Latest Fieldnotes

After speaking to the county archaeologist David Strachan, we came to the conclusion that the stone I found half-buried was probably the side-slab of one of the cists that was discovered “many years ago.” It was probably stood upright by workmen when the cist was ploughed open to mark the grave, and left standing since then. It doesn’t have the appearance of a standing stone, especially if that stone was supposed to have been the remains of a circle.

This doesn’t take away from the fact that there may well have been a stone circle on the site at some point, either around the cairn (long since ploughed away) or nearby.

Visited 26th November 2003: This was a fleeting visit, having persuaded a colleague to tag along after a work visit to Swansea. We drove right up the drive and parked in a little car park near the cairn. It was overcast, the light was fading and it soon began spitting with rain. Having only seen photos of the site I was surprised how small it was, not so much in length but in the height of masonry.

Almost as soon as we got to the cairn my camera stopped working. From the few shots I got, only one came out without camera shake. Must go back again under better circumstances.

Visited 22nd November 2003: William and I climbed Dinas, me with Alfie on my back. The plan was to get the boys out of the house so that Louise could work. Will coped well with the gradient (genuinely enthusiastic), especially as he was only four. Alfie slept most of the time (no enthusiasm there).

By the time we got to the top there wasn’t much sunshine left. The oblique light worked to emphasize the contours of the fortifications, so it was easy to take photos. The views of the surrounding hills and Dinas Reservoir were as stunning as I remembered from the last time I climbed up to the fort. It got chilly as the sun set, and with the light fading we headed back downhill to the car, making it before it got dark.

This reasonably well preserved Clyde cairn can be visited by extending a trip to Achnabreck.

An interesting feature of the cairn is the possible existence of a porthole between two compartments in the lateral chamber.

Enjoyment of the site is considerably reduced by the forestry having planted so close to the cairn especially at the forecourt end. There are extensive views out over the rear of the cairn to the SW which will eventually be obscured as the new plantation grows.

To get to the cairn, follow the track past the two Achnabreck sites until it reaches the forest road then turn right.

Visited 12 May 2004

Visited 9th December 2003: Old Warren is now tree covered, sitting above the slightly dilapidated Nanteos Mansion. It is managed as a nature reserve by the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales, and is accessible to the public from the south.

I visited the fort for the first time following reports that a paintball company was applying for permission to use the adjoining woodland. When I got there it turned out that there is no shared perimeter between the two pieces of land, although they are very close. The archaeology is unlikely to be effected by the paintballing, although the nature reserve may suffer from the noise.

Apparently the fort is the largest single-ditched hillfort in Wales. This may well be true, but it’s hard to get a good idea of the layout of the defences because of the foliage. I was interested to see relatively new wooden steps built into one of the defensive banks. This struck me as a bit unnecessary, especially given the small number of visitors that the site gets.

This stone stands on its own in a field close to Belhie farm on the haughs of Aberuthven. First appearances suggest that it’s an isolated site, but in fact the surrounding area features a complex of ritual monuments, mostly only showing up as crop-marks. (see main Belhie grouping)

As can be seen from the photos above, the stone enjoys great views in all directions to the surrounding hills. This open aspect will be changed forever if the plans for a film studio come to fruition, with a hotel and golf clubhouse planned for either side of the standing stone, which would stand at the end of a car park.

This definitely looks and feels like a genuine standing stone. It’s not marked on the OS map from the 1860s (see link below), but a lot of sites in Perthshire weren’t. I believe that this is a real standing stone, and if it isn’t, it’s a brilliant fake.

Came across this stone whilst on walk over the Cheviot and Hedgehope Hill, it’s actually a couple of miles North of the circle at 98199 22452. Looks like a contender to me and is not part of a dyke etc.

This ruined stone circle was rediscovered by Ron and Margaret Curtis, Moey and Joolio Geordio on 19th September 2002 and documented in the Council for Scottish Archaeology publication Discovery and Excavation Scotland Volume 3 2002. Additional details are included in my web log Two “New” Stone Circles (Re) Discovered On Lewis.

Joolio

This destroyed stone circle was rediscovered by Ron and Margaret Curtis on 19th September 2002 and documented in the Council for Scottish Archaeology publication Discovery and Excavation Scotland Volume 3 2002. Additional details are included in my web log Two “New” Stone Circles (Re) Discovered On Lewis.

