D
Damonm
The ‘castle’ is in the middle of the picture, Wild Boar Fell is in the top right-hand corner of the picture.
Image credit: Damonm
This is a earthern rampart circling the summit of a small conical hill to the south of Kirkby Stephen. The area within the rampart is fairly small, so this maybe was a temporary site, used by a small community when the area was unstable. Another theory is that it was a ritual site, aligned as it is to the sacred hill of the area, Wild Boar Fell.
Visited August 2002. As you approach Cleeve Cloud from Cheltenham the sheer size of the escarpment is amazing. The ridge rises sheer from the Severn Valley floor up to over 300 metres (the highest part of the Cotswold Hills). This is why I have defined it as a sacred hill, there seems to be real reverence for it in the landscape. The sense of peace you have whilst walking round and taking in the view and the landscape is almost to see the world as the ancients saw it. The modern world can try to interfere, note the numbly positioned golf club nearby, but on Cleeve Cloud I felt the atmosphere of a different time.
Within Hunsbury Hill country park, to the south of Northampton, are the remains of an Iron Age camp site, this is an elevated site with a high inner bank, a deep ditch and outer bank. The site dates around 1000 – 500 BC.
The Hunsbury Ring Camp would have had an outer perimeter fence encompassing the dwellings which were no more than single room huts made up of timber and straw – normally round in shape. The Chieftain and retinue would have occupied the inner camp with their families whilst the rest farmed small plots in the Local area.
There is a reconstruction model of how it may have looked in use at the Central Museum and Art Gallery in Northampton.
Arbury Hill from the south east. The source of the River Nene can be seen in the foreground.
Image credit: Unknown
Roughly square topped hill with a visible bank rampart. Iron Age settlement. Fantastic view across countryside from summit. Highest point in Northamptonshire (224 metres above sea level). Sadly spoiled on one side with a dirt track for motorbikes. Possible connection with Borough Hill to the north east. No official access but a bridleway runs close by. The River Nene rises in a spring to the South east.