Latest Fieldnotes

This chambered cairn is situated on Horse Law across the Westruther Burn and is visible from Greens Moor long cairn.

From Greens Moor, head E. There are several crossings over the Westruther Burn. The more adventurous may want to try the telegraph pole crossing situated on the line between the two sites.

Alternatively, detour a little by following the wall S until it ends. There you will find a more substantial crossing.

The cairn is possibly a Clyde cairn. Identification is difficult due to its having been heavily robbed to build the sheepfold which sits at its E end where you might have hoped to find a façade and evidence of an axial chamber.

The remains of one S-facing lateral chamber can be seen just W of the sheepfold and there may be another one opposite it.

The surviving cairn is 30m long.

Park at Redford Bridge on the A70, walk along the north bank of the river then follow the line of the forest east.

The long cairn is close to the SE corner of the forest.

The cairn is 82m N/S and 13m at its widest end (N). Robbing has reduced it to a maximum of 1m high.

There are two round cairns to the S and groups of small cairns to the S and W.

The grid reference is for the original location of this cist but there is nothing there now.

The cist was part of a small cemetery discovered during sand-quarrying operations in 1939. It is now in Hamilton Low Parks Museum (ML3 6BJ).

The notable feature of this cist is that one of the side slabs was decorated on both sides with examples of the concentric circles, arcs and spirals generally known as “passage grave art”.

The Museum does not allow photography of the cist and, as a further example of their unhelpfulness, only one side of the decorated slab is visible in the reconstruction.

The designs can be seen in the PSAS link below.

An Unenclosed Platform Settlement (UPS) is formed by taking a semi-circular scoop out of a hillside and using the materials to build a circular level platform on the downslope side. A timber house is then built on the platform.

Walk SE from Fall Hill. A good UPS can be seen after 35m.

Continue round the S side of Normangill Rigg to the small plantation where another good UPS can be seen on the E side near the gate. This and others in the vicinity correspond with the grid reference given for this entry.

Continue walking E parallel to the road where further UPSs can be seen near the sheepfold at NS 971211.

Park at the junction of the two minor roads just S of the site. Walk N to a small quarry on the E of the road. Head E and (sadly) follow the vehicle tracks which run through the centre of the site.

A low stony bank 2.1 to 2.4m wide surrounds an area 16m diameter enclosing an eccentrically placed stony mound of 4.3m diameter.

On the SE arc of the bank are visible two shallow grooves about 0.7m apart. They may have supported timber uprights and, although no longer visible, could have continued around the entire bank.

No detailed directions should be necessary for this site as a look at the map will confirm.

A Class II henge measuring 61m x 55m. Both entrances can still be seen and the bank/ditch are best preserved on the E.

Leave the M74 at Junction 13 and take the B7078 north. Stop at a farm gate on the E about 0.75 miles after passing the B740.

From the gate head in an “11 o’clock” direction for the higher ground nearer the motorway. Keep the stream on your left. Once nearer the location, you should see a 2m stone lying flat. This is on the E of the circle. The other stones are either just above or in a hollow just below ground level but are all visible.

23 stones can be seen in an elipse measuring 50m x 40m. They range in length from 0.9m to 1.7m. It is estimated that the monument may have had 40 stones originally.

It is not known whether the stones were originally standing and later fell or whether they were brought to the monument but never erected.

If you land at Burwick pier this promontory fort is within easy reach around the coast to the North. Most of what little remains is dykes. The fort itself is attached by a short narrow strip of land to the main coastline. In my brief visit I could make out nothing there, though to make up for this looking landwards there is a mighty fine cave at the bottom of the cliffs through which the sea rushes (alas the only pictures I have are of this – I did see a nice wall on the cliffside at the main coastline but for once didn’t take a picture of something I thought at the time mediaeval!).

I found the reference to this site in a report called “Danby Moors Archaeological Survey 1988-1989” (cheers Kat).
The site is described as an elongated mound (NE/SW) 19m long.
Fired up by this refence I was up at the mound today. The mound is quite easy to get to, it stands about 50m from the Danby Beacon road.
The mound is situated on the southern side of a shallow valley with views to the coast and Danby beacon.
The mound itself is curiously boat shaped with a depression on the top that echoes the shape of the mound, as opposed to your usual circular excavation pit. In paces I found it to be 23m long and 15m wide and orientated EEN-WWS.
There are a few rabbit holes in the mound which reveal the construction to be earth & stone.
Conclusion, not a spectacular mound but a definite NYM curiousity given it’s shape, it may possibly related to the long barrow at Newton Mulgrave 7km away which is a lot bigger but of a similar shape and orientation.

Panel of approximately 40 or so cup marks. The panel is on the most prominent spur of a low ridge of bedrock. Most of the cups are about 5cm diameter and are very worn with a thick covering of lichen. Hence the approximation of the number, some of them may be bumps on the natural surface of the rock.

