Latest Fieldnotes

Seamer beacon is located just off the A170 on the edge of Scarborough.
To access the site, turn off the A170 at Irton Mount and drive up to the wireless station and park in the car park there.
The beacon is an obvious feature and easy to access. The top of the beacon was once a folly which has now fallen into disrepair. The folly was constructed from large and generally unworked stone.
The possible source of this stone could have been the stone circle and cist reported by Frank Elgee ” Forty five feet from outside of the barrow, a stone circle surrounded the cist.”
There are a number of barrows in this area including the lovely named Hagworm Hill.
The beacon itself has an excellent aspect and is perfectly placed to relay signals from Scarborough Castle to the hinterlands of the vale of Pickering and beyond.
There was once a Roman signal station (not to mention Bronze and Iron age settlements) situated on the Scarborough Castle site and given the local barrows and earthworks I think it it safe to assume that this site has been utilised since the Bronze Age.
The position of this site has not been lost on telecommunications folk, there is a large array of dishes and masts situated close to the site, continuity of use or what?
The OS map has an earthwork marked between the beacon and Hagworm Hill, Brigantesnation and I searched extensively and found no trace of this earthwork.

Brigantesnation and myself set out to check out these multiple dykes that so dramatically cross the landscape of the tabular hills .
Our first target was the multiple dikes of the Cockmore system.
We drove to Snaiton and the turned right along Nettledale lane.
As we moved into the dry valley of Wydale we became aware of the dyke running along the ridge to our right. Most of the time it was signified by an unploughed zone running along the ridge, but where the plough had got through a soil or crop mark was left to indicate that the dyke was still running true to line.
The valley peters out just beyond Cockmore Hall, this is the really interesting zone. The valley is funneled into a gap between the hills and drops away dramatically into Troutsdale.
As for The dyke, as the ridge flattens out towards the head of the valley, the dykes become more numerous until you have 20 or so parallel dykes runing towards the head of the valley and then dropping over the brow into Troutsdale gradually petering out about 10 meters over the brow.
There is also a lovely round barrow that appears to be associated with the system, it is either part of the system or older because the dyke deviates around it .
The traceable length of the dyke is about 3km.

Next we move on to the the Scamridge Dyke. We followed an extremely muddy path into the woodland. the dyke bisects the path about 500km into the wood. The dyke at this point is about 30 metres across and is made up of four dikes and ditches. Again this dike runs across the landscape and terminates at Troutsdale brow.

If you continue along this path you will come out at thew Oxmoor Dykes, which again are multiple dykes and can be seen on the landscape as a large unploughed coppice area running across the landscape.

As for the purpose of the dykes, who knows? They are probably not ‘kingdom’ boundaries as there are too many of them and they make no sense as military structures.
The best Brigantesnation and I can come up with is that they served a ‘none-functional’ role.
Personally I think it may be significant the the valley below the terminations of the dykes, Troutsdale, has a number of springs, two of them have names, Magerick keld and Jenny Thrush. This is limestone country so water appears and disappears as dictated by the geology.

I parked in the lane below Hailglower farm,it was a lovely day and the walk was most enjoyable.I was wondering how to find the circle but just past the farm on the right is a plaque with an arrow pointing the way.It is a beautiful place,the air was humming with insects and swallows and martins were swooping ,I found it very difficult to leave.

Sorry about yet another foot print,at the right below you can just see the Ogham writing on the side of the crack.

A circle that is easy to find from the map reference, but because of the numerous stones that are there naturally, it is diffiuclt to tell which are actually within the cirle. There are several that are obviously errected, but others that may be there naturally

There are 2 standing stones here located on the northern edge of a cairnfield; 1 stands about a metre in height the other, less than 1m away, about half this height. They both look to be kerbed. Another upright slab is also visible 30m away to the west and although probably natural the NMR says that it is likely to have formed a prominent feature of the cairnfield.

A square hill fort that was discovered in the late 1980’s. It is roughly 10 acres in size, protected on the North and South by natural slopes, a low banking can be seen on part of the North side. The Eastern Bank is very low with a wall running along it’s top. The Western bank also has a wall, but the banking here is more prominent.
Not a great deal to see, but Lathkil dale which the fort overlooks is well worth a walk along.

This is a tiny hillfort above Bakewell. Protected on two sides by steep natural slopes and a curved bank and ditch; enclosing an area of approximately 1.5 acres.

Excavations here unearthed several cup and ring marked boulders. These boulders pre-date the fort, one of them was used in the construction of the rampart. The stones are now in the Sheffield museum.

Room to park on the roadside above Ball Cross Farm.
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The nearby ‘Moatless Plantation’ was a meeting point (moot). There is an earthwork, of unknown date, surrounding the plantation

SK194633 – Bateman’s Tomb

Not really an antiquity as such, but Thomas Bateman dug over 200 barrows in the Peak District, sometimes up to 6 a day. He wrote two books on his works, ‘Vestiges of the Antiquities of Debyshire’ in 1848, followed in 1861 with ‘Ten Years Digging....’.

