Latest Fieldnotes

Visited on the 6th of February and was greeted by a huge striped cat.

This beautiful little cairn circle has been seriously damaged by a fire being lit in the central kist, you can see by the photos that the stones have been badly scorched, and it looks like the peat infill repairs from the 1993 fire damage has been dug out. These images are from August 2008, i hope that further damage has not occurred since. I am susprised that this is allowed to take place, considering its close proximity to the road, where are the Dartmoor forest rangers or local farmers when this is happening?

Visited here on 13th Jan 2009. There’s not all that much to see at the moment, as someone has added to the clearance heap, so now a pile of angular blocks obscure the motifs.

It didn’t look as if the block dumping had damaged any of the motifs, though as stated, it’s difficult to see them all. I’m assuming this outcrop isn’t managed by the same folks who own and manage Fowberry Park, as they are well aware of the carvings on their land, and would seem unlikely to treat a marked outcrop so carelessly.

When I visited the nearby Borg in-Nadur temple I must have walked past these without knowing they were there.
There’s only a short length of ruts to see, but what makes them of particular interest is that they run straight into the sea.

In August 2008, during a field walk West of the ruined Knock farmhouse, a new vulva-like motif was found in grid reference NX 3690 3995, consisting of an enhanced natural oval feature.
These kind of enhanced natural features are not common in British rock art. There are but a few examples, e.g. at Townhead (D&G). There are, however, more engraved natural holes in Ireland, e.g. at Drumsinnot, Co. Louth, West Dundalk, but they look different from the Kock-5 panel.

Sant’alosio is a little village on the top af an high hill on the south/east of Piedmont. The rocks are partially covered by the eastern tower and also by lots of vegetation, but you can still see some cup marks expecially in winter without snow. Some cups looks very old and little, one is bigger (20 cm) and, I think, more recent. From this place you have a great 360° view, you can see all the western Alps, Ligurian Appennino and hills.

This stone is now situated in the town of Birr, next to the Birr Heritage Centre or also known as Johns Hall.

The information board has this to say about it.

Referred to by Geraldus Cambrensis in the 12th Century as ‘Umbilicus Hiberniae’ (“The Navel of Ireland”).
Probably part of a megalithic monument located at Seffin, the exact site of which now unknown.
Reputted by oral tradition to have marked a meeting place of the Fianna. Taken from Birr in 1828 by Thomas Steele to his residence Cullaun House, Co. Clare, to honour Daniel O’Connell and used as a Mass rock at that site.
Returned to Birr Urban Council in June 1974 by the Department of Lands. The stone is a block of limestone of lower carboniferous age around 250 million years old and is of local origin.

Easily viewed from the Morvah – Madron road, the round is a compact defensive structure now incorporated into the corner of a field. The wall is almost two metres high in places. It has an entrance on the western side.

Visited on a walk from Zennor to Towednack, via Zennor and Sperris Quoits and Trendrine Hill.

The roundhouses are strung out in a line across Sperris Croft, not the usual sort of grouping. They are quite overgrown in summer.

6ft plus tapered stone standing in hedge on the west side of the lane that runs north to Ding Dong from the Madron – Morvah road.

Visited in freezing cold (1.2.2009) on a walk from Crickley Hill. I have visited twice before, when the barrow has been obscured from the Cotswold Way by vegetation. At this time of the year it is clearly visible.

The barrow stands in a private field in which horses are kept. The sign on the gate reads “Please close the gate to safeguard our horses”.

The barrow is very impressive, larger than Belas Knap even. It is covered in trees, which if W.L. Cox’s description is correct have been replanted since 1981. The excavation at the east end of the barrow has left a deep hollow.

The northern hedge of the field has recently been properly laid, with the result that the barrow can now be seen from Greenway Lane.

I can see no sign of the small round barrow recorded as lying at the southern end of the field.

Visited 1.2.2009 as it started to snow! There were still plenty of people up here, 12 or 15 cars in the car park. Nothing much to add to Moth’s access notes below, there are a couple of car parks and a toilet block, there are also a series of “trails” waymarked around the hill, one of which is the “Hillfort Trail”. NB: There are no litter bins, the idea is for people to take their litter home.

The bank and ditch of the Iron Age fort is quite impressive, the remains of the Neolithic settlement less obvious (although there is an information board). The position of various Iron Age features as determined by excavated post holes are marked by coloured concrete sunk into the ground.

As Moth said, the real reason for coming is the views, which despite the snow are stunning (I could even see Clee Hill, near where I grew up, which is 50 miles away).

