Latest Fieldnotes

I thought I would cut through the forest to find these stones which was not a good idea. I was relieved to have my GPS in the rucksac which let me find the site and get back to the car via the path I should have followed in the first place. Caught a glimpse of a wild-cat too. Good views from the rocky knoll above the forest clearing which houses the stones.

This was a beautiful day and I have wanted for a long time to visit this Stone, and it was well worth it.So here it is Rhiannon in all its glory.

This was on a hot summers day in August this year, well a couple of them... Having seen various Barrows on the sky-line and hill sides in the distance from Avebury ring itself... Curiosity (among other things) drove me to seek out and explore these exquisit and ancient features...
I was not disappointed as hiking in the heat along the Ridgeway we came across those barrows, visible more from the Avenue of Stones, that I have affectionally named ‘The Gang of Four” as there are four of them in close proximity to each other...
With their twisted outer ring of sentinel-like trees (so shaped due to the wind?) and other magical things and relics found, like the remains of magical cigarette like objects which I guessed weren’t quite so old, I found myself transported to another time and place.
Incidentally, I also noticed that Avebury itself with its hard to miss Stone Circles and ring, was not visible from here, nor was the equally hard to miss Silbury Hill... or anything for that matter, even though we were quite high up. Interesting, we thought. All of it was hidden by series of natural banks, hills and and hollows, and probably deliberately. So with this in mind we sought out the other Barrows that could be seen from the Avebury Ring itself.. and sure enough found them a little further down (up?) northward along the Ridgway.
Crossing the harevested cornfields in the undulating counyryside we got to these Barrows.. two of them, or so we thought.. standing out magestically from the hill side. One covered in trees and one ‘bald’ one... (rather it was covered in nettles). On exploring the Tree covered mound, it was like entering a fairyland with the eerie sculpted trees adorning its form. From here we could see another barrow much further down the hill side.... and also (finally) Avebury Ring itself...
On leaving these mounds, tramping through the crisp cut, corn stubble we chanced to turn back and saw, to our astonishment, what looked like a third mound next to these two we had just explored.. how could we have missed THAT? we thought... how indeed...

This place attracted my notice on the map as it appeared to have a contour line all to itself. But it did not say ‘rems of’. Which is a bit misleading, as there are others on the Black Isle which do, but are in much better condition than this one. It’s apparently the remains of a chambered cairn. You wouldn’t know to look at it, and that’s assuming you could see it hiding behind all the bracken and other assorted thorny bushes.

If you were to get that far, I’d assume you had navigated a safe route past the very interested looking male bovines who were edging ever slightly closer when I visited, but in that manner that precludes any actual movement whilst one is looking at them. Rather they waited until they weren’t being watched, then sidled closer.

Having said that, Mulchaich has got enigmatic traces of bits and bobs that an enthusiast would possibly enjoy making sense of. There’s a linear stone thing going on to the east side, and a couple of the big middle stones remain in situ, perhaps sufficient for someone who knew their stuff to deduce a bit more about the original placement. All I could think about this was that it was in a prominent spot, easily viewed from all around. But then you could probably work that out from looking at the map.

Irritatingly, I found on return home, that there is a cup marked stone here too. I even photographed the blighter without knowing it. Except I photographed the wrong side, as the cupmarked side faces outwards, which was hidden by bracken. Hmpf!

Fairly easy to get to, only about 30m or so from the road, but there is a hop over a wire fence, then some pretty boggy and uneven ground, with the odd deephole down into the peat.

However, if you’re passing, give it a shot. There’s something very proud about these two piles of tumbled stones. I don’t know how the idea that they have chambers got started, but that is the recieved wisdom. But I do agree with Mr Cope on this one, it’s nice to see a couple of monuments that have been left intact. It really adds to the feel of the place. Very brooding and slightly ominous at sunset. Hollow hills? Aye, probably.

Compared to many Brochs on Skye, this is in pretty good nick. It’s not just a pile of loose stones indicating where a Broch once stood. But compared to those in nearby Glen Elg, it’s a bit of a dissapointment.

It has a good 4ft of wall left, all the way around the circumference, and there are a couple of side chambers plainly visible and reasonably intact. It has a fair view of the Cuillins, which must have been even better when it was taller.

