As the link explains, in early sources the fort is known as ‘Ditchling Castle’ but since it was used as a beacon site for fires its accepted name has gradually changed.
It’s said that the Wisht Hounds can be seen racing overhead here (no doubt on dark, stormy nights) in their pursuit of damned souls.
(J+C Bord, ‘Atlas of Magical Britain’)
These two round barrows are known as the Devil’s Humps or the Kings’ Graves.
Along with two bell barrows and two pond barrows to the south west, they form part of a linear round barrow cemetery which is partly enclosed by (contemporary)earthworks around the three limbs of the Y-shaped hill.
Local legend has it that these Bronze age graves actually contain the Viking chieftains killed in a battle with the Saxons. The yews round about mark the graves of other warriors. Their ghosts are said to haunt the area.
Alternatively, if you prefer the Devil hypothesis, you can arrange to meet him by running around the barrows ‘six or seven times’.
(info from MAGIC and J+C Bord’s Atlas of Magical Britain).
It’s not hard to see why local legend has it this fort was built by giants.
It also has an interestingly recent bit of folklore: it is said that during WW2 the Home Guard made use of a tunnel which connects the site with Dorchester, two miles away.
(J&C Bord, ‘Atlas of Magical Britain’)
Just above the giant’s head is a small square Iron Age earthwork, and a maypole was traditionally raised here, as if another fertility symbol were required.
Childs, the former sexton, well remembers the maypole. It used to be set up in the ring just above the giant. It was made from a fir-bole and renewed every year. “It was raised in the night,” It was decorated with garlands, &c. The villagers went up the hill and danced round the maypole on May I. Nothing of the sort is now done.
.. The maypole was set up, not as is usual elsewhere, in the town, which possesses two convenient spaces, formerly, no doubt, “village greens,” but a good way off, on the top of a very steep hill immediately above the giant, in the centre of an ancient camp, belonging probably to the Bronze Age.
From: Dorset Folklore Collected in 1897
H. Colley March
Folklore, Vol. 10, No. 4. (Dec., 1899), pp. 478-489.
J & C Bord report some relatively unsurprising folklore for the figure, though they don’t give any dates – well, perhaps it’s still going on:
In order to cure barrenness, women would sit on the hillside (they don’t mention where, but I think some spots would be more effective than others). Likewise, married couples would spend the night there to ensure they had children. Unmarried girls (being much more polite) would pray at the giant’s feet that they wouldn’t end up old maids.
(’Atlas of Magical Britain’)
A vicar of the nineteenth century put a stop to the scourings of the figure, which were held every seven years, ‘as’ says Udal in his Dorsetshire Folklore (1922), ‘they tended to practical illustrations of the above superstitions.‘
Disgraceful. (Quoted in Jennifer Westwood’s ‘Albion’).
St Levan had been fishing and was just resting here when he struck the stone with his fist, splitting it in two. Didn’t know his own strength. The prophecy quoted below was supposed to have been made by Merlin himself.
A well connected with the saint can be found to the south, in the cliffs to the sea.
(J & C Bord, ‘Atlas of Magical Britain’)
Janet and Colin Bord give a very strange tale for this mountain in their ‘Atlas of Magical Britain’, but as usual don’t reveal their sources, so perhaps a reader will know if this story is still current, or from where it originates.
The mountain is said to be magnetic and distorts compass readings, confusing hikers. There is supposed to be a large smelting furnace at its heart, where iron ore is smelted by dwarves. A standing stone somewhere on the mountain is called ‘the Stone of the Little Men’ and if you leave a silver coin and a drawing, the dwarves will make you your object and leave it on the stone for you.
The mountain does actually contain veins of the unusual earth elements La and Ce.
So, is this a recent romantic view of the mountain? or a weird memory of iron toolmakers and their newfangled technology?!
This story (or essentially a similar retelling of it)
themodernantiquarian.com/post/55818
is also attached to the mountain, according to
p159 of
The Folk-Lore of Sutherland-Shire
Miss Dempster
The Folk-Lore Journal, Vol. 6, No. 3. (1888), pp. 149-189.
If you dare to walk three times round the remains of this stone circle at midnight, the devil will appear.
(noted by Grinsell in his ‘Folklore of Prehistoric Sites in Britain. He gives the name ‘Deil’s Stanes’ with ‘Nine Stanes’ as an alternative name. Canmore denies that anyone knew any local names in the 60s/70s – but with such a wealth, surely this cannot be true?! It’s officially known as the Standing Stones of Urquhart stone circle now.)
