Barbury Castle is a scheduled hillfort in Wiltshire, England. It is one of several such forts found along the ancient Ridgeway route. The site, which lies within the Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, has been managed as a country park by Swindon Borough Council since 1971. It is on Barbury Hill, a local vantage point, which, under ideal weather conditions, commands a view across to the Cotswolds and the River Severn. It has two deep defensive ditches and ramparts.
Aerial view of Barbury Castle
Steep earthworks looking northwards
Aerial view from above
Barbury Castle showing the scale of the present-day structure
The Ridgeway is a ridgeway or ancient trackway described as Britain's oldest road. The section clearly identified as an ancient trackway extends from Wiltshire along the chalk ridge of the Berkshire Downs to the River Thames at the Goring Gap, part of the Icknield Way which ran, not always on the ridge, from Salisbury Plain to East Anglia. The route was adapted and extended as a National Trail, created in 1972. The Ridgeway National Trail follows the ancient Ridgeway from Overton Hill, near Avebury, to Streatley, then follows footpaths and parts of the ancient Icknield Way through the Chiltern Hills to Ivinghoe Beacon in Buckinghamshire. The National Trail is 87 miles (140 km) long.
The Ridgeway National Trail on Grim's Ditch near Mongewell
Ivinghoe Beacon (the eastern trailhead) seen looking north from The Ridgeway
The Ridgeway winds over the Berkshire Downs
Path down from the Ridgeway to Bishopstone, Wiltshire