Tag: Bronze Age

Little Skirtful Carvings, Burley Moor, West Yorkshire

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Cup-Marked Stones: OS Grid Reference – SE 13830 45195

East side of Little Skirtful

Also Known as:

  1. Carving nos. 391a, 391b, 391c, 391d
  2. Little Skirtful of Stones’ Carvings

Getting Here

Follow the directions to reach the Little Skirtful of Stones giant prehistoric cairn. Once here, look for the singular rocks out of the many thousands which make up the giant cairn, mainly from the middle to the northern-half of the cairn, and you’ll find them amidst the mass!

Archaeology & History

Cup-marking near the centre of the cairn

Despite the task sounding difficult, it’s not too hard locating the cup-marked rocks within this giant cairn. As I recall there should be five of them, though the Boughey & Vickerman (2003) survey only list four and I only have photos of four of them as well…so I reckon age is probably getting to me at last!  There could very well be more of them amidst this massive tomb.  But we certainly can’t rely on the Boughey & Vickerman (2003) survey for the carvings at this site as they give the wrong grid references for each of the cup-markings listed, with them all being a kilometre east from the site of the tomb itself! Awesome! God knows what their cartographer was on when he did the profiles for these carvings! (there are plenty of spliff-butts scattered over this moor…..)  Not only that, but the position they cite of the relative cup-markings within the cairn are also wrong.

Another portable stone
Cup-mark at outer edge

But for those of you who like to know the archaeological data, here’s what was said: Carving 391a is a “small rock towards SW edge of cairn, with single worn cup”; but this stone is actually closer to the northern section of the cairn.  Carving 391b was told to be a “small dome-shaped rock at extreme S edge of cairn with single, small clear cup at top of dome.”  This again is more on the northern section of the cairn, away from the centre.  Carving 391c was described as a “small oval, rounded rock at N edge of cairn, with single, broad, shallow worn cup.”  Whilst carving 391d which was told to be a “small rock at SSE edge of cairn, with single small worn cup.”  However, we have to take into account that any errors about their position may simply be down to the fact that the small rocks have been moved.

Smoothed cup
Showing different rock-type

As you’ll see in the photos here, one of them is actually near the very centre of the cairn, with the cup-marking etched into the edge of the small rock itself.  I’m not quite sure if this is the additional fifth carving in the cairn, or whether it’s one of those wrongly ascribed as being in another position.  It’s hard to tell, as the local Ilkley Archaeology team don’t publish their findings and information on-line as they should do and unless you’re in their little club they’re hard to get info out of.  So this will have to do for the time being I’m afraid.  Also note how one of the cup-marked stones is of a rock-type different to the local millstone grit.

Folklore

The creation myth of the Little Skirtful itself tells that the giant Rombald (who gives his name to the moor) was in trouble with his wife and when he stepped over to Almscliffe Crags from here, his giant wife – who is never named – dropped a small bundle of stones she was carrying in her apron. Harry Speight (1900) tells us of a variation of the tale,

“which tradition says was let fall by the aforementioned giant Rumbalds, while hastening to build a bridge over the Wharfe.”

Variations on this story have said it was the devil who made the site, but this is a denigrated christian variant on the earlier, and probably healthier, creation tale. Similar tales are told of the Great Skirtful of Stones, 500 yards south.

The cluster of portable small stones with single cup-marks on them relates to traditions found in other cultures in the world where, usually, women would carry such items in their aprons and deposit them at or on the tomb, in honour of the ancestor or spirit known to be resident at the sacred site.  The folklore found at the Little Skirtful (and Great Skirtful too) of Rombald’s wife dropping the rocks here and forming the giant tomb, probably derive from variants of this same honorary practice.

