Scheduled monument
In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change.
Following various previous attempts, the 1882 legislation was guided through Parliament by John Lubbock, who in 1871 had bought Avebury, Wiltshire, to ensure the survival of the stone circle.
[5] The act also established the concept of guardianship, in which a site might remain in private ownership, but the monument itself become the responsibility of the state, as guardian.
In a speech in 1907, Robert Hunter, chairman of the National Trust, observed that only a further 18 sites had been added to the original list of 68.
[7] Scheduling offers protection because it makes it illegal to undertake a great range of 'works' within a designated area, without first obtaining 'scheduled monument consent'.
[9] In England and Wales the authority for designating, re-designating and de-designating a scheduled monument lies with the Secretary of State for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).
The long tradition of legal issues did not lead to a condensed register nor to any single authority to take care of over the course of the last 130 years.
The UK is a signatory to the Council of Europe's Valletta Treaty which obliges it to have a legal system to protect archaeological heritage on land and under water.
[3] The body of designation legislation used for legally protecting heritage assets from damage and destruction is complex, and dates back to 1882.
[12] There have been many revisions since, and the UK government states that it remains committed to heritage protection legislation reform,[13] even though the draft Heritage Protection Bill 2008,[14] which proposed a single 'register' that included scheduled monuments and listed buildings, was abandoned to make room in the parliamentary legislative programme for measures to deal with the credit crunch.
[16] The wide range of legislation means that the terminology describing how historic sites are protected varies according to the type of heritage asset.
Monuments are "scheduled", buildings are "listed", whilst battlefields, parks and gardens are "registered", and historic wrecks are "protected".
World Heritage Sites, conservation areas and protected landscapes can also contain both scheduled monuments and listed buildings.
In England the Department for Culture, Media and Sport keeps a register, or schedule, of nationally important sites which receive state protection.
The 1979 Act makes it a criminal offence to: Despite perceptions to the contrary, only a very small proportion of applications for scheduled monument consent are refused.
They encourage owners to maintain scheduled monuments in good condition by using sympathetic land uses, for example restricting stock levels or controlling undergrowth which can damage archaeology below ground.
[32] The register is compiled by survey by a range of heritage groups including Natural England, the Forestry Commission, local authorities, national park authorities, the National Trust, regional and local archaeological societies, Portable Antiquities Scheme Finds Liaison Officers, voluntary groups, property owners, land managers and farmers.
