Aerial photography and excavations the Strathearn Environsand Royal Forteviot (SERF) project have revealed it as one of the most intensively developed prehistoric ceremonial landscapes in Britain, comparable to Stonehenge, although largely built in earth and timber (Noble and Brophy 2011a). The catalysis for the creation of the monument complex at Forteviot appears to have been the establishment of a major late Neolithic cremation cemetery in the early centuries of the third millennium BC. This was followed by the construction of one of the most spectacular monuments constructed in prehistoric Europe – a monumental c.260m diameter palisaded enclosure defined by an immense circle of over two hundred oak tree trunks approached by a confined avenue of posts. This monument, dating to around 2700 cal BC, is one of five of its type in Scotland, but shares important parallels with great monuments of wood and stone found across later Neolithic Britain and Ireland and echos similar traditions found in south Scandinavia and Continental Europe (Noble and Brophy 2011b).
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