References:

  1. Bennett, Paul, The Old Stones of Elmet, Capall Bann: Chieveley 2001.
  2. Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAA 2003.
  3. Cowling, Eric T., Rombald’s Way, William Walker: Otley 1946.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Castle Campbell, Dollar, Clackmannanshire

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Cup-Marked Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NS 9613 9928

Getting Here

Cup-markings at Castle Campbell

From Dollar, take the steep road up to Castle Campbell (ask a local if you get lost).  When you’ve got into the building and paid your fiver, walk straight forward as if you’re heading to the front gardens, but stay within the castle by walking left on the inner-front section of the building, all the way along to the dark room in the far corner at the end of the path.  Just before you walk into the end room, look at the ground rock beneath your feet.

Archaeology & History

My first and only visit to the superb half-restored ruins of Castle Campbell was in the company of the author Marion Woolley.  It was a damn good day and the castle here is really worth checking out!  But as Marion and I wandered the grounds and internal remains, my eyes caught sight of what looked like a cluster of cup-markings, never previously recorded, on a section of earthfast rock over which a section of the Castle had been built.

A distinct arc of at least four cup-marks was accompanied with outlying single cups on either side of it.  Beneath the gravel it seemed that more were waiting to be be unearthed—but we left them alone.  As you can see in the photo here, the cup-marks seem typical of those we find in their thousands across northern Britain.  However, the rock hereby is volcanic and conglomerate and may be the result of such natural processes.  I’m truly not sure.  A local archaeologist in Stirling thought the carving looked authentic – but we need to return here and brush off the rest of the gravel to see in greater detail the extent of the cups.  There seemed to be more of them hiding at the edges.

If anyone finds out more about this, or gets some better photos, or ascertains this as a simple geophysical artifact, please lemme know.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Tomochrocher, Glen Lochay, Perthshire

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Cup-Marked Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NN 457 359  —  NEW FIND

Getting Here

The stone in its setting

From Killin heading out along the northern Loch Tay road, turn left just past the Bridge of Lochay hotel and go right to the very end of Glen Lochay, just past Kenknock.  From here you’ve gotta keep walking along the glen’s dirt-track, and when you go through the third gate along (about a mile), another 100 yards on, keep your eyes peeled for a reasonably large boulder on the left of the track. This is your marker to go up on the right-hand side of the track, where the large stone is about 20 yards up the slope.

Archaeology & History

Three cup-marks & their lichen

Not far from a prehistoric hut circle relocated by archaeologist Dugald MacInnes I found this, a previously unrecorded cup-marked stone, when I was ambling about around the top of this beautiful valley last week.  It’s only a simple cup-marked stone with two very distinct cups and a probable third in the middle of the well-defined ones.  A covering of aged lichen was living on the carved rock and it seemed that there may have been other cups beneath the lichen — but I’ve got a real love of these old plants and wasn’t about to tear them from their homely stone.

There are some other little-known unrecorded human remains all along the slopes above here, which I’ll have a look at when next up this Valley of the Black Goddess…

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Blue Stane, St. Andrews, Fife

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Standing Stone: OS Grid Reference – NO 50552 16707

Also Known as:

  1. Blue Stone

Getting Here

The Blue Stane, St. Andrews

From the bus station in town, walk across the road and to your right, as if you’re heading into the town centre.  Barely 100 yards on where you turn left, you’ll see the Blue Stane Hotel across the road right in front of you.  The stone in question sits in a small forecourt on the other side of the metal fence (as the plaque describing the stone tells).

Archaeology & History

Although the Blue Stane is well known to local people in the ancient coastal town of St. Andrews, outside of the area little seems to be known of the place. Even the Royal Commission (1933) report for Fife didn’t include the stone in its survey – and the site is east enough to miss it if you walk past too quickly and don’t have an eye for all things megalithic! When Paul Hornby and I came here, it was pretty easy to find. It helps with there being a small plaque in front of the aptly-named hotel, giving a small history of the stone.

