In the field containing the RSC, about halfway between the fence and the circle is a stone poking out of the ground which certainly could be another outlier (part of an avenue?). The two standing outliers are directly behind me..
Another possible outlier stone lying at the edge of the trees near to the two ones still standing
Such a wonderful site, apologies for the finger top right. I hadn’t noticed the potential to hold water on the top surface of the recumbent before (or I had and then forgotten). A nice feature, kinda looks like a pair of eyes.
Recumbent, looking towards Bennachie, October 2025
Sketch map of the barony of Carnousie
Prehistoric traces accordingly are numerous. A short cist was dug out in the Cunning Howe, and others on the farm of Castlehill, while burials were found on the slopes of Cairnhill—the name of which is significant. The remains of at least two stone circles and a much dilapidated cairn. Cairn Ennit, survive in the Whitehill Wood (now cut). Flint and stone implements have been turned up in various localities. A little further to the east, in the grounds of Forglen House, are the notable Bronze Age burial mounds known as
Rounie Law and Barbara’s Hillock, from the latter of which a short cist grave was recovered, while the former yielded three unburnt and uncisted interments associated with beaker urns, charcoal and, in one instance, a flint arrowhead.
Seems like this used to be a biggie:
“Stone circles vary very much in size ... one at Innesmill, Urquhart, is 120 feet” – banffshirefieldclub.org.uk/PDFs/BOOK_8/Banffshire_Field_Club_Transactions_1908-1909_-_1909_The_Stone_and_Bronze_Ages_in_Scotland_WM.pdf
“Perhaps the largest is one in the parish of Urquhart, which is a hundred and twenty feet in diameter.” – banffshirefieldclub.org.uk/PDFs/BOOK_9/Banffshire_Field_Club_Transactions_1910-1914_-_1911_Sepulchral_Stone_Circles_WM.pdf
1968: completely destroyed about twenty years ago
NJ94SE0022 – SKELMUIR HILL – Site of three standing stones which were probably part of a stone circle. They were removed before 1904. No further information.
After an interesting presentation of the Inveravon Pictish Stones – the church is heading into community ownership apparently and the mound above the stones has never been excavated – we thought a quick visit to Lagmore East would work out before it rained, and it did.
The gate to the field can be opened and we respectfully saluted the sheepies. On looking at HER, it’s claimed this is a clava cairn, I’m not sure about that there’s not really enough left to see. There’s also supposed to be another fallen stone with cupmarks which was not visible under the turf.
We discussed how it’s kind of odd that one of the remaining stones looks rectangular and pretty easy to repurpose as a lintel, but it wasn’t looted. Our last theory: this was an unfinished circle and never had a full complement of stones.
Remains of a Clava type cairn. Five stones remain, being part of an outer circle of monoliths, consisting of three that are standing and two fallen, which would have formed a circle just over 30 m in diameter. The northwest stone shows signs of splitting. One of the fallen stones to the northeast bears a number of cup-marks. Only a slight ground disturbance indicates the cairn and it cannot be ascertained whether it has been a passage grave or a ring cairn. It is depicted on the OS 1st and 2nd edition maps as remains of a stone circle. The cup-marked stone was visited in July 2021 by Scotland’s Rock Art Project, but the panel could not be viewed as covered by deep turf, which was not removed.
I was exploring the most excellent Cruickshank Botanic Gardens when I saw the mound and knew I had to investigate. What a great location next to the Don, it seems notable that St. Machar’s Cathedral was plonked close to it. The HER link tells about the recent excavations.
A prominent conical mound, formerly thought to be a motte, but which excavation showed to be much earlier, a defended site dating possibly to the Bronze Age, also to the 1st century AD. There appears to have been no medieval occupation of the site. This artificial mound is located at the south end of Seaton Park, Old Aberdeen....
Visited in 2012, when I cycled round the island in a week!
Just as some of the previous commentators have said, I’ve had varied reactions to this stone circle. One time before I didn;t really like it at all, possibly because the sight lines are blocked by trees. This time round visiting with two friends, I quite enjoyed myself. Do wish I’d stood in the middle of the cairn and will have to do that next time.
The split recumbent is a good conversation point, as is the alleged line of cupmarks on a stone, we could only find two. There are three different info boards now, the old one at the entrance saying 312 burials, the new one inside saying 31? I do like the burial cist board with the three ravers, hands in the air and feathers in the hair giving it their all for the DJ.
However, I remain slightly annoyed by the recent gravestone right at the northwest edge of the site, just inside the fallen fence. I’m also a bit annoyed that it irks me, but it’s not cool. There’s a small headstone and two flower pots. “E. Garland 1941-2014” – is it a former akela? I normally don’t like this form of argument but ... what if everyone did this? I wouldn’t mind a plaque on a tree outside the field or ashes being scattered, and yes it does seem to be a site which had a funerary function, but a gravestone right on the edge of the scheduled monument is just disrespectful for me. The lack of prior mention makes me think it hasn’t been there long, although I did see it last year already.
