A pond barrow comprises a circular depression, very well and regularly formed, the material from which has been placed around the circumference to form an embanked rim. Within the enclosed central area there may be pits and/or shafts, some of which contain burials, and some of which can be of great depth. In diameter pond barrows range from about 5m to 30m across. Most are recognized as upstanding earthworks, but it is possible that plough-reduced examples could be identified from cropmarks or soilmarks on aerial photographs because of the distinctive hollow centre and peripheral bank. Pond barrows are mostly confined to central southern England, principally Wiltshire and Dorset, although a few outliers are known further north and east.
Pond barrows may potentially be confused with various other classes of monument, notably shafts and wells of various periods, hengi-form monuments, collapsed mines or extraction pits, old ponds, and natural sink holes. In all cases close attention to the size and position of the central hollow and the surrounding bank is required as these are the key features by which pond barrows are identified.
Specifically excluded from the class are other kinds of round barrows with which pond barrows are often associated (eg. fancy barrows, bowl barrows and bell barrows). Strictly speaking, of course, pond barrows are not "barrows" at all since the word denotes a hill or mound which is absent from the pond barrow tradition. Pond barrows forming components of round barrow cemeteries are evaluated within the context of the cemetery rather than as separate monuments, although in preparing this decription account is taken of examples in a variety of situations and associations.
Pond barrows are generally interpreted as funerary and/or ceremonial monuments of early and middle Bronze Age date because of their close associations with other kinds of barrows and round barrow cemeteries; the pits and shafts within pond barrows may have been for communication with the spirits of the earth. As such, pond barrows may have had similar or identicle functions to other broadly contemporary monuments, for example shafts, ring cairns, and tor cairns.