The plaque that tells the tale
The Blue Stane

Standing—or rather, resting—in front of the Blue Stane Hotel, the stone has obviously seen better days. Cut in half from its original size, the small upright block certainly has a very blue haze to it and was probably a prehistoric memorial stone, perhaps attached to a long forgotten tomb somewhere close by.  Nowadays the little fella is only 2 feet high … and is somewhat reminiscent of a petrified Tyrion Lannister: proudly assertive despite his shortcomings! And long may he reign…

Folklore

The historian and folkorist, A. Lindsay Mitchell (1992) told that the stone here was “more of a reddish sandstone colour”, which passed me by, as I’m brilliantly colourblind!  But the fine lady also gave us one of the little known creation myths of the stone, saying:

“Legend has it that an angry giant threw this substantial block of whinstone at the missionary, St. Rule, who had usurped the giant’s influence.  However, legend also records that the giant was not one of life’s bolder characters. He made sure that he remained far enough away frm this upstart, St. Rule, and threw the stone from the safe vantage point of Blebo Craigs, about 5 miles away.”

In Robertson’s (1973) fine work on the history of St. Andrews, he tells how the Blue Stane,

“comes down in the annals as having been a stone altar of pagan times. It was used for long as a meeting or trysting place, and was regarded with superstitious awe by passers-by. Men would give it placatory pat and women a cautious curtsey in the way-going. It is said that the pikemen of St. Andrews touched it assurance before departing in 1314 for (the battle of) Bannockburn.”

References:

  1. Mitchell, A. Lindsay, Hidden Scotland, Lochar: Moffat 1992.
  2. Robertson, James K., About St. Andrews – and About, J. & G. Innes: St Andrews 1973.

Acknowledgments:  Huge thanks to Paul Hornby for use of his photos for this site-profile.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Fingal’s Stone, Killin, Perthshire

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Standing Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NN 5712 3301

Also Known as:

  1. Canmore ID 24192

Getting Here

Fingal’s Stone, Killin

Less than 100 yards up the road from the Co-op in Killin, take the footpath on the same side of the road into the park at the back of the buildings. Keep following the footpath round the back of the buildings and you’ll see the stone in front of you soon enough.

Archaeology & History

Another curious site in this quite beautiful mountainous arena.  Thought to have originally stood by the rounded fairy knoll a bit further up the hill, no one knows for sure when the stone was moved to its present position—but locals will tell you how the curious knob-end atop of the stone was also a later addition to the fallen original, when it was resurrected in the latter half of the 19th century.  C.G. Cash (1912) also found the fairy mound and its companions on the slope above to be of interesting, wondering, as I have, that “they might have been burial mounds.” The local historian William Gillies (1938) said of the stone:

“Both the Old and New Statistical Accounts of the parish of Killin make reference to a site near the village that had been pointed out from time immemorial as the burial place of Fingal, the hero of Celtic folk stories. At this point, which is in the middle of a field immediately behind the schoolhouse, there is a standing stone 2 feet 8 inches high and 5 feet in girth.  The stone had fallen, but in 1889 it was re-erected by Mr Malcolm Fergusson, a patriotic native of Breadalbane.  Without any reference to the original arrangement, a smaller stone was fixed on the top, and others were placed near it. The lands in the vicinity of Fingal’s Stone used to be called Stix.  The name suggests that here, as at Stix between Kenmore and Aberfeldy, there were a number of standing stones, of which this one alone remains.”

And it certainly smells that way… Yet no further monoliths have been found hereby or on the slopes above.

Folklore

Reputed to be a stone that marks the grave of the hero-figure, Fionn.  Local historian  Duncan Fraser (1973) told that:

“Killin is steeped in history and one of its memorials of the past is a standing stone in a field behind the school, that is said to mark the spot where the mighty Fionn lies buried.  He is believed to have died about the end of the Iron Age, in 283 AD.”

Gazing N, to the Cailleach

William Gillies (1938) also reported how tradition said that an early church and graveyard was once to be found at the original site of Fingal’s Stone. Legends of Finn, his magick and his encounters with both faerie and men are found all over the landscape in this neck o’ the woods….

