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Ancient monument

Grimes Graves

Near Brandon, Norfolk

A field of hundreds of Stone Age flint mines.

Grimes Graves is a field pitted with at least 433 filled-in mine shafts. Neolithic miners dug down more than 14 metres through the chalk to reach a seam of fine black flint.

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When
c. 2600–2300 BC
Where
52.4750, 0.6750
Group
Circles & monuments

Visiting

English Heritage, open in season. Shaft visits are limited.

Cover of The Ledger of Lost Britain by Cale Mills
From the book

The Ledger of Lost Britain

In Norfolk, about eight kilometres north-east of Brandon, a field is covered with hollows. This is Grimes Graves, and the hollows are the mouths of filled-in mine shafts, at least 433 of them.

The Romans arrived in AD 43. For most people that is where the history of Britain begins. But by the time the legions landed, people had already been living on these islands for thousands of years. They had hunted, farmed, mined flint, dragged stones across the country, raised a hill by hand, and buried their dead in great tombs. They left no written words. What they left was the ground itself. Every place in this book can be visited, or has been dug up, or is in a museum.

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