Some of his finds are displayed in the Sheffield and Buxton museums.

Inside the chapel the tomb lays behind, there used to be a carved marble memorial to Thomas Bateman....it is Now in Sheffield Museum. A strange thing to do with the grave and chapel still there.....I can imagine Batemans wry grin at the thought of it..

This is a corker.....
Down on the SMR as a barrow.....but it does look more like a stone/kerb circle with a central stone. Easy parking at the road junction, by the public footpath that leads below the stones, at SK954679.
Views to the North and East are very impressive.

Went to Grimes Graves on route from North Norfolk to London but it was closed for lunch. Those pesky miners and their rights.

Couldn’t wait to go down but will go again.

Above ground though, what a vibration.

Devils holes abound in the ground in a Thetford Forest clearance.

The man in the shop said they were Grim’s holes.

Grim being olde name for Odin apparently.

But to spoil the thrill of the olde its just land slippage but buy a post card. I didn’t.

There is so much history about Rudston. It is apparently the oldest village in Britain. There is the monolith, that was part of a larger site with some processional routes still surviving (just) as earthworks around the area. Also the Romans came and built the roman road and a villa. So was the site occupied because of its sacred connections?
The Christians also built thier church to encompass the monolith probably because they dare not, or could not destroy it?
There are also several lost villages and Thorpe Hall that lies on the bridlington road is a wonderful example of a country manor house and it all goes to make Rudston into a wonderful example of the history of britain.

Lengthy posting follows, for which all due apologies, however I bring good news.

I wasn’t happy about just fearing for the future of this site, so have done something positive about it.

The two plots of land (P1 and P2) which make up this site are listed in the Aberdeenshire Local Plan for “access” and “environmental” developments. This plan was posted on the council website for consultation in the 6 weeks ending 11/10/2002.
aberdeenshire.gov.uk/localplan/maps/Garioch%20main/Inverurie%20and%20Port%20Elphinstone.pdf

The nature of the developments are not detailed in the plan. I visited the local council planning office in Inverurie to try to find out more, but the people working there didn’t have any detail. They did suggest that landscaping and a children’s play area may be involved however. The prospect of landscaping raised grave concerns for me since since most of the henge monuments in Scotland have been obliterated as surface features by ploughing.

The site contains several Scheduled Ancient Monuments, which are therefore subject to National Planning Guidelines (NPPG5 para 17), and the protection afforded by the 1979 AMs act. Most of the site has been owned by Aberdeenshire council since 1967, during which it has been benignly neglected. In the two hundred years or so before this, the site has a history of abuse of nationally important archeology for building stone and railway aggregate.

I questioned the development using the formal objections procedure. I copied the custodian of the National Monuments Record of Scotland, the Aberdeenshire county Archeologists Office, and Historic Scotland for information purposes. The NMRS people said thanks for the warning, however legally they could not express an opinion on the plan. The council planners said they had contacted the county archeologist who had checked my points, agreed them all and could not understand how they had missed the monuments when OK-ing the draft plan.

They acknowleged that for any development to go ahead on the site, that Historic Scotland would have to give the go ahead (the protection afforded by the 1979 act with a presumption of no development). Ominously HS were consulted on the plan and did not raise any concerns about this site, though hopefuly that was just an oversight as it is a several hundred page document. I copied HS on my email to the council, but have yet to receive a response from them.

Here are my questions and contextual material sent to the council. They phoned to say they had checked my points out, agreed them all, and couldn’t understand why development had been proposed. The guy who made the proposal was on holiday, but will be back and will revert in w/c 28/10/2002. I will try to report further to this site.

I made the point verbally to the council that not all development was necessarily bad. If the site were grassed undamaged, and some interpretive boards put nearby, that could be an improvement over the rusty fence and scrubland currently in place for example.

“Questions:

1) In more detail, what specific developments are planned for the P1 and P2 sites, and when.

2) What protection will be afforded to the following monuments, and how will they fit into the proposals.

RCAHMS NMRS NJ71NE 6 (Scheduled monument – one of just twelve 1:50,000 mapped henges in Scotland)
Stone Circle (two original stones remain, plus symbol stone RCAHMS NMRS NJ71NE 8 moved during railway construction), Class II Henge diameter 33m approx, and 2 Cists 100m South of henge. Stone avenue sockets leading to henge from south (all 72 stones bar the three remaining today destroyed in 19th century). Most recent excavation of stone sockets 2001.

RCAHMS NMRS NJ71NE 7
Site of three concentric rows of erect stones with a small cairn in the middle, and a flat altar-stone, with a cavity in the upper part, raised on a rough cairn (recorded 1757). Now the site of a derelict sandpit.

