Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Little Kit's Coty House, also known as the Countless Stones, consists of 19, 20, or 21 large and small stones which were part of a Neolithic megalithic structure, now thought to be more akin to a portal dolmen rather than a chambered tomb. An Iron Age settlement probably overlays the site.

Images

Monument Types

• CHAMBERED TOMB (Neolithic - 4000 BC to 2351 BC)
• LONG BARROW (Early Neolithic - 4000 BC to 3001 BC)

Full description

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[TQ 74416039] The Countless Stones [OE] (1)

The Lower Kits Coty, generally called the Countless Stones or The Numbers. It is a group of 19 or 20 sarsens which represent a megalithic structure destroyed c.1690. In 1722, Stukeley was sent a description of the structure before its destruction given to his correspondent by a person who remembered it.(a) Stukeley's reconstruction shows a portal chamber with a small peristalith behind (b) but such a structure would be unique and does not accord with the number and size of the stones. Comparison with Coldrum [TQ 66 SE 7] suggests that the peristalith should be larger. There have been the usual vague rumours of human remains found at this site but they lack confirmation. (2)

The Beale-Poste MSS include seven possible reconstructions of the Lower Kits Coty. (3)

Included in list of Burial Chambers where no remains of a mound are visible or recorded. (4)

The site consists of a confused group of c.20 recumbent megaliths; they probably once formed a burial chamber. At present there are no traces of a barrow. (5)

Little Kits Coty (d) or the Countless Stones, a confused group of recumbent sarsens gathered around a small clump of trees in a cultivated field 200m south of the Pilgrims Way. As suggested by the preceding authorities, they probably once formed a burial chamber.They are a scheduled ancient monument. Published Antiquity model survey found to be correct. See GP/AO/59/6/8 - taken from 5.

(6) TQ 744604. Little Kits Coty House, also known as the Countless Stones now consists of about 21 large and small stones, now under trees and enclosed by iron railings. The stones probably represent the partially demolished chamber of a long-barrow. It seems probable that some of the stones may also have come from the facade or side of the barrow. One of Stukeley's sketches suggests that the mound may have been revetted by a stone kerb, but this is by no means certain. The site has never been properly excavated. (7)(8)

Lower Kits Coty. This is a jumbled and half buried group of 19 or 20 sarsen stones (the Countless Stones) which represent the remains of a megalithic tomb destroyed in the 17th century. (9)

Additional bibliography/information. (10, 11, 18, 19)

Trial trenching in 1989 found no clear evidence of a quarry ditch and mound for for the neolithic tomb although one ditch (No.4) could be a candidate. (17)

From the Register of Scheculed Monuments:
DESCRIPTION OF THE MONUMENT
Little Kit's Coty House, also known as The Countless Stones, is situated near the foot of the North Downs scarp some 600m from the Kits Coty House Long Barrow. It comprises a group of ca.20 sarsen boulders in a tight cluster and represents the remains of a burial chamber which was seriously damaged in 1690 before any reliable records were made. The stones and an area immediately around them are in the Guardianship of English Heritage. The understanding of the monument relies heavily on the reconstructions made by Stukeley in 1722 based on information from a correspondent who remembered the monument before its alteration. The reconstructions suggest a monument somewhat similar in its original form to that at Coldrum, 10km to the west, with a burial chamber in which skeletons may have been deposited, an earthen mound partially or completely covering the chamber and a revetting wall of smaller sarsen stones surrounding the mound. The size of the surrounding revetting wall, or peristalith, may have been reduced to facilitate cultivation, perhaps as early as during the Iron Age. Evidence from a recent evaluation suggests that the monument did not occupy one end of an elongated mound in the manner exemplified at Kit's Coty House, and that no flanking ditches accompanied this monument. The railings which delineate the Guardianship area and the information board are both excluded from the scheduling of this monument.

ASSESSMENT OF IMPORTANCE
Long barrows were constructed as earthen or drystone mounds with flanking ditches and acted as funerary monuments during the Early and Middle Neolithic periods (3400-2400 BC). They represent the burial places of Britain's early farming communities and, as such, are amongst the oldest field monuments surviving visibly in the present landscape. Where investigated, long barrows appear to have been used for communal burial, often with only parts of the human remains having been selected for interment. Certain sites provide evidence for several phases of funerary monument preceding the barrow and, consequently, it is probable that long barrows acted as important ritual sites for local communities over a considerable period of time. Some 500 long barrows are recorded in England. As one of the few types of Neolithic structure to survive as earthworks, and due to their comparative rarity, their considerable age and their longevity as a monument type, all long barrows are considered to be nationally important. The atypical example of Little Kit's Coty House represents an unusual variant of this class of monument but nevertheless forms part of the group of Neolithic burial monuments known as the Medway Megaliths. Being held in Guardianship, the monument is of high amenity value. (20)


0.02ha was surveyed via resistivity within the enclosure at Little Kit’s Coty House by Birmingham University in July 2009. This revealed the possible presence of buried stones. It is now thought the site is more akin to a dolmen or portal dolmen rather than a chambered tomb of the Severn-Cotswold type. (21)

