Hunsbury Hillfort, also known as Dane’s Camp, is an Iron Age Hillfort situated in Hunsbury Hill Country Park. It is probable that defences were built at Hunsbury Hill between the 7th and 4th centuries BC. The deep ditch excavated has survived to the present day. A wooden rampart was also constructed and there is evidence that Hunsbury Hillfort’s inner ramparts were burned down and vitrified.

Ironstone extraction began at the hill fort in the 1880s. Many of the hillfort’s internal features were destroyed, but the work revealed up to 300 pits which, according to the curator of Northampton Museum in 1887, contained “numerous artefacts that now comprise one of the finest collections of Prehistoric antiquities in England”. The finds included iron weapons and tools, bronze brooches, pottery, glass and over 150 quern stones. All of the artefacts were given to the town’s museum, although most of them have now been transferred to the Northamptonshire Archaeological Resource Centre (the ARC) at Chester House (between Wellingborough and Rushden Lakes).

Hunsbury Hillfort is a Scheduled Monument in the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979, and so any damage to it, including the defensive ditch, constitutes criminal damage. Parts of the hillfort’s banks have been badly eroded because of the 19th century quarrying, the effects of burrowing animals and damage from tree roots. It is now managed as part of the Hunsbury Hill Country Park by West Northants Council.

Part of the railway built for the quarrying remains and is maintained by Northamptonshire Ironstone Railway Trust (NIRT).

Also running through the Country Park is part of the Banbury Lane Drovers’ Road, used in years gone by by Welsh farmers bringing their sheep to Northampton’s Cattle Market. Some sources maintain this Drovers’ Road has been in use for thousands of years, making it contemporary with the Hillfort, and that it originally ran through the hillfort itself. Others argue that the name Green Lane, which is used to refer to the Drovers’ Road though the Country Park, comes from the ‘crown of trees’ landmark that the fort has become.