It also as a souterrain a couple of hundred metres to the NW, on the other side of the road. It’s even got it’s own little parking space and an HS interpretative board. Fenced off with a one of those annoyingly narrow kissing gates that won’t admit anything wheeled.

This is a good contender for the title of ‘smallest standing stone’.

Or mebbe not. Could it actually be a giant stone, over 6ft tall buried in the peat so that only the tip is showing? Well, OK, fair enough, probably not.

It is fairly close to the road, with only a small wire fence to hop over, and there’s a cairn about 80m to the NNW. So at least that’s something.

Accessible indeed! Roadside stones, in the verge.

Even if you’re in a hurry, it’s probably worth the tiny detour past the little row of houses you can see from the A-road. I barely had time to jump out and bob about for a minute or two, so I was left with a strong sense of wishing I’d had longer to try and ponder these stones in relation to the putative circle and the landscape around it.

I have been meaning to stop here for a closer look for a long time.I am usually traveling too fast here. It must have been a very large barrow at one time. It was 50mtrs long and 17mtrs wide, there were three chambers one of which is exposed.

It needs to be a dry day to appreciate this.It is quite a steep walk from the stile and is a bit boggy. It is well worth the effort to get here. The stone is about 6ft high and 3 and a half ft wide and very surprising only 10ins thick. Although you cannot see Maen Mawr this stone seem in alignment.

The carved rocks here are fantastic but the setting is not the best I have been to.The folk here don’t seem to care very much about it.It is a typical housing estate.

On an 1882 map the only likely candidate is an unlabelled earthwork (HY43240863). This is a site I have often mused on when I have walked past the broch and the possible early wall remains. From Scapa beach if you look across to the house it is in a region of disturbed ground just below the latter [some of which appears to relate to previous (pre-1882) field boundaries]. From the coastal walk below the feature you see it sitting on a ?platform at the top of a broad U that comes down from the field fence there. You see an area of rocks above a low mound showing bare earth and small stones, with one or two isolated slabs towards the ends and several smaller ones on the hillside below. Climbing carefully over the drystane wall I snuck under the barbwire fence – I would suggest going by the metal gate at the top of the field for anyone else, you can always go down the hill then to gain a proper sense of the lie of the land on your way up. It is difficult to ascertain if the stones before you reach the earthwork are buried into the earth or evidence for rocky outcrops. Once you get there it is )like Kier Fjold) a disappointment, though if this is the place you should bear in mind it has been double-dug. There is no evidence of structure in the side of the mound you stand on, and the site does resemble a natural quarry – a flat ‘wall’ at the RH back above which the field fence (boundary not shown on oldmaps 1882) is seperated from by a couple of metres of earth and stone in section, a tooth-edge wall of stone to the right, and a large (relatively) shallow rectangular ‘pit’. The LH end of the depression is big stones and earth. In front of the back ‘wall’ LH side two large slabs are partially buried, in the rest of the depression there are some smaller ones covered by the grass. In the RH corner between the two outcrops there is what appears to be a cairn of drystane wall remains, definitely not slump. Below this in the furthest part of the corner is an anomalous foot thick chunk of pink stone.

I don’t know how most other people think with regards to ‘ghost orbs’ and other digital camera peculiarities but I captured an interesting light anomoly and orb at Nine Stones on my visit. I found Akasha’s note about a White Lady by the tree very intriging. I have included the photo here to share with others.
The photo was taken at Lammas 2004 and someone has done a ritual earlier with flowers being left at the stones.

From Shire Archaeology’s excellent Hillforts of England and Wales book by James Dyer.

“Rectangular four-poster huts, some measuring 2.4 by 3.6 metres, apeeared at at Credenhill and Midsummer Hill in the fourth century BC. Most of the latter fort’s 12 hectare site was filled with them. S.C. Stanford has used the probable number of huts to estimate the total population of all the Herefordshire hillforts in the mid fourth century BC. This could have been about 25,000, with perhaps 18,000 in the neighbouring Shropshire forts.”

You get great views of British Camp from this hillfort and wonder what the relationship was between these two contour hillforts. When entering the fort, which is approached from the Worcestershire Way, take the small path running East which can be easily overlooked. Carry on walking past the enterance and enjoy the amazing views all around the Malverns. The ramparts are impressive and use the contour of the hill as part of its defence/structure(?).

