Hillforts in Britain Hillforts in Britain refers to the various hillfort s within the island of Great Britain . Although the earliest such constructs fitting this description come from the Neolithic period , with a few also dating to the later Bronze Age , British hill forts were primarily constructed during the Iron Age . Some of these were apparently abandoned in the southern areas that were a part of Roman Britain , although at the same time , those areas of northern Britain that remained free from Roman occupation saw an increase in their construction . Some hillforts were reused in the Early Medieval period , and in some rarer cases , into the Later Medieval period as well . By the Early Modern period these had essentially all been abandoned , with many being excavated by archaeologists in the nineteenth century onward . There are around 3 , 300 structures that can be classed as hillforts or similar " defended enclosures " within Britain . Most of these are clustered in certain regions : south and south - west England , the west coast of Wales and Scotland , the Welsh marches and the Scottish border hills . British hillforts varied in size , with the majority covering an area of less than 1 ha ( 3 acres ) , but with most others ranging from this up to around 12 ha ( 30 acres ) in size . In certain rare cases , they were bigger , with a few examples being over 80 ha ( 200 acres ) in size . Various archaeologists operating in Britain have criticised the use of the term " hillfort " both because of its perceived connection to fortifications and warfare and because not all such sites were actually located on hills . Leslie Alcock believed that the term " enclosed places " was more accurate , whilst J . Forde - Johnston commented on his preference for " defensive enclosures " . Bronze Age hillforts . British hillforts , as now recognised , first appeared in the Late Bronze Age . Archaeologists Sue Hamilton and John Manley believed they were a part of " . . . substantial landscape and social reconfigurations at the start of the first millennium [ BCE ] " , that coincided with the change of three characteristics of British Bronze Age society : " . . . disappearance of an archaeologically visible burial rite , . . . increased deposition of prestige metalwork in rivers , . . . and the demise of a middle Bronze Age settlement format of groups of round houses set within enclosures . " They went on to note that " Accrued place - value may have been important in the establishment of the earliest hillforts . These are often in locations with conspicuous traces of previous ritual monuments . This may have been a means of validating new social practices through making links with the past " . This idea was examined in more depth by ethnologist J . Forde - Johnston , who made note of how a number of Iron Age hillforts had been built close to earlier Bronze Age barrow s . Commenting on the fact that both types of monument typically were constructed in high locations , he said , " It is not surprising that the two features should coincide in several dozen cases . " He added that it was possible that hillforts had been intentionally sited near barrows for defensive protection from the " . . . sacred associations of the burial place . " Iron Age hillforts . The Iron Age hillforts have remained dominating features in the British landscape : as ethnologist J . Forde - Johnston noted , " Of all the earthworks that are such a notable feature of the landscape in England and Wales few are more prominent or more striking than the hillforts built during the centuries before the Roman conquest . " He continued , describing them as an " eloquent testimony of the technical ability and social organization of the Iron Age peoples . " On a similar note , the English archaeologist J . G . D . Clark remarked that " [ Iron Age ] Hillforts are at once among the most impressive and informative of our prehistoric antiquities . They impress by their mere size , by the height of their ramparts , by the depth of their ditches , by the extent of the areas they enclose , and frequently by their commanding position . " There was " immense variation subsumed within the class of monuments called hillforts " , and those of the British Iron Age have been characterised as belonging to four different types . The main two are " contour " and " promontory " forts , and the lesser two are " hill - slope " and " plateau " forts . Contour forts are those " . . . in which the defences cut off the upper portion of a hill from the ground below by following , more or less , the line of the contours encircling it . " Promontory forts are typically defined by " . . . an area to which the approach is limited , to a greater or lesser extent , by natural features such as cliffs , very steep slopes , rivers etc . Where such features exist little or nothing in the way of man - made fortification is required . " Hill - slope hillforts , rather than " enclosing the hilltop in the manner of contour forts , are situated on the sloping ground on one side of it , overlooked by the crest " , whilst plateau forts " face level ground on all sides , regardless of their elevation above sea - level " ; these final forts then are often , although by no means always , located in plateaus , hence their