THE DISCOVERY earlier this year of a pre-history field system on the South Downs could be linked to bronze age burial mounds on Petersfield Heath suggest experts.

A state of the art aerial survey of the downs revealed that under the trees there was evidence the land had been farmed, certainly while the Romans were here, and very probably before that.

The South Downs National Park Authority (SDPNA) funded survey stretched from Queen Elizabeth Country Park to Arundel, and was aimed at revealing what was under the tree cover.

Meanwhile on Petersfield Heath archaeologists and volunteers from the Petersfield Museum run People of the Heath project are in their third year of excavating Bronze Age burials mounds.

Now it’s being suggested the evidence uncovered by the SDNPA survey has reinforced early claims that the 20 or so burial mounds on the heath are a site of national importance.

SDNP chief executive Trevor Beattie said: “One of our biggest of the survey findings is the discovery of a vast area farmed by pre-historic people on an astonishing scale. Archaeologists are going to have to rethink the human story in this part of the country.”

Archaeology Officer at Chichester District Council James Kenny said: “It’s exciting to see such extensive field-systems which have probably lain untouched since the Romans left 1,600 years ago. But evidence suggests that they go back much further to before the Roman settled here.

“The find raises so many questions. Who was growing these crops and who was eating all of this food? We haven’t found signs of settlement so where were they living? The scale is so large that it must have been managed, suggesting that this part of the country was being organised as a farming collective on a very large scale.

“The degree of civilisation this implies is completely unexpected in this part of the world at this time.”

It maybe that these early settlers were farming on the downs and living in the valley, and there is view that the ones on the heath could have been cemetery for those farmers.

Lead archaeologists for the People of the Heath project George Anelay said: “Potentially the field systems could be bronze age, which is the same period as the burial mounds on the heath.

“We know there were bronze age people living here, from the River Arun to the Meon Valley, and we will be looking to see if the heath and the field system are linked.”

He added that due to the time frame of the field system and the burial mounds, it was certainly likely they were used by the same people.

To find out more about the People of the Heath project visit the Petersfield Museum website, www.petersfieldmuseum.co.uk, and to learn more about the aerial survey visit the Secrets of the High Woods webpage on the SDNPA website, www.southdowns.gov.uk