Jarn Mound

It was commissioned by Sir Arthur Evans to provide and preserve the view of the "dreaming spires" of Oxford and the surroundings which the poet Matthew Arnold had immortalised in his poem Thyrsis in 1865.

[1] The mound was designed by Sir Arthur Evans to provide a view of Oxford as described by Matthew Arnold in his poem, Thyrsis, "that sweet city with her dreaming spires".

[9] An adjacent field and heath were also bought to form part of the Jarn project which is now maintained by the Oxford Preservation Trust.

[7] Evans financed all this with his personal wealth and then wrote a 45-page booklet about the work – Jarn Mound With Its Panorama and Wild Garden of British Plants – which was published by Joseph Vincent in 1933.

[9] In 2016, a volunteer group – Abingdon Green Gym – started to help maintain the site by clearing such brush and cutting down trees.