If you march round Winkelbury Hill seven times, cursing all the time, the devil will appear on a white horse, and grant you a wish.
Kathleen Wiltshire heard this from a Michael Wheeler, who went to school in Salisbury in the 1940s. It’s printed in her ‘More Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’. I don’t know if he’d tried it. Your success would be limited by how polite you are I suppose.
The Bords, in ‘Secret Country’, connect Winkelbury with tales of a hidden golden coffin.
Kathleen Wiltshire published this story in her ‘More Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’, hearing it from a Mrs J Morrison of Urchfont Manor in 1970.
A man was once camping near Wayland’s Smithy on a hiking trip. In the night ‘he heard much movement nearby as would be heard if men and horses were moving camp.’ In the morning he went to investigate where the sounds had been coming from – but there wasn’t so much as a mark in the damp grass. Locals were said to remark ‘It would be them Romans’ whom he’d heard.
Kathleen Wiltshire, in her ‘More Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’ spoke to a young couple who had experienced something there in September 1973. They were walking there one evening when suddenly a mist came down. As it got thicker they saw several trotting white horses. ‘A strange atmosphere prevailed’ and both the young people felt very scared. The horses disappeared into the mist, and slowly this too disappeared.
White horses are rather a Celtic motif, if you would like to read that into the story.
Kathleen Wiltshire, in her ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’, mentions an infamous thorn bush which was – and is? – to be found on the top of Winkelbury.
“It was planted some years ago to mark the situation of an earlier thorn known as the Witches’ Scrag Tree. Witches were said to have become entangled in its thorny branches as they rode low over the hill on their broomsticks. It is said that at the time of the full moon a spate of them would litter the hill with their corpses – thus preserving the village folk from their nefarious attentions.”
I’m assuming Gun’s Church is this round barrow – but please, if you have local knowledge and it is a different barrow, do contradict me.
I read in Kathleen Wiltshire’s ‘Ghosts and Legends of Wiltshire’ that the barrow is in the SE end of Hill Deverill parish. The local lords of the manor were the Coker family. The last in the line, Henry, died in 1730, but he haunts the district still. He’s known as ‘Old Coker’.
To me this sounds like another name for the devil – and when you hear what his ghost gets up to it rather sounds like the folklore isn’t just about a local landowner.
Old Coker follows his hounds in a phantom hunt round the barrow. Kathleen reports from her informant in 1971, a Mr J Vyner, that ‘sounds of horses galloping, chains rattling and horns blowing have lately been heard’. Does this not bring to mind tales of Odin / the Devil and his Wild Hunt with his hellhounds?
The name of the barrow is intriguing too – what does it mean?
one is almost tempted from the similarity of wording to suspect Ms Wiltshire of fibbing.
The whole parish seems to be awash in strange stories, and Kathleen collected tales of headless figures in the churchyard, buried treasure, and the appearance of dead inhabitants at Midsummer Eve. They seem to have long memories there too – redheads were locally referred to as ‘Daners’.
As ocifant says, this place has traditionally been considered the burial place of a Danish leader, Hubba – hence the name ‘Hubba’s Low’ – though of course it is a much older Neolithic barrow. It was excavated by John Thurnam in 1856, and in 1910 it was seen fit to use some of the limestone rubble used in its construction as foundation for the nearby Chippenham to Bristol road. Kathleen Wiltshire, in her ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’ reports that “We are told that even today there is a feeling of unease around this pagan burial ground” – she collected this local information in 1971.
John Thurnham’s write-up of the excavation (with extensive discussions about Hubba and battles) can be read at Google Books, in the 1857 volume of the Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine (v3, p67).
books.google.co.uk/books?id=cDoGAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA67
In her ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’, Kathleen Wiltshire says:
“The late Miss Edith Olivier, the author of several books of Wiltshire interest, told of an experience she had had when driving her car from Devizes to Marlborough one night in the years of the First World War. She arrived at Avebury just at twilight, and pulled up her car to look down into the Circle. There she saw the lights and heard the music of a fair being held amongst the stones, so she drove on to Marlborough. On her arrival there, she remarked to someone what she had seen at Avebury, only to be told no such fair was being held; the last fair was held there at least fifty years before. Miss Olivier said she could only suppose she had experienced ‘hindsight’.”
Edith Olivier wasn’t a stranger to such weird experiences. Apparently she once saw Lyonesse from Land’s End. That may or may not affect your view of her tale above.
