Latest Fieldnotes

I was up at this fella today.
The views down the lower Esk Valley to the sea are absolutely crackin’.
There is also a modern memorial stone close by.
The are definitely worse places to spend eternity.

We popped in to have a look at this today, on our way back home from Birmingham, as it’s only a 5 minute drive from J11 on the M40.

Approaching Cropredy from the A361, just before the Cropredy Bridge is a large stone on the left hand side of the road. An information plaque proclaims it to be a boundary stone from the 15thC, but it looks and feels much older than that.

Anyway, continuing on, we came to a ‘T’ junction. We turned Right for no particular reason, and shortly spotted a road on the left marked ‘Cup and Saucer’. I swung in and the stone was there in front of us.

I’m not certain what to make of it, to be honest. It looks as if it should have an inscription carved on the ‘plinth’, for plinth it is. The base and ‘cup’ appears to be a single stone, but at the same time has obviously been extensively worked into its current font-like form. It’s hard to tell if the ‘spoon’ was ever actually a separate stone, or if the whole was carved from a single piece of stone.

Cup & Saucer? Mug & Spoon? Pestle & Mortar? I think the jury’s still out on this one...

I was up at this fella today. It’s quite easy to find and is just visible from the parking area. The circle is now a sort of elongated “D” shape as a good portion has been chopped off by the old turf road. It’s a decent size with some large stones.
Its pretty wrecked and definitely not the best looking circle, but we ain’t got many so we love ‘em all.
For all your earthly needs check the village store in Gillamoor, it’s a happy place.

I last visited here over a year ago, in late spring, and never felt I could gather enthusiasm for the site. Too close to the road, too perfect in its approach, it struck me as almost an exhibit in ‘theme park Penwith’, such is the nature of the location.

One thing I noticed this time was how it now seems a repose for partaking of ‘the magic leaf’? Certainly our visit disturbed many ‘toking’ frantically in the late summer sun.
I am undecided about this place. Perfection, symmetry, and a certain...blandness, all conspire to make this a visit of conflicting emotions.

Access is easy – park at the side of the road and then a gate is the only obstacle. In the past this has been easily opened but yesterday it was tied shut with string. The stones are then inside a gently sloping field. The ground is good and firm, with only the droppings of a bovine beauty to be wary of.

The stones are too perfect, especially when compared with the primitive beauty of nearby Boskawen Un. If I were to ‘have a smoke’ it would certainly be in the sacred confines of Boskawen.

Is this how a circle should be, or is it how we want it to be?

A customary stroll around the perimeter revealed little of interest, and as we watched the occupants of the circle frantically puffing away, my companion pulled at my sleeve. ‘It exists because they want it to...‘

I think she was right.

The Isles of Scilly were formerly one island and many archaeological sites now lie beneath the sea. Excavations have only been possible at the lowest tides and there are certain to be more sites permanently under water (there are more than 500 sites above the high water line). Normally submerged sites that have been excavated include: 10 hut circles, 7 cists and graves, 4 field wall enclosures and 12 other occupational sites and partial exposures in eroding cliffs. See marine contour map.

The area around Tregarthen Hill contains 78 mound cairns, some with retaining kerbs. 5 entrance graves are on the south side, 4 being in a line fron NE to SW.

The island of Nornour (SV 944147) is less than four acres in size and is joined to Great Ganilly at low tide. Yet the excavations of the late 60’s and early ‘70’s revealed the remains of a major settlement which was occupied from the middle of the Bronze Age to the Romano-British Iron Age. Nornour clearly reveals the effects of rising sea levels, as this tiny scrap of land could never have supported such a thriving community. Many more houses are doubtless lost beneath the sea and right up until Tudor times, the islands of the Scillies were one island – known then as Ennor. Did the inundation of Ennor give rise to the legend of the Lost Land of Lyonesse? (see Scilly-Lyonesse)

On Nornour, there are eleven circular stone houses each having a main room with a smaller chamber alongside. Later, in the Iron Age, the site became a shrine to the goddess Silina and a number of goddess figurines have been found. The island also housed a workshop for brooches and other items. Over 3000 brooches, 35 bronze rings, 11 bracelets, 24 glass beads and 84 Roman coins have been excavated. The photographs were taken in 1970, soon after wind and waves exposed the site that was previously covered by sand. Since then, the sea has subsequently damaged much of the site. The settlement is still visible, but access is discouraged. All of the finds are displayed in the museum on St Mary’s.

This head was found early last century and then lost. Rediscovered in 1989, it is now cemented to the rock. Often hidden in the bracken and heather, it can be found by searching near the path to the very conspicuous red and white daymark. It seems to be the head of a lost statue and bears a resemblance to those found in the Channel Islands and Brittany. Prehistoric field system, an entrance grave and cairns nearby.

This, for me, is a must-see site. It is more than possible to see Drizzlecombe, Brisworthy, Ringmoor and possibly Shaugh Moor and Yellowmeade in one day.

The complex lies on a valley floor near a river and is well worth any effort to reach it. There are three cairn cirles, each with its own stone row. Two of these rows have very tall (3 metres?) stones at the non-cairn end. They really do make an impressive site. Situated between the rows and the river is ‘the Giant’s Basin’ standing a good few metres high it must have been an impressive mound before looting/excavation (?) ripped it open.