Form The National Heritage List for England:

Details
Little Kit's Coty House, also known as The Countless Stones, is situated near the foot of the North Downs scarp some 600m from the Kits Coty House Long Barrow. It comprises a group of ca.20 sarsen boulders in a tight cluster and represents the remains of a burial chamber which was seriously damaged in 1690 before any reliable records were made. The stones and an area immediately around them are in the Guardianship of English Heritage. The understanding of the monument relies heavily on the reconstructions made by Stukeley in 1722 based on information from a correspondent who remembered the monument before its alteration. The reconstructions suggest a monument somewhat similar in its original form to that at Coldrum, 10km to the west, with a burial chamber in which skeletons may have been deposited, an earthen mound partially or completely covering the chamber and a revetting wall of smaller sarsen stones surrounding the mound. The size of the surrounding revetting wall, or peristalith, may have been reduced to facilitate cultivation, perhaps as early as during the Iron Age. Evidence from a recent evaluation suggests that the monument did not occupy one end of an elongated mound in the manner exemplified at Kit's Coty House, and that no flanking ditches accompanied this monument. The railings which delineate the Guardianship area and the information board are both excluded from the scheduling of this monument

Reasons for Designation
Long barrows were constructed as earthen or drystone mounds with flanking ditches and acted as funerary monuments during the Early and Middle Neolithic periods (3400-2400 BC). They represent the burial places of Britain's early farming communities and, as such, are amongst the oldest field monuments surviving visibly in the present landscape. Where investigated, long barrows appear to have been used for communal burial, often with only parts of the human remains having been selected for interment. Certain sites provide evidence for several phases of funerary monument preceding the barrow and, consequently, it is probable that long barrows acted as important ritual sites for local communities over a considerable period of time. Some 500 long barrows are recorded in England. As one of the few types of Neolithic structure to survive as earthworks, and due to their comparative rarity, their considerable age and their longevity as a monument type, all long barrows are considered to be nationally important.

The atypical example of Little Kit's Coty House represents an unusual variant of this class of monument but nevertheless forms part of the group of Neolithic burial monuments known as the Medway Megaliths. Being held in Guardianship, the monument is of high amenity value (20)

Historic Englan archive material (22)

<01> OS 6" 1938-48 (OS Card Reference). SKE48355.

<02> Dr. Stukeley's Diaries Surtees Soc 76 p.226 (OS Card Reference). SKE41513.

<03> Iter Cur 2nd Edn 1766 plate 32 (OS Card Reference). SKE44785.

<04> Arch Cant Vol 63 1950 p.67 (JH Evans) (OS Card Reference). SKE36420.

<05> Beale-Poste MSS Maidstone Mus vol 3 sect 3 p.84-91 (OS Card Reference). SKE37615.

<06> Arch Cant 62 1949 p.134 (JH Evans) (OS Card Reference). SKE35351.

<07> OS Prof Papers NS 8 1924 (OGS Crawford) (OS Card Reference). SKE48428.

<08> Preh Chamber-Tombs of E and W 1950 p.234 (GE Daniel) (OS Card Reference). SKE48645.

<09> MOW nameplate (OS Card Reference). SKE47358.

<10> F1 AC 14-JUL-59 (OS Card Reference). SKE41801.

<11> Philp, B, 1981, A survey of the Medway megaliths, KAR 64 1981 80 illus (B Philp) (Article in serial). SKE24000.

<12> Arch Cant 97 1981 232-3 (R Holgate) (OS Card Reference). SKE36279.

<13> The Bldgs of Eng W Kent and the Weald 1980 141 (J Newman) (OS Card Reference). SKE50114.

<14> Arch J 126 1969 (E Warman) (OS Card Reference). SKE36539.

<15> Field report for monument TQ 76 SW 1 - July, 1959 (Bibliographic reference). SKE4157.

<16> "KITS COTY" (Collection). SKE6554.

<17> Oxford Archaeology, 1989, Little Kit's Coty, Aylesford, Kent: Archaeological Assessment, Little Kits Coty, Aylesford, Kent: Arch Assessment 1989 (Oxford Arch Unit/G Hay & G LambricK) (Unpublished document). SKE11890.

<18> DEMOLISHED C.1690. SEE ALSO AO59/6/8.ALSO KNOWN AS 'LITTLE KIT'S COTY HOUSE','THE COUNTLESS STONES'. (Photograph). SKE110.

<19> VIEW Types: BURIAL CHAMBER (Photograph). SKE109.

<20> English Heritage, Register of Scheduled Monuments (Scheduling record). SKE16191.

<21> Institute of Archaeology & Antiquity, Birmingham University, 2009, Kit's Coty House and Little Kit's Coty House, Kent: Geophysical Survey, 2009 (Unpublished document). SKE16366.

<22> Historic England, Archive material associated with Kits Coty Scheduled Monument (Archive). SKE54072.

Sources and further reading

Related thematic articles

• Neolithic Kent (Thematic Essay)