She relates the ‘fair’ story in a book called ‘Without knowing Mr Walkley’ and not content with just claiming to see a fair from the past, ‘it turns out’ that she saw the long-lost Beckhampton Avenue too. There’s more you can read at the ‘UFOarea’ website. Personally I think she had a rather creative mind. But why spoil a good story.
ufoarea.com/physics_cosmology_windowavebury.html
Kathleen Wiltshire, in her ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’ recounts the following tale, collected firsthand from the person who experienced it.
“Miss Muriel Cobern had an experience on Walker’s Hill in the summer of 1965 or 66. She was walking back from the barrow above the White Horse, towards the lay-by at the top of the hill, where she had left the car. About fifty yards from the barrow she suddenly felt very uneasy, and glanced around; it was very cloudy and rather cold, and no one else was about. A flock of sheep through which she was passing seemed untroubled, so she went on. Suddenly she could distinctly hear horses’ hooves thudding, as if a whole army was coming at full gallop; but there was not a horse to be seen anywhere. Miss Cobern, walking much faster she admits, passed Adams Grave, and could hear the hooves no longer.”
Kathleen Wiltshire spoke to an old shepherd who used to keep his flocks on Cherhill Down, in the research for her book ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’.
There is a Roman road behind Oldbury Camp – the one that leads to Silbury Hill.
“The shepherd told me he had seen ‘a lot of men a’marchin’,’ adding, ‘they did wear skirts!’. ‘WERE they men?’ I asked. ‘Oh yes, they did have beards, some on ‘em, and they wore girt helmets – wi’ ‘air across the top.. and had a girt bird on a pole a’front on ‘em!’”
For some reason, I just find this stretch of hills fantastic and inspiring to look at, with its mad chalk undulations. Legend has it that a man carrying his head under his arm haunts Roundway Down above the fort. This area is famous for its Civil War battle – but perhaps the ghost isn’t associated with this era as you might expect. A Mr R Coward, who farmed at Roundway, stated that on three occasions prior to 1848 the apparition appeared to people he knew, and they had been drawn by the ghost towards an almost imperceptible barrow. The barrow was opened in 1855, and (perhaps) the figure hasn’t been seen since. But the vicinity is also haunted by a black dog – his arrival is announced by the sound of chains rattling.
This information was told to Kathleen Wiltshire in 1960, and is in her book ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’.
Kathleen Wiltshire, in her 1973 ‘Ghosts and legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’ mentions a barrow on Knighton Down, north of Stonehenge, where a ghostly dog is said to be seen.
She calls the barrow ‘Doghill Barrow’ but I’m unable to find other references to this. However, as Knighton Longbarrow is the only barrow I can see up here on Knighton Down, I’m willing to bet they’re one and the same. Though if someone with local knowledge knows better..
The idea of dark ghostly dogs – sometimes hellhounds foretelling Bad Things – is common in Wiltshire folklore (as it is in various other parts of the country).
Grinsell (in the Folklore of Prehistoric Sites in Britain) reports the following story connected with the stone:
“They tried to move it and found it eight feet deep in the ground, and the tackle broke as they tried..”
If you visit Gravlaba you will see a cairn and some standing stones. But don’t look too hard just in case. One day some visitors to this site were just too nosy and they saw some Picts (fairies) dancing in the knowe to celebrate the birth of a child. These two people didn’t just intrude and stare, they tried to nick off with a keg of buttermilk that had been laid in for the party! It’s not surprising, but the Picts turned them to stone for their rudeness. The keg of buttermilk got turned to stone too (bit of a mix up with the curses I think). So there used to be three stones there, but now apparently there are only two. Perhaps the Picts eventually worked out how to get their buttermilk back.
(very likely in Grinsell’s ‘Folklore of Prehstoric Sites in Britain’)
I found an alternative version of the story in Whitlock’s ‘The Folklore of Wiltshire’ (1976).
Nearby is ‘Barrow Farm’, and the barrow lies in the field called ‘Barrow Piece’. So one imagines it must have been fairly sizeable and noticeable before excavation and ploughing?
The story in Whitlock’s book goes thus:
When Manton barrow was excavated in 1906 it was found to contain a skeleton adorned with gold, amber, bronze and lignite articles.. After excavation and reinterment of the skeleton the barrow was made up and planted with trees [?]. A widow who lived locally told a Dr JB Maurice of Marlborough (her late husband’s employer) that ‘every night since that man from Devizes came and disturbed the old creature she did come out of the mound and walk around the house and squinny into the window. I do hear her most nights and want you to give me sammat to keep her away.’ The doctor gave her some medicine telling her to go to bed in the dark immediately after taking it. Later the widow said ‘the old creature came round the cottage as usual for a few nights, but not seeing me, gave up, thinking no doubt that she had scared me away’.
batty old wife’s tale – or the truth.....
