Dorchester’s Fascinating Maumbury Rings
Maumbury Rings is a fascinating and free place to visit in Dorchester that has an amazing history. Find out more about it on this page.
The prehistoric henge
When Maumbury Rings was excavated in 1908-13, it was discovered that there was a prehistoric henge here before Roman times. It had roughly the same outline you see today, but lower banks and a deep inner ditch.
Henges were built by Britain’s first farmers in the Neolithic or ‘New Stone Age’. They had a circular ditch and outer bank interrupted by one or more entrances. Some had stone or timber circles.
Here archaeologists found 45 ‘shaft” pits dug in the bottom of the ditch, some more than 13 metres deep. Material from the ditch and pits was heaped into an outer bank. There was a single entrance in the north, where there may have been a large single standing stone, Eight pits were investigated, revealing burnt material along with carved chalk objects and human and animal bones dated to between 2000-2800 BC, around 4500 years ago.
Other large henge sites are known just east of the town at Mount Pleasant and Flagstones. Another, discovered nearby in the 1980s beneath Greyhound Yard and Acland Road, once had a great circle of massive timbers. These impressive sites show that, long before the town was here, this area was the centre of a major Neolithic ceremonial landscape comparable to those at Stonehenge and Avebury.
Celtic henge? Roman amphitheatre? Civil War army camp?
Maumbury Rings was all of these, and a place for the people of Dorchester to gather for circuses, fairs, executions, political meetings and town celebrations. It can accommodate a crowd of around 12,000 people!
"Maumbury”
Maum – Of uncertain meaning but possibly Old English mealm, meaning ‘chalky soil’ or maene, meaning ‘common’ (perhaps referring to the gatherings of people in a common place) or Celtic, main meaning stone.
Bury – From the Old English burgh, meaning ‘earthwork’. (it also means ‘fortified town’)
The Roman Amphitheatre
When the Romans built their new town of Durnovaria (Dorchester) in around 60 AD, rather than build an entirely new amphitheatre, they re-modelled the prehistoric henge.
They dug out and fattened the inside of the ring to create an arena, which was floored with rammed chalk and sand. The arena is one of the largest in Britain – but among the smallest in the Roman empire.
The extra chalk and soil was used to raise the banks to about the height they are today. There may have been wooden seating built into the sides and there is evidence of a wooden safety fence around the arena. Behind the safety fence was a service corridor.
The Romans also built new entrances and, on the east, west and southern sides; they built small recesses into the banks. It is not known what these were for – perhaps pens or cages, or small rooms with shrines or religious statues. It is possible that stands – like theatre boxes – were constructed above these small rooms.
Roman Shows
It is likely that the amphitheatre was built by the Second Legion Augusta of the Roman army when they established a base here in Dorchester. One possible site for the Roman barracks is across the road at the Market site.
The amphitheatre would have been used for practice and demonstrations of army skills. No strong evidence of gladiators has been found, but there were probably circuses, bull fights and wild beast shows. Wolves, bears and wild boar were present in Britain at this time and may have been captured for shows.
The use of Maumbury Rings transferred from the army to the townspeople, but it gradually fell out of regular use.
Civil War Camp
During the English Civil War (1642-1648) modifications were made to the ampitheatre. A ramp at the southern end was built to move heavy guns to the top of the banks. There are also smaller ramps from this period on the eastern and western sides.
The defences were built by Parliamentarian forces in Dorchester to defend the town against a possible attack from Lord Caernarvon’s troops in Weymouth. There was also a fort at Dorchester’s southern gate (near where the war memorial is today), which was connected to Maumbury Rings by a covered trench.
The defences cost over £19,000 to build, but would only have lasted about half an hour, according to one critic. We don’t know if he was right, as the fortification was never used; in 1643 the town surrendered to the Royalists as soon as they appeared!
Later History
Maumbury Rings has been used for town gatherings from Roman times to today.
In 1706 Mary Channing was executed here, watched by 10,000 people. She was strangled and burned at the stake at the age of 19, having been convicted of poisoning her elderly husband. The trial took place in July 1905, but, as Mary was pregnant, the execution was delayed until after her son was born. She defended herself at her trial and protested her innocence till the last.
“Not one of those ten thousand people ever cared particularly for hot roast after that” wrote Thomas Hardy.
When the railways came to Dorchester in the 1840s, the original routes would have caused damage to both Poundbury Hillfort and Maumbury Rings. A campaign by the poet, William Barnes, and others led to changes in the route and the setting up of the Dorset County Museum in 1846.
Find out more...
Visit the Dorset Museum, where objects from Maumbury Rings are displayed.
Read about the trial of Mary Channing, online or at the Dorset History Centre, and Roman Dorset by Bill Putnam.
Discover events held at Maumbury Rings in our What’s On pages