From here I followed the Cotswold Way to Crippets long barrow and then Leckhampton Hill.

Visited in freezing temperatures (1.2.09). The largest barrow is impressive, pretty much as per the dimensions quoted by L.V. Grinsell (see Misc). The hollow in the top is clearly visible. One of the smaller barrows was apparent to the NE, but I couldn’t see the SW barrow as reported by W.L. Cox.

The barrows are situated in a small clump of trees adjoining the east side of the A417, which is incredibly busy. Access is from the Gloucestershire Way, which runs through the trees to the SW of the barrows. The path hits the road directly opposite the carpark of the Air Balloon pub (also worth a visit!).

Well worth a visit during the autumn/winter, but I imagine that the barrow will be lost in foliage and vegetation in the summer. Could easily be incorporated in a visit to Crickley Hill (as I did today).

Visited 31.1.2009 on a cold day, approaching up the hill from the west. The barrow is in a rather sorry state – I don’t know how it looked prior to the 1930 excavation (when a number of intact burials were found) but the excavation itself clearly was more “destructive” than simply invasive. The remaining barrow looks like the crater of a grassy volcano!

Even in its reduced state, the barrow is a good size, at least 12 paces in diameter and almost a metre high around the rim. As with many Cotswold barrows (both long and round) it is not situated on the top of the hill, but some way down the slope. In this case, it sits a hundred metres or so down the western side of the slope, about 10 metres lower than the ridge where the Cotswold Way footpath runs. However, this gives it a very commanding view to the west (not today sadly!) over the vale of the Severn and to the Malverns.

The barrow is visible from the Cotswold Way, and without the field boundaries would have been fairly prominent. Sadly there is no real ambience or sense of place, as the barrow is very run down and sits in a ploughed field (the lack of visibility probably didn’t help today either).

If anyone is intending to visit, there are three ways of approach: (1) up the steep slope from the west (Battledown), taking a footpath heading due east off the lane that runs past Hewletts Reservoir and goes past Northfield Farm (2) from the north along the Cotswold Way, from the direction of Cleeve Hill and (3) from the south along the Cotswold Way from Dowdeswell or the Ham Farm lane. (2) and (3) are pretty flat and easy walking, (1) is pretty steep. The barrow itself lies near the SW corner of a ploughed field on private land, but the footpath (1) runs along the north side of this field and I skirted the field edge to get to it – no harm done!

Not perhaps somewhere to come specifically, unless you’re curious, but could be viewed as part of a walk around Cleeve Hill.

A short distance north east of the pretty fishing village of Marsaxlokk is Tas-Silg temple. I knew it wasn’t officially open to the public, but decided to go and take a look anyway. The site has a reasonably tall wall round it, and the gates are chunks of solid metal. Nothing to see here, without an appointment!

This tomb is completely overgrown almost exclusively by thick dirty brambles, i could only locate 4 stones through the thicket.

Can anyone shed some light on the date/purpose of the large oval pit in the background, its as if the pit was dug and trees planted at the bottom giving the observer an unusual eye-line with the tree tops, from the tomb ground level. Also the trees form a straight line pointing directly at the center of the tomb. Coincidence maybe?? This effect is best seen on MSN Maps “Birds Eye View”. A second line, this time an embankment recently had a circular ditch and a fenced off tree (NOW DESTROYED!!!) in the south-west of the building site, which now holds 3 large piles of massive stones. I’d appreciate any feedback on these (probably wacky:) theories....

This is a great and unusual ‘wedge tomb’. This is the desciption in the inventory but it does cover this by saying “Structure is similar to wedge tomb but large covering mound is not typical of such monuments and could be a secondary feature”.
It was opened in 1838, the cairn was then 6m high. The chamber is aligned E-W and approx 1.7m high. Although the floor is low enough that you can stand up comfortably in it.
The inventory says that the finds found within it arent reliable but include bones.
This tomb isnt far from New Twopothouse. From the OS map the access looks restricted, however this ‘track’ is actually a road into more houses and there is room to park comfortably near the tomb. I spoke to the lady in the house at the entrance to the road / track and she said it was no problem visiting and that they get a lot of people coming to look at the tomb.

This seems to be related to the Moneen complex and is on the other side of the road to it.
I couldnt get a good look at it because there were was a herd of cattle in the field they were in.
It is described as a multiple cist cairn in the inventory. Access to it from the new farmyard / cattle crush and into the field to your left.