There are other cairns in the area, particularly on the hillside between the complex and the path from the carpark.

johan

When I was a child no trip to Saltburn was complete without climbing Cat Nab and it felt like being on top of the world! I always loved it. According to my parents, who still live in the area, it’s been fenced it off now because the feet of hundreds of children were wearing it away.

Visited on 31.08.03. There are several paths running through this little woodland, best thing is to park in the layby on the right-hand-side of the road to Bodsham where the public footpath sign is pointing along the edge of a field, but instead of walking down that footpath walk up the road, past a cottage, to the bridleway and turn right down there, we’re pretty sure we found it – about a 5 min walk and set back from the right hand side of the track.

The barrow is quite large around 50 ft long and 2 meters high but very overgrown by trees and other assorted undergrowth. It felt great to find it but I can see why JC would have chosen Julieberries Grave for the book over this site. The entrance would seem to be at the track end of the barrow but there aren’t really any specific signs of this. There’s a large burrow, badgers? dug deep into the top of the barrow about half way along and is about the only spot for sitting down.

A ruined entrance grave crowns the summit of Gweal Hill with two cairns nearby. One cairn is surrounded by five kerbstones.

This massive cairn site consists of 134 cairns most of which are small circular platforms linked by lines of stones forming rectilinear alignments.

Across the neck of the promontory is a low stone rampart of the cliff fort.

A line of at least four cairns along the crest of the hill.

Accessible on foot from St Martins at low tide. At least five cairns and an entrance grave

A ruined entrance grave incorporating a massive outcrop of natural rock. 50ft in diameter with a chamber 12ft in length. Glass, amber and faience beads found in 1912.

11 Iron Age cists in this cemetry with another 5 nearby. Bronze brooches found

An Iron Age cliff fort with four ramps and ditches. Finds include pottery dated to 300 bce.

Often blind to things on our own doorstep, I revisited our local mystery with a view to seeking opinions from TMA. The Devil’s Hoofprint is carved in clunch (a soft chalky rock) and located in the south porch of St Michael’s, Bishops Stortford. What is it?

Like other churches dedicated to the warrior saint, St Michael’s is a hilltop church built on a pagan site. The church guide is coy about the carving and describes it as “possibly pagan”. Other views maintain that it is the result of someone sharpening their arrows in the porch! Now, I am not one to see vulvas in every megalithic nook and cranny, but this one look pretty explicit to me. Given the church’s pagan association, could it be a fertility symbol? Ignored and unnoticed – I’d love to bring it out of the closet and would welcome your thoughts.

The twin barrows of Trevelgue were where it all began for me. I’ve been tump hunting ever since.

An impressive hillfort with complex defences second only to Maiden Castle. Occupied from the 6th century to the Roman occupation. I have only seen it from the A5, but its at the top of my “must visits”. Surprised the site is not already covered on TMA.

Clambering up on to the flat, plateau–like top of the fort, we were treated to the most amazing view across Oxfordshire, and what was clearly a very important Iron Age kingdom. To the south-west lay Churn Knob, easily picked out from the copses on the horizon by the bloody great cross erected next to the mound. (Blasted St. Birinus; but it does make a handy reference point – OK, I deserve a smack with a riding crop). Beyond Churn Knob lay the Blewbury Downs Tumuli, almost equidistant between Blewburton Hill and Perborough Castle. The same tribe, maybe, or a shared burial ground?

Looking round to the west, the land spread before us magnificently, leading out to the Vale of White Horse; then we were subjected to the unfortunate and grotesque Didcot Power Station, squatting like a homunculus on this realm; and in the north, Oxford. Further round, clearly and unmistakably, the twin copses of Wittenham Clumps and the Sinodun Hills rose up proudly from the flat fields. A kilometer from them stood the lonely tree on Brightwell Barrow. Looking north-east, we could see what I thought was Stokenchurch Tower, poking up from the edge of the Chilterns. Cloudhigh wondered if he could see Ivinghoe Beacon on the horizon.

And somehow, it suddenly all added up for me, this landscape. The different places flowed together across the land in one continuous line; a line the ancients knew; a line that continues throughout time, just as powerfully on a Sunday afternoon in the second millennium CE as in the first millennium BCE. Blimey, that’s 3,000 years!!!

Sitting at the roof of Oxfordshire, just looking at the land below, the curvature of the earth, and the pattern of the fields became very centering. Time slowed instantly. The warm wind rustled gently through the long grasses. Its whispering was a panacea to my twisted, mangled, exhausted emotions [after the sudden death of my sister’s boyfriend]. Goddess knew how my sister felt; I wished I could pass on some of this spiritual salve.

Visited 2nd August 2003: Based on my experiences working on another estate, I decided we could just brazen it out, so long as we were confident and polite. We drove up the drive in our clapped out Fiat Uno, and parked behind the trees near the house. I left the others in the car (Lou doesn’t share my taste for this sort of thing) and strolled up to the chamber.

The chamber is beautifully proportioned. You can really see why some people mistook it for a folly. I didn’t go inside, because that would have looked a bit weird (not in keeping with my “I’m supposed to be here” persona). I did my best to look academic, and strolled around the taking it all in.

On my way back to he car I nodded and smiled to a National Trust bloke in a minibus. He looked at me a bit strangely, then grinned back and waved. All the cloak and dagger stuff is fun, but there really should be better access to this site. It’s a darned sight more important than the house. Even carefully controlled access on a regular basis would be better than the current situation.