NEOLITHIC sites near Bedale, said to be equal in importance to Stonehenge, could be made known to a wider public.

Dr Jan Harding, an archaeologist at Newcastle university, has spent the past six years leading a research project into the three henges at Thornborough and others at Hutton Moor, near Melmerby.

The sites date from 4000 to 2200BC, and Dr Harding said that, with the Devils Arrows, near Boroughbridge, they were archaeologically equal to the Neolithic monuments found at the World Heritage sites of Avebury, Stonehenge and Orkney.

Thornborough has three equally spaced henges, or large banked and ditched circular enclosures, the central henge being built over an earlier cursus, or long, cigar-shaped ditched enclosure.

The landscape also includes a pit alignment 300 metres long, the largest such monument in Britain, and a number of burial mounds from the Bronze Age between 2200 and 1800BC.

The earthwork circles have been scheduled as ancient monuments for many years and in the 1970s, partly in response to the threat from local gravel workings, the scheduled area was extended to include land of known archaeological importance between the circles.

Only limited archaeological work was done at Thornborough between the late 19th century and the 1950s, but Dr Harding's research involved extensive surveys and field walking which yielded a collection of flint tools.

Organisations which funded the research included English Heritage, the British Academy, the Society of Antiquaries, the Prehistoric Society and Newcastle university.

The henges remain little known to the public, but Dr Harding now hopes to publish the research findings with the help of Hambleton District Council.

The 94,000-word monograph will be intended mainly for an academic audience, but the council believes there is scope for promoting the henges as a low-key tourist attraction.

The planning committee was yesterday recommended to give £1,000 towards the estimated £9,000 cost of Dr Harding's findings being published on condition that some of the text and illustrations can be incorporated in a council publicity leaflet.

Mr Steve Quartermain, head of planning services, said: "In recent years there has been a huge growth in the popularity of archaeology and it is becoming an important component of the tourism industry.

"The monument complex at Thornborough is little known about and rarely visited by the general public. The lack of visitors arises from the lack of publicity and displays or other material.

"There is scope to develop the site as a low-key tourist and educational venue and the principal landowner has expressed an interest in this form of development, with the development of a visitor centre."

Mr Quartermain said a brief guide could be produced and distributed through tourist information centres, with interpretation boards near the site giving information on the monuments for visitors