This is a very cool looking mushroom like cist. It looks almost dolmen like and about 0.6m high.
According to the Archaeological Inventory there is local tradition of this being used as a mass-rock.

You can easily see this from the field next to the Moneen cairn.

It was one of the those times when you wanted someone else to be with you so they could take a picture of you on what looks like a like fairy mushroom.

This site was excavated by O’Kelly in 1948 and was originally dated as Neolithic. However it has recently been reclassified as from the Beaker period. Radiocarbon dating from the primary inhumation in central cist of (2260-2140 cal. BC) and from charcol found beneath the ‘old turf’ layer (2560-2390 cal. BC).
There are three phases suggested, first the ring barrow was constructed, then the mutiple cist cairn was placed on this barrow and then the food vessel burial and urn burial outside of the fosse.
I parked at a new farmyard gate a little up from the site on the opposite side of the road. No direct access into the field it is situated in (which is directly adjacent to road). There is a gate in the field next to it and used this to work way around to the cairn which is hidden in the corner of the field.
There is also an unusal stone in the southern corner which hasnt been mentioned before that looks like it has been smoothed out somehow.

This site is marked as a holy well on the map and the reason for me visiting is because this link doonbleisce.com/ancient_and_holy_wells.htm mentions a bullaun stone at the spot.
The stream nearby was very flooded when I visited and so there was no sign of a well or a bullaun stone. However there was this standing stone within what looks like an enclosure.
I will drop back this way when the waters have retreated to make sure there is no bullaun stone but from from inspection I couldnt find one.

Not marked on the OS map but is described in the Tipperary Historical Journal of 2006.
The stone is about 1.2m high and its most interesting feature is the line of quartz on one side (and half ways round one other side) that gives it a phallic look.
It is located less than a 1km outside of Cashel Town.

The barrows adjoin the Coast Path, along the stretch between Cape Cornwall (Carn Gluze) and Sennen Cove and are easily visited as part of a coast walk – they can also be reached from the footpaths around Nanjulian/Hendra. Not as impressive as the Mayon Cliff barrows, but still a prominent feature to look out for.

Visited in blazing hot sunshine in June 2005. We approached from the west, via Zennor and Sperris Quoits and the strung out line of the Sperris Croft roundhouse settlement. On top of Trendrine Hill, surmounted by an OS trig point, there are two large round barrows. The higher of the two is a huge cairn (62ft across) constructed of smallish stones, which the trig point sits on top of.

Slightly down the slope to the SE is another large barrow, this one incorporating some natural rocks into its massive kerb. Although overgrown in midsummer, the two barrows are very prominent. We left to the SE, over Beagletodn Downs and then onto the footpath running east to Towednack (this was a steep descent and looked easier to follow going downhill than it might have been to find in the opposite direction).

Visited 27.1.09 – blue skies when I left the house (a mile to the north of the hill) but when I got up the hill it was enveloped in freezing mist, with no visibility over Cheltenham at all. First time I have been here in January and I wanted to have a look at the earthworks and the “round barrow” outside the eastern entrance.

In the interior of the fort I came across a series of circular crop marks in the tufty grass: the largest 10 paces in diameter, the smallest 4 paces. The excavations at the site have focussed on the ramparts and nothing has been excavated within the main enclosed area. These marks are certainly of a size that would be consistent with hut circles (like the ones found at nearby Crickley Hill) but without excavation (or at least a more expert eye than mine) there’s no knowing what they are.

The rampart curves round from the SW corner of the fort to the NE corner in a shape like a “D” with the top flattened. Along the SE side the rampart is topped with dry stone construction – according to Geoffrey Williams in “The Iron Age Hillforts of England” (1993 Horace Books) the rampart was revetted with dry stone wall, so this may be part of the original construction.

As the rampart turns to the north, it becomes more of an earthen bank, leading up to the eastern entrance (which is simply a gap).

The mysterious “round barrow/celtic shrine/tree enclosure” is clearly visible on the E side of the rampart, although very difficult to photograph! The square bank is clear, and each side measures approx 20-21 paces. The round barrow (if that’s what it is) in the centre is again quite clear, but very low and unimpressive.

After this the mist closed in and it started to get wetter, so I headed off back down the steep scarp slope to the north, pausing first to have a look at the earthworks to the NE of the fort that run next to the Cotswold Way footpath. It’s not clear what these are or how old they are – in “Prehistoric and Roman Sites of the Cheltenham Area” (1981 Gloucester County Library) W.L. Cox merely mentions that they are of “uncertain use”. Helpful!