Edmund Hogg in his ‘The Golden Vale of Mobray’ (around 1910) thought the mound was from the 6th century – perhaps the artefacts were from a reuse of the barrow. His speculations are as romantic as thoughts about fairies:
A curious ancient Pack-horse Bridge (World’s End Bridge) crosses the Codbeck (very picturesque hereabouts), and from hence the path leads to a tumulus on the east bank of the stream, known as ’ Pudding Pie Hill,” perhaps from its resemblance to a pie or pudding. The hill was opened about fifty years ago, and was found to be a funeral mound and contained skeletons, some in crouched postures. There were funeral urns mid other relics found, which were presented by Lady Frankland Russell to the York Museum. Until the mound was opened its origin had been a source of conjecture. Even Jefferson, the historian of Thirsk, says it was originally raised on which to build a watch tower for the Mowbray Castle of Thirsk. A most strange and foolish guess when we consider the height of the land immediately behind it. All speculation was set at rest by the excavation under the command of Lady Frankland Russell in 1855. The mound has probably been the burial place of a small band or the first Anglian settlers in this district, say about early in the 6th century. In the centre of the barrow, and 16 feet from the surface, lay the skeleton of a warrior of more than ordinary size. His legs and arms were crossed, his shield had rested on his breast, but the central boss of it only remained with the rivets which had held it to the wood. By his right side lay the handle of a sword, so that lie had probably been buried in full dress, with all his arms and accoutrements.
On the evidence, this warrior and leader of the band who had followed him hither from their homeland beyond the sea, had been first buried and then the huge mound raised over him, and afterwards the members of his clan had been laid to rest on either side and above, and further soil heaped over their bodies. The circumference of the mound at the base being upwards of 160 yards, and the height about 17 feet.
Legend has it that a golden image is buried in this tumulus. One night, a long time ago, some local people thought they would dig it up. As they began in the moonlight, they heard the sound of horse’s hooves – and looking up saw the apparition of a headless man on horseback, clutching his severed head under his arm. Understandably they were terrified and abandoned their plan instantly, fleeing into the night. No-one has attempted to claim the treasure since.
(theme collected by Grinsell in ‘folklore of prehistoric sites’)
The story is probably retold in many books, but certainly in Devereux’s ‘Haunted Land’ and forms part of his article in Fortean Times here.
Just one word of caution – Devereux claims ‘the figure clearly saw’ Dr Clay. Is this really apparent in his actual statement above – the figure turned to him, but does that mean it saw him?. It doesn’t particularly tally with the Doctor’s theorising which followed his experience: Peter Underwood, a writer on the supernatural, described in his ‘Ghosts and how to see them’ in 1993 that Dr Clay felt such images were ‘a cinema of time’ replaying certain emotion-charged moments at particular times to particular sensitive people. He also had had a vision of his brother when he was killed in the first world war, for whatever relevance you may see in that. A search of the internet revealed Clay was in charge of at least one dig in Wiltshire – I wonder if his colleagues knew about his unorthodox experiences?
Kathleen Wiltshire also records the tale in her 1984 ‘More Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’, though she doesn’t say specifically where she heard it. A number of local people were asked about the sighting: an old shepherd was said to say “Do you mean the man on the horse that comes out of the opening in the pine wood?”
Haltadans means the ‘limping dance’. Trows (the little people) often went there to dance in the light of the full moon. One night they got a bit carried away and danced on until the sunrise – and they were turned to stone. The two stones in the middle (originally there may have been three) are the fiddlers who played for them. Around these is the earth and stone circle, with the originally standing stones around the outside.
Over to the northwest are three cairns – these are know as the fiddlers’ crus (the fiddlers’ enclosures).
The tune they were allegedly said to have played is in a book from 1642, and reprinted in the Shetland Folk Book II of 1952. This interesting tome contains a number of tunes actually sung by fairies which were collected over the years. Truly.
(folklore from Grinsell’s folklore of british prehistoric sites)
Fitzcoraldo’s account mentions the classic motif that once the man had crossed ‘the first beck’ and put moving water between himself and the hobs, he was safe. Grinsell notes a version of the story, which was told to Raymond Hayes by a local in 1938. The important point here is that the beck was specifically named as the Gypsey Race. Rather grossly, when the man got there the fairies were just catching up with him, and they cut off the back half of the horse, which hadn’t quite crossed the stream. He escaped clinging to the forequarters, which managed to struggle ashore!
The Gypsey Race is right by Willy Howe, so our hero didn’t have far to go, luckily!
