Latest Folklore

“Local folklore attributes Grubstones ‘to have been a Council or Moot Assembly-place’ in ages past (Collyer and Turner 1885). Considerable evidence points to the Freemasons convening here in medieval times and we are certain from historical records that members of the legendary Grand Lodge of All England (said to be ordained in the tenth century by King Athelstan) met here, or at the adjacent Great Skirtful of Stones giant cairn 400 yards east.”
‘Circles, Standing Stones and Legendary Rocks of West Yorkshire’ Paul Bennett

Paul Devereux reported this modern story in issue 153 of the Fortean Times:

“Paula C climbed to the top of the ancient mound. From that height she saw a group of hooded figures walking briskly across an adjacent field towards the monument. She couldn’t see their lower limbs and assumed they were walking through tall grass. The hooded and apparently robed figures never seemed to get any closer despite their energetic gait. Concerned that they were about to be disturbed by strangers, Paula climbed down to where her family waited. When no newcomers appeared, she returned to the top of the mound. No one was in sight, but the field looked different – there were fewer trees around it, the path was in a slightly different location, and what had seemed to be a deep dip in the ground was barely apparent. ”

I don’t want to be a killjoy but whilst we were at the site there were a lot of hikers passing on the nearby footpath (the Cotswold Way). A surprising amount of them didn’t come over to look at the mound – so you thought ‘oh god, all those people will be here in a minute’ but after a while they never turned up, having quietly gone round a different way. But don’t let me put you off the story.

“Then Whitby’s nuns exulting told,
How to their house three barons bold
must menial service do;
They told how in their convent-cell
A saxon princess once did dwell,
The lovely Edelfled;
And how of thousand snakes, each one
Was changed into a coil of stone
When holy Hilda pray’d -
Themselves, within their holy round,
Their stony folds had often found.”

Marmion, canto ii
Sir Walter Scott.

Ord comments on this
” Sir Walter like all true antiquarians, had large faith. “These miracles” he says, “are much insisted on by all ancient writers who have occasion to mention Whitby or Saint Hilda. The relics of the snakes which infested the precincts of the convent, and were at the abbess’s prayer not only beheaded but petrified, are still found about the rocks and are termed by protestant fossilists Ammonitae”

The History and Antiquities of Cleveland
J.W. Ord
1846

The guide in the church tells how maidens would place a cake they had baked upon it on All Saints’ Eve, and that night they would dream of the man they would marry.

The Nine Stones have been regarded by local folklore to be the Devil, his wife and children. Though another tale suggests that the stones were once children who where turned into stone by the Devil while playing five-stones on the Sabbath.

darkdorset.co.uk

It is said that Diana the Moon Goddess, leads a ghostly hunt of fairies, demons and witches over the summit of the ancient hillfort collecting the souls of the dead.

darkdorset.co.uk

Adding to what Fitzcoraldo said, another legend has it that the Hole of Horcum was made by the local giant, Wade. He was having a row with his wife, Bell, and got so angry that he scooped out a lump of earth and chucked it at her. The Hole of Horcum is the dip left where he scooped out the earth, and Blakey topping, the clod itself, resting in situ where it landed.

The Dorset historian, Rev. John Hutchins writes in his ‘History and Antiquities of the County of Dorset’, “The common people call it Hell stone, and have a tradition that the devil flung it from Portland Pike, a north point of that island full in view, as he was diverting himself at quoits.” [1803]

www.darkdorset.co.uk

The “Whispering Knights” are traitors who, when the King with his army hard by were about to engage with the enemy, withdrew themselves privily apart, and were plotting treason together, when they were turned into stone by the Witch. Some, however, say that they are at prayer. I was told that once upon a time the big flat stone (the capstone) was taken away to make a bridge across the brook at Little Rollright. It took a score of horses to drag it down the hill, for at first it would not move, and they had to strain and strain to get it along till every bit of the harness was broken. At last they got it to the brook by Rollright Farm, and with great difficulty laid it across to serve as a bridge. Butevery night the stone turned over back again and was found in the morning lying on the grass. So when this had happened three nights running they saw that the stone must be taken back to whence it came. This time they set a single horse to it, and the single horse took it up the hill quite easily, though it had taken twenty times that number to drag it down, and that they could hardly doWith regard to this tale, I found generally the most absolute belief among the country people, one man going so far as to say that there were those now living who had spoken to men who had helped to bring the stone down and up again, and “that it was done in Farmer Baker’s day, who was not so very long dead.”

From: The Rollright Stones and Their Folk-Lore
Arthur J. Evans
Folklore, Vol. 6, No. 1. (Mar., 1895), p25 in pp. 6-53.

The Whispering Knights join the King Stone for a drink every night – see
themodernantiquarian.com/post/38780

The King Stone is in front of a long mound – the mound that stopped the king seeing Long Compton in the legend. Stukeley called the mound the ‘Archdruid’s Barrow’ but it’s probably natural. He said “near the archdruid’s barrow by that called the King Stone is a square plot, oblong, formed on the turf. Hither, on a certain day in the year, the young men and maidens customarily meet and make merry with cakes and ale.” (from Stukeley’s ‘Abury’).

By the way you’d better believe the folklore: Stukeley said “this story the country people for some miles round are very fond of, and take it very ill if anyone doubts of it: nay, they are in danger of being stoned for their unbelief.”

I suspect quite a few people have got stoned at the Rollrights, but that’s another story.

Lunchtime might be the best time to visit – apparently the stones dance everyday at noon.* They’re also known as the 17 brothers. That’s some discrepancy (especially as they are also known as the nine maidens – they were turned to stone for dancing on the sabbath) – I suppose nine is a rather special number (three times three), and maybe seventeen, as a prime number, also has its weirdness.

(partly from Grinsell’s ‘folklore of prehistoric sites in Britain’)

*This is mentioned in Notes and Queries 61 from 1850.
gutenberg.org/files/16404/16404-h/16404-h.htm#page513

“It was said that if you touch a Logan stone nine times at mid-night,any woman will become a witch.A more certain plan is to get on the Giants Rock at Zennor church-town nine times without shaking it.Seeing that this rock was at one time a very sensitive Logan Stone,the task was somewhat diffucult.”
Source:-Robert Hunt – Popular Romances of the West of England 1871.

Back in 1867 a gentleman called Mr Morgan wrote about Garreg Fawr (the great stone) in his Aberystwyth Guide. He describes how it once “stood on pillars of the same material” but was “fractured by the kindling of a bonfire upon it”.

Before it’s destruction the tomb appears to have been the focal point for village life. Morgan says that “the [village] crier used to proclaim all matters of public interest” from the monument.

These stones may be the stones the giant St Keverne threw at St Just for stealing from his drinking cup, there is debate as to whether these are the stones or the two stones on Crousa Common.

There are several other stories to do with this circle other than maidens being turned to stone for dancing on the sabbath. One story says that the place was the scene of a large battle between the Saxon Athelstan and Cornish Howell in 936AD, the site of the pipers is where the two men stood and directed their men on the battlefield.
Flint arrowheads found at nearby Boleigh were believed to be from a battle King Arthur fought for the Cornish.

This stone, supoosedly marks the burial place of Ryalvran, who is said to have died here fighting for the recovery of his fathers land.
His opponent is unknown, although it’s thought he occupied Lescudjack Castle around 400-500AD.

The 8ft+ stone leans because a farmer supposedly tried digging under it for its fabled treasure – but a thunderstorm started up (as they so often do in these situations) and struck the stone. The farmer understandably left in a hurry.
[I’m not sure where i read this].

Also:

This [stone] was visited, in 1706, by Edward Lhuyd, who found upon it an inscription which he read, TEFROVTI; but there are no letters upon the stone at present. The upper part of the stone has been split, and the inscribed part either destroyed or taken away. This act of Vandalism is attributed by the farmers of the locality to a stone mason named Shon Morgan, who went in a fit of drunkenness to “try the quality of the stone.” It is nine feet high and eighteen inches in thickness.

From ‘Archaeologia Cambrensis’ ser 3. v8, 1862, p134 (readable on Google Books).

I found this at www.yewgrove.demon.co.uk/spirits/faery.htm (The SONG – Spirits of the North Gathering – website)

“There was once an old woman who lived on the Eastern moors of the Peak District who offered shelter to Hob Hurst when he was in need. Whilst Hob was with her the woman was careful not to look at him for Hobs were known to be very shy, but when she was weaving she would often catch a glimpse of him from the corner of her eye. He was little with dark skin and gleaming eyes. She would often hear his singing which sounded like the wind blowing through the cotton grass of the moors, and when he was not singing it was laughter she could hear. His laughter was like the bubbling, chuckling streams that populate the moors. One day when the woman was ill, she was collecting water from the well when Hob disappeared into the rock that was near the stream and stayed there for a while. Upon drinking the water she was made well and the water tasted especially good to the woman ever after.”
(c) Ben Littler

There are many references to the fairy Hob in Derbyshire, apart from Hob Hurst’s House here. For example, there is another Hob Hurst’s House in Deep Dale, south of King Sterndale.
It is said that Derbyshire farmers used to put a bowl of cream out to appease Hob, who like a brownie would then help with little odd jobs around the farm. If you didn’t please him though, he would make mischief.
Hob is probably from the same root as Rob, and the many Robin Hood legends in Derbyshire may actually refer to the fairy Hob instead, a ‘green man’ of the forest.
It should be noted that sometimes Hob is depicted as a helpful giant, not a small creature, and ‘Hurst’ actually means a giant.

Hob Hurst was a good-hearted fairy who used to live in the forest now part of the Chatsworth Estate. He did all he could to be helpful, but wasn’t really all that good at it. For example, one day he attached himself to a local cobbler who was travelling with his wares along the pack-horse track that goes by Hob Hurst’s house. Hob followed the cobbler home and all the way implored with him that he could make shoes for the cobbler. The cobbler relented, and Hob Hurst set to work.
Hob made shoes alright, but he made them so quickly and so shoddily that all the cobbler could do to keep up was to throw the shoes out of the window as fast as Hob made them.
Hence the Derbyshire expression about something made too quickly: “Its bin done faster than Hob Hurst can chuck shoes out o’ t’ winder”

“The twin dales of Fryup (Fri-hop = Frigas valley) meet to th south of the elevated oval-shaped barrier which seperates them. The southerly tip of that rising piece of moorland is called Fairy Cross Plain, a name which dates to more than two centuries, and accordingly to local folklore, this used to be the haunt of fairies”
Folktales from the North York Moors
Peter N. Walker
Pub. Hale
1990

Ancient mesolithic settlement dating between 7544 and 6380 BC. The people were hunter/gatherers who also fished. The fidning of flint tools indicates that they fashioned wood and bone. It is thought they lived in pit dwellings and circular huts made of branches with pole supported roofs of wattle and turf.

It is thought that nearby Dunino Law is an artificial mound or an enlarged hill. The name Dunino is thought to be a deviation of the word Dunnigheanach which means “hill or fort of the daughters or young women”.

There is a ley line that runs from Kellie Law past the edge of a crossroads, the edge of where the stone circle stood, across Bel-Craig through an ancient farm, ending at Dunino Law.

The stone circle used to exist across the burn from the Bel-Craig. Portions of it are thought to have been incorporated into nearby farm walls. Additionally, investigations in the Den have found ten large boulders, some of which bear plough marks, possibly being discarded from the adjacent field.