stubob

Decided to check out the group of barrows near the villages of Osmaston and Edlaston.

This barrow was a bit, no alot of a surprise, it’s bloody massive. Measuring some 45 x 50m in diameter, and around 4m high the barrow is in excellent condition.
Close to Thomas Bateman’s patch, the barrow somehow escaped his attention.

It’s a pretty easy walk of nearly a mile to this huge barrow, parking by the church in Osmaston village, although you have to leave the path by the stream in the bottom to get to the barrow.

Finding Rains Cave on the eastern end of Longcliffe Crags is a real task, the small 2ft x 2ft entrance is well hidden behind large boulders. Only clue on the ground as to where it is, is the rubble infill that has been removed from the cave. Still ain’t easy to spot even then. Makes you wonder how it was found in the first place....and who was the first person down there.

Once through the dirty squeeze entrance the low cave chamber slopes downwards for about 35ft. Possible crawl offs from the chamber.
Not the most pleasant cave I’ve been in, but it’s location high on the craggy dolomite outcrop overlooking Rainster Rocks is excellent

Today on large scale O.S maps Steep Low is marked as ‘Tumulus – Site Of’...
However John Barnatt disagreed with this in his Barrow Corpus and noted the mound as a “natural rocky knoll”.

Happens alot in the Peak District....Confusion starts with the word ‘Low’, which usually means high anyway, and can refer to either a conical/rounded hill or a burial mound. It’s pronounced ‘la’ (from Olde English ‘hlaw’ for hill?), by old school Derbyshire folk.

There are several barrows on Stanshope Pasture most of which are impressive in their own right, but their position high above where Hall Dale meets Dove Dale, the Peaks most dramatic limestone gorge, is perhaps more impressive still.

AT SK132 542, is a huge barrow measuring some 41m x 35m in diameter and maybe over 1.5m in height, although it’s position on a narrow ridge makes it appear much larger.
Excavations in 1849 unearthed 3 rock-cut graves, a disturbed cist. These held 5 inhumations, 3 beakers, horse teeth and flint and bronze artefacts.

Built onto a low rocky knoll the most southerly of the barrows is the pick of the bunch. Measuring around 15m in diameter, the barrow is around 2.5m high and pretty complete. Excavated the mound contained inhumations, cremations, a cist and flint and bone artefacts.
The views across the valley to the Nabs and then south down Dove Dale are something else.

Excavation info:
J. Barnatt’s “Barrow Corpus”
B Marsden’s “The Burial Mounds of Derbyshire”

What’s happened here then? Stones all over the shop. Big stones, little stones, upside down in the heather stones…..Looks like the setting could be any one or more of the suggestions given in the fieldnotes below.
It’s a pity about the erosion of the moor around the stones, but it takes little away from what is an interesting place.

It was sorta strange to find out that Elgee described the Low Bridestones as “Perhaps the most remarkable example of prehistoric walling....“. Cos like that was the first thought that struck me about the stones, that it was walling.....

In the Peak District there are quite a few field system walls from the Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age that have the same appearance today as the Low Bridestones (tho’ on a much smaller scale admittedly)....
In the case of the Peak’s ‘walling’ the double row of larger stones and slabs once held a rubble infill....Whether that is the case here, I dunno.
Although the two larger ‘gatepost’ sized stones here in the Bridestones might kinda scupper the that theory......

Corkin’ set of stones whatever they are anyway.....

This was the last visit of the day and what a crackin’ stone it is. Not too sure I get the ‘stone-triangle’.....dunno why, there are two other stones forming the triangle.....Just didn’t spring to mind that they were all part of the same thing, like the way say Ramsdale did/does.

It’s a truly smart place Blakey Topping...its conical shape when viewed from the SE similar to High Wheeldon in the Peak District.

The stone circle/alignment, although a bit worse for wear, is worth the short walk (unless Fitz’s navigating) from the Hole of Horcum. Blakey Topping makes it a must

The Manifold Valley (River Manifold = river of many folds/bends) is a long steep sided limestone valley. It begins kinda near Ecton and winds and gouges its way southwards several miles through the hills of Wetton continuing on a few miles farther before meeting up with the River Dove. Close to St. Bertrams Cave at Beeston Tor the River Hamps joins the Manifold.

There’s roadside parking at Wetton Mill, SK095 561, near to the Nan Tor Caves it’s then just a case of working your way southwards with the map references for the caves, most have a vague sorta path leading up to them.
For St Bertrams Cave, park at SK100 543, unless you wanna make a longer walk of it and continue south from Thor’s Cave to Beeston Tor Farm.

An excellent place to spend the day.....it’s sorta Creswell Crags on steroids....and even better some of the caves aren’t gated.

If you time it right during a good dry spell the River Manifold may or may not be visible.....it disappears into a large swallet by Wetton Mill or the Darfar Bridge and re-emerges a mile or so further down stream.

This fissure cave is below the West Window in Thor’s Cave, SK0985 5496.
There’s no real easy way to get round to it, I ain’t got a real head for heights so dropping down out of the ‘Window’ was a bit of a no-no. Then again going round the back of the hill and scrambling down on the wet grass and rock was a real pant-filling experience.
I also ain’t mastered using a camera with my teeth just yet, so no pics.

There could be an easy way round there... but I’m not looking for it. The fissure was in use from the Upper Palaeolithic right through to the Roman.

Seven Way’s is a bit of an odd one, SK0982 5490. Today’s entrance to the cave looks to be contained in chamber with collapsed roof, the outer rim of this ‘chamber’ can still be seen. On the northern section of the rim are 3 low arches in the rock, possibly entrances to the cave at some point.
Bit of a low dirty squeeze into the actual cave.

Quite close to the Elderbush Cave, although nearer to the crag’s edge.

Elderbush Cave is located on the SW of Thor’s Crag; follow the path around from Thor’s Cave to the back of the hill and look for a lone Elder Bush, SK0978 5488. The caves entrance is just below and to the side of this bush. A large round entrance leads into a single chamber, a narrow squeeze leads down from the floor to lower chambers, but you’ll need a bit of caving experience to get down into them.
It’s a nice enough place and nearly at the very top of the crag. Some steaming views over Ladyside.

Old Hannah’s Hole is located up a short overgrown ‘valley’ on the eastern side of the Manifold Valley, half a mile south of Wetton Mill, the Hole is at SK1002 5575.
Sited about a third of the way up the grassy slope to the left, trees and brambles block the way forward so you’ll know when it’s time to head up the slope.
Old Hannah’s Hole has the appearance of a fissure cave; quite high and narrow, easy enough to enter and perhaps 10m long.

Nan Tor is perched above Wetton Mill Farm and the tearooms next door in the upper Manifold Valley. Shortest way up to the Tor is by heading down the track to Dale Farm, then keep looking to the right for a narrow scrubby path that heads steeply up through the trees and to the caves.

Although the Tor has two large south facing entrances, it is in fact
like a swiss cheese, tunnels everywhere. And while there’s nothing tricky about them, some of them can come out on high-ish vertical rock faces, so it’s best to be careful.
One of the caves has an open air chamber, where some of the roof looks to have collapsed.

Strange place. Great views down the valley to Thor’s Cave.

I guess Shardlow isn’t really in the Peak District proper, unless of course you take the Pennines right to their bitter southern end, and finish at the Heritage Hotel (nee Pennine Hotel) in Derby City centre.
But seen as the news item on the discovery of the boat appears under the Peak District section, this is probably as gooder place as any.

In the Bronze Age Shardlow was marshy wet ground on the edges of the then River Trent. Today it’s a nice enough village on the Trent and Mersey Canal, still close to the Trent.
Sadly the area’s prehistory has been completely ruined by gravel extraction. A Henge complex, cursus and a later Iron Age settlement were replaced by gravel pits, now flooded and a mass of anglers.
Possibly the only ‘good-ish’ thing to come out of the pits apart from a ‘Windsor 3inch pea driveway gravel’ is the discovery of the Bronze Age log boat and the stone and timber causeway/walkway it was discovered next to.
The causeway was being constructed from sandstone rocks found 3 miles up river from Shardlow. It’s thought the boat was deliberately sunk with a full cargo of sandstone. Many bronze votive offerings have been recovered from the area of the causeway.

From The Old Dungeon Ghyll Hotel we headed along the Cumbrian Way that passes below the scree shoot and the Pike of Stickle. Then set off upwards towards the Pike calling in at the bulging bottom end of the shoot.

Then up through the bracken to the foot of the thimble shaped Pike of Stickle. We took the wide sloping grassy ledge that heads west and upwards before traversing eastwards to the quarried rocky ledges directly above the gulley of the main axe factory site. It’s a bit of a hairy route and you can end up feeling pretty exposed on some of the eastern ledges. But it gives you an impression of what it might’ve been like working up here.

After copping for some of the best views in the Lakes on top of the Stickle (Ingleborough is visible on the southern horizon on a good day); we headed off to Loft Crag before descending its buttress to pick up the path below Gimmer Crags. The smaller scree shoots here also contained many chippings and cast offs from axe production.

Much like Graig Llwydd in North Wales where the axe factory scarred the mountain with a deep notch. The workings here appear to have separated the Pike of Stickle from the rest of the Langdale Crags.
All in all a chuffin’ top place....

It’s a short climb up the hill opposite Raisgill Hall to the ring cairn, which is located above the old lime kiln visible from the road.
It’s a bit of an uninspiring site overall, but the views over to the Howgill Fells help it along.

NY41640 05884.

This is a great double circle. Although it’s been battered, enough remains to get a feel for what the stone circle might’ve looked when un-disturbed.
Unlike the RMS entry we thought there are perhaps 6-9 stones left in the outer-circle, only 3 now built into a wall remain upright. The other possible stones are now fallen and are at ground level.
The inner circle stands on a large mound (well large for the circles 20m outer diameter), and has 3 remaining stones.
Excellent views to the east out over the Tongue to the high ridge that includes Forswick, Ill Bell and Yoke. Whilst to the north Threshthwaite Mouth.

There’s room to pull off the road that heads through Troutbeck and then Town Head, at NY414 062, bang opposite the ‘bridleway’ you need to take. Follow it down for 0.25miles to an old slate quarry, the track passes through the actual circle.

To add to Ironman’s and Chris’ comments about the size of the Cop Stone.
When viewed at a distance from various points on the moor the stone appears to be much larger than it actually is when you’re up close and personal like.

Another site along with Little Round Table that had been bugging Fitz and myself for some time.
In July the circle was pretty bracken covered, it wasn’t helped any further by being on the edge of a limestone pavement. The only thing that gave the circles location away was the wooden post planted in its centre.
The embankment(?) of the circle was constructed of chunks peeled away from the pavement, several granite stones stood out within this embankment.
A gnarled limestone block in the circles’ centre being the highlight and most obvious feature of the monument.
After walking across the limestone pavement and seeing the stones used to construct the circle, we both came away thinking about the stones in the circle of Arbor Low.

The question of whether anything had survived of the Little Round Table had been eating away at Fitz and me for yonks.
So when we discovered the NMR still listed the henge as having a small surviving section of the bank and ditch; we made it our first port of call.
Behind a wire fence, the remains of a 4m wide shallow ditch stretch for around 30m in length. And although it’s nothing too impressive, it was a buzz to finally get to see it.

From Lowther bridge head down the narrow road passed Lowther Lodge for approximately 40m. The earthwork can be seen in trees to the right of the road.

Fitz’s ‘megalithic jumble’ is a spot on description for this site.
Sitting on a mound/knoll, the two most visible sections of the kerbing do look to have once described a circle.
But the two small quarries that look to have disturbed quite large sections of the kerbing have made the whole thing a bit hard to grasp.

Well worth a look, with some great views out towards the Howgill Fells.

Standing by the West Coast main line, near to Kitchenhill Bridge is this 10ft tall monster.
A big surprise for a stone that isn’t marked on the O.S map.

A great looking, thick-set 1m high lump of a stone. It’s just over the hill from ‘The Dipping Stone’ which is marked on the Dark Peak O.S maps.
Like the nearby Murder Stone this stone also seems to stand at the head of two valleys.
Grid reference SK99839 81479.

The only reason the overgrown lump that is Green Low gets a mention anywhere..ever..Is because of the Beaker burial Bateman (who else) ripped out of the barrow in the mid 1840’s.
The (k)cist he uncovered contained a real haul of finds..with the inhumation....a flint dagger, a handful or more of flint tools and arrowheads, a food vessel/beaker/urn, bone tools and fools gold and a body of a child was also within the cist.
The barrow was opened again in the 1960’s...more flint tool finds were made as well as burials from the romano-British period...
(info:J.Barnatt’s “Barrow Corpus”
B. Marsden’s “The Burial Mounds of Derbyshire”)

You’re probably better off checking out what came out of the barrow..which is displayed in the Weston Park Museum in Sheffield, rather than visit the barrow itself.

Slipper Low is visible as a clump of trees behind the farm of the same name......Whats left of the barrow is perhaps 10 x 9m in size.....it’s a messy site and ploughed out.
No real reason to leave the roadside and see it close up........

This barrow seems to go against the overall norm of a Peak Barrow by being perched right on the top of the highest point on Hollins Hill. Measuring 14 x 13m it stands about 1.5m high.

Obviously with the barrows dug out centre it’s been tampered with in the past, but I’ve not come across any records of excavations (edit see misc post).

With Chrome Hill, Parkhouse Hill and High Wheeldon all clearly visible from the barrow, it enjoys excellent views.

My guess is that Hollins Hill is in fact private property......
If you do go up there.... remember the spirit of the Kinder mass trespass of way back when don’t burn strongly in folks’ minds round these parts (more’s the pity) and especially not with the farmers.

I didn’t get this place at all......(it’s only a short steep climb up Bole Hill of several 100m’s from the stones of Strawberry Lea). But most of the remains (well kinda the most sorta visible) up there seem to be related to the old lead smelting workings...
Then again if your’e an hardcore hillfort fan then it’s possible I guess you might be able to find something...

Excellent views over Sheffield.....

In the 18yrs I’ve been going to Barbrook III.....I don’t think I’ve ever seen it properly.
Until now that is.....the moorland fire that has slowly burnt out over the last few days or so has stripped back all the long grass over quite a large area....(the ground was still warm and smoking in places).

Barbrook III has always impressed me.....but even more so now...
All the stones are quite visible as is the bank....Stones that before were seen as being only a few centimetres above the grass... are now a decent height....

I’d suggest getting over there as soon as you can and see the circle before the grass makes a come back.

The area around Gibbet South was burnt off at the end of Feb 2004, and for the first time in quite a number of years the stones and rubble bank of the circle are quite visible.
Although it has to be said it’s still nowt to get excited about.

There are 5 stones stretched out along a distance of 330m on Min-End Lane. 2 pairs and a single stone. They’ve all been used as gateposts in their time, and stand on the line of an old stripped out drystone wall.

The Cheshire Monuments lot, reckon 3 of the stones could be prehistoric in origin. (These are the pair furthest north and the single stone to the far south, with the modern gateposts in between).
The prehistoric idea seems to come from the stones looking different to the ‘modern’ squarer gateposts, (which seems to suggest that there is a kinda ‘model gatepost’) and the fact that they lean.

Not sure I go with it myself.....worth checking tho’ out for the views alone.

What is it?.....barrow or stone circle?

Low grass covered rubble bank, around 13x11m in size, bank broken to the NNE & SW. With several large-ish stones on the banking.

The stone circle theory comes from a geezer named W.Andrew...who described the site as ‘being a stone circle similar to the 9 ladies.’ the rest of his description is a bit confusing....but he makes no mention of seeing upright stones and describes it much like it is now.

Barnatt reckons on it being a robbed cairn and the stones around the bank being kerbstones.

This stone is north of the Church at Bradbourne....Tall and thin limestone slab (riddled with them crinoid fossils) and leaning badly.

The top has a wide notch like looking thing along its top....hard to say whether it’s been shaped like that or not.

There are several vague references to another coupla stones that stood nearby. No sign of ‘em now tho’.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The two missing stones are said to have been used in the construction of the bridge over the stream before you get to the stone.
04/11

Not O.S marked.
About 350m SE-ish of the lake on the southern boundary of the Longshaw Estate.
I guess 8x8m in size, with nice sections of double kerbing.

Toot Hill’s barrow is only a small affair, 8x9m and just under 1m high.
Barnatt noted the site as a possible barrow in his ‘Barrow Corpus’, since then though it has made it onto the NMR.
A small gritstone slab sticks out of the barrows top, about 50cm wide and 60cm tall....whether it is anything to do with the barrow seems uncertain.

Excellent views with the weird summit of Shutlingsoe visible in the SSE and the moors of Wildboarclough filling the eastern horizon.

The earthwork marked on O.S maps that stands on the summit of Toot Hill, is a deer pound from medieval-ish times when the Macclesfield Forest was a Royal Forest.

From Wirksworth I this stone is in the field to the east... 200m away.
Perhaps 50-60cm tall when upright... and a complete contrast to the other 2 stones which stand/stood either side of it.

In a rocky area covered with linear clearance banks on Gibbet Moor are 2 small standing stones, several metres apart. A much larger square set stone can be seen 40m away to the NW-ish.

Barnatt and friends debated whether the stones could be the remains of another four-poster....the size of the stones and the distance apart are much the same as Gibbet Moor North.

11/04.

The three stones are now thought to be what is left of an alignment.

I posted this up a while ago and then removed it..because it didn’t really go along with what Barnatt had written... and who am I to nay-say the mighty Barnatt... it’s back now though.

Rooke noted in the 1780’s that 3 stone circles and an augurial seat stood at Durwood Tor to the west of The Stride.

Barnatt made mention of Rooke’s lost circles in his book of 1990 and had them as being in the area of Dudwood Farm on Dudwood which is to the south of The Stride.

There is no trace of the circles today, but under the south side of Durwood Tor is a stone shaped like a chair?...is this what Rooke was referring to?

A similar ‘augurial seat’ was said to have stood on Strawberry Hill in Leicestershire.

It’s a thigh-burning 150m or so climb to the little summit of High Wheeldon; home to the Fox Hole, a small hidden cave, in one of the areas most distinctive hills. The name of the hill has often been mentioned as being named after a stone circle....although no trace of one has ever been found.

It’s National Trust property and the path to the top is by Wheeldon Trees Farm.

The entrance to the cave is hidden away on the NW side of the hill. About a 25m walk down a little ridge from the top.....and as with most of the Peaks caves, archaeologically significant or not, the entrance is gated and padlocked. The entrance is larger today after dynamite was used to blast it out in order to help rescue a dog in the early 20th Century.

The cave has been occupied throughout prehistory beginning in the Paeleolithic, while in the Neolithic it was used to house a burial, the bones being the oldest known bones yet recovered from the White Peak. Some of the finds from the caves are/were displayed at the Buxton Museum.

The views from up here are outrageous thru’ 360’.

The cairn on Hitter Hill is well battered and stands in an area of old mine workings.

It’s probably not worth the steep climb up Hitter Hill from Glutton Bridge to see the cairn....But the views from the cairns top are outrageous...with the old coral reefs of Parkhouse Hill and Chrome Hill dominating the northern view and the pyramid hill of High Wheeldon (home of the Fox Hole Cave) in the south.

The two stones are in a fenced enclosure about 50m from the road....Unsure of public access, but there is a large gate into the field where the stones are.
Nowt much to say about ‘em really...one stands, the other don’t.

This stone struggles to be noticed....built into a drystone wall and covered by brambles.
The stone is opposite a line of terraced houses on the main road through Bladnoch....It can be tricky to spot.....(look for the top of the stone as it is higher than the wall).

This was a crazy one.....the sun was low in the sky and lit the carvings up perfect but when the sun went behind the clouds awhile the cup & rings went with it..

A nice enough little stone, about 1m high.
Stands at the head of two valleys in the hills above Whaley Bridge.

It’s a bit of a boggy ‘shortish’ trek over the moorland near Cambret Farm to this circle.....but even after getting the shoes sucked off of my feet it in the mud it was well worth it....(nice one Fitz for digging it out).

Eight low stones surround an egg shaped central stone, the ruined little brother of Glenquickan, which stands over the otherside of Cambret Hill. Excellent views of the surrounding hills.

Have to agree with Moey....the views back down onto the Glenquickan circle are great.
Beware of trying to shorten the journey back to the car park next to the bridge, the ground is very boggy....try it and you might get to sample the delights of trenchfoot.
The cist and its graffiti covered cap stone are worth seeing.....and it’s only a short walk from the circle.

What a top place.....I knew this was gonna be something special, and it didn’t disappoint.
Everything about it was class from the stones to the circles location...smart.

From the standing stone, visible from the track to Cambret Farm, the circle and four poster are 500ft away to the north over the otherside of the drystone wall.
Unsure of access rights...but we managed without any hassles.

The cairn and standing stone at Bagbie are both marked on the 1:50,000 O.S map but not this little four poster that stands next to the cairn.

A great little circle in a bleak moorland area with excellent views.

You can see this stone in a field behind the barn on the way out of Bagbie on the road to Cambert Farm on the way up to the Claughreid circle.....