 Previous 20 | Showing 21-30 of 30 miscellaneous posts. Most recent first
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A couple of years back the site was visited by Historic Scotland and Aberdeen University people. They mentioned to Gregor Cook that if he had time he could move the field clearance. Apparently Gregor replied in language I won't repeat.
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The Culsh monument now stands on the site of this circle which was destroyed presumably during 1876. Alistair Moffat, the former Church of Scotland minister of that parish, informed me that some of stones had been used in the building of the manse. Alas no remains can be seen.
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Tom Weir's Scotland gives the site a little mention in the chapter "The Ythan Estuary."
"But the shifting sand uncovered as well as destroyed. When it blew away it revealed a record of 3,000 years of human history, in ring cairns, kitchen middens, stone implements, fragments of pottery, and stone circles, dating back to the Bronze and Early Iron Age."
Just down the coast, towards Aberdeen near Balmedie, Donald Trump is trying to build his infamous golf course on a nature reserve and sand dunes. Perhaps the North Sea winds will blow this greedy bampot away.......if only!!
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One person, whom I won't name, who was brought up on Carnousie farm didn't even know that these two sites existed. (she is now quite a well known photographer and one of my former pupils) Even worse, her father, who has worked on the land his whole life, didn't know either! I found out when my father and myself did some dry stane work at the nearby castle and estate.
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Greywether's comments could well be correct as local legend and rumour has tales of circle(s) being destroyed in the area. Sheilburn has only stone left and the Carlin Stone has it's remains. The stone at the Hill of Laithers also merits a mention. (Why was Backhill left alone?) Some reckon that the stones are in a wall at the Mill of Laithers. Just recently I found the standing stone at Newton of Fortrie. (July 09)
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If you ask the present occupiers to see the circle chances are they will be very helpful. I was shown inside one of the barns. Notches showing the heights of various Shand children over almost the last 500 years are marked on wooden posts. The Shand family only recently, 10 years ago, left Yonder Bognie. The daughter of the last Shand occupants still visits the circle with her daughters.
October 08.
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This area is covered in ancient wonders with hut circles, Schivas, South Ythsie, Mill Of Kelly and Shethin stone circles, Fedderat and Pitmancy Cairns, cup marked stones as well as the standing stones at Bellmuir, Monkshill and the Candle Stone. These are all situated on or near the River Ythan between the villages of Fyvie and Ythanbank.
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Cortes House across the road from Cortie Brae has been long rumoured to be the site of an ancient circle. Indeed the house is supposedly built on top of it. Anyway this is what Mary W. Melville had to say in the Fraserburgh Herald Oct 9, 2008.
"At one time there stood a Druidical circle on the Cortes estate. The name Cortes is said to be derived from the Gaelic for circle, so it must be of ancient origin. It was first recorded in the 1696 Poll Book that the estate was owned by Patrick Ogilvie of Hallyards a cadet of the Ogilvies of Findlater who purchased the lands from William Keith, Earl Marishcal. The estate remained in the Ogilvie family for the next century"
The rest of the item gives the history of the house up to 2nd World War.
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J. Barrett writes in the Knock News Dec 08 edition page 27,
"A little side trip takes us up to the field behind the houses - and another wonder. Ravaged by stone robbers and disrespectful agriculture, are the remains of a boulder kerbed cairn: the burial place of a petty pharaoh, and sacred high-place of the Bronze-Age sky cult. We creep through the fence, feeling, perhaps, that we should remain respectfully upon our knees as we approach this place of ancient power."
A little further up the road Barrett continues,
"The green lane becomes a tarmac road leading downhill towards our favourite Speyside wonder. Oppressed by two more misplaced new builds is the Fairy Hillock. Is this curiosity a natural feature? The archaeology books are unhelpful. The hillock is shaped like a Norman castle-motte, but the site argues against this interpretation. Perhaps it is another Bronze-Age high-place from which the spirits of ancestral chieftains watch over their flocks, crops and descendants in the Strath of Spey. Perhaps it was built by fairies after all."
Also known as Hatton Burial Cairn.
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In Alistair Moffat's book "Before Scotland" Pitglassie, which means "patch of green" is a place of historical note.
Page 118
",early farmers worked a place called Pitglassie. The name translates as "patch of green land" and might remember a cleared area of woodland. Between 3750 and 3500 BC the farmers lifted the turf, cleared away the stones from a roughly circular area and built a funeral pyre in the middle. They buried the resulting cremations in the same place. This circular area was marked by a ring of 11 or 12 timber posts. A ring cairn was thrown around the site, probably making use of the cleared turf and stones. Pitglassie is significant because it prefigures the wood and stone circles of a later period, and may be the particular forerunner of the recumbent stone circles found in North Eastern Scotland."
On Page 138 he continues concerning remains, bones etc.
"What was done with the majority of the bodies? How were they disposed of? There is no evidence of mass graves, or indeed of anything else, and only speculation is possibe. It may well be that cremation of the sort that went on at Pitglassie provides an answer. Perhaps bones were defleshed and burned to dust, and that dust strewn over the ground that those people had farmed. And when it rained their remains went back into the land. This means of burial is undetectable."
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Previous 20 | Showing 21-30 of 30 miscellaneous posts. Most recent first |
Still doing the music, following that team, drinking far to much and getting lost in the hills! (Some Simple Minds, Glasvegas, Athlete, Us3 on the headphones, good boots and sticks, away I go!) As well whistling Lostboy tunes soon to be whistling another bhoys tunes. Soon!
(The Delerium Trees)
Protect your heritage!
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