References:

  1. Cash, C.G., “Archaeological Gleanings from Killin,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, volume 46, 1911-12.
  2. Fraser, Duncan, Highland Perthshire, Standard Press: Montrose 1973.
  3. Gillies, William A., In Famed Breadalbane, Munro Press: Perth 1938.
  4. Wheater, Hilary, Killin to Glencoe, Appin Publications: Aberfeldy 1982.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Clach na Boile, Kinloch Rannoch, Perthshire

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Standing Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NN 66983 57984

Also Known as:

  1. Canmore ID 24556
  2. Clach na Voile
  3. Stone of Fury

Getting Here

Clach na Boile & its rocky landscape

From the lovely village of Kinloch Rannoch, take the south road over the river that heads (eventually) to Aberfeldy.  3-400 yards along, another small road meets with the one you’re on, on your right. Stop here! Then look across at the field ahead of you, on your left, and you’ll see a small standing stone amidst the green.  That’s it!

Archaeology & History

This is a small, squat but impressive standing stone, less than 4 feet tall, set amidst a beautiful landscape which catches the eye in every direction.  Found close to the remains of several prehistoric cairns, it seems probable that funerary associations would have happened here, although direct evidence is lacking.

Folklore

Clach na Boile, looking south

Although I can find nothing specific to account for the Gaelic meaning (“stone of fury”) of the monolith, on the other side of the road in the trees is the old house of Innerhadden, where a curious ghost story told how an old inhabitant there was helped by the spirit of one who died in the Battle of Culloden. (Cunningham 1989)

References:

  1. Cunningham, A.D., Tales of Rannoch, Perth & Kinross District Library 1989.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Allt Leathan Stone, Fortingall, Perthshire

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Standing Stone: OS Grid Reference –NN 7251 5659 

Getting Here

Allt Leathan stone

Follow the same directions to reach the Allt Leathan enclosure and hut circles.  Walk along the eastern side of the hill on which the enclosure mainly sits, and as it slopes down the hill, you’ll note an odd-shaped stone leaning at an angle less than halfway down.

Archaeology & History

A truly curious and fascinating site, not previously recorded, but found by Paul Hornby on August 7, 2012, during a venture to explore the nearby settlement and hut circles around Meall Dubh.  On the eastern slope over the edge of the Allt Leathan enclosure, with its hut circles and possible cairns, we see this upright worn stone, leaning at an angle, which would stand nearly 5 feet high if pushed properly upright.  It is found in association with two other smaller stones, all of which stand and lean in the same direction.

Possible cairn remnants surrounds base of stone
…and again

Around the base of the main stone is a scatter of small rocks, as if suggesting that a cairn was once next to the standing stone, perhaps inferring that the stone marked a tomb.  There is also a very distinct line of walling running along the axis of the upright stones, meaning that we cannot discount the possibility that the monoliths here were connected with a walled enclosure in some capacity. And considering the excess of other prehistoric remains close by, this may be more likely than not!

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Tullibody Stone Circle, Clackmannanshire

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‘Stone Circle’ (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NS 86 95

Archaeology & History

In Alex Wilson’s (1901) rare work he gives the only reference of what may have been a stone circle once found in the township of Tullibody.  On a talk given at the Alloa Archaeology Society in the 19th century, the site was mentioned by one of the speakers in his talk on the standing stones of Stirlingshire and district.  Mr Wilson told us:

“…at a meeting in November 1871, Rev. Mr Bryson made one of his first speeches before the Society, and spoke of Boulders found in the district, and how these were gradually disappearing owing to the utilitarian spirit of the age.  Mr Bryson related how that he had been informed that about 60 or 70 years ago there existed seven or eight boulders round about the Boulder at Tullibody, which Mr Duncan had spoken of.”

This is a brief but intriguing account!  Whether we can ascribe the “seven or eight boulders” in the description as merely glacial erratics, or whether the ruins of a stone circle were here as the description seems to imply, we don’t know.  If anyone has any additional information they can add to this account, please let us know.