RCAHMS NMRS NJ71NE 8 (Scheduled monument – one of 30 scheduled Pictish Symbol stones in Aberdeenshire)
Class I symbol stone : South face shows an elephant above a crescent and V-rod. Having visited most of the known pictish symbol stones of Scotland, I can confirm that this is an exceptionally well preserved example. Moved to current location during construction of the railway as the rock under its original site was quarried for ballast.

Square Barrow structure
At the original location of the above symbol stone (NJ 7798 1970) on CUCAP air photograph BVD 083.

Context

In the whole of Scotland, just 75 henges or suspected henges are recorded in the National Monuments record. Of the ones not dismissed as miscataloged natural features, just 42 are scheduled, just three of which are in Aberdeenshire. The majority of both scheduled, and unscheduled henges in Scotland have been severely damaged over the past 100 years, as successive site reports in the NMRS demonstrate. Most have now been completely obliterated as surface features by ploughing, and can now only be detected by crop variations from aerial photographs. Although it beggars belief, a further group have had modern buildings or forestry put on top, or metalled roads put through them. Just 12 remain as sufficiently distinctive features to be mapped by the OS as henges at 1:50,000 scale, 11 of which are scheduled, one of which is in the P2 area of Port Elphinstone. A monument of this rarity, and comparatively excellent preservation must be protected.

In the whole of Scotland, there are fewer than 250 pictish symbol stones, of which a fifth are in Aberdeenshire. Just 30 of the Aberdeenshire stones are scheduled, including the well preserved example on the P2 site. Given that the symbols on some of the Aberdeenshire scheduled stones are completely illegible (eg NJ53NW 1 at Huntly), have been smashed up comparatively recently (eg NJ72SE 23 at Brandsbutt), or defaced by later carvings (eg NJ71NW 12 in Monymusk church with a hideous OS benchmark), then protection of the few known clear and uncompromised examples is very important. ”

What I hadn’t realised before sending the above, is that henges are unique to the British Isles (according to the Time Team website). From this Head Heritage website I can see there are a bunch beyond Scotland, but wonder if anyone knows how many, or how many are scheduled, or even if there is an online way of determining this? My main research source for the above objection was the brilliant RCAHMS website listing the archeological records of all known Scottish sites, and featuring a brilliant GIS search engine to see exactly what has been recorded in any Scottish location on any scale of mapping. Free accounts at rcahms.gov.uk/canmore/login.show .

Go use this. You’ll find out a bunch (11 pages from 1856 surveys onward for this site alone) and UK tax payers pay for it!

Jon Metcalf

Declaration of Interest:

I’m a keen armchair student of OS maps and visitor of ancient monuments, particularly pictish remains. I’ve lived about 3km from Broomend of Crichie for a decade, so care about this site in particular. I work for BP, and both researched and made the above objection on their time between day job tasks, with the organisation’s support. It is easy to be cynical about any large organisation’s line on caring about the environment, however in my 15 years at BP, I have found that it “walks the talk”, for example offshore putting emissions limits above production, despite investor pressures.

The garage cited in earlier postings has had no impact on the monuments at all. Hopefully the objection above, made on BP’s time, will have a lasting positive effect.

We bumped into a guy who lived on Cromlech Road who showed us the chamber.. he said something about cromlechs and dolmens and one of them has a ring of timbers around, thats how to tell the difference? something like that....

He had some ace pictures of down the Orme mine before you had to pay to go in.
Crazy guy whose breath smelt of windolene.......

I just added another pic. of the cupmarked stone,the sun just caught it right.

I wasn’t really expecting much of this site – I’d previously seen a sketch of the chamber and was expecting more of a ruin. The chamber is in almost complete collapse, but the stones remain roughly in place so it is pretty easy to get an idea of the original construction. The setting impressed me most – oddly reminiscent of a few Welsh sites, Din Dryfol in particular, in its seclusion. Facing the site is a low, tree lined, limestone shelf with a natural break forming a kind of entrance. Here is a great example of a site obviously placed to compliment a naturally formed sacred, ritual landscape.

It’s been three months since I last visited a site, for one reason and another – so I thought rather than go somewhere new with friends, I’d take myself to an old favourite, alone. I approached the site, hidden among the ferns, with some trepidation.

The last time I came here was in January and the ground was covered in frost, today’s scene was completely different – the grass still a lush green and the thick ferns just starting to turn an Autmnal colour. I stayed here at the circle for some time – taking in the view and studying the stones in detail, before setting off up the hill to the top of Birkrigg Common. I’d recommend the effort to anyone – the remains of a few burial cairns lie scattered over the moor on the way, and on reaching the top the view really opens up. The Lakeland fells, Morecambe bay and Black Combe dominate this panorama.

About 2’ high, this is next to a busy-ish road at the entrance to some kind of private estate.

The plaque mentions that the stone is definitely pre-norman (presumably a Domesday book reference), but beyond that, not much is known.

Found some great conkers, but beyond that, a pretty dull experience!

This is on the corner of the turning to fowlis wester from the A86.There is a distinct hump and a scattering of large stones.I didn’t clamber over the wall,fence and stinging nettles for a closer look.There was also some large evil looking striped black and yellow flying things buzzing about.

I was here the beginning of September, it was very warm and the fields were being harvested – the air was full of swooping swallows fattening themselves for their long journey to Africa. I won’t add to Winterjc’s description.

This is a nice round cairn that is a fair size and still in reasonable condition despite having the centre dug out. Finding it is a bit tricky, travel southeast from the Cow and Calf car park and take the path that follows the edge of Green Crag Slack for about a mile. To your right you should be able to see a shed on the crest of the hill about half a mile away and halfway between you and it should be the pile of boulders of the cairn.

GPS Reading SE1383045197

This is a badly damaged cairn that has been heavily dug into and now has various bits of rubbish dumped into it There is a large stone that could be a boundary marker or milestone (I couldn’t read the inscription) that has been pitched into the middle of it and it also has what could be grouse buts built on one side although these could just be rocks thrown out from the inside. Just to the southeast there is another smaller but just as badly robbed cairn.
Directions are similar to those for the Grubstones – head in a southerly direction across the moor from the Cow and Calf carpark until you see a shed on a hillside ahead. When you get to this turn left along the track and walk for about 5 minutes or so until you pass the Lower Lanshaw damn on your left. The cairn should now be on your right hand side, not far from the track.

GPS – SE1406244550

Visited 5th August 2002: Once again I visited a site with good intentions to stay on the footpath, but in the end it came to now’t. I walked along the bridleway to the north of the stone, but the hedgerow made it very difficult to see it clearly.

Rather than turn back I kept on walking until I got to a gate into the field adjoining the one that the stone is in. By hopping over this I reached the stone and took a couple of very furtive photographs. I was feeling rather smug with myself until I spotted a couple of faces watching me from the upstairs window of a house at the bottom of the field. I decided to briskly leave the scene of the crime via a gate next to the house, and onto the A487. Yes, the stone is clearly visible from the main road!

Trips to the nearby sites of Tinkiswood, St Lythans, Rhondda Stonehenge or Pontypridd Rocking Stone will inevitably lead to a brush with the City of Cardiff. From the Castle Grounds, the home of a modern stone circle, look up and look to the North you will see the long high ridge of the Garth.

This hill, or mountain, depending on your point of view is supposedly the inspiration for the film, “The man who went up a hill and came down a mountain”. From the summit are impressive views across Cardiff and south to Exmoor whilst to the North, Pen y Fan and the Brecon Beacons can be clearly picked out.

There are five Bronze Age Burial Mounds here (five that is according to the CARN database, the rather jaded interpretation board suggests there are only four). Two stand out and are visible as nipples on the horizon overlooking Cardiff. The interpretation board in front of “burial mound number 2” warns sternly of the penalties for vandalising the site, yet this, the largest of the four mounds, sports an ugly triangulation pillar. Whilst despoiling the site it does produce the uncanny effect of making the mound look like a mini Glastonbury Tor from a distance.

The western-most mound (number 1 on the interpretation board) is seldom spotted by the frequent vistors to this viewpoint but it is my favourite. A small hollow provides shelter from the winds and a cosy bed from which the scurrying clouds overhead can be tracked. Some distance to the east is a long ridge running north-south which was built as a gun emplacement during the 1940s. I’ll venture no opinion as to whether the intention was to shoot at the Germans or the English.

This site commands spectacular views for 360 degrees and I would suggest therefore that this was a high status burial. Any significant fires burnt in the vicinity of Tinkiswood/St Lythans to the south west or Pontypridd Rocking Stone to the North East would generate a pall of smoke easily visible from here. If you’re visiting these other nearby sites you should really try to find time to take in the views from up here. Let me know on the forum if you’re planning a visit as this is my local.

Oh, one more thing. It’s ALWAYS windy up here.

This Bronze Age platform cairn was originally sited further down the valley (SN75108690), and was flooded when the Nant y Moch Reservoir was created in 1961. The cairn was rediscovered in 1984 when the level of the reservoir was low. After excavation it was moved piece by piece to its current location (you can still make out some of the numbers painted on the stones to identify them).

It’s usually pretty easy to find the cairn, but in poor weather you might not spot it from the road because its surrounded by reeds. Coming from Ponterwyd you need to cross the Nant y Moch Dam itself, then after the first cattle grid start looking out for the site on your right. There is a stock fence around the cairn (but no gate to stop the sheep or visitors from getting in). There’s also a conveniently placed lay-by for parking in.