Joolio

Field was empty and only grass growing yesterday, so took some pictures of the stone from round about it, rather than just from the fence. Interesting texture on the stone.

Go into Finstown and take the road to Evie. Go out of town and you can’t miss the pillbox. This sits on The Hillock (RCAHMS NMRS Record no.HY31SE 4). At the near end is a space going down to the shore. To the left is a square modern wall and from there looking across its nature was plain as a pikestaff, that familiar broch outline revealed. I went down on the shore to see if there was a nice vertical section but the lumps of tarmac sticking out a foot below the clifftop disabused me of any such notion. Maybe further along, but I was restricted to how far I could go. So I came back and followed a path over the rise of the near end that may have been the double wall. Up to the pillbox for a looksee. To the shoreside of this are the visible wall remnants and the ‘cell’ revealed by a minor dig relatively recently. You can make out some passages and an entrance. There is even a little exposed walling. It was very dangerous getting photos because the grass hides holes, a couple of pieces of wire-frames and abundant nettles. Gingerly letting myself down to the passage floor I was always finding myself reaching out for grass holds that then revealed nettles. The walling you can see from the pillbox is a scant course or two high but when you are down in the passage looking back the cell shows itself several courses high owing to that excavation.

Continue along the Hawell road and you come to a spot where a church on the hillside overlooks a tiny disused quarry. just at the end you turn tightleft at the junction. At the top of this section of road is a thriving farm with modern sheds, immense by Orkney standards. At the back right corner you can see a long mound (HY509067) of bare earth of comparable size to the fence. This is liberally covered with stones, of which many are bloody big. I have photos but this is simply tons of material dumped from somewhere else. No, my site is a rather slighter mound in the field along which the road turns again. It lies towards the upper right corner of this field. On this same side a large-scale map marks a well. Nothing thus far along the road has a NMRS.

I do not have the words to describe the deep overwhelming joy of this place – Step in Shiki

“Roses:
The flowers are easy to paint,
the leaves diffcult.

I was up here recently with the rockartuk fellas on their RAM04. I’ve been here before but could never find the ‘deer carvings’. Nay problems this time, Jan and Gus took us straight to them. Well, what actually happened was, Jan went to the farmhouse took ask permission to scramble on the crag and Gus went off in search of an owl’s nest. But we got there in the end.
It’s well worth the climb to see these lovely carvings, they are quite worn and there is some debate about their antiquity but bearing in mind that when this rock overhang was excavated it yeilded flints and burials, plus the fact that the top of the overhand is decorated with carvings and that the whole site looks down over the Routing Linn complex of carved rock, enclosure, cave and waterfall, I would say that the circumstantial evidence for these carvings being ancient is pretty strong.
After checking out the carvings we moved up onto the moor. There are some nice carvings up here including the ‘horseshoe carvings on the top of the overhang. We also came across a couple of carvings made by the fellas trying to extract millstones.
If you are visiting Routing Linn I would recommend that you take an extra hour or so to check out this area. There is lots to find and the views are crackin’. It will also give you an idea of the intervisibility theories between the various sites along the Millfield Plain and Till Valley.

We came up to Chatton with Pebbles acting as our guide.
It’s a lovely drive up to the moor. We parked up at the large, no longer black, shed and tried to ignore what we thought may have been a corpse in the car next to us – don’t get involved!
After mooching up the hill past some industrial sized clearence cairns we hit the panels...JEEZUS!!
To be honest, I had viewed Chatton as ‘somewhere on the way to Ketley’. Just shows how wrong you can be.
The rock is a ghostly whiteish grey shot through with iron staining. The carvings combined with the colour & texture of the rock give the panel a strange meglithic ‘shroud of turin’ vibe, wierd I know but that’s what I felt.
This was a special place, the circles the dominos, the bizarre Television set carving...too much.
We finally dragged ourselves away and set off towards Ketley but Chatton hadn’t quite finished with us yet. The next panel we came to was Stubobs pecked rock with its lovely pecked grooves and cups followed by the enclosure and Stans ‘occulus’ with it’s strange ziggy-zaggy groove.

Chatton is a beautiful place. The landscape has been knocked about a bit over the centuries but it still manages to retain it’s power.

This astonishing cave, in a giant rock like an elephants foot rising out of nowhere, is on the southern side of the main Doddington complex. (It is not listed on the www.magic.gov.uk site.)