The panel is easier to find if approached from the south. The ditches and banks of the nearby settlement and the disused quarry make the ridge easy to find. The panel appears to mark the northern edge of the cairnfield. Most of the cairns are quite low and overgrown, but there seemed to be more than are marked on the OS map. The ground is typical Northumberland swampy hillocks and tussocks, so is not suitable for anyone with mobility issues. Permission for access can be sought at Byers Hall.

Slab of groundfast stone on the ridge directly above Kellah burn. It has 50 or so very worn cupmarks most of which are about 5cm diameter. Some have faint grooves connecting, others are slightly eliptical. The slab is about 1.5m by 0.7m, maybe a cist cover.
It’s easily found amongst the irregular line of what look like stones removed for field clearing. This row extends along the length of the ridge, but the cup-marked slab is next to the tallest of the stones in the row. Easiest access from the south via the bridlepath, leave the path next to the small cairn marked on the OS map. The wall extending north to Black Rigg on the OS map is not there now, skirt round the side of this and head down to the ford over Kellah burn. Not suitable for those with mobility issues. Permission for access can be sought at Byers Hall.

This broch was formerly within sight of the Howe which lay on the hill the other side of the water (just past the RH edge of the photo). The mound to the south, Corn Hillock, is now considered as of similar nature, giving a pair of brochs as seen elsewhere in Orkney.

Although there’s no evidence left of there being a circle here, what it lacks in stones it makes up for in location. It sits out in the middle of a large flat floodplain in a sweeping bend of the Tummel, and can be seen for miles around. At the time of building, with the landscape free of trees, caravan sites, farm buildings and the A9, it must have been an even more impressive site! This is the tree-covered cairn that can be seen to your left across the river as you drive into Pitlochry from the south.

The cairn originally had a ditch and embankment around it, with a “row of upright stones round the mound”. These stones were apparently toppled around 1840 and used to repair the nearby river embankment.

Two seperate authors writing in the 1920s in books about Pitlochry mention stones from a destroyed stone circle lying at the end of the golf course. The land is marked on the Explorer map as marshy, so perhaps predictably CANMORE found “no trace of these stones” as they are some distance from the car park, and it’s just possible you might get your feet wet looking for them!

However, the stones are here, some of them turfed over, but here nonetheless. A bit of poking around and scraping away of long grass and mud revealed 4 large stones. I didn’t find the ten foot long stone described in 1925, as a party of golfers were getting more and more suspicious. But there were several long bumps in the ground which could do with another look. I will no doubt be back sometime soon.

A stone circle once stood here on the knoll known as Cnoc Dubh (black hill). The stones were removed early in the 19th century to build Balnadrum farmhouse, and Cnoc Dubh was levelled to build a tennis court in what is now the grounds of the Pitlochry Hydro.

This area was excavated, then destroyed by the Nosterfield quarry over quite a period of time, and in several phases. As a result it is difficult to visualise all of the features and contexts found.

In this general area, three ring ditches, currently identified as the remains of Bronze Age barrows, one containing a burial have been found. In addition to this eleven or twelve cremations were deposited in ditches and two Iron Age square barrows were found. All that remains at the present time (Feb 2004) is a single barrow and several pits contining charred remains probably related to the burial activities.

The Square Barrows are the only such structures located in North Yorkshire and are interpreted as being of the Wetwang type, if so they would date to around 600BC and along with the chariot burial found recently in Ferrybridge will have a significant impact on our interpretation of Yorkshires Iron Age.

The Parisi can no longer be seen as being hemmed into a small area of East Yorkshire and they appear to have spread well into the Kingdom of Brigantia, leaving behind their warrior graves as far afield as Ripon and Leeds. The best assumption must be that relations with the Brigantes were not as unfavourable as has commonly been believed – The Parisi are thought to have been later “invaders” – decendents of the Gaulish tribe of the same name that lived in Paris.

It is a real shame that these important finds were not the first to be located on the quarry, as it would have placed considerable importance on the site and would have meant the archaeology of the area would have seen less of the “roughly dug” and more of the “100% excavated”.

FEBRUARY 24TH
Second time I reached the Ring of Bookan. Knowing now where it was as I went up the hill past where Bookan tomb lay to the top there was its outline to my left, a long low mound with a cleft in the middle in which a rectangular stone is prominent. The first time I saw it was as an unimpressive but still high mound, two fields away from the road and with a big hollow interior in which I saw a large standing stone and some less distinct stuff besides. This time it was clear that it is in the first field and there is no central empty space.

