Another visit to this site this time with a bit more information on the barrow itself. Deverel barrow is not as I thought last time the large, low round barrow easily visible from the footpath. It is in fact a clump of trees to the west of it with a circular flint wall surrounding what is left of the barrow.
Apologies to juamei, who I should never have doubted, the remains of the barrow is covered in sarsens. I counted 24, more could be hidden in the undergrowth. Most of the stones are about 18 inches across, the biggest is about 3 feet long and 2 feet high.
A group of the stones lay in a circle in the centre of the site, while the largest stone, which looks to be part of a cist is at the northwest corner of the barrow.
Incidently the information which lead to the correct site came from Peter Stanier’s excellent book Dorset’s Archaeology.
Latest Fieldnotes
October 10, 2007
Tucked in beside the road, this cairn is in a sad and sorry state. Many trees are now growing on the mound and a lot of the structure has been robbed/quarried away. There is evidence of some kerbing in the south-west quadrant. The area is such a mess that it’s hard to tell which are original stones and which may be field clearance.
What a beautiful place. I sat on a kerbstone at the south-west of the monument while the sun burned away the morning mist. I’d driven up along the rutted track from the east of the hill and got to the gate with the sign. I’d called the number 5 times without any joy before deciding to head over to the tomb anyway.
I stayed for about half an hour, almost forgetting the intrusive noise from the farm machinery and barking dogs – somebody had unleashed the hounds of hell and they marauded all over the heather-covered hillock at the north end of Harristown.
The small undifferentiated passage tomb is in reasonably fine condition. The kerb remains around much of the monument. Two roofstones remain, one over the chamber and one near the beginning of the passage. There is a sill-stone at the beginning of the passage. The stone reminded me of the stone found in other monuments in the south-east. What seems to be a thrown down roofstone rest between the kerb and passage just behind the chamber.
This was a beautiful place to pass the time. The only let-down was that the sun didn’t burn the mist away quickly enough and I couldn’t take in the full breadth of the expansive views.
Easy to spot in a field beside the road from jamaica Inn to Codda. Parking is a bit of a problem if you want to be away from the car for a while and I would advise either driving along to the end of the road or parking on the side of the road when it turns to Bolventor Church.
Field is open access so no problems there and you can carry on up onto top of tor from stone.
Stone is about 7ft high and it has been suggested that it is a modern erection...looks pukka to me!
In the large garden of a large house on the south-eastern outskirts of Waterford city. There was so much growth on the stones that it was hard to make out what was what. One large capstone (?) rests on a metrre-high upright. Resting beside these was a large block of reddish conglomerate stone. Maybe with the forthcoming book about the area the owners might clean up the site.
The mound is roughly 3 metres high and fenced in by the farmer. It’s cut on the north side by the hedge and road. To the south the field slopes down to a small strteam. There were some large stones thrown onto it in the western quadrant – these could be field clearance but looked distinctly structure-like.
It’s marked on the OS map but not mentioned in the Carlow Inventory. Like a lot of the sites I saw this weekend, it could do with a clean-up. To the north-east is Moylisha wedge tomb and the cairn on Aghowle Upper.
One of Somerville’s five stone circles of West Cork (JCHAS 35, 1930; 79), Maulatanvally can suffer when placed in comparison with its more intact brethren. Lacking the more monumental construction and solar event alignments of Drombeg and Bohonagh, the beauty and seclusion of Reenascreena and the mystery of the lost world at Carrigagrenane SW, it could almost be the odd child of large local sites.
Situated on a platform, with the ground falling swiftly to the south and west, the circle is pushed fairly tightly against the eastern field boundary. The gap and deeply rutted track from the next field are right beside it and just on the rise to the north is a chicken factory. After the drop to the west the ground rises steeply again, over the Dunmanway-Rosscarbery road, to reach a hill summit that gives the townland its name. Beyond this lies the omnipresent Carrigfadda.
The rise of ground to the west pulls an axial azimuth of 256.5 back to a declination of -5.4 (Ruggles, Astronomy in Prehistoric Britain and Ireland, 1999; 217), offering no obvious solar or lunar event to a modern observer. What might be significant however is its direct line to the peak on the northern section of Carrigfadda, the imposing centre of the source forks of the Argideen river, a flow whose silver is mirrored in the quartz components of many of these monuments.
According to O’Nuallain (PRIA 84C, 1984; 21) there would have been originally 11 stones in the perimeter of a circle with a common local diameter of about 9.5 metres. Seven stones remain, with four in an arc at the western side and three in a group to the east. The entire northern side is missing, including what should have been the northern portal. Placed slightly off centre is the squarish, box-like quartz block, smaller than that at Lettergorman SW and Carrigagrenane NE but still dazzlingly white.