I hope Fitzcoraldo won’t mind me reiterating the folklore he’s recorded, because I was fascinated with the extra bit I found out. Apparently the story originally comes from something written by William Newburgh – and considering he died in 1198, that’s proof that the story is pretty old. Often tales were only written down in the Victorian era, and then you can say they’re only Victorian romanticism – but this time it suggests that stories with the same themes and motifs go back a long way. It’s interesting that the Gypsey Race should get first billing. The ‘unknown material’ of the goblet is also interesting and even reminds me of modern tales of alien abduction rather than fairy abduction.
This stone was thrown by the giant of Papa Stour at the giant of Mavis Grind. It weighs about 20 tons.
(from Grinsell’s folklore of prehistoric sites)
Sir Walter Scott visited the stone in 1814. He mentions it in chapter 19 of The Pirate:
“The lonely shepherd avoids the place, for at sunrise, high noon, or sunset, the misshapen form of the necromantic owner may sometimes wtill be seen sitting by the Dwarfie Stone.”
Later in the book he describes the ‘witch’ Norna’s visits to it to communicate with the troll who lives there.
In the 17th century at least, it was considered to be the home of a giant and his wife, with the stone inside their bed, and a hollowed area in it showing where the pregnant wife slept. Though judging by the size of it, a ‘dwarfie’ would fit better than a giant!
A late 16th century tradition suggested that the hole in the roof was gnawed by a giant who was trapped inside, after another giant blocked the entrance with a stone.
(info from Grinsell’s folklore of prehistoric sites)
An echo is called, in Icelandic, ‘dverg-mal’ or dwarf-talk, and there is said to be a fine echo from under the Dwarfie Hamars. Then there is Trowie (Troll’s) Glen to the westward of the stone. A troll or trow in old Icelandic lore is a huge creature or giant, mostly in an evil sense. Mr Heddle states that Trowie Glen is still considered an uncanny spot, and that people will go a mile or two out of their way rather than pass it after dark. In Jamieson’s Scottish Dictionary, under Hill-Trows, it is stated that the superstitious in some places endeavour to bribe the trows by leaving an offering of food for them every night, being persuaded that otherwise they would destroy the family before morning. Probably this accounts for the offerings mentioned by Dr. Clouston as being left in the Dwarfie Stone.
From Alfred W Johnston’s ‘The ‘Dwarfie Stone’ of Hoy, Orkney’ in the Reliquary for April 1896.
And speaking of echoes, the ones in the tomb itself don’t sound much better: check out the tale at the bottom of this Everything2 page
everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1524143&lastnode_id=1372629
More folklore connected with Callanish is that it was a traditional place to exchange betrothal vows. Any marriage consummated amongst the stones would be especially happy.
(from Grinsell’s collected folklore of prehistoric sites)
TomBo’s story below is very reminiscent of the story told at Mitchell’s Fold.
In ‘the Secret Country’ the Bords add the weird information that the white cow (white with red ears perhaps – a typical otherworldly animal) appeared ‘in the sea’ at this time of famine. It politely interrupted a woman who was so desperate she was intent on drowning herself – telling her to go to the Callanish stones with her neighbours and a couple of pails. I wonder why it should have originated in the sea?
Clach an Trushal might mean ‘stone of compassion’, or maybe ‘stone of gathering’. It’s the largest standing stone on Lewis at 5.8m high and allegedly was erected to mark a victory by the Morisons of Ness over their enemies the MacAulays of Uig.
(I probably read this in Mr Grinsell’s ‘Folklore of Prehistoric Sites in Britain’ (1976)).
The Odin stone, long the favorite trysting-place in summer twilights of Orkney lovers, was demolished in 1814 by a sacrilegious farmer, who used its material to assist him in the erection of a cowhouse. this misguided man was a Ferry-Louper (the name formerly given to strangers from the south), and his wanton destruction of the consecrated stone stirred so strongly the resentment of the peasantry in the district that various unsuccessful attempts were made to burn his house and holdings about his ears.
(County Folk-Lore, vol. 3: Examples of Printed Folk-Lore Concerning the Orkney & Shetland Islands, collected by G. F. Black and edited by Northcote W. Thomas (London: Folk-Lore Society, 1903).
online at pitt.edu/~dash/monuments.html
Sir Walter Scott used these beliefs in his book ‘The Pirate’ (chapters 22 and 33).
.................................................................................