As a final point, there’s a pile of stones in the southern corner of the field which I felt drawn to. When you go stand on them, it might actually be bedrock. If the grass was stripped off and everywhere was bedrock this site would have a very different feel, it would be a lot more brutal.
Visited today, 150925.
There was once a monument so large, so incredible, it attracted travellers, archaeologists, and tourists from across the Isles to admire its fragments, several times described as “pyramids”. Paintings of this mysterious monument survive, but what exactly was it? And what can archaeology tell us about its origins? Destroyed in the 18th and 19th centuries – Shap Avenue – was once Britian’s largest megalithic monument, stretching several miles through the landscape. Bigger than Stonehenge and Avebury, should we instead be analysing the importance of SHAP AVENUE.
[note – despite the bombastical promo it’s pretty good]
The Oxenham Arms is a very interesting historic building in South Tawton (SX650936) not far from Okehampton. It is claimed the building started life as an early Christian monastery in the twelfth century. It was built around a large standing stone that is thought to be prehistoric. The prehistoric stone is embedded in the wall of the small snug room at the back of the pub. It is listed on the Devon & Dartmoor HER as a prehistoric standing stone. In the dining room across the corridor is another stone which is claimed to be early Christian and was probably imported into the building in the eighteenth or nineteenth century... dartmoorwalks.org.uk/site/oxenham.php
This is the first RSC I visited, around 2020. It’s a beautiful site now – impressive after what it’s been through, yet also understandable because it’s such a fantastic location. The stones are on the small side, but the framing of being set amongst the hills is overwhelmingly impressive.
It is def one of my fave sites and I was happy to go there recently with two friends who also loved it. They couldn’t get over how much the recumbent looks like a whale and also pondered hard over how the stone got there. Hopefully they are now also stoneheads!
I joined an archaeological dig close to here which has been investigating another site with possible usage back to the neolithic. In time I’ll log that but perhaps it’s best kept unmentioned for now since the dig is ongoing – happy to share details privately.
Afterwards I decided go for a walk on the hill and “discovered” the maiden castle [hahaha] whilst checking out the graveyard structure which is basically next to it. The wall of that can now easily be seen from the footpath since the (plantation) trees have been chopped down. If you make your way over the logging destruction, then you’ll see the “castle” behind it marked by a ring of mighty beech trees. I guess it was a dun which has been looted over time?
Maiden’s Castle is a great location, was cool to stumble across it. The mysteries of Bennachie are plentiful!]
” Apart from evidence of non-ferrous metalworking, a piece of early medieval decorated glass and a glass bead, there are three radiocarbon dates from contexts below and above the inner rampart, and beneath the wall of the circular internal building, all of them falling in the range of AD 410-640. ” -hillforts.arch.ox.ac.uk/records/SC2962.html
Thanks to Drewbhoy for reminding me that I visited here in 2022 or 2023. Loved the place! I was just driving past and it grabbed me. I took this pic as a self portrait and used it on my online dating profile, which resulted in ZERO dates :)
“Stonehenge always demands attention and sometime it sucks a bit of the oxygen out of the room when it comes to prehistory. Nevertheless, when the opportunity arose last year (thanks to Jennifer Wexler at English Heritage) to film inside the stones, we leapt at the chance. We’ve been so grateful to be able to use the time to create our homage to the latter of the two bookends of the Göbekli Tepe to Stonehenge Project. We hope you enjoy it.”
i like how the (probably displaced) recumbent aligns with the hill
The logical spot to park to go see the dun is at the layby on the A9 at
NH 76570 83716, opposite Morangie distillery.
Beside the layby is an ENORMOUS erratic, which has sunk down into a hollow so far I don’t think you can see it when driving north, although you can when driving south. It is inscribed with a dedication to Walter Scott and is known as the Big Stone of Morangie.
The Tain museum website gives three folk tales about the stone –
1 Two giants, one on Struy and the other on Tarbat Ness, were throwing a large stone to each other when one of them got tired and the stone fell half way and landed at Morangie.
2 “When Glenmorangie Distillery was being built in 1843, one of the masons engaged on the work was wont to repair to this stone at the dinner hour to eat his ‘piece’, and at the same time occupy himself in commemorating one to whose memory, no doubt, he was deeply attached”
3 “As far as I can remember, he said the lady was passing through Tain when she heard of the death of Sir Walter Scott & being a great admirer of the novelist asked & obtained permission from Major Rose’s father, who owned Tarlogie at that time, to have the inscription cut on the stone.” Other, relatively reliable sources, identify the lady as a Miss Lindsay who “had published a book on ‘Boulders’ or some such subject” and state that it was carved by a mason working on a bridge nearby.
Source – tainmuseum.org.uk/article.php?id=199
“In 1760 the broch measured 30’ internally, with walls 12 1/2’ thick at base and battered externally, surviving to 15’ in height. ”
To my surprise, the church is now a home! Didn’t meet anyone on my visit but also didn’t enter the former churchyard. I found the smaller of the two stones then walked around like an idiot looking for the big one for a while until I went back to my car and it was right next to it :)
Reminds me of a pleasant afternoon spent with a pal in Kent looking for Wayland’s Smithy, let’s just say sometimes the stones can lead us on a merry old dance.
After sitting in the sunshine for a while absorbing the lessons of Old Keig RSC, I decided to give myself another chance to find Cothiemuir Wood circle. I had stupidly managed to come out without both a charged phone and a OS map, so I was a bit in the dark. I’d already got as far as the sign off the road for the natural burial site, which since it used an image of the recumbent and flankers was probably a fair bet, so I went back towards Cothiemuir from Old Keig (which is pretty close) and impulsively decided to park on an unused track just off the road at the bend before the burial site turnoff. I wandered up though lovely trees and suddenly spied a flanker standing tall!
It’s a beautiful site, nowadays standing in an area of chopped trees, funny how that really changes things in photos but in reality it probably always had a great ambience. Trees still visible and of course the hill, not the water – I always forget to look for the water, which is often nearby. Of course that was down the hill beside the road and the old granary.
The flankers were great! They are pink granite and very impressive in person. The recumbent is huge and had a mad face in it. I was at first puzzled by the slab in the middle with burnt wood nestling underneath it, but that of course was the cist.
I had been there for a while when two other people appeared, which made me realise how lucky I am in Aberdeenshire to mostly have circles to myself. Still I didn’t mind to share the space since I was thinking to head off; we said hello and one woman chatted with me about stone circles. She seemed quite knowledgeable so I enquired if she knew this website and she said she doesn’t really use the internet which I have to admit surprised me.
In this day and age, I’d find it very hard to research sites without this site and the internets more broadly. She told me she was a therapist and perhaps unsurprisingly she then told me the stones have healing properties – I don’t necessarily disagree. In her opinion, Cothiemuir has a gentle healing energy, Old Keig more aggressive, Sunhoney is the best for healing, Monymusk is for making decisions, Midmar has hard energy, Aikey Brae is a good one as is Berrybrae.
This made me wonder if my habit of trying to see two or three RSCs in an afternoon is the right approach; I do remember having a very nice relaxing time at Sunhoney and I would say Midmar once felt pretty scary visiting at midnight, however I also do think we all take (and give) different things to the stones. In any case it was an interesting spring equinox conversation. She told me confidently that the beautiful flankers had been quarried at Bennachie and most neighbouring stone circles had some pink in them. I do hope the two women had a great healing sesion after I left. I certainly enjoyed finding Cothiemuir and next time I’d park at the burial site, which is I think is probably what they did.
What a cracker of a monument!! I’ve tried to find this a few times and finally succeeded on the spring equinox. As others have noted, the setting is sublime and despite only the recumbent and flankers remaining, it’s a stunning site, with the view down to Dunnideer castle and the way the hill drops away.
I hadn’t seen Stoneheid’s message so I parked on the road just off the junction, which seemed out of the way enough to me then walked down and hopped the rickety gate.
So Craigroy is the farm next door (with an impressively large recumbent stone next to the road) and this site is actually on the land of Haugh Farm. I was lucky enough to have an introduction to the farmers, who were happy to show me the stones and at the same time ensure their dogs didn’t eat me :) They said they hadn’t thought much about the provenance of the stones and guessed maybe they were Pictish, so I was happy to tell them the little I knew about bronze age burials. Lovely people. After later researching the site as I enjoy doing, I’ve sent them some links and told them about the excellent NLS maps service.
Having just read Richard Hayman’s excellent ‘Riddles in Stone’ it really tickles me how he says that people are wont to interpret ancient sites in the way that fits their own world view. So for example classical scholars saw stone circles in the light of Athenian temples, and I see sites as possible rave venues. This small grave is in a beautiful location near to the River Avon as it surges down to the Spey.
Canmore says this is a burial cist marked by the three stones and I interpret that as the excavators leaving the three standing as markers, because I’ve never seen a cist like that before. It also occurs to me it’s a small burial site and perhaps many sites like this have been destroyed over the years. It’s currently listed here as a bank barrow, which seems unlikely because it is so small.
I came up through rhododendron bushes from the Foulford Bridge cairn, a route which I would not recommend. Better to come on the track from the bridge and then climb a quick steep ascent.
A tunnel dug by animals through the stones of the cairn
Garrrr this one was a nightmare, the rhododendron bushes have completely taken over (see pix) so I got close to it but didn’t see anything :(
Found this cairn quite easily following a mossy track off from the main way at the Foulford bridge. This is the closest one to the bridge. The pheasant prison is gone! Just the foundations remain. The cairn will outlast us all.