Walking towards it I was pleasantly surprised by the size and excellent condition of the surrounding ditch, which put me in mind of Maes Howe (though later this ditch called to mind Stackrue Broch down the other side of the hill : perhaps this like The Howe not only goes forward to Viking times but back to to the Neolithic – the subterranean passage could have been put through a tomb entrance as with the souterrain there). The stones I had seen were on a platform-like area across the mound. There seems to be an area of grass on the central mound indicative of an henge-type entrance long gone.

Down on the hillside portion there are exposed the friable stones of whatever structure underlies the mound’s exterior – this is so fragmented that I can’t help wondering if the builders used some pre-existing natural for a starting point at least. From here you can see the decent-sized mound of Skae Frue (alias Wasbuster barrow HY282144) below.

It is not obvious to me whether the ‘platform’ is archaeology or excavation. There is quite a lot going on there, possibly more than one structure even going by what is immediately obvious/visible, and you could use up a whole film trying to make sense of it. The archaeologists are unsure whether this is a henge or a tomb but I feel it could have been both (if some tombs were based-on, or incorporated, standing stones then this brings them closer to multi-period henge development – there is a divergence from a common origin let’s say).

[visited 22/02/04] I came here last on my day out to watch
the sunset over the lancashire plains, but changed my mind when I realised how likely I was to hurt myself going down the escarpment in the dark...
It really is a mess up here, I’m not convinced that much is prehistoric, given the huge industrial mill? stones just off the edge of the quarry. However if most of it is prehistoric then its a big cemetary, something like Raven Tor or even one of the barrow cemetarys down south (Poor Lot springs to mind.)
Well worth a visit, the views are spectacular & who knows what else is lurking under the heathery peat.

[visited 22/02/04] What a site for sore eyes this is, its condition reminds me of Grey Mare in Dorset, but the ground plan on the wellkept sign makes it look more like Hetty Peglars Tump. I parked on the corner & headed across open moor to the barrow. Its a bit trashed, but the location made up for it.

Didn’t find the circle mentioned here, but did find a cairn with stones on the center which was approx 300m at 58 degrees from the Pikestones so maybe...

[visited 22/02/04] A brisk walk above Bolton leads you to this sorry site. It looks to be a dead ringer for an abused twin of Twelve Apostles, sitting sorrowful by the side of what is surely an ancient track. Despite the top of this windswept moor
doing steady traffic, I was the only person who stopped & walked over to the stumps, a somewhat depressing fact.

This circle isn’t impressive, unique or even readily recognizable, but still it struggles on & fair play to it. Go visit & make sure it is less forgotten.

Visited this site yesterday, a very cold, bright day. From the archives of Canmore:

“A large standing stone about 8’ high in the angle of the garden wall close to the W side of the farm steading, which gave name to the farm. It is considered a stone of memorial of some event”. (By 1923 (OS 25” map) the stone had apparently been moved from its position W of the farm which also became known as the Home Farm).
Name Book 1859.

This standing stone, 2.2m high, 1.0m broad and 0.9m thick, bears a number of small cup-marks – especially noticeable on the lower portion of the north side. Some of the ‘cups’ may be due to weathering.

It’s big, in quite a prominent position, and some of the cup-marks are almost certainly weathering – but some aren’t. I wonder if the stone was orientated differently when first erected, as cup-marks aren’t commonly on the north face of a stone. Maybe it’s just an exception.

Canmore quotes the Statistical Account’s reference to the stone being 5’2” (1.6m) high without comment but it is more like 1.2m high – a little higher than the two on the other side of the road.

Plenty of parking available at the crossroads in Tweedsmuir village – a short walk from the stones.

Visited 17 February 2004

An alternative approach, particularly if level ground is important, is to park at NN740230 and walk the mile or so along the disused railway line.

This is a fairly typical Clyde cairn with its one axial and two lateral chambers. However, an unusual feature is the narrow width of the forecourt. It is assumed that forecourts were used for some form of ritual activity and they are generally semi-circular but here it is more V-shaped.

Visited 14 February 2004

The tor is best known for the small church perched on its peak, but on closer inspection the remains of a large hillfort or settlement can be found on the northern side of the tor. The guide book in the church says they date from the Iron Age and at present I can find no other info to say if this is wrong or right.

The tor is easy to find (it can be seen for miles around) by heading north out of Tavistock towards the village of North Brentor. There is a good carpark beside the road and the walk up to the church takes you through the remains of the settlement.

Whatever your views on Christianity, a visit to the Church is worth it, if only for the views.

Just to the south-west of the tor there is marked on the OS map a row of tumuli running down from a point called the beacon.

Note :- The exact location of this site cannot be guaranteed as it does not appear on any O.S. maps.

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This site looks very similar to Black Coppice Chambered Cairn but still buried with a similar sized cap stone fully visible but only a small gap visible of the possible chamber.

Unfortunately the photograph I took came out corrupted. This may have been the cold getting to it internals or something else !!

I suggest this site is seen at its best during the winter months as summer vegetation will obscure it.