name . Iron Age hillforts made use of both natural and man - made defences , with the former including such geographical features as cliffs , steep slopes , rivers , lakes and the sea , and the latter largely consisting of banks and ditches . There were actually two forms of banks built at such sites : revetted and glacis . Revetted banks present " a vertical or near - vertical outer face to the enemy . This outer face or revetment is normally of timber or dry stone walling , or a combination of the two , and retains the core of earth , chalk , clay etc . , derived in most cases from the outer ditch . " Glacis banks on the other hand " are usually triangular in cross - section and at their simplest consist of a single dump of the material excavated from the ditch . " The number of these such ramparts differs in Iron Age British hillforts ; some , which are known as univallate , are single - rampart only , whilst others , known as multivallate , are multi - rampart forts . Commenting on their distribution across southern Britain , Forde - Johnston stated that " roughly one - third of the Iron Age forts in England and Wales have multivallate defences , the remaining two - thirds being univallate . " Purpose . The reason for why British Iron Age peoples built hillforts is still under dispute . One school of thought , dominant amongst archaeologists in much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries , holds that they were primarily defensive structures built in an era of inter - tribal warfare . However , in the late twentieth century , various archaeologists began to challenge this assumption , claiming that there was not sufficient evidence to back it up . As Mark Bowden and Dave McOmish remarked , " there is a tendency to assume that they were all built for similar purposes and are all performing similar functions " , something that they note may well not have been true . Taking a similar stance , archaeologist Niall Sharples noted that " It is clear from [ my ] analysis of the sequence [ of construction ] at Maiden Castle , and by comparison with other sites , such as Danebury , that hillforts do not have a single function . A variety of different activities can be associated with these sites and with time the importance or perhaps the emphasis of certain activities changed dramatically . " Defensive usage . It has been traditionally assumed that hillforts were constructed for defensive purposes in the Iron Age . Describing warfare of the period , archaeologist Niall Sharples stated that war was such an integral part of all agricultural human societies that it was possible " to believe " a priori " that after the introduction of agriculture [ in the Neolithic , ] warfare was a constant feature of the prehistoric societies of the British Isles . " It was in this context , he believed , that hillforts were constructed as defensive positions . Writing in 1948 , J . G . D . Clark commented that hillforts ' " defensive character cannot be stressed too often . " Another archaeologist to hold a similar viewpoint , Barry Cunliffe , a specialist in the Iron Age , believed that hillforts from this period were defensive settlements . Nonetheless , various archaeologists have called into question the defensive capacity of many hillforts . Using the case study of the Scratchbury hillfort in Wiltshire , Bowden and McOmish noted that " The positioning of [ the fort ] suggests that it was not built for defence " because " a potential assailant is enabled to observe all the dispositions of the defence " , thereby leaving it particularly vulnerable to attackers . On a similar note , archaeologists Sue Hamilton and John Manley , after investigating the forts in south - east England , noted that for this region , " It is noteworthy that most of the hillforts are univallate , and lack the in - depth perimeter elaboration which elsewhere has been ascribed a defensive role . " Niall Sharples , after accepting that many British hillforts were not particularly defensible , theorised that Iron Age warfare in Britain , like much warfare around the world , did not consist purely of physical violence , but instead might have primarily " . . . involved ritualised display and threatening behaviour . I believe that the bulk of the evidence for warfare in the archaeological record [ which included hillforts ] is created as a deterrent , or to symbolise the nature of the conflict rather than actually the physical act . " In this manner , hillforts would have in many respects been symbolically defensive rather than practically so , in a period when warfare was primarily about being threatening to your enemies rather than entering into open conflict with them . Ceremonial and ritual usage . Mark Bowden and Dave McOmish , writing in 1989 , noted that " The idea that some hillforts performed ceremonial functions is not a new one but discussion has concentrated on the possible existence of shrines and temples within the defences . " Instead , they proposed that " The morphology and topography of the ramparts themselves may indicate ceremonial activity " . Sue Hamilton and John Manley noted that archaeologists must keep in mind a phenomenological view of hillforts within their landscapes , noting that " Hillforts provide a defined location from