The ring was part of a tradition of stone circle construction that spread throughout much of Britain, Ireland, and Brittany during the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, over a period between 3300 and 900 BCE.

The purpose of such monuments is unknown, although archaeologists speculate that the stones represented supernatural entities for the circle's builders.

In the early 18th century, the site was recorded by the antiquarian William Stukeley although the stones were destroyed by local farmers in the 1720s.

[5] The archaeologist Aubrey Burl noted that the site is "visually unexciting",[4] offering only a "dull and stunted concrete reproduction" that does "little for the uninstructed imagination".

[6] The archaeologists Joshua Pollard and Andrew Reynolds noted that although it was "far from the most spectacular or evocative of the Avebury monuments", the site's significance "should not be understated".

[7] By 3000 BCE, the long barrows, causewayed enclosures, and cursuses which had predominated in the Early Neolithic were no longer built, and had been replaced by circular monuments of various kinds.

[15] Archaeologists initially suggested that a fifth example could be seen at Langdean Bottom, although further investigation has reinterpreted this as evidence for a late prehistoric hut circle or a medieval feature.

[16] Burl suggested that these smaller stone related to Avebury in a manner akin to "village churches within the diocese of a cathedral".

This is reflected by a scatter of Peterborough Ware discovered by archaeologists that possibly extends for several hundred metres to the north of the monument.

The final phase was of 42 sarsen stones forming a boundary ring 40 metres (130 ft) across, which replaced all the timber structures.

[18] The Sanctuary connects to the West Kennet Avenue, a line of stones stretching for 2.4 kilometres to the Avebury henge.

The timbers may have supported a roof of turf or thatch, to form a high-status dwelling serving the ritual site at Avebury, although this can only be conjectural.

[26] The archaeologist Stuart Piggott later noted that this was "a rather improbable name for rural folklore, and suggesting some seventeenth-century antiquarianism at work".