The western section contains the axial stone, long but low at just over knee height, its two flankers and the continuing stone to the north. The top of the axial is rather weathered and it has a curious seam running across the middle of its inner face. The eastern side still has the radially set southern portal, now leaning somewhat to the north, with a rather sharp looking stump and a round topped circle stone to the south. Despite the wrecked guttery look to the remains this circle hasn’t deteriorated since at least as far back as 1930 and possibly much further (see plan below).
A slightly unusual aspect to the ring is the position of the axial stone with regard to the remaining stones. It would seem to be positioned to be perpindicular to a line running between the stump to the south of the portal and that stone, rather than facing a line to the north of it, between it and the presumed northern portal. This stump can’t be a portal here because it is set with its long axis along the perimeter and it is well off the centre line of the circle as deduced from the remaining stones.
The whole eastern section seems to be flattened and pushed slightly too far north to make a true circle. If a secondary alignment was intended it would be closer to an equinox event than the mid-portals-axial line, but this has never been surveyed.
This site is located in the second field to the east of the road from Dunmanway to Rosscarbery, just down from the rim of the hill after Kippagh bridge. There is a little lay-by as the second indentation in the ditch after the chicken factory. Look over the brambles here.
October 9, 2007
When I read the information board and it mentioned a spiral votive I was very excited. Especially with the amount of great rock-art that Cianmacliam and Fourwinds are photographing around Ireland.
Im not sure when this spiral is dated to but I presume it it Christain. However it is not a design that is used very often in Christain art.
It looked to me as if the lintels may have been “megalithic” when I did a search when I got home that evening I was happy to see that I had the same theory as Anthony Weir on his website.
He also mentions possible alignments with the Galtys which I have to be honest I didnt see. This is a lovely site and a place where you could bring anyone (non-megalithic) for a quick stop and I think they would be impressed. So I think I will drop in here at another stage.
There are three mounds marked as “Tumuli” and a host of ring-forts marked on the OS map.
There are also signs for the Cush Prehistoric Complex from the town of Kilfinnane.
There is a nice parking area for access. However access is not as straight forward as it sounds.
The parking area allows you to visit one of the ring-forts and that is about it. The “Tumuli” are on private property and require jumping over a number of fences and thru a few fields.
I also got the impression thru a number of signs restricting access that perhaps the landowners arent too happy about people being on there lands.
I could be wrong maybe they are just making sure they not liable.
The mounds themselves arent as impressive as I thought they might be, 2 of them are just about 1.5m high while the third is very low and hard to make out.
There is an impressive ringfort very close to the mounds but it doesnt photograph very well.
I believe that burials were found in the bottom of some of the ring-forts and this is really a multi-period site. The mounds date to the Bronze Age according to the info board, approx 2000-1600BC.
On my way back from the Rath I had another good snoop around for the standing stone. Especially since it is mentioned on the fairly recent looking information board at the Rath.
Still no sign so I decided to stop in at the farm nearby where I could hear so activity going on.
As I drove in there on my left beside the swing was the standing stone.
I talked to the farmer and he said he had moved it to his yard for safety.
It is a fine standing stone about 2m-2.3m.
I spotted a standing stone on the OS map near a short-cut Ive been taking on the road home from dublin. It is near the town of Ballyraggert in Kilkenny. On a whim I decided to have a look because it seemed so close to the road.
I hopped into the field where I thought it would be hoping to get a quick picture and be on my way again.
The field beside where it should be is the location of a piggery and the sounds or the smell out of it werent great but thats how we get bacon I guess.
I had a good look around for the standing stone marked but there was no sign of it. I decided to have a quick look at the church marked on the OS map.
To my surprise out of nowhere was this massive Rath.
How something like this isnt marked on the map or more well know is beyond me. However it does have an information board and is a national monument with sign and all.
The info board says that the inner diameter is 50m and the the ground inside the ring is 3m above the surrounding field. Parts of the ditch are up to 6m deep.
There is also a souterrain located within it but I didnt see this at the time. It may be closed in.
The stonework on the vertical shaft is not unlike the well structures at Broch of Gurness and Hillock of Burroghston sites, providing footing through laterally protruding flattish rocks It could be that some of these shafts served a double purpose for their constructors of water supply and a hiding place.
Climbing the eastern-most mound gives an excellent perspective on the entire site. It is basically an earthen path and will only take you a minute if you are a strong runner.
October 8, 2007
In this little village is a strange little church, on the whole it seems like any other church but part of it is built over and incorperating an allee couverte. Other instances of this can be seen in Geurnsey, Spain, and Portugal, so their pretty rare.
Entry to the tomb is closed off by a big red gate but the key can be attaind from the local post office, as it was a sunday it was closed so we made do with looking through the bars and looking in the church.Inside the church you can see a statue of St. Michel slaying a dragon, and the upper surface of a capstone.