which to view the ' world ' . . . Such an experience of changing visual perspectives is largely lost in academic publication , yet it must have been a preeminent aspect of how hillfort builders and users described and understood hillforts . " Southern Britain in the Romano - British Iron Age . In the first century CE , southern Britain was conquered and absorbed into the Roman Empire , leading to the creation of a hybrid Romano - British culture within what is now known as Roman Britain . It appears as though settlement ceased at many hill forts in Roman Britain . For instance , excavators working at the Dinas Powys hill fort in the Vale of Glamorgan , southern Wales , noted that although artefacts that were clearly Romano - British in nature were found at the site , they were not found in sufficient quantities to imply settlement , and that there was also no evidence of any construction going on during the first four centuries of the common era . They concluded therefore that under Roman rule , Dinas Powys had been effectively abandoned . In the extreme southwest , however , enclosed settlements , albeit on a much smaller scale , continued to be constructed such as at Chysauster or the ' Rounds ' found in Cornwall — presumably reflecting a lesser degree of Roman influence , which continued through into the Sub Roman . Northern Britain . The Roman Empire never occupied northern Britain ( which at this time was largely the geographical equivalent to the later nation - state of Scotland ) , and as such a native British Iron Age culture was able to continue here with less imperial interference . This had some bearing on the nature of hill forts in this period . Archaeologist Leslie Alcock noted that a fort - building hiatus in the early centuries [ CE ] was followed by a new wave of construction — beginning in the third century , gathering momentum in the fifth , and perhaps extending through to the eighth . Also , out of all northern forts with radiometric dates , about half were either earlier forts that had been refurbished in the later period , or were newly constructed on virgin sites in the later period . Early Medieval hillforts . In the Early Medieval period , which began in the fifth century CE , much of southern Britain ( comprising much of the area that later became the nation - state of England ) , adopted a variant of Germanic culture from continental Europe , likely due to migration from that region . These Germanic peoples , the Anglo - Saxons , typically did not build or re - use hillforts . However , in Northern and Western Britain , areas that retained a cultural link to the earlier Iron Age , hillfort use continued . After looking at the difference between Iron Age and Early Medieval hill forts , archaeologist Leslie Alcock thought it reasonable to infer that Political and social conditions that demanded the massive pre - Roman Iron Age hillforts — and had the labour to build them — no longer existed in [ the fifth and sixth centuries CE ] . This implies a remarkable change in social organization . Western Britain . In Wales and the West Country ( the latter of which is now part of England ) , Iron Age British culture continued , largely free from the adoption of Anglo - Saxon culture . For instance , the Dinas Powys hill fort in southern Wales saw re - settlement in the fifth century , as does South Cadbury Hillfort which has revealed significant evidence for the construction of a Sub - Roman ' Great Hall ' within the enclosure , having long been associated with the mythical Camelot . In other cases , defensive positions were also reoccupied , for instance , on the defensive peninsula of Tintagel Island in Cornwall , a promontory fort known as Tintagel Castle was built in the Early Medieval period , with archaeologists believing that it acted as a " stronghold for the post - Roman kings of Dumnonia . " Several similar promontories in the southwestern region , as well as in neighbouring Brittany show signs of occupation from this period and are often associated with so - called ' Celtic Christian ' hermitages and / or chapels such as at Rame Head , St Ives , St Michaels Mount , Mont Saint - Michel , Burgh Island and Looe Island recently excavated by Channel 4 ' s Time Team . Northern Britain . Northern Britain had never been conquered by the Roman Empire , and so the Iron Age proceeded directly into the Early Medieval without imperialist intervention . According to archaeologist Leslie Alcock , " warfare " was perhaps the " principal social activity in Early Historic northern Britain " , playing a major part in " contemporary prose and poetry " , and for this reason many hill forts of this period have been commonly thought of as defensive structures designed to repel attack . Hill forts occupied in the Early Medieval period appear to have primarily been settlements for the social elite , the ruling classes who governed society . The northern British peoples who constructed hill forts knew of various forms of the monuments , leading Alcock to note that " the three Celtic peoples of northern Britain [ Britons , Picts and Gaels ] were fully aware of the potential of different types of fort , and used them variously , taking account only of local terrain , building materials , and politico - military needs . "