At the OrkneyJar webpages
orkneyjar.com/history/historicalfigures/pirategow/
you can read about the ‘Stromness Pirate’ John Gow, who was hanged in London in 1725. It is said that he was engaged to the daughter of a Stromness merchant, and that they’d pledged their betrothal by joining hands through the Odin Stone. After he was hanged, his poor girlfriend (it is said) had to travel all the way to London, to touch his hand and so release her from the oath. What a terrible thought. You rather hope the story isn’t true.
Stukeley wrote that the country people “make merry with cakes, figs, sugar, and water fetched from the ‘Swallow head’.” (see ‘Swallowhead Springs.)
It has been suggested that this ceremony had some connexion with the gospel story of the barren fig tree, but it is much more probable that the tradition has a very early origin. As a matter of fact the cakes were mostly made with raisins which are called figs by natives of Wessex.
from Wanderings in Wessex by Edric Holmes (date?)
online at project gutenberg:
gutenberg.org/dirs/1/1/4/1/11410/11410-h/11410-h.htm
Another story connected with Tan Hill is in Kathleen Wiltshire’s book ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’.
She collected it in person from the woman who experienced it, a Marney Gale (nee Wiltshire – perhaps a relative?).
Around 1962 or 1963 a schoolgirl of about 12 took her dog for a walk up on the downs, near the Wansdyke on Tan Hill. She eventually came across a house, and thinking she might see the occupants and say hello she walked into the yard. Chickens were scratching around, and a horse poked its head out over a stable half-door, but she couldn’t see anybody about. When she returned home she mentioned the place to her friends, but to her surprise no-one knew where she could be talking about, ‘not even the oldest shepherds’. Confused she later went back to search for the house, but couldn’t refind it. Soon her experience was put to the back of her mind, but a few years later she had a copy of an old book, and there in one of the illustrations was the house she had seen, which had once existed up on the hill.
Kathleen Wiltshire collected the following story, which is in her ‘Ghosts and Legends of the Wiltshire Countryside’:
She heard the story from Mrs Alice Maslen, of All Cannings, in about 1940. Her grandfather, George Tasker, was a shepherd. When he was young he was up on the downs working with an older shepherd, Tod Beake, and a young lad.
This night they were looking after their flocks just north of Tan Hill. Night had fallen and they were just settling down when they heard sounds like men and horses coming towards them along the Wansdyke. This (she says) would have been unusual enough during the day. The moon shone out from behind a cloud and the two men could see a party of figures carrying torches, walking behind a wagon drawn by black horses. On the wagon they could see a coffin strapped on, and lying on top of it a golden circle, perhaps a crown. The young lad hurriedly made his exit (’and never stopped running until he reached Cannings’), but the older men bravely stayed put. When the cortege drew level with them it vanished.
The experience understandably made the shepherds’ hair stand on end: “Me fustian cap rose right off me head” George told his family.
In the light of the BBCs recent ‘treasure hunting’ (hmm) programmes I am inclined to romantically interpret the ‘golden circle’ (strange to mention it in this way, as opposed to claiming definitely that it was a crown) as a lovely golden torc.
Kathleen continues: “When telling the above story to the Marlborough Townswomen’s Guild in 1969, a member told me how her father went courting her mother, and had to pass near the Wansdyke where it runs near the village of Huish [this is also on the edge of the hill, but further east than Tan Hill, beyond Knap Hill]. One night he saw the same funeral procession as had been described by the All Cannings’ shepherds. This would have happened [around 1880].”
In the 19th century, the stone at the end of the barrow was known as ‘Little Eve’, the barrow being called ‘Old Adam’. Either way, like the older way of calling the place Woden’s (Odin’s) Barrow, it suggests that it has been there as long as time itself.
(reported by Grinsell, Folklore of Prehistoric sites)
How many stones are there at threestone burn? There aren’t three. There are supposed to be 16 of these pink granite stones, according to English Heritage’s records. But ... the circle
consisted once, tradition rumoured, of 12 stones, but only 11 of them were visible, and it was foretold that whenever the 12th was found, a fortune in money would reward the lucky discoverer. The present worthy tenant, at the head of a company of hay-makers, whose work in the adjacent haining had been interrupted by a shower, instituted a search after the missing pillar, and lo! instead of twelve there were thirteen stones. Thirteen is always an unlucky number, so his painstaking was unremunerated. Perhaps he was not aware that Druid money is only bestowed by reversion in the world to come.
From the Folklore Society’s publishing of the Denham Tracts, v2.
Mrs Cunnington told L V Grinsell that when she was excavating the site, she was told of a local belief that it contained treasure.
