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July 5, 2026
The Citizen Cairn finally takes a look at what is surely among Snowdonia’s most powerful hillforts. Bit stormy, though.
July 4, 2026
A brief video of the remains of the passage grave
A visit to the mound
The toppling of the Old Woman Stone and the Mass Trespass of 1932
July 2, 2026
great face in the stone today – nose on left, with a dark eye!
Image credit: stolinskie
After today’s visit, I can add a bit more information to the West circle history [when I googled it, TMA was the top authority according to AI which shows what a bright future we are careering towards].
As you leave the road to go down to the farm, you pass a bungalow on your right, then there is the farmhouse, then there is the steading. The man in the farmhouse answered a knock and said that he owns the field with the Backhill of Drachlaw stone circle in it. Then there’s the steading which is still owned by Mr Sutton, who Drewbhoy met, he wasn’t in at the time of my visit. The various stones which have been found recently have now been erected in a rough circle next to the ones in the dyke, see photos. The farmer added there had been people down surveying last week, so perhaps that was Hysteric Scotland.
It’s notable that there are so many ancient monuments in such a small area – Cairn Riv, West of Drachlaw, Backhill of Dracklaw and the Shielmuir stone in immediate proximity, then nearby Newton Of Fortrie and Milnbank/Hill Of Laithers, plus a little bit further away RSCs such as Pitglassie, Mains of Hatton and Corrydown. The venerable Pratt said back in 1901 that Cairn Riv marks a former boundary between Banffshire and Aberdeenshire, and Turriff and Inverkeithny. That makes sense when you go down the hill to the Deveron, it is indeed a natural border.
I have to say after today’s visit and seeing that the stones in Backhill, West and Cairn Riv all have seams of quartz, I wonder if they were originally all parts of one megacircle. Also if they were marking a boundary, surely something should have been up on the top of Drachlaw Hill, perhaps the Drach Law itself, now ploughed out?
Final comment, in today’s light, Cairn Riv seemed more like an erratic to worship than a former recumbent, with an excellent face on its side.
The only stone of the Louden Hill circle still standing, now leaning outwards at an angle of about 45°. Rough Tor is in the background.
Image credit: Roy Reed
July 1, 2026
Before the marsh, out of which it rises, was drained, the Herne Burn, for great part of the year, was a tiny rivulet; now, it scarcely amounts even to this. Its course is through a deep and narrow ravine, forming part of the boundary of the parishes of Turriff and
Inverkeithny, and of the shires of Aberdeen and Banff, — as well as of the district or thanedom of Buchan.
Ascending the ravine, and then holding in a direction ~ almost due south by the compass for about a quarter of a mile, and near the apex of the hill of Drachlaw, we
reach the Caerlin-ring, or, as it is locally termed, the Cairn-riv stone, which marks the boundary of the district at this point. This stone approaches in shape
to a triangular prism—its broadest side being about eight, and each of the other two sides about six feet, and its height upwards of eight feet.
It stands at a short distance from the public road from Turriff to Inverkeithny, on a piece of uncultivated ground on the Backhill of Drachlaw, being one of the stones of a large Druidical circle of about thirty-six yards in diameter.
It is placed in the south side of the circumference. From this point the boundary of the district runs in a southwesterly direction to the Hare-stone, on the farm of Feith-hill, about two miles and a half from Drachlaw.
This stone had also been part of-a Druidical circle, and is now nearly all that remains of it: it projects above ground about three feet. From the Hare-stone of Feithhill, the boundary proceeds in nearly the same southwesterly direction for about a mile, when it reaches the Woof, or Oof-stone, on the hill of Monduff, which indicates not only the limit of the district, but also that of the parishes of Forgue and Inverkeithny, the shires of Banff and Aberdeen, and the estates of Cluny, Gerriesford, and Drumblair, which all meet at this point.
p6 of ‘Buchan’ by John Pratt (1859) ia800906.us.archive.org/24/items/buchan00prat/buchan00prat.pdf
ARCHAEOLOGISTS have discovered an underground “ancient circle” which may have been used for burial rituals hundreds of years ago on the Isle of Arran.
A geophysics survey has revealed traces of a stone or timber circle in Arran’s ancient Machrie Moor which could have come from the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, according to a new report released by Historic Environment Scotland (HES).
June 30, 2026
Not sure what I did to get this photo with my phone, but the small white speck in the centre is the whitestone!! Which does show how it stands out in the field.
Image credit: stolinskie
June 29, 2026