We walked there whilst at the Big Chill festival which is only a mile or so away. If you know it, walk up the Art Trail and carry on past the Obelisk and then to a gate which leads up to the hillfort.

I’m sorry to start like this, but I have discovered it is a fact that some people (some people) from Whitchurch are pure scum. I’d driven up a tiny lane from this suburb of Bristol, up onto the plateau where the fort is, in a lazy attempt to avoid a climb. The views are fantastic – ‘panoramic’ doesn’t even begin to cover it – the Clifton suspension bridge, the Severn crossings, the Welsh mountains behind. But some people don’t register this. Some people prefer to sneak up here to dump their rubbish, set fire to bits of cars, and generally behave like complete fwits. What a complete shame – and shame on them. (If they can be bothered to make the effort to dump stuff up here, why don’t they exert the same energy and take it to the tip? It’s beyond understanding really. I’ll probably be writing to the Daily Mail in a minute:). I backed the car up to a large forlorn sarsen blocking the entrance into a field, got out.. and decided that despite it being a quiet midday on a weekday I was too afraid to leave the car alone for fear of the wheels disappearing by the time I got back. So I’m sorry, if you can’t handle a steep hill, you’ll either have to park here or forget it.

Fuming I drove round to the other side of the hill at Norton Malreward and braced my unfit body for the climb. It’s infinitely worth it though. Indeed, what can’t you see from up here? I could easily spy the stones of Stanton Drew, looking like cows grazing in their field. Over to the east was Lansdown and Bathampton; straight ahead, Stantonbury; over the back the edge of Salisbury Plain where Bratton Castle is; the strange shape of Cley Hill; and to the south the Mendips and Beacon Batch.

Recovering, I followed the footpath to the Tump. Visiting this just underlines for me the absolute necessity of spending time at a place, not just assuming from a map. The tump (as RichardZ says in his comments on the attached forum post) – when you reach and climb it, the view opens out into 360 degrees. It’s fantastic. It’s a huge lump of earth and presumably it must have been created for the very purpose of raising you up above everything else to see. The view includes all the places I’ve mentioned so far, and would also include the line of the Cotswold Hills, if it weren’t for some ill-positioned trees. Is it really part of the later Wansdyke, as has been suggested elsewhere here on tma? It feels as though it is older, part of the fort, because you ‘need’ this extra vantage point for visibility and defence, surely?

It was marvellously relaxing eating my lunch on the tump, with Bristol strangely still and quiet below, and listening to the sounds of insects, hay harvesting and dogs barking. Maes Knoll is directly on the flight path to Bristol Airport and the strangest effect happened when planes went over. The sun was bright and cast a clear shadow of the planes which moved quickly over the ground. It looked to me like a huge bird undulating over the landscape. In fact the whole place was ‘birdy’ today – there were crowds of crows sitting on the slope below like a van Gogh painting, and I’d surprised a bird of prey out of the hedge as I’d climbed up. More birds sat in a nearby ash tree like big black fruit, watching me, and flocks of pigeons wheeled over my head. It was hot though and there’s no shelter (that probably explains a lot eh. But maybe, as I thought much later, they were just the legendary Birds of Rhiannon come to see me, as they might).

You can’t walk across the inside of the fort, but you don’t need to – the inside of the fort is not the point. Visit – it’s so worth the climb.

