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.

There are two big stones here and lots of smaller ones under the grass. The big two are mysterious. They hang out in a bit of scrub at the top of an egg-shaped (ie ancient) field, before Clune Woods starts. Locally they are known as Pattenbringan. Trove records them as Pittenbrinzean. There used to be a manor house adjacent, lived in by an Ogilvy and then a Gordon, but no trace of it remains. Did the two stones used to be part of a stone circle? Possibly. The location feels right for it.

To get there, you can walk up from Lintmill through the trees beside the road until you get to a gate. There’s also just about enough room at the side of the gate to park there. There’s a track which heads up the hill and when it opens up into an area there’s a track down again, and then a scramble over to the scrubland. You can also walk up the side of the barley field but there’s quite a lot of intruding gorse.

Drew – interested to see what you make of these two stones. Coles thought they were part of something, Blood did not.

Visited February 2026

After reading the previous reports from Drew and Carl about the demon undergrowth at this site, I was prepared for battle, although the indefatigable Jamie Swanson had commented recently on facebook that he had done a bit of pruning.

I passed the possible site of the stone circle, then turned left and parked in a little layby which seems to be mostly used nowadays for dumping trash. I considered walking back along the road then headed into the woods instead, where I quickly found myself trapped between gorse and fallen trees. My heroic expedition continued for about 15 minutes (see map image), until I got to a field which was full of sheep watching me. I thought I could see the bit of gorse I needed to get to, but I then heard a burn, so I went to look at that. There is quite a substantial bridge over the burn for the road (see pic), and I imagine that is where the majority of the stone circle went.

I turned around after my bridge discovery and the sheep had moved closer as a block. I def now could see where I thought the circle was, a gorsey area on a rise next to the road, so instead of heading towards it I retreated back through the woods to find the road. From the road you can see the sea, and combined with the burn the spot makes sense as opposed to being a place in the middle of nowhere next to a trash recycling plant.

I walked round by road only to discover there’s a gate right next to the site and even more than that you can actually see two big rocks in the gorse from the road! Thanks Jamie S. for revealing them. The two big stones looked lovely but I didn’t go any closer, having fulfilled my gorse quote for the day already. I would recommend parkign where I parked but walking round strictly by road. I did see a treecreeper though.

Leaving the site I went on to Lower Tynet farm, where they have a fully automated 24 hour shop! Kinda like FEBO in the Netherlands!! So if you are driving on the nearby A road, remember you can always get eggs or milk there, no matter what the time.

“Their present unsightly condition is but another instance of the deplorable want of respect for megalithic remains which has been so prevalent throughout these northern agricultural districts” – said Fred. R. Coles in 1906 -journals.socantscot.org/index.php/psas/article/view/7055

This circle is in a magnificent spot atop a small hill roughly equidistant between Mither Tap and Tap o’Noth. So no wonder the Picts marked an already ancient stone, they must’ve loved this place as a prominent point between two forts, especially ift hey used beacons. I figure an ancient track went past it, and it was probably quite the highway back in the day.

It’s a real shame that a bunch of heathens has tried so hard to blow up the recumbent, it looks a bit sad now, all angular at the ends and yet still unbroken in spirit. Ritchie was already commenting on this attempted idiocy in 1909, so it’s not recent damage. I would blame the ancient landowner but Welfare mentions shepherds who used the recumbent as the back of an almighty fireplace for boiling tar!? I really don’t know why you would do that at the top if a hill, but the stones still standing in the RSC do bear black marks :(

The fallen stones at the circle are a blend of field collection, a possible inner cairn and probably a few fallen orthostats. As my pix show, there’s a stone in the ground halfway between the circle and the outliers, plus another possible outlier at the edge of the trees. The pinky sunset was lush!

Wow it’s bloomin amazing. It’s huge!! The ceiling is composed of massive hunks of pink granite. This was no fridge, don’t make me laugh. This was a supercool hidey hole for giants playing hide and seek. That much is obvious.

Parking is bad, if that’s because the Brownies have cultivated a former layby on the other side of the road then shame on the Brownies, I hope they grow up to realise the error of their ways. But the souterrain itself is just wonderful. I could even stand up at the end! Which put my head amongst the resident flies, an unexpected pleasure in late November.