Within the tomb are 7 statues said to be found buried inside it when it was first explored centuries ago and now occupying space on a shelf, the statues are also said to be the seven sleepers of Ephesus.
One legend says the allee couverte dates from the beginning of the world.
Aubrey Burl called this place Pergal but as I saw the sign pointing down a footpath it said Pergat, I shrugged and walked the lane, Burl said it was 200m to the stones but it was barely 100m, he also said it was a lovely place and thankfully in this if anything he was underselling it.
The sun was out, flowers carpeted the floor, a stream runs by and the birds were singing as loudly as my children were playing.It was ideal.
There are three stones in a row, one head height one fallen and one monster reaching for the sky,apparently the third tallest in Brittany, if your in the area please make the effort to find this place you’ll be glad you did
This group of barrows sit on top of a hill on heathland south west of the village of Bere Regis. From it can be seen the nearby hillfort of Woodbury Castle to the east. Magic show nine barows on this site, on this visit I could only see two. The more westerly of them was a low bowl covered in bracken.
The most curious was a low round shape with a large sarsen on top of it. I haven’t seen this listed anywhere else, this stone is not local, this is heathland with sand and gravel pits on it. Also it’s on top of a hill, so someone had to lug it up here. I’m really not sure if this is ancient or not, caution is needed and more information/research is necessary to find out if this stone is modern or a genuine megalith. I have seen this stone refered to as the “Devil’s stone” and it was reputed to have been 11 feet in height in the past.
This seldom visited and moderately small Iron Age fort sits on the end of a promentary on the escarpment beneath the Ridgeway to the South and overlooking the plains around Swindon to the North. The nearest village is Wroughton about 3 miles East and the more famous Barbury Castle hill fort is about 3.5 miles away to the South-East. It can be reached by taking the A4361 South (Swindon to Avebury) then taking the turning to the right after passing the entrance to the Science Museum at Wroughton Airfield (on your left). There are limited places to park near Quidhampton Wood but it’s only about a miles walk through fantastic beech woods till you come out at this amazing site with steep valleys on both sides and staggering views all around. Touchingly romantic and you only have to share it with a few cows.
[From a comment posted by A R Cane]
In their wonderful book, Malta Prehistory and Temples, David Trump describes Wied Filep Dolmens as being “the most accessible” and as having “one of the biggest capstones” accessible and biggest, yeh, my kind of words.
Trump doesn’t lie when he states that Weid Filep is accessible, it’s right beside the road, trouble is you have to find the road. I spent a good part of half an hour driving in and around Mosta before I found the Dolmens. My tip is this, find the wadi on the outskirts of Mosta and head east along the road that parallels the steep valley. Take a look over your left shoulder and you should see a fort on the opposite hillside. Now wind your window down and listen. You should be able to hear the sound of dogs barking. So if you can see the sea, the fort and the wadi and hear the dogs then you are ‘in the zone’. The noise of the dogs barking is coming from the fort which is the Maltese police dog pound.
The dolmen are situated on the edge of Mosta and can be found on a raised limestone platform beside the road. The monuments have been walled-in presumably to protect them.
There are two dolmen , they are both sat on the same limestone exposure and it is possible to see how the stone has been quarried from behind the dolmen to create the large capstones. Trump states that the largest of the pair is 3.8m from end to end.
As impressive as the dolmen were it’s the setting that grabbed me. The dolmen are sat on a hillside overlooking a wadi with the beautiful Mediterranean Sea in the distance. A modern addition to this view is a huge limestone quarry, I guess some people could see this as an abomination but for me it’s just another sign of continuity of the use of the beautiful Maltese limestone. Only the scale has changed.
Buggibba/Quara is a typical Mediterranean tourist town. It has developed in a strip along the sea shore overlooking St Pauls Bay. The temple is in the grounds of a hotel called the New Dolmen. I drove up and down the seafront looking for this hotel but was unable to find it. I eventually parked the car and walked along the sea front. The hotel faces the sea but doesn’t open out onto the shore side road, its quite easy to find, just look for the biggest, ugliest hotel on the strip, and then march on in through the glass, marble and gold foyer, through the bar and out onto a patio area where you’ll find all of the usual suspects laying around the pool on their sun beds oblivious to the Megalithic wonder in their midst.
The temple has been incorporated into the hotel grounds and on the day I visited it was being used as a sanctuary/hangout for teenagers escaping from their over-oiled, overweight, g-string be-decked parents. The uprights and lintel of the temple entrance are present and give the temple an air of authenticity, but apart from that there are a number of low walls and a few large stones but it is difficult to visualise what the original structure must have looked like from these meagre remains.
