Hob

Those who refer to the Ancient Italian Wall Builders as ‘R*mans’ will not like this site.

It’s rock art that’s been kidnapped by the Romans! The fiends!

It’s smack bang in the English Heritage Corbridge site. Hence quite easy to find, but incurs a £3.50 admission fee.

I was a bit deflated to find that no mention is made of it in the obligatory ‘stuff that was found here’ museum, especially given that it is placed on the edge of a mystery building. And you know what mystery buildings were used for doncha? Ritual purposes. Which begs the question, what were romans, or romano brits doing lugging what looks like it was a great lump of earthfast rock art, all the way into some strange structure, of purpose unknown, at a site that had alleged mithraic cult activity? Questions should be asked in parliament.

I couldn’t help think that it may have come from the same ridge as the possible cist cover at St John Lee. This ridge overlooks the eastern end of the confluence of the North and South Tyne, and would have been a very useful place to spy out the land. In such places is free range rock art found round these parts.

Ask at the till which is building 11, and approach it along the stanegate. It rests on a low wall, conspicuous as the only stone that isn’t a rectangular lump.

Possible cist cover, in a church.

It probably came from the ridge nearby, having been found in field clearance, following the ploughing of some mounds which may have been burial cairns. So syas Stan B, and so says a nice handpainted explanatory sheet framed above the stone.

Very weathered, the motifs have been ‘enhanced’ by some kind of paint, porobably wtaercolour, which has soaked into the carvings. It’s not in-your-face, like some painted enhancing I’ve seen, and I don’t think it detracted from my appreciation of the carvings.

It’s on the right hand side of the door as you enter. The Rev. was quite happy to allow access, and was quite chatty, being interested in the more recent archaology of the area.

Couldn’t help thinking it would feel happier outside in the fresh air though, somewhere it wouldn’t get battered by the elements, but I guess at least putting it in the church makes it easy to find.

Disabled access is fine, but if in a car, don’t come from the east, via the hamlet of Anick, as the road gets very poor and very steep. Rather come from Acomb. If on a bike, it’s worth the brief climb up to Anick, passing the ridge the stone originally came from, as it gives a bit of context to the carving.

I never tire of this place. Been here more than any other ancient site. It sometimes looks exactly as the last visit, other times it’s seemed totally different, like a different place, depending on the season/weather etc.

For the sake of a change, we decided to approach this time from the east. Not wise, the roads are narrow, the bends tight and the tractors large. In future, I think the more sensible route from Little Salkeld is the way to approach, it has signposts and everything. It even used to have piles of gravel to block solstice access to hippy vehicles, but I think they’re gone or overgrown now (the piles of gravel, not the hippies).

Tombo makes ref to a possible recumbent figure to the west. I’ve wondered if this is Lazonby Moor (it must be...). Annoyingly, the air was muggy on this visit, so I couldn’t check, but I recall a december with crystal clear air, and low light, where the recumbent figure was unmistakable.

This time I noticed the increased shinyness of the spiral carvings, presumably from traces of fingertip skin cells accumulated over the years. Maybe one day this will be C14 dated by future archaeologists to prove the stone was erected in the early 21st century.

I was very taken with the small raised circular platform in the middle of the henge. It’s just off centre, only a few inches high. It put the fancy into my head that this was a cousin to the aboriginal Australian bora circles, and that the henge was built around a pre-neolithis ritual platform.

Probably totally tosh, I know, but if there’s another more sensible explanation, I don’t know that I want to hear it, it would spoil the delusion.

Even dodgier idea, is that the big stone planter in the carpark of the pub is the remains of one of the two stones alleged to have stood over the entrance to the henge. The pub Landlord was adamant about the truth of this claim. It it is such a large thing, it must have taken some effort to reduce it to an oversized garden ornament. Though it looked more like sandstone to me, and not of the same stuff as the central stone of Mayburgh, not that that means anything either way.

Having read Fitzcoraldo’s tales of stone hunting in Shap, I was well keen to revisit the area, and this was a logical place to go, it’s so close to car access it would have been silly not to.

We had time to ponder the stone, where did it come from? Was it carried by glaciers? How far did the Hengineers have to shift it?

But then my attention was drawn to the small prannets of the bank, which poke through in patches all over. How many are there? How long did it take? Were they brought after the central stone, or was it brought after them? Are there any buried that might have cup marks on them? Why only one entrance?

Then the henge started playing tricks, like nicking my camera twice, sending a bull to come snort, and generally behaving in a Loki-esque manner. It’s got character.

The stones Nigel mentions below are pretty unconvincing, being rather small compared to the ones lying prone in the field across the road (the field on the map). They’ve got the reddish cast that implies they’ve been underground for a goodly while, whatever that implies.

If you hadn’t read of the contoversy, you’d think ‘blimey these circles have been well and truly wrecked’, and would probably be dissapointed. But if you have read the controversy, and like whodunnits, you could have a whale of a time here, trying to piece the clues together.

One thing I’d add, is that the distribution of the prone stones if unlike that of the natural sarsen drifts on Fyfield down. They seem buried a lot deeper for a start, just barely peeking above the turf for the most part. But that’s just my perception, and even if accurate, is proof of nowt at all.

We found getting here reasonably easy with a 3-wheel buggy. Gate rather than stile.

Only saw one other bod, in over an hour and a half, compared to the afternoon crowds at Avebury, it was bliss. Peaceful place, even despite the military transport droning overhead. The barrows are well defined, as are the ditches. We had a picnic as it seemed the thing to do at a causewayed camp.

It struck me that it would be an excellent place to watch the sunset, you’d get a really good idea of the local topography watching the shadows change. When you read about the Avebury area, and stare at the maps, you get an illusion of familiarity with the landscape and how the monuments are set within it. But I reckon spending an hour or more up here is the way to try and get your head around it all, if only because there are no cars or crowds.

There are some strange patches of lichen, that made me think that someone has been painting the stones with yoghurt.

These are massive, Adam especially is on par with the Swindon stone and the Devil’s Chair.

As Moth says, the access is decent, we asked at the farm, no probs they said, we got an oversized 3wheeler buggy over the wire easily, no gate though so wheelchairs would be a bit more problematical.

Got buzzed by an attack ‘copter, the airspace around here is full of contraptions.

If, whilst mooching about the Avenue, you should happen to notice some anomalous concentric circular marks in the field on the hill opposite (not Waden, the other side), don’t get excited, it’s nowt more than the remains of last year’s crop circle.

Take the time to examine as many stones as you can. They all have their own individual features, in that smashing sarseny style.

What a strange and lovely spot this is.

If you approach from the houses on the edge of Wooler, and go down the path from Waud House, you walk along a nice well defined flat path, through a really steep ravine, the Kettles fort overlooks from the right, and as you pass the Kettles, the ravine widens and bifurcates. The well is at the point where the ravine heads off to the right, towards the scree.

Immediately above the well is the natural rock outcrop of the King’s Chair, which sort of looms out of the side of the hill, silently having a sly neb at anyone passing. But you don’t see it until you turn around, it gave me a bit of a surprise.

It could be the fact that we visited at dusk, but this place really did have a magical quality to it. The well itself is a very rude affair, just piled stones really, but the ones on the top areobviously way younger than those at the bottom.

There’s been no excavations, so you couldn’t say for sure if there is any prehistoric signifiance to this site, but I defy anyone who visits to argue that this would not have been regarded as a special place since humans first explored these hills.

People still visit to drop bent pins into the water (you can see them as the water is nice and clear) and make a wish. I’m told this has been recorded going on since the 19thC, and that the tradition allegedly goes back much further. Make of that what you will.