Walked from Hartsop to Beckstones, on my way to the hills, and called in to see the rock art. Arrived at the farm at the same time as a National Trust Landrover, with two people with enviable jobs within.
The first chap out was very helpful and enthusiastic, and was more than happy for me to go into the field enclosure (off the right of way) to see the rock art. He even knew it was prehistoric. “It’s up theer, lad”, he said, “supporsed t’be pre’istoric.” I replied with “Ovver theer, up on th’mound?” To which he said “Aye, lad, it’s on top o’ that theer, jus’ gerrup an’ it’s a few bits o’ dimples in t’ rock.”
My heart sank – “...a few bits o’ dimples in t’ rock.” And it was just that.
It’s a small site to say the least, with cup-marks that were a little underwhelming, to me. No wonder it took so long to discover them.
Most are covered in moss, but is it ethical to clear the moss? I dug one or two out for photos.
About a quarter of a mile back there was a rock that someone had cleared some moss off, and that had, on first acquaintance a cup-mark. This, on closer inspection, looked more natural than man-made.
Having seen the Beckstones area, I am now even more confused as to what is natural and man-made. The big issue with cup-marks is the fact that with the Borrowdale Volcanic rocks there are so many natural cup-marks, that are attributed to volcanic gas bubbles. Having said that, the Beckstones cup-marks were fairly regular, but small.
The site is covered by trees, so photography is tricky, if your digital isn’t set to what you thought it was, like mine.
So, apologies for the over-exposed photos, but they do give some sort of impression of what to expect. Thank goodness for the fact it rained hard last night, filling the cup-marks with water. The ones that I cleared the moss from don’t show up much, but the puddles show up the others.
Further on, I looked over a garden wall, just below where the path from Pattrerdale ascends to Boredale Hause. Guess what? There’s a rock slab in the garden with moss cleared off, and what looked to me to be cup-marks. I took a few photos from a distance, but will check t’internet to confirm my suspicions that this is another “Goldrill Beck” site, so the photos of that will have to wait.

I enjoyed visiting this site more than any of the other cairns in the area.

It was totally deserted, and very peaceful. The axehead carvings in the south cist are very nice, and I was quite taken with the capstone of the west cist.

I couldn’t make out any traces of a cup-and-ring on the stone of the south cist, as is shown chalked in Greywether’s photo, but then, maybe the light has to be just right for it to appear. I find it nicer to think it may actually be there, hiding in plain view.

A big old lump of rock in the middle of a very bleak and often featureless moor which makes it very hard to miss!
There seems to be a longheld tradition of carving names on this rock some date back to the 1600’s and are quite beautifully carved for graffiti puts the modern stuff to shame! Theres also quite a few cupmarks carved into the top of the rock.
Some modern steps have been carved into it to and some much older steps carved around the back that look like footprints it would have been very intresting to see the other three rocks and what carvings were on them.
You can just make out the hollows on the ground of where the other stones were.
I was also quite suprised by the number of people that visited the stone.

Bit of a steep climb up to this one. I’m a seasoned walker but i had to stop twice on the way up! The cairn itself is quite substantial still you can make out the basic shape even with the modern interventions. its very easy to see why the cairn builders chose this location its a perfect setting and you can look right down onto Bleasedale from here.

A quite prominent looking cairn in the centre of a field with fairly substantial remains. it was getting late and i only took a photo from the side of the road for this one as it was too late to ask permission at the farmhouse. it does seem to closely resemble the cairn on top of Parlick Pike though.

On this bleak desolate moor on the outskirts of Lancashire bordering Yorshire youll find two tumuli. Neither very impressive now and both heavily excavated, if your in the area stop and pay them a visit and make sure they’re not forgotten.

This place would have commanded a fantastic view if there were no trees about. You can’t see much of the surrounding area due to the trees and the house, but it’s in what I believe they call ‘a prominent position’. It would have been visible for quite a distance I’d think.

There are a few larger stones lurking about in the field, some down the bottom of a steep slope that forms the western edge of the field. Another is about 50m to the north, these may have been part of the structure, I don’t know enough about these kind of monuments to pass judgement on the matter.

What I do know is that it has a nice feel, and the Oak doesn’t detract from the place at all. In fact, I’d love to see the place in the winter, it would look fantastic in the snow at sunset.

The folks at the house were more than happy to allow access, providing visitors ask.

These are some of the best settlement remains ive seen in Cumbria, the remains are fairly substanstial

Just a stones throw from Hellclough is the Ell clough ring cairn. this is slightly unusual as it has 2 Hollows with an internal bank cutting through and surviving Kerstones are present on the outer edges, i found traces of possible rock art on one stone, there is rumoured to be possible rock art in this area and on the Craggs above, so far besides the possible spiral i have only found some early christian rockart. More moochin about is needed!

This is the most intact and recognisable Tumuli in the area although no stones are standing there are 4 near the entrance one being concrete so not contemporary but the other three may be Extwistle Moor stone circle is 25 metres East of here and Ell Clough is 25 metres Northwest.