(Grinsell – folklore of prehistoric sites)
In ‘Notes and Queries for Worcestershire’ (1856) John Noake explains on p204 that:
At Dudley there is a tradition that many years ago a giant lived in Dudley castle, as did also one in the castle of Birmingham. The Birmingham giant had done suit and service to the Dudley giant for many years, but growing fat he began to kick, and refused to serve the Dudley giant longer. A furious dispute thereupon broke out; the Dudley giant in his rage threw a large stone all the way from Dudley at the Birmingham giant and demolished his castle and killed him. Some of his surviving followers erected a stone in the lane as a memento of his prowess and rage and called it the War Stone, whence the name Warstone Lane.
Online at Google Books.
The stone has also been known as the Whorestone or Hoarstone.
It can be found just inside the cemetery in Warstone Lane.
These stones are the remains of five men who were cheeky enough to be digging their turnips on the Sabbath. Their leader was knocked over by the shock of being turned to stone: before the beginning of the last century you could see him lying there, but he’s since been righted.
(from Grinsell’s prehistoric folklore book, drawing on a book from 1919 which I haven’t yet tracked down. I wonder if the turnips got rather specifically incorporated because of the fame of turnips in the district – the Laing’s Improved Purple-Top, don’t you know.
books.google.co.uk/books?id=4CMaAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA2-PA7)
Janet and Colin Bord (in ‘Atlas of Magical Britain’) describe a man who follows walkers: he has a lantern and rattles a bag of gold coins.
From a horrifying letter from a W Parry to W Stukeley himself, just before Christmas 1742:
” I have, as hundreds have done before me, carried off a bit from the King, his Knights, and Soldiers, which I intend to send or keep for you.”
Notes and Queries from May 14th 1859 perhaps illuminates this odious habit further:
“My guide told me that it was daily diminishing in size, ” because people from Wales kept chipping off bits to keep the devil off,” and that he could remember it much larger. My guide was born half a mile off, at Long Compton, and had, he said, lived there “all his days.“”
People From Wales!! The cheeky bleeder!! It’s MILES away from Wales. Classic anti-Welsh sentiment if you ask me! Oops. Parry’s a Welsh name, isn’t it.. And the road going past the stones is a drovers’ road from Wales. Oh well.
And another example from ‘Folklore’ vol 6, no 1, p23- from yet another Welsh sounding traitor, Arthur J Evans.
Chips were taken from the King-stone “for luck,” and by soldiers “to be good for England in battle.” Betsy Hughes told me that her son, who had gone to India as a soldier, had taken a chip with him, “but it brought him no luck, for he died of typhus.” A man told me that he had been offered as much as a pound for a chip at Faringdon Fair; and the Welsh drovers, who used to trench the road with their cattle before the railway was made, used continually to be chipping off pieces, so that formerly the stone was much bigger than it is now. A man at Great Rollright gave me a chip that he had kept in his house for years.
Notwithstanding the prevalence of this practice there were many who held that to do an injury to the stones was fraught with danger. In Wales one of the most frequent punishments that falls upon those who thus transgress against the stones is the breaking down of the transgressor’s wagon, and this belief still survives at Rowldrich. A ploughman informed me that one day a man who was driving along the road from Banbury swore to a friend who was with him that he would carry off a chip of the King-stone “though his wheel locked.” He got down from his cart and chipped off a piece of the stone, but when he tried to drive on he found that one wheel was locked in such a way that nothing he could do would make it go round again.
Dragon Hill, the flat hillock below the white horse, is where St George (or King Jarge, as he might be known locally) uncharitably killed the Dragon. Where the mortally wounded dragon’s blood fell, it is said no plants will grow.
The name of this round barrow tends to suggest people thought there was treasure within it – or maybe they did actually find some. Whatever, these etymological speculations pale beside the following story, gathered by Grinsell from one of his many dusty tomes.
As you can see from a map, a path runs right by the tumulus. It’s said that on the night of Bisley Feast, two men from Chalford were returning home towards France Lynch. They were near the barrow when they spotted some people up ahead of them. Assuming they were some friends who’d also been to the festivities they hurried up to catch them. As they came closer they realised that the figures were men with no heads! As Grinsell quotes: “The consequent fright had an abiding effect on the men.”
As it well might.
