Devil's Lapful Explained

Devil's Lapful
Map Type:Northumberland
Map Size:200
Coordinates:55.2287°N -2.5645°W
Gbgridref:NY 642 929
Designation1:Scheduled monument
Designation1 Number:1009666
Designation1 Date:15 November 1994

Devil's Lapful is an archaeological site in Northumberland, England, in Kielder Forest about 0.8miles south-east of Kielder. The site, a Neolithic long cairn, is a scheduled monument.

Description

The cairn is one of few surviving long cairns in Northumberland. It is on the south-west slope of a hill, and is orientated north-north-east to south-south-west. It is constructed of rounded boulders with some stone slabs, and with smaller stones at the edges; it measures 60by, and is high. There has been some later quarrying to make a sheep fold, which is next to the cairn on the north-west.

Monuments such as this are thought to date from the Early to Middle Neolithic (about 3400–2400 BC); they were probably burials sites for a local community over several generations.