the three earthwork enclosures recorded.

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Table of Contents

Main Belle Tout page
Summary of Archaeological History
Interpretational Problems
Research by Bournemouth University
Acknowledgements
Bibliography
Comments and enquires should be addressed to:
Miles Russell (email:mrussell@bmth.ac.uk)