Landscape description

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Wiltshire is a county of contrasting and attractive countryside with downland, woodlands, river valleys and clay vales. The chalklands of the North Wessex Downs, Salisbury Plain, Cranborne Chase and the West Wiltshire Downs, form undulating open scenery characterised by large fields and isolated tree clumps. In contrast, the valleys appear well wooded due to the enclosure of smaller fields by hedgerows and the presence of riverside trees and copses. Extensive deposits of clay-with-flints on top of the chalk support major woodlands such as Savernake Forest and the Great Ridge, Grovely and Tollard Royal woods.

Escarpments form the most dramatic features of the Wiltshire landscape and are the locations of a number of chalk carvings such as the white horses and regimental badges. Earthworks and ancient trackways give the chalklands a distinct archaeological feel, particularly in the Stonehenge and Avebury areas. Settlements are concentrated in the river valleys or below the ‘spring line’ beneath the escarpments. The traditional building materials of brick, stone, flint and thatch add to the picturesque qualities of these villages.

The oolitic limestone of the Cotswolds forms a gently undulating plateau with deeply incised, heavily wooded valleys. Much of the plateau is under arable cultivation with large fields separated by dry stone walls. The use of ‘traditional’ local stone has ensured that villages blend well with the landscape.

The clay vales are areas of gently undulating topography and varied landscape with permanent pasture on the flood plain and arable cultivation on the better drained soils. Throughout the vales there are numerous villages and many of the major towns of Wiltshire. The Thames and Bristol Avon Vales are separated by a line of low wooded hills, remnants of the ancient Braydon Forest, which occur on the outcrop of corallian limestone stretching from near Westbury to Highworth. In places this forms an important escarpment, especially around Lyneham. The Thames Vale is broad and relatively flat with more extensive floodplains and meadows than those in the Vales of Pewsey or Bristol Avon. In the Upper Thames Valley the extraction of gravel deposits has created numerous lakes, which form the core of the Cotswolds Water Park.

On the edge of the Chalklands in the south-west is a series of wooded ridges and valleys on the greensand there are many large estates, such as Fonthill in the Vale of Wardour, Longleat and Stourhead. In the south-east of the county, on the sands and gravels, there is a heavily wooded landscape more typical of the New Forest.

Last updated: 21 September 2009