References:

  1. Wilson, Alex, Review of Proceedings since Inauguaration, Alloa Society of Natural Science and Archaeology, Buchan Bros: Alloa 1901.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Craigmaddie Muir (2), Baldernock, Stirlingshire

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Chambered Cairn (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NS 58 76

Also Known as:

  1. Blochairn 2
  2. Canmore ID 44421
  3. STR 3 (Henshall)

Archaeology & History

Close to the ruined Craigmaddie Muir cairn could once have seen a companion, of roughly the same size and structure and made up of thousands of small stones, covering a long internal chamber. It was described in David Ure’s (1793) early history work on the area which, even then, thanks to “frequent dilapidations, will soon be annihilated.” The cairn was included in A.S. Henshall’s (1972) magnum opus in which she wrote:

“There was a second cairn in the vicinty of Craigmaddie Muir I. It was also ‘of an elliptical shape.’ Writing in 1793, Ure says that it ‘was laid open last year, and, though not so large as the other, was of the same construction, which seems to be Danish.  Some of the stones placed in the rows at the bottom are considerably large… Among the contents, upon opening…were urns… One of the fragments of an urn is ornamented, near the mouth, with two shallow grooves. The diameter of the circle of which it is a segment seems to have been at least 20in.”

Fragments of human bones were also found within the site, but the entire cairn was sadly destroyed a long time ago. In the Stirlingshire Royal Commission report (1963:1) it was speculated that the urn found herein,

“must have been either a neolithic vessel or a cinerary urn. In view of the method of construction of the chamber it may be assumed that both cairns were related to the Arran or Clyde-Carlingford types.”

References:

  1. Henshall, Audrey Shore, The Chambered Tombs of Scotland – volume 2, Edinburgh University Press 1972.
  2. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Stirlingshire – volume 1, HMSO: Edinburgh 1963.
  3. Ure, David, The History of Rutherglen and East Kilbride, Glasgow 1793.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Balbirnie Stone Circle, Markinch, Fife

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Stone Circle: OS Grid Reference – NO 28585 02968

Also Known as:

  1. Balfarg Stone Circle
  2. Druid’s Circle

Getting Here

Balbirnie stone circle – with Marion checking it out!

Take the A92 road running north out of Glenrothes towards Freuchie and, after a couple of miles out of town, you’ll hit the B969 road on your left.  Across from here on the other side of the road, you’ve just passed a small B-road that takes you to Markinch.  That’s where you need to be!  Go along there for less than 100 yards and turn first right, swerving along the tree-lined road for 200 yards or so. Watch out, just before the first house on your left, for a footpath which leads into the woods. Walk down it, barely 10 yards!

Archaeology & History

This is a lovely megalithic ring in a lovely setting – albeit a new one. The circle was originally positioned some 125 yards northwest of here and would have been destroyed, but was thankfully reconstructed by Fife Council before road-widening of the A92 was done. And the job’s a good one! But as Burl (2005) tells, this wasn’t the first time Balbirnie had been threatened with damage:

The southeast stones & cists
Balbirnie from the roadside, looking SE

“With some stones removed in the eighteenth century, dug into in 1883 when bones and sherds were found, damaged by trees, it was finally excavated and restored in 1970-71,” before the main road was built. Thankfully it’s still here – and an excellent stone circle it is! However, the reconstructed site here doesn’t show the circle in its entirety. Originally there were ten standing stones making up the ring, as opposed to the seven you can see today.

The site was built amidst the scatter of other larger, and once more impressive, mythically important monuments than the circle – but it’s as likely that the circle added more to the sacred dimensions of the region as a whole when it first came to be built. For on the other side of the A92 we can still see the denuded remains of the Balfarg Riding School Henge, with imitations of its internal upright posts resurrected into position to give an idea of what once stood inside the sacred enclosure. And then about 200 yards west of that, the gigantic Balfarg Henge is impressively surrounded by a modern housing estate, built with the henge in mind, with its outlying megaliths and internal level surface area graciously intact. It’s a truly impressive prehistoric area all round, although the Balbirnie stone circle was built some considerable time after the two henges had been done, many centuries later…

