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Glastonbury Tor

The tor maze (or not)

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Mustard M
Mustard Feb 25, 2010 22:41:40
Replying to juamei

juamei wrote:
Mustard wrote:
juamei wrote:
The land drained for farming was transformed for profit. Monks and Romans were very big on making money.
You've hit the nail on the head there. If they were putting the effort in to create the dyke system throughout the levels, why ignore the hill in their midst.
Because the levels were drained for grazing land - not for agriculture. You don't need to terrace the tor to throw a few cows on it.
But you do to get more land for crops... Maybe we should agree to disagree, I'm becoming circular. :-)
I'd love to agree to disagree, but Glastonbury simply didn't require the land for food production to support its population. If the motive was profit, the returns would hardly have been worth the investment, and the monks were busy (as you pointed out) draining the levels for the much more lucrative production of of meat, dairy and woollen products. Terracing the tor for agricultural reasons just doesn't make sense. Whether a maze or other neolithic terracing makes any more sense is another matter. :)

J juamei
juamei Feb 25, 2010 22:57:12
Replying to Mustard

You know maybe its the tiredness, but I am starting to come round to your point of view! I'm still pretty unconvinced on the maze / spiral thing though...

Neolithic is a weird one, there is a bronze age cross ditch on the land spur that links Glastonbury to hills on the way to Shepton Mallet; Pointers Ball. Its still quite large though hard to get to as its in back gardens. There was settlement on the Poldens and Wedmore certainly, probably from before the Neolithic, so I think there is no doubt people were on the Tor, Wearyall Hill and the other attached high ground.

If its neolithic would it be some kind of Causewayed Enclosure? Something novel?

Time for me to finish reading "Sweet Track to Glastonbury" methinks...