Kennet Avenue
| UNESCO World Heritage Site | |
|---|---|
Kennet Avenue in 2014 | |
Interactive map of Kennet Avenue | |
| Location | Wiltshire, United Kingdom |
| Part of | Avebury Section of Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites |
| Criteria | Cultural: (i), (ii), (iii) |
| Reference | 373bis-002 |
| Inscription | 1986 (10th Session) |
| Extensions | 2008 |
| Coordinates | 51°25′23″N 1°50′53″W / 51.423°N 1.848°W |
Kennet Avenue Location of Kennet Avenue in Wiltshire | |
Kennet Avenue or West Kennet Avenue is a prehistoric site in the English county of Wiltshire. It was originally an avenue of two parallel lines of stones 25m wide and 2.5 km in length, which ran between the Neolithic sites of Avebury and The Sanctuary. There are currently 27 upright stones and 37 concrete pillars marking original stone locations.
Excavations directed by Alexander Keiller and Stuart Piggott in 1934 and 1935 indicated that around 100 pairs of standing stones had lined the avenue, dated to around 2200 BC from finds of Beaker burials beneath some of them. The missing stones had been pushed over and buried, or broken up for building materials, between the 13th and 17th centuries.
A second avenue, called Beckhampton Avenue, led west from Avebury towards Beckhampton Long Barrow, with the 'Adam and Eve' long stones still standing west of the village of Avebury Trusloe.