been military sites constructed in response to invasion from continental Europe, sites built by invaders, or a military reaction to social tensions caused by an increasing population and consequent pressure on agriculture. The dominant view since the 1960s has been that the increasing use of iron led to social changes in Britain. Deposits of iron ore were located in different places to the tin and copper ore necessary to make bronze, and as a result trading patterns shifted and the old elites lost their economic and social status. Power passed into the hands of a new group of people. Archaeologist Barry Cunliffe believes that population increase still played a role and has stated "the forts provided defensive possibilities for the community at those times when the stress of an increasing population burst out into open warfare. But I would not see them as having been built because there was a state of war. They would be functional as defensive strongholds when there were tensions and undoubtedly some of them were attacked and destroyed, but this was not the only, or even the most significant, factor in their construction". The fort, which covers about , consisted of ditches and earth banks topped with a wooden fence in an elevated position above the marshy land below. The ramparts are apart. It extends approximately from north to south and from east to west. The ditch is around deep and the ramparts rise up around . After the Iron Age occupation may have continued into the Roman era indicated by the discovery of pottery fragments, a small stone statue of Mars possibly from a Roman temple and coins of Claudius Gothicus and Valentinian II. The site may still have been occupied into the Anglo-Saxon period. Several of the finds were uncovered during excavations by Harold St George Gray in 1922, although the coin dating from around 370 was discovered in 1945 and a Romano-British relief in the inner defensive ditch in 1974. The relief was given to Weston Museum, and loaned to Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery. During World War II the site was used for bomb disposal and as the location for a searchlight battery. Current management The site was once part of the estate linked to Clevedon Court. It is now managed via a Higher Level Stewardship agreement between the National Trust and Natural England. This has involved removing trees whose