This circle took a hell of a lot of finding on a very foggy day – be warned that the footpaths are not easy to delineate...

There are incredible views from this earthwork fort across to the Chillingham estate – with the spooky ruin of Hepburn Bastle in the foreground (the family was killed by border reivers, and the atmosphere is very eerie).

Had a look here today, and spoke to the farmer. He’s an enthusiastic member of the local Dunning Parish Historical Society, and has farmed the land here for many years. He doesn’t know of any stones or circles in the vicinity, and knows all his land well – he has taken part in field walks held on his land, helping turn up flints and suchlike.

But no stones!

I have to agree with others about the astonishing atmosphere here – it is probably the most breathtaking site of its kind I have ever visited (in 2002, in my case), too.

Some practical notes: the main marks are to be found on the north side of the top of the hill: there’s a gate which a farmer has sagely put into the fence that divides his land from the actual Old Bewick Hillfort. The OS Explorer map is a bit misleading with its ‘Cup & ring’ label.

Had a long blether with the farmer here at the stone today, after asking his permission to photograph it. Lovely bright day, you could see hilltops 40 miles away to the north. A little history of the town states that the field it stands in is known as the Thane’s Field, but the farmer (who is the 8th generation of this family to farm here) says it’s always been known on the farm as simply the ‘Big Stane Field’. More prosaic, but eminently practical.

It’s a decent size, easily 6 feet tall and a yard broad. And what a view!

These pictures were taken just when it began to rain: it took a fair bit of hopping from hummock to hummock to find these rocks.

Take the track opposite the bend in the B6348, and there’s a gate/stile with a public footpath going through the gorse on the right-hand side. The rocks are spread across a fairly wide area ahead and to the right – worth spending a while here to find the best ones.

Before leaving Kirkwall as you reach the Hatston Industrial Estate junction take the lower road till you reach the turnoff for the new pier. Beyond you see a field fence on the same side. Walk towards it and you’ll see the burn going down to the shore which you now follow. It is very rough pasture with hidden holes and barely buried bits of woodwork along the way. The burn at this the beginning points straight at the middle of a mound. Saverock burnt mound is RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY41SW6 at HY43481280. About 20m away from the edge of the mound the burn turns slightly to the left.
What you come to is a grassy mound a couple of metres high. No features at all (though apparently it is a channel cut across the top that revealed the burnt material). RCAHMS say it is a wonder how it survives so untouched in this area, so we shouldn’t grumble really. From the top I could make out a slight small ditch about the mound but felt it to be a modern development.
So what took my fancy was a set of features at the point where the burn takes a turn (HY43461277), date unknown. Most of the way from Yairsay the Burn of Hatston is lined by drystane walls, no sign of a break apart from the bridge below Yairstay. But here it does intriguing things. About 9m down from a wide turf-covered bridge a slab of stone bridges the water (is it a clapper bridge?), near the top of the walls and inset to their sides. It lays horizontally and I wonder if this is how the slab at Burn of Swannay once lay too. A metre past this the right wall turns at a right angles, straight until the end curved round a little. About 4.5-5m further on it is mirrored, except that this wall goes across the water as another wide turf-covered bridge, though of better construction than the first. Hereabouts the walls are thicker than elsewhere, for opposite where the first wall turn is lies a wall inset about 1.3m long, and this is set half-way back into the wall a scant few courses above the stream. Even though there is a chunk of concrete between the wall-turns the arrangement is definitely original with the drystane walling. On a later visit I found another place, further upstream, where there is a similar ‘crossroad’ of wall.
Down from the mound, almost at the shore, was Saverock Souterrain (HY43681296, HY41SW 5), that Petrie had down as a broch. And the Hatston Airfield Souterrain (HY43621238, HY41SW 3) wasn’t too far away. So obviously this area has always been important.
Look from here in the direction of Finstown and the long arm of land includes the site of the Crossietown Neolithic settlement and recently excavated Ramberry chambered cairn (HY42401363, gone). Though it seems to hold watch over the Bay of Kirkwall there was no broch there (Ingshowe lies further towards Finstown). But unseen around the hill Quanterness did have a roundhouse, so perhaps this explains the lack ?

(Note that there are several Deverill Roads in this area: this is the one going from Longbridge Deverill to Sutton Veny.)

I too have been back and forth along this road looking for the henge and finally found it today: a notable depression in the field, but hard to see from the road unless the light catches it – go in the late afternoon or early evening!