It’s worth thinking about the closeness of the sea and the role it may have played in the choice of site for the temple builders. The sea is only a couple of dozen yards away from the temple. This part of the bay forms a natural harbour within a harbour. The view to the North West is interesting as it looks over to Saint Paul’s island and the coast beyond. This may be significant to the location of the temple when you consider that the wonderful temples of Hagar Qim and Mnajdra also overlook an island. However the temple entrance is orientated to face inland (south-south-west). This view is completely obscured by the hotel and town. Another indicator that the sea may be linked to this temple is the lintel stone with carved fish along it. The stone was discovered during the excavation of the temple and is now on display in the museum in Valletta.
Chun Quoit is a place i visit as reguarly as possible, my first being around 10 years ago at the tender age of 7/8 years.
It is a beautiful place, peaceful and quiet.
recently i walked up over Kenijack Moor, past the Hooting Carn and crossing the road headed up the hill towards Chun Quoit.
As i approached, the top of the Comlech stood out in silhouette against the lightening sky, the sun was just beginning to slowly make its way towards the horizon.
As i drew closer, the view took my breath away, as it always does, away over fields, rough heather and gorse, down towards the sparkling sea. I stood for a moment and took in the atmosphere, the sun has sped up now and is turning the clouds pink and gold, a beautiful sunset in the making.
I took a few moments to walk around the Quoit, noticing new details from the last time i was here.
I stop again as i finish a full circle, the light is becoming more golden by the minute, i take out my sketch pad and quickly sketch in the basic tonal values for reference later, thinking all the while that i’ll never be able to capture the essence and atmosphere on paper anyway!
I finish drawing and sit watching the sun finish its descent, the breeze is getting up and is getting cooler, two birds fly over, late home, calling as they go.
it is getting cold now, i turn, take one last look, and start on the long walk home.
From Port William head out on the A747 toward Monreith for about a mile or so and Barsalloch point is hard to miss. This is a Historic Scotland site and as such comes complete with small car park, info board and neatly trimmed steps to the fort itself but is well worth inspection if you are in the area. The fort has steep natural defences on the coastal side and two substantial horseshoe shaped ramparts and deep ditch to landward. The fort commands outstanding sea views on a good day and is an excellent spot to sit a while.
Car parking is available at the Laggan Wolftrax centre. Leaving the car park head toward Laggan Bridge along the main road for a few hundred yards. Just after passing a row of white Forestry Commission cottages on your left you will see a forestry track leading up towards Black Craig follow this as it winds up the hill to the fort (it is signposted). Of the fort itself there is some impressive walling still standing and plenty of stuff for the imagination, although the up-down nature of the inside of the fort is a bit harder to get to grips with. The best bit, as with all hill forts is the view and Dun-Da-Lamh is no exception.
Just before the summer I went to a talk given by Professor O’Brien on the prehistory of the Dunmanway area. While the first half of his presentation was a steady trot around the expected topic, he spent the rest of the time speaking about his excavation at Clashanimud, a townland that he ventured to translate as ‘the trench of the timber’. It’s possible that some folk memory remained into historic times of this massive wooden construction.
I’ve included the newpaper report from August in the miscellaneous section below, as a reasonable summary of his findings. On visiting the site myself in early June I found access to be easy, with a parking spot just up the hill from the entrance at the eastern side.
October 6, 2007
On the SS133 from Palau, about 3km west of the town and about 1.5km from the junction of the SS133 and SP123, there’s a turn down the side of the Vecchia Gallura restaurant signposted “zona archeologica”.
TME mentions a sign to “Tomba di Gigante S’Aiacciu” which later turns into a sign for “Li Mizzani” – these are in fact two separate tombas. See palau.it/tombe.html.
To get to Li Mizzani, it’s about 4km from the main road – take the left fork as signposted, and go uphill, then downhill, then uphill again – carefully! It’s narrow and winding, and precipitous in places, and you’ll be needing first gear!
Eventually we found the sign to the right to the tomba, and parked there to walk down the slope and through the gate, to the left away from the church, and through another gate – where we found quite a few parked cars. It’s about 350 metres in total from the signpost to the tomba.
Through a small gate, then to the left a few paces .... well, we obviously weren’t going to get the place to ourselves, as we’d had at many of our other stops, but we weren’t expecting it to be quite so busy!
Maybe a Saturday thing, maybe an equinox thing, maybe just local custom ...
There were a couple of people laid out on one side of the funeral corridor, one laid in the corridor itself with his head through the portal in the stele, and people sat either side of the stele; as more people arrived, they formed a queue sat on the bench seat around the esedra.
Someone asked if I wanted to join the queue – but I just wanted to take photos and wasn’t entirely sure what was going on. Beardy meanwhile sat quietly right at the far side of the esedra. Every so often, the person under the portal would move on, and the next in the queue would take their place – all had come prepared with roll mats or doss bags to lie on.
Beardy was convinced the lady sat waiting was giving him the evil eye and, being unable to check out the tomb properly, we didn’t stay over long. A strange experience – still, interesting to see the site being used for something.