Before the circle was moved, the consensus profile of the site was that given by the Royal Commission (1933) lads following their visit here in June 1925, when they told it looked like this:

Royal Commission ground-plan, c.1933

“At the southern end of a small wood on the east side of the main road from Kirkcaldy to Falkland, about 180 yards south of Balbirnie Lodge, are the remains of a large circular cairn and of the setting of standing stones by which it was once surrounded… The circle, which has had a diameter of some 48 feet, has been composed of sandstone boulders. Four of these are still in place, but one other on the southeast has been slightly displaced, while against the stone on the northeast lie two large boulders, which apparently have been transferred to this position. Any other stones that may once have existed have been removed or destroyed. The greatest height above ground of any of those that survive is 5 feet 6 inches, while one, which rises no more than 2 feet, measures in circumference as much as 9 feet 9 inches at the base. The cairn itself seems to have been broken into at two points. No record of these excavations appears to be extant, but a number of fragments of cinerary urns from the site are preserved in the National Museum. These indicate that, as might have been inferred from its general character, the monument was sepulchral and dates from the Bronze Age.”

Sepulchral indeed. When the stone circle was excavated at the beginning of the 1970s by J.N.G. Ritchie (1974) and his mates, it was discovered this was a primary function of the site. As Burl (2000) wrote:

“At Balbirnie patches of cremated bone lay underneath some circle-stones. Whatever the ceremonies here they were interrupted when the site was converted into a cemetery. Four or five cists associated with a late beaker and a jet button were constructed within the ring. The date of about 1650 BC came from wood alongside the beaker. Stretches of low walling were put up between the stones forming a continuous barrier…analogous to the embanked stone circles elsewhere in Britain that seem generally to belong to a period in the mid-second millennium… But the first cists did not long remain undisturbed and were seemingly rifled when later cists were built that contained the cremations of women and children… One of these later cists held a food-vessel and a flint knife.

“The stone circle was further abused. A low cairn was piled over all the cists. Sherds of deliberately broken urns, one with barley impressions, were scattered amongst the boulders, intermingled with small coagulations of burnt human bone. This last phase at Balbirnie occurred late in the second millennium BC, for a C-14 determination of…1200 to 900 BC came from the land surface that had built up within the ring during the centuries while the stone circle remained open to the weather.”

Measuring 49 feet across at the widest, this flattened ellipse also possessed a curious rectangular section of laid stone, near the middle of this circle, almost ‘Roman-road’ like in appearance and covering about a quarter of the internal arena. It’s visible today at the reconstructed site and looks almost intrusive! Measuring some 11 feet by 9 feet, the flat stone surface has been suggested as a place where corpses were rested.

Also found within two of the tombs inside the circle were the cup-and-ring marked stones of Balbirnie 1 and Balbirnie 2, showing yet again the relationship that some of these carvings have with spirits of the dead.

References:

  1. Burl, Aubrey, “Intimations of Numeracy in the Neolithic and Bronze Age Societies of the British Isles (c.3200-1200 BC),” in Archaeological Journal, volume 133, 1976.
  2. Burl, Aubrey, Rings of Stone, BCA: London 1979.
  3. Burl, Aubrey, The Stone Circles of Britain, Ireland and Brittany, Yale University Press 2000.
  4. Burl, Aubrey, A Guide to the Stone Circles of Britain, Ireland and Brittany, Yale University Press 2005.
  5. Denston, C.B., “The Cremated Remains from Balbirnie, Fife,” in Archaeological Journal, volume 131, 1974.
  6. Ritchie, J.N.G., “Excavation of the Stone Circle and Cairn at Balbirnie, Fife,” in Archaeological Journal, volume 131, 1974.
  7. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Inventory of Monuments and Constructions in the Counties of Fife, Kinross and Clackmannan, HMSO: Edinburgh 1933.

Acknowledgements:  Huge thanks to Marion Woolley for getting us out to see this and the related neolithic monuments.  Cheers m’ dears!

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian