Cat Nab, Brotton, North Yorkshire

Tumulus (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NZ 6692 2154

Archaeology & History

Location on 1930 OS-map

This long lost burial mound was first located by the local antiquarian William Hornsby in the early 20th century.  It had been constructed close to the summit of the prominent rise  of Cat Nab, immediately east above Saltburn.  Its position was shown on the 1930 OS-map of the area.  Destroyed by quarrying, it was thankfully excavated by Hornsby in 1913; and although his finds were never published, he left notes which told us that,

“there were two cremations and the sherds of at least three vessels: a collared urn, a pygmy cup and a vessel with an everted rim.” (Crawford 1980)

Crawford (1980) told that these finds could been seen in the Middlesborough Collection.

References:

  1. Crawford, G.M., Bronze Age Burial Mounds in Cleveland, Cleveland County Council 1980.

Acknowledgements:  Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian


Mount Lodge, Portobello, Edinburgh, Midlothian

Cairn (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NT 3071 7366

Archaeology & History

The only reference I can find of this long lost cairn is in William Baird’s (1898) massive history work of the area—but even in his day he reported that “it has long since disappeared.”  He wrote:

“We have a curious reference in a charter of Kelso Abbey, granted about 1466, to a cairn of stones which stood near the south-east corner of the garden wall at Mount Lodge, Portobello.  In the charter, where it is referred to as forming part of the boundary of the lands of Figgate, it is described as, ‘a certain heap of stones there deposited.'”

The cairn was likely of considerable size and, said Baird, “in all probability marked the site of an ancient place of sepulture.”

References:

  1. Baird, William, Annals of Duddingston and Portobello, Andrew Elliot: Edinburgh 1898.

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Warsett Hill, Brotton, North Yorkshire

Round Barrows (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NZ 692 214

Archaeology & History

Tumuli shown on 1920 map

On top of the large plateau that is Warsett Hill, on the southwest side of the old trig-point, could once be seen a cluster of at least seven burial mounds or tumuli.  The mounds are shown on the first OS-map of the area, but merely as mounds.  It wasn’t until there’d been a subsequent investigation here by local historian J.C. Atkinson in the 19th century that they were highlighted on the 1920 map as “Tumuli.”  Sadly, since then, they’ve all been destroyed.

Very brief notes were written on six out of the seven tombs here by William Hornsby (1917), with only one of them receiving any real attention.  “Of the other six,” Crawford (1980) wrote,

“there is very little information; all were excavated by Atkinson prior to 1893, but his excavations revealed no finds and he stated that all of the mounds had been previously disturbed.  They were later dug by Hornsby, who stated that although he found no sepulchral deposits, all the mounds contained flints.”

In medieval times this became a beacon site, where bonfires were lit.  I can find no further information about this. (NB: This site should not to be confused with another Warsett Hill that exists two miles southeast of here above Skinningrove.)

References:

  1. Crawford, G.M., Bronze Age Burial Mounds in Cleveland, Cleveland County Council 1980.
  2. Hornsby, William & Stanton, R., “British Barrows near Brotton,” in Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, volume 24, 1917.

Acknowledgements:  Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Folly Top, Barden Moor, North Yorkshire

Ring Cairn:  OS Grid Reference – SE 03536 59756

Getting Here

Folly Top ring, looking E

It’s easier to explain how to get here if you’re coming from the Burnsall-side of the B6160 road that leads to Bolton Abbey.  A half-mile out of Burnsall village you a small woodland with a small parking spot.  From here, a footpath runs up the steep hill above the parking spot.  It zigzags a little and you eventually come out on the south-side of the trees where it meets some tall walling.  Follow this walling further uphill for more than 600 yards (past more woodland) until the land starts to level out.  Hereby, go thru an opening in the wall and less than 100 yards away (west) amidst the overgrown heather, you’ll see what you’re looking for.

Archaeology & History

A large but peculiar site resting on a moorland plateau on the eastern edges of the mighty Barden Moor.  Peculiar inasmuch as it’s completely isolated from any other monument of the same age and type anywhere on these huge moors.  A few miles east, on the moors around Appletreewick, Thruscross and Beamsley we have a plethora of prehistoric sites—but up here on Barden Moor there’s apparently nowt else!  I find that hard to believe….

Inner rubble walling
Rubble walling, looking N

Listed on official websites as being a ring cairn, it’s difficult without a detailed excavation of the site (there hasn’t been one) so say that’s what it is.  But we’ll stick with it for the time being.  My initial impression of the site was that it was a crude form of a collapsed Scottish dun: impressive large circular monuments—buildings if you like—with very well-built large stone walls, usually several yards thick, a little bit like the Scottish brochs (mighty things indeed!).  This thing at Folly Top isn’t quite as impressive, but it’s like a collapsed version of a dun.

Arc of western walling

The site consists of large ring of raised collapsed rubble walling, more than a yard high in places, and about three yards thick all the way round, measuring roughly 21 yards (N-S) by 19 yards (E-W) from outer wall to outer wall.  There are “entrances” on the east and west sides; but there seemed to be little of any note in the middle of the ring, although the site was somewhat overgrown on our visit here.  Outside of the ring there was also nothing of any note.  It’s a pretty isolated monument which seems to have more of an Iron Age look about it than the Bronze Age—but until there’s an excavation, we’ll not know for sure.

It’s well worth checking out—and from here, walk onto the huge moorland above you to the west….

Acknowledgements:  Huge thanks to the Crazy-gang of Sarah, Helen and James for their awesome assistance on our venture up here.  A damn good day indeed!  Cheers doods. 🙂

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Ballakelly, Santon, Isle of Man

Cup-Marked Stone:  OS Grid Reference – SC 32144 71990

Also Known as:

  1. Oatland

Archaeology & History

This carving is one that was found inside the remains of a chambered cairn and so, as with all things petroglyphic, it deserves its very own site profile.  It’s been mentioned before—in fact many times before, from the legendary J.T. Blight (1868) to our modern researchers—although it was curiously absent in Ron Morris’ (1989) otherwise excellent survey.  When Mr Blight described the tomb, he told us that,

“Its outer ring, of which but three or four stones are left, was about 45 feet in diameter; the inner one 15 feet, with a kistvaen in its midst.  As on the external face of one of the uprights of the inner circle there are rows of cup carvings … it may be presumed that this was always exposed to view.”

Position of cups in the tomb
E.L. Barnwell’s 1868 sketch

The same year, Barnwell (1868) mentioned the same carvings—albeit briefly—telling us “that one of the stones has several rows of the curious cups.”  The design faced to the north, which is the traditional direction relating to Death in most northern hemisphere cultures.

As you can see, this design is similar to other petroglyphs that some students have suggested have a numeric nature (see the Idol Stone on Ilkley Moor for example).  You can understand why!  The basic linearity of the cups, in rows, certainly gives that impression and indeed it’s not unreasonable to make such an assumption—but, as always, we simply don’t know.  A similar design was found on a stone at Ballagawne in the parish of Kirk Arbory, but the cups were much deeper and deemed as being a medieval game played on stone, known as Nine Man’s Morris.  The original function of the game may have been divinatory.

References:

  1. Barnwell, E.L., “Notes on the Stone Monuments in the Isle of Man,” in J.G.,Cumming (ed.) Antiquitates Manniae, London 1868.
  2. Blight, J.T., “Stone Circles and Megalithic Remains,” in Gentleman’s Magazine 1868.
  3. Cubbon, A. M., Prehistoric Sites in the Isle of Man, Manx Museum: Douglas 1971.
  4. Cumming, J.G. (ed.), Antiquitates Manniae, Manx Society: London 1868.
  5. Gale, J. & Darvill, T., “A Survey of the Ballakelly Chambered Tomb,” in Darvill, & T. Billown (eds.), Neolithic Landscape Project, Isle of Man, 1997, Bournemouth University 1998.
  6. Henshall, A. S., “Manx Megaliths Again: An Attempt at Structural Analysis,” in P. Davey (ed.), Man and Environment in the Isle of Man, BAR: Oxford 1978.
  7. Kermode, P.M.C., “The Ancient Monuments of the Isle of Man,” in Archaeologia Cambrensis, volume 84, 1929.
  8. Kermode, P.M.C. & Herdman, W.A., Manks Antiquities, University of Liverpool 1914.
  9. Simpson, James, Archaic Sculpturings of Cups, Circles, etc., Upon Stones and Rocks in Scotland, England and other Countries, Edmonston & Douglas: Edinburgh 1867.

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Hawksworth Shaw, Hawksworth Moor, West Yorkshire

Cairnfield:  OS Grid Reference – SE 143 439

Also Known as:

  1. Hawksworth Moor cairnfield (2)

Getting Here

Curious small ‘long cairn’ (photo © James Elkington)

It’s a bittova pain-in-the-arse locating this site unless you’re into walking off-path, through excessive dense heather  or burnt coarse ground.  You can either follow the directions to the Black Beck tomb, or set off from Horncliffe Circle and walk up parallel to the fencing for nearly 300 yards (275m).  From here, walk due east for nearly half a mile through the deep heather until you reach an overgrown track that keeps you eastwards towards a line of grouse butts abaat 275 yards (250m) on.   Naathen, walk on the north-side of this path-track and for a few yards and you’ll begin to see either small piles of stones, or heather-covered mounds.  Zig-zag about.  You’re in the middle of the cemetery!

Archaeology & History

This cairnfield, or burial ground, or necropolis (choose whichever term you prefer) is a bittova beauty!  Although some of the tombs here had been ‘officially’ noticed a few years back, the magnitude of it was understated to say the least.  On a visit to the place a few months ago in the middle of one fuckova downpour, James Elkington and I found not only the large Black Beck tomb, but scattered clusters of many more cairns.  But it wasn’t until a few weeks after that we got a longer time to check it over and, even then, I think the job was only half-done.  So this site profile is merely an overview of some of what we found there.  Along with the Black Beck tomb, we found more than thirty examples of prehistoric cairns—probably Bronze Age in nature—around the Hawksworth Shaw area near the middle of Hawksworth Moor, scattered around (seemingly) in no particular order.

…and another one…
Round cairn in foreground

Three types of cairns were identified in this large cairnfield.  The majority of them are of the standard circular form, averaging 3-4 yards across and rising to about two feet high.  They are of the same architectural form as those found in the Hawksworth Moor cairnfield 4-500 yards northwest of here (there is the possibility that the two of them are part of the same necropolis, but unless we can locate an unbroken continuity between the two groups, it’s best to present them as separate clusters).  When we looked at them a couple of weeks ago, most cairns of the ’round’ type were overgrown, albeit in low growth, as a couple of the photos here show.  The main cluster of the round cairns are just a few yards off the aforementioned track, but there are others scattered here and there at other points on this part of the moorland.  A number of these cairns seem to have have been damaged and robbed of stones to build a line of grouse butts close by.

One of the ‘long cairns’
Another ‘long cairn’ during an utter downpour!

The second type of cairn in the necropolis—close to the main cluster of round cairns—are curious small, long cairns.  Each one of them measures between 8-10 yards in length, are up to three yards across, and rise to a height of about one yard.  They are built of the usual mass of small stones typical of the huge number of other cairns on Rombalds Moor, but have been constructed in an elongated form, in contrast to the more usual circular ones.  Four of them are very close to each other with a fifth further away from this main group.  A sixth one appears to be under the heather 50-60 yards away to the northeast.  Unlike some of the nearby round cairns, this group looks as if it’s barely been touched by the hand of man, with only fallen scatters of stones around the outer edges of them.  Tis an interesting group…

Small cairn, 50 yards N of Black Beck cairn
Small cairn 100 yard SE of Black Beck tomb (photo © James Elkington)

The third architectural cairn-types are scattered unevenly across the necropolis and are characterized as smaller, mini-versions of the round cairns, i.e, small piles of stones between 1-2 yards across and and just one or two feet high.  Each of this type of cairn are more deeply embedded in the peat with more vegetational growth covering them due to their small size.  This makes them much more difficult to see in comparison to their larger  compatriots.  One example (at SE 1423 4404) can be seen in the photo, above left, some 50-60 yards north of the Black Beck tomb; with another, above right, some 100 yards away to the southeast.  There is the possibility they may be so-called ‘clearance cairns’, although I have some doubts about this and believe they are more likely to be individual graves…. but I could be wrong…

There’s little doubt that other tombs are hiding away in this area, waiting for fellow antiquarians to uncover them.  Equally probable is the existence of hut circles or similar living-quarters lost beneath the heather.  Two such sites have been found on recent ventures here: one a short distance west of the Black Beck tomb and another hiding away nearly 300 yards southwest, right beside the Black Beck.  The main thing lacking up here are cup-and-ring stones.  Apart from several uninspiring cup-marked rocks it seems few exist hereby; but there are, no doubt, some hiding away that have been hidden for millenia…

One final thing: the grid-reference given for this necropolis is based loosely on where some of the cairns can be found, but there are others whose positions lies slightly beyond that grid-ref, as you’ll find if you potter about.

Acknowledgements:  With huge thanks, as always, for James Elkington for use of his photos.  Also to the evolving megalith and landscape explorer Mackenzie Erichs; and to Linzi Mitchell, for additional input…

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Black Beck Tomb, Hawksworth Moor, West Yorkshire

Cairn:  OS Grid Reference – SE 14233 43987

Also Known as:

  1. Small Skirtful of Stones

Getting Here

Old tomb looking east (photo © James Elkington)

Probably the easiest way to find this is to use other sites as guides.  From the Great Skirtful of Stones tomb, get over the fencing and follow it eastwards for exactly 500m (238 yards) where you’ll meet a small footpath on your right that goes southeast up the small slope of Craven Hall Hill and onto the moorland.  Go along here for literally 0.2km (223 yards) and, just where the path bends slightly to the left, drop diagonally down the slope to where the moorland levels out close to the Craven Hall Hill (2) tumulus.  From here walk WSW onto the flat moorland for literally ⅓-km (0.21 miles; 365 yards) where you’ll find either a large rounded mass of stones, or a large heather-covered mound—depending on whether there’s been a burning.  Best o’ luck!

Archaeology & History

…and looking NE (photo © James Elkington)

Very troublesome to locate when the heather’s fully grown, this large prehistoric tomb was uncovered very recently as a result of extensive moorland fires.  It’s the largest such structure in a cluster of more than thirty cairns near the middle of Hawksworth Moor, many of which were rediscovered at the end of May, 2021.  Due south of the Great Skirtful of Stones, this smaller skirtful of stones measures some 45 feet across and is more than three feet high in parts.  Probably built in the Bronze Age, the tomb looks as if it’s been deliberately robbed at some time in the past, probably before the Victorians by the look of things—although only an excavation would tell us for sure.  Primarily, the cairn has been robbed from its centre outwards mainly on its western side, where you’ll also see a small and rather dodgy cup-marked stone.  Scattered into the surrounding peat are visible remains of where some of the loose stones have been cast.

Small hole in the middle
Northern edge of cairn

A possible alternative to this being simply a large cairn, is that it’s a much-disturbed ring cairn.  Some sections on the north and western edges give the impression that the mass of stones may be collapsed rubble walling.  There are also a couple of internal features beneath the overgrowth of peat and compressed vegetation: one being a small circular piece of stonework that has either fallen in on itself, been dug into, or is the home of an animal; and a yard or two from this is what looks like another internal U-shaped stone structure – again, deeply encased by centuries of encroaching peat.  But I must emphasize that these features are far from certain and can only be proven one way or the other by an excavation.

Small Skirtful, looking S (photo © James Elkington)
Ring-cairn or just a cairn? (photo © James Elkington)

The site is well worth seeing, not only for its own merit, but also because of its place in a much wider prehistoric cemetery in the middle of Hawksworth Moor.  There are at least six small single cairns (which may be clearance cairns) scattering this area—the closest of which from here is some 20 yards to the north.  A more curious group of at least five small long cairns exist about 100 yards to the south; and below these is the largest cluster of standard tombs in the form of small round cairns.  A curious D-shaped hut circle structure can be found less than 100 yards to the northwest, and what seems to be remains of a larger deeply embedded enclosure exists beyond the long cairns.  Check ’em out!

AcknowledgementsWith huge thanks, as always, for James Elkington for use of his photos.  Also to the evolving megalith and landscape explorer Mackenzie Erichs; and to Linzi Mitchell, for additional stimuli…

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Eas Uilleam, Callander, Perthshire

Cairn:  OS Grid Reference – NN 6539 0985

Getting Here

The cairn on the ridge

This is a helluva long way to walk to find such a small site, but the landscape makes it all the worthwhile.  So… From Callander, head up the Bracklinn Falls road, going past the car-park there and on for 1½ miles, watching for the track on your left where you park-up.  Walk down the track, over the river, then uphill until another track veers to your left.  Follow this for nearly a mile until meeting another track that veers right.  4-500 yards along, on the same side as the burn on your left, the hill slopes up where a small grassy mound sits on its ridge. That’s it.

Archaeology & History

From the cairn to the SE

This site is likely to be of interest only to the hardcore antiquarians amongst you.  It’s a small singular cairn sitting on a small hillock of once woodland-clad grasslands, a few hundred yards east of the small chambered cairn of West Bracklinn.  Much of it is covered in vegetation, but sections of its stone structure are visible mainly on its south sides.  Measuring 6 yards across and less than a yard high, it has been classed by Historic Scotland as Bronze Age in nature, although no excavation has been done here.

Reference:

  1. Royal Commission Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Braes of Doune: An Archaeological Survey, RCAHMS: Edinburgh 1994.

Links:

  1. Canmore notes on Eas Uilleam

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian

Denny Bridge, Denny, Stirlingshire

Cist (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NS 808 830

Archaeology & History

A small and seemingly prehistoric grave, or cist, destroyed sometime around 1840, once existed on the top of a large hillock close to the River Carron where the bridge leads from Dunipace to Denny.  Thankfully, memory of its existence was preserved by Robert Watson (1845) in his short description of Dunipace parish.  He first began by talking of some large natural mounds on the eastern side of the township which, folklore told, gave rise to the place-name Dunipace; but from those mounds,

“About two miles to the westward of these hills, there was a very beautiful one about forty feet in height, and covering nearly three roods of ground, said also to be artificial.  This hill was mutilated, from time to time, for the purpose of repairing roads and other purposes.  It was entirely removed about six years ago, to form an embankment on the turnpike road near Denny bridge. The strata of which this hill was composed, were carefully observed during its removal. These were so regular, and as if rising out of, and gradually returning again to similar strata in the circumjacent level ground, as to afford conclusive evidence that the hill was not the work of man.  On the top of this hill, and about three feet below the surface, was found a coffin or tomb, composed of five large un wrought stones, in which were the bones of a human body, scull and teeth not much decayed.  Along with these, was a vase of coarse unglazed earthenware, containing a small quantity of material resembling the lining of a wasp’s nest, probably decayed paper or parchment, which in the lapse of ages had assumed that appearance.  No conjecture could be formed about the individual here interred, tradition being entirely silent on the subject ; but this circumstance corroborates the opinion of some writers, that the hills of Dunipace might have been used as burying-places for ancient chiefs.”

The site was included in the Royal Commission’s (1963:1) Inventory, but they found no additional data about it.

References:

  1. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments Scotland, Stirling – volume 1, HMSO: Edinburgh 1963.
  2. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Archaeological Sites and Monuments of Stirling District, Central Region, Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 1979.
  3. Watson, Robert, “Parish of Dunipace,” in New Statistical Account of Scotland – volume 8, William Blackwood: Edinburgh 1845.

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian 

Craven Hall Hill (2), Hawksworth Moor, West Yorkshire

Ring Cairn:  OS Grid Reference – SE 14574 44098

Getting Here

Site shown on 1851 map

Unless the heather’s been burnt back, this takes a bitta finding.  Direction-wise, the easiest is from the moorland road above Menston.  Go up Moor Lane and then turn right along Hillings Lane. 350 yards on is a dirt-track on your right marked as Public Footpath.  Walk up here for two-thirds of a mile—going past where the track goes left to the Shooting Range—to where the track splits.  Bear left and after 250 yards you reach a fence on your left where the moorland proper begins.  Follow this fence SW for 300 yards until it does a right angle turn.  Just before this, you’ll see a large worn overgrown trackway or path running north into the moorland.  Walk up here for nearly 100 yards and look around.  Best o’ luck!

Archaeology & History

Western arc of earth & stone

Shown on the 1851 OS-map adjacent to the long prehistoric trackway that runs past Roms Law, the Great Skirtful and other prehistoric sites, the antiquarian wanderings of Forrest & Grainge (1868) came past here and, although didn’t mention the Craven Hall cairns directly, they did write of “a group of barrows” hereabouts, and this may have been one of them.  James Wardell (1869)  gave an even more fleeting skip, only mentioning “pit dwellings” hereby.  A little closer to certainty was the literary attention Collyer & Turner’s (1885) pen gave, where they described, “near the adjoining old trackway, which runs from East to West, will be seen a small barrow”—but this could be either of the Craven Hill sites.  And the usually brilliant Harry Speight (1900) gave the place only more brevity….

Structurally similar to Roms Law nearly ¾-mile northwest of here, this little-known and much denuded prehistoric tomb has seen better days.  It is barely visible even when the heather’s low—and when we visited recently, the heather was indeed low but, as the photos here indicate, it’s troublesome to see.  It’s better, of course, with the naked eye.

Highlighted ring cairn, looking NE
Highlighted ring cairn, looking SE

It’s the most easterly cairn in the large Bronze Age necropolis (burial ground) on Hawksworth Moor.  Measuring some 12 yards across and roughly circular in form, the ring is comprised mainly of many small stones compacted with peat, creating a raised embankment barely two feet high above the heath and about a yard across on average.  A number of larger stones can be seen when you walk around the ring, but they don’t appear to have any uniformity in layout such as found at the more traditional stone circles.  However, only an excavation will tell us if there was ever any deliberate positioning of these larger stