Latest Fieldnotes

The Uffington White Horse – 8.2.2004

It was about 12 years ago when I first visited this enigmatic hill figure. That day was very misty and I hadn’t had a chance to wander properly or visit Dragon Hill. This time I had a perfect view for miles and miles across the Oxfordshire countryside. And I got to go down to Dragon Hill, which is as amazingly flat topped and as out of place as I’d always envisaged it. I love the look of the escarpment from the hill, both up towards the horse, and across the side of the escarpment as it concertinas its way along to the west.

No-one seems to have done the obvious yet....(car centric) directions. A large (and free) National Trust car park exists just off the B4507, up the hill, opposite to the road to Woolstone. From the car park it’s a 600-700m walk to the Horse / Castle. I think a separate car park for people with disabilities exists closer to the Horse / Castle and is approached via the narrow road that starts opposite to the road to Uffington village and cuts Dragon Hill from The White Horse (hhmmmm!). This is all well signposted. Note – The B4507 lives up to it’s ranking in the B roads stakes. It’s a twisty, potholed, slightly narrow thing.

It’s a shame you can’t get into the chamber at Knowth. The artificial room that tour parties are led into might as well be in the Visitor Centre.
The view from the top really gives you a sense of the place of this tomb within the landscape and I could spend hours looking at the rock-art on the displayed kerb-stones.
The later use of the site by Celts and Normans are also of interest, in particular the creep passage east of the main mound. Children of all ages (!) can crawl through it during the guided tours.

Newgrange looks amazing from the outside, but is blatantly too good to be true. The chamber is beyond belief. I just wish I could spend some time in there without an official guide’s voice as accompaniment.

I’ve been to the Complex three times now. On the whole the preservation of the area, and the way tourism here is carefully managed, seems understandable, bearing in mind that people live here and don’t need their roads choked with cars. The Visitor Centre is also impressively unobtrusive.

I just can’t help getting the urge, though, to stick two fingers up at the buses that you are strong-armed into using in order to get to Newgrange and Knowth. On all three visits I have wished I walked to the tombs instead and this has been the source of a couple of heated discussions with my partner.

I just can’t stand feeling openly “managed” at such sites.

We visited Carrowmore on a drizzly day and missed much of the view of Sligo one gets from the complex, which was a shame.

There are an impressive number of tombs here in a tiny area, and in various states of preservation. Being with non-megarak family members meant I couldn’t help feeling self-conscious gleefully bounding around the place photographing every rock that stuck out of the ground.

My family were interested at first, but after about an hour of being rained on, the advantages of walking around a field full of rocks were rapidly waning as far as they were concerned. We returned to the Visitor’s Centre and I was granted a brief visit over the road to Tombs 1-7, with strict orders to return quickly or lose body-parts.

Tomb 7 I will not forget in a hurry.
As soon as I had settled myself in the chamber of the dolmen for a brief bit of megalithic contemplation, a bullock nosed right up to the entrance and stood sniffing the air in the tomb inches from my face. I don’t mind admitting I can be a bit of a big girl’s blouse when it comes to bullocks and on this occasion I froze and felt my heart begin to leap into my throat.
He obviously could not see me and my smell was making him nervous. Looking back now it’s obvious that one movement from me would have caused him to bolt, but at the time this didn’t even occur to me. Eventually he got bored and walked off.

I can’t convey it in writing, but it was somehow an incredibly intense, and not entirely negative, experience. Being one of those druidy types I tend to like reading meaning into such encounters. The meaning I gleaned from this incident, distilled into a phrase, was “Fair enough. Have your little sit in here, but remember you actually belong elsewhere”
Such overactive imaginings can make sense when one is sitting in a tomb, I always find. Walking away from Tomb 7 I was smiling at my unexpected experience, as the visit to Carrowmore had been very practical and down to earth up to that point.

“Fair enough” I said to myself, with a last, very respectful, glance back at the tomb.

Visited 26th August 2003: This place is mad. It’s so close to a stone circle, but it ain’t. The setting is spectacular, high above Port Erin with views out to the Calf of Man. There’s a lot of sea visible, and with the crest of the hill on the landward side of the circle it seems reasonable to assume that the site is orientated towards the coast.

As well as being spectacular and special, Meayll is very difficult to do any justice to on ‘film’. It’s definitely one of those optimised for 3D sites, where walking among the stones is the only way to really figure it out. We got a bit of sunshine, and it all felt very good. It goes without saying that Meayll is megalithic Mann royalty. Blinkin’ great!

A word of warning for anyone with limited mobility; the distance from the road to the circle is relatively short, but it’s entirely made up of a steep incline. Not at all wheelchair friendly.

Discovered last year, not listed on CANMORE. There are other cup marked rocks in the area but not as decorative as this.

I had little idea what I was about to see. ‘Blakey Topping’ sounds like a cheapo, bubblegum-flavoured, powdered dessert mix and not a smooth, graceful sacred hill standing alone, like Kilimanjaro. With the icy wind cutting through my clothes as we got out of the car at the Hole of Horcum car park, and with the threat of a bit of a walk to reach it, I thought: ‘this better be good, Moth.’ I wasn’t disappointed.

As you approach it the way we did, it doesn’t play visual tricks on you like Silbury does, it’s just there and absolutely compelling. It’s hard to take one’s eyes off it. You can feel why the ancients regarded it as sacred in some way, but I couldn’t begin to describe why.

The big surprise for me was the wrecked stone circle in a field nearby. The tallest stone stands about 6 feet high. Others remain standing and some are down but still its hard to know what’s been moved and what hasn’t and so quite diffcult to work out how big it once might have been, or even where its centre was. It’s quite a sheltered spot by the stones and completely dominated by the shape of the hill beyond.

In a big, wide rolling, landscape pockmarked with earthworks and tumuli, Duggleby Howe stands proud and tall despite being a shadow of its former self. Now only 20 feet high, rather than 30, and without its surrounding ditch and bank of which I could see no trace, this massive tump really dominates this little valley. We followed the edges of the field to reach it, as there is no path.

I liked it enormously and had there not been a biting cold northerly wind, I’d have liked to sit and considered its position in the landscape a little longer. Like you do at Silbury, for example.

How this survived in a churchyard, God only knows. Woooo! I challenge anyone not to be impressed by this monster though it is made to look silly with its little metal helmet. I lay on the ground and looked up from its base watching the clouds scudding past. I was intrigued by its juxtaposition with the gravestones and its proximity to the church itself.

In the corner of the graveyard, under a tree lies a couple of broken standing stones one of which has the most amazing bright white lichen on one side only. Seek this out, it’s fab. Next to this is a gorgeous, open stone-lined coffin. Loads to see here!

Coming from the Kirkwall-Stromness road the first hillock you come to on the Germiston Road is, it must be admitted, unremarkable (looking across the road you can see Lower Hobbister farm in the middle distance). But to one side of the far slope is the most magnificent stone-lined ‘stream’. This is so well-made that I feel the hillock has to be an archaeological site too , as if the ‘stream’ has had a section seconded as some kind of rampart. Alternatively the large stones lining the stream could instead have actually come from a structure on the hill ( which shows evidence of ?unrecorded excavation ).

we (charlie and i) visited the nine stones on the 1st of february. after driving past the site a couple of time found that the layby across the road was indeed the best place to park. apart from the narrow strip of grass leading from the little chef there is/was also a deep water filled ditch to contend with if you park in the little chef car park.
being feb there were no leaves on the trees which left a good if little exposed view of the stones. we still found it possible when standing with our backs to the road to forget there was a busy road there at all. There is something very special about this site and the way it made us feel to be there. i took many pictures which i will attept to post should they offer anything not already on this site.

pic quality is a bit duff but it could show a possible alignment with sunset a couple of days before winter solstice .

Hi, My name is Simon Hart and I work at the fish feed factory just up from the paper mill. A few years ago we had to replan our environmental improvemts as it was too near to the Refuge Stone. Due to the new legislations we are reviewing our facilities and must state if any buildings etc are near Heritage sites, the stone being one. A quick search turned up the last post, and I am probably going to go looking for it tomorrow (Tues 10th). If I locate it, I will take pics and post.
I think the map is wrong, when zoomed down, it seems to place the stone within the grounds of the papermill (now closed), right in front of the Westfield Inn which is quite a way from our factory and we wouldn’t have had to do any modifications.

Just got back from my first trip to Ilkley in a few months and what can I say that Stubob hasn’t already, what an absolute disgrace. This is one of the most perfectly situated, unpublicised sites on the moor and it’s now been damaged, quite possibly forever, by a mindless, selfish idiot. Shame on you whoever did this.

Pair of barrows as specified by Purejoy. There are another two pairs, one on the racecourse and the other on Littledown. These 6 barrows are the only intact barrows left on Greatdown and Littledown, except for a singleton further down the road. But there are also many destroyed barrows in this area.

Nothing remains now of the Broch itself as this was bulldozed in 1981. It was along the cliffpath to the left of the Scapa Distillery. The mounds that can still be seen represent the outbuildings. These may have stretched as far as the Orphir road on a bend in which you can sit on part of the mound still. This reminds me of the one opposite the Standing Stones Hotel on the main Kirkwall-Stromness road. It could also have been associated with the Broch of Warbuster whose remains used to be at Tofts Farm.

Visited 26th August 2003: There are two barrows marked on the Ordnance Survey Landranger map. The easiest to see and get to (so long as you don’t wear shorts because the heather is dense) is to the east of the A27. The grid reference for this is approximately SC232769, and it’s sited on a piece of land with no boundary fence, and apparent open access.

The other barrow is to the west of the road (approximately SC230769), in a fenced off field. From the road it’s tricky to make out, and I’m not entirely sure I’ve photographed the right bump.

Worth stopping off to see if you’re passing through, if only for the view out to sea.

Around 1823 this stone was dug up and moved about 20 feet. At a depth of 3 or 4 feet under it was found an urn containing ashes, a piece of tartan too decomposed to be identified or moved, and copper and silver coins dating from the reign of Mary Queen of Scots. The urn was reburied in situ.

Around 1951, the stone was moved again, the farmer dumping it by the side of the field at NJ 5184 3048, where it lay “largely obscured by a grass-grown pile of stones, and farm rubbish” when visited in 2002 by the RCAHMS.

Came to see this last September on a bit of an exploration of other local bits ‘n’ bobs. It is easy to find, marked on the OS map, and a brief walk from the road. If you’ve got the car, there is nowhere to park in the immediate vicinity that I found.

It’s a nice stone – very tall! There is a massive chunk missing, that I’m sure I read somewhere was lopped off to become part of a road (although I could be confused with another story!) – I also read about the way that, due to this, it changes shape quite dramatically from each angle – which it does! It’s not in the most ambient of locations, but that’s not to say it’s not worth another visit. Maybe it’d be different if I wasn’t so paranoid about my parking!

There are several other stones from teh direction we came from, some of which formed a distinct circle. I will post the pics of that soon – it’s not marked on the map if it is anything, but it is a circle of stones for sure! About 10-15 metres round (from memory). I re-checked me pics t’other day, and it really does look deliberate!

But... where I did park was a bit precarious, so I had to leg it back before anyone complained. Not that anyone was around, but that’s the conscienscious person I am... :o)

Located on top of Twist Hill, although I’ve not visited this site yet I have viewed it through binoculars from Hambledon Pasture.

I also have an aerial photo of this site rectangular in shape it seems to be the same size and shape of the Ring Stones which are very close to this site (about 0.5km away) there’s also supposed to be an Iron Age barrow next to it. Hopefully I’ll visit soon.

After a visit to the Pikestones I read the noticeboard which informs you another chambered tomb was found in Lancashire (it doesn’t say where). I was pointed by others to two possible locations for the tomb the first being Black Coppice Chambered Cairn and the other possible site being this.

The mound is situated high on the plateau beneath the peak of Great Hameldon, close to the edge of a quarry, but far enough away to be independant of the quarrying activity. The mound is a ‘whale shaped mound’ about 5 metres high and about 60 foot long by 30 foot wide. At the western end is a small T shaped depression. The cross section is about 4 metres wide and goes quite deep in places. It’s been suggested that this could be the remains of a collapsed burial chamber. At the base of the T someone has cut a large rectangular test pit and there are three other test pits on this mound too, one on top, and two on the sides. I’d suggest these were dug by amateur treasure hunters as they’ve not been filled in afterwards.

On the western side of the plateau are two more mound like structures, different to this one, with rectangular chambers on the side. These are aligned with each other and I couldn’t say for certain wether they are modern or not.

Once again this is a bit of a climb but with great views to substitute this its worth the effort.

I climbed up here with relative ease against my better judgement in the ice and snow! My reasoning behind this was the structures would be a little clearer now the undergrowth had died back somewhat due to the colder weather (at least thats how I convinced myself that climbing up here was a sane thing to do).

As I said in my previous fieldnotes there’s lots to see here. I found the possible remains of a stone row, although you could probably imagine all sorts of alignments with the rocks and structures on top here. There’re many possible standing stones and four clearly banked circular structures with depressions in the middle surrounding the tomb, two of them having possibly fallen capstones. In the centre I also checked out the alignment of the tomb, which is alligned almost perfectly NW/SW.

Whatever you make of it up here the views are stunning and its a great place just to sit and contemplate.

A small, intriguingly named moor to the west of Halifax with some interesting features (a robbed tumulus, a stone circle, the site of burial mounds and an Iron age embankment). You can walk around them in a few hours and see lots of wildlife.

Nothing immediately visible on a highly cultivated hill top, but some slightly raised areas could be mounds. There is however a scheduled ancient monument here somewhere, according to Magic.

1st February 2004