Much more famous than “Ragged Jonathan”* is a perforated menhir about a mile to the east of Minchinhampton. It was formerly surrounded by the Common arable fields, to one of which it gave the name of “Longstone Field.” Once, when they were ploughing there with oxen, they yoked a good many together, and tried to pull the Longstone out of the ground, but “something” held it firm. [..] Further, “when the Longstone hears the clock strike twelve, it runs round the field,” as almost every child in the place will tell you. Within living memory, children with whooping-cough and rickets used to be put through one of the holes in the stone. Traditions of bloodshed also cling round the Longstone; some say that it marks the burial place of a Danish chief killed in a battle at “Woeful Danes’ Bottom,” about half a mile distant, where “the blood ran as high as the wheels of a cart,” and the victory was won by women who gave the Danes poisoned pancakes to eat. At the battle of “Woeful Danes’ Bottom,” which is much talked about, “the solders shot through the holes of the Longstone”; and all the tumuli or “tumps” in the neighbourhood are held to be “the soldiers’ graves.”
From: Cotswold Place-Lore and Customs, by J. B. Partridge, in Folklore, Vol. 23, No. 3. (Sep., 1912), pp. 332-342.
It’s also been said that a hellhound-style black dog has been seen in the stone’s vicinity. Not that you’ll probably see the black dog at midnight – bar its nasty red glowing eyes. In the ‘alternative approaches to folklore bibliography’ at
hoap.co.uk/aatf1.doc
it specifically mentions Woefuldane Bottom as the location of the spectral dog – this appears to be the road that the stone lies next to.
In ‘A history of the parishes of Minchinhampton and Avening’ by Arthur Twisden Playne (1915) it’s mentioned that the Danes marched in here via the Daneway and met the Saxons at Woefuldane bottom. The slaughter of the Danes was so great that ‘the blood came up over the fetlocks of the Saxon horses’. But then Playne ruins it all: “I am sorry to throw doubt on so picturesque a legend” – he says Daneway is from ‘Dene Way’ or valley way, and Woeful from ‘Wulfflaed’, a personal name.
The ‘Ragged Jonathan’ mentioned above is explained as follows (also in the Folklore article):
Two menhirs, “Cob Stone” and “Picked Stone,” were destroyed on or near Minchinhampton Common, about seventy years ago. Still standing is the curious “Ragged Jonathan” or “Holey Stone” about 5 ft. high, pitted all over with small regular cup-like depressions. It has been used at some time as a milestone; but one old inhabitant says he thinks it came from the Devil’s Churchyard, while another says that children used to be lifted over it to cure whooping-cough. I have also been told that the holes in the stone were made by Oliver Cromwell’s guns.
As the EH Schedule says:
“The failure of the workers on the artillery castle to topple this
standing stone for use in their structure demonstrates a respect for such
antiquities that has sometimes persisted in the folklore of recent
communities.
The stone’s survival is also considered to reflect its useful
siting as a navigational aid for seamen entering St Mary’s Pool, a role now superseded by the modern marker adjacent to the standing stone.”
From The Old Stones of Rollright and District by Paul Bennett & Tom Wilson (and gratuitously recopied from ‘Megalithic Mysteries’)
“It is said that the Goose stones are petrified Geese turned into stone for grazing Chastleton Common illicitly. Their owner or guardian, an old lady, used to drive them down Grey Goose Lane to graze. Despite being warned about this she continued the practice and the stones are all that are left of her geese. What happened to her is unknown; the stones however have been dragged away to adorn a local landowners garden.
All that remains are a few loose oolites scattered across the common, and a possible monolith. The location commands a good view of the valley to the north west of the site and is located close to Adlestrop hill site of several now overgrown and abused long barrows. ”
It’s said that when the horse hears the church clock in Bratton strike midnight, it goes down to the nearby Bridewell (’Briddle’) springs to have a nice long drink (these are at ST 892518, according to Katherine M Jordan in her ‘Haunted Landscape’ book).
But maybe Bratton’s church doesn’t have a clock.
Whilst reading ‘The Holy Wells of Somerset’ (D E Horne 1923), I spotted one called ‘St Sativola’s Well’ or St Sidwell, close to the barrow.
The field in which the barrow lies is Barrow Sidwells – a never failing spring is to be found within a stone’s throw westward of the tumulus. ‘Within living memory Stoke Courcy women used to bring their children to this well to be washed, if suffering fom any ailment of skin or eyes, and this healing reputation is still well known, even if the water is less sought after.‘
Saint Sidwell was martyred near Exeter in the 6th century. Apparently she’d come into some inherited land, and her evil stepmother wanted it. The latter bribed two harvesters to bump the poor girl off. As Ms-soon-to-be-St Sidwell knelt in prayer in the field, they sneaked up and decapitated her with a scythe. Where her head fell, a spring instantly sprung up. You can see her in Exeter Cathedral’s east window. (story in Reader’s Digest ‘Folklore Myths and Legends of Britain).