The Modern Antiquarian. Stone Circles, Ancient Sites, Neolithic Monuments, Ancient Monuments, Prehistoric Sites, Megalithic MysteriesThe Modern Antiquarian

Great Langdale

Cup Marked Stone

Fieldnotes

13/04/09
Easter Monday in the Lakes, eh? Deserted on mine and Mrs. TEs' walk. From Elterwater, over the shoulder of Lingmoor, into the twin valley of Little Langdale and a pastoral idyll. This is what Great Langdale must have been like before the internal (infernal more like) combustion engine.
We continued over the ancient (not prehistoric) Slater Bridge, and along to Fell Foot. In days gone bye, and in the second half of the 20th century, an old chap used to sit by the fell gate, opening and closing the gate to cars for a penny or two.
Sorry to go on, but we continued a couple of hundred yards up Wrynose Pass, before cutting across Blea Moss. According to local writer Bill Birkett, in his book (Great Langdale, A Year in the Life of), it's a site of a neolithic/bronze age burial cairn, not that I've found it. We continued to delectable waterfalls, and on to Blea Tarn. Then we had our sarnies on the shoulder of Lingmoor, with Great Langdale below our boots.
I looked, through the bins, to the Pike of Stickle, and Harrison Stickle stone axe factories. Knowing where they are helps.
We descended soft, grassy, and mossy slopes to the Great Langdale campsite, stopping to admire the cup-marked boulder, amongst the sighing trees.
It does make you wonder what it was all about. Something to do with the axe factories? Why just the one boulder, when half-a-dozen similar ones lay about? Why just cup-marks, so near the axe factories, especially when the Copt Howe boulders are so elaborate?
The beer in the friendly, and familiar, beer garden at the Old Dungeon Ghyll finished off a perfect day.
The Eternal Posted by The Eternal
19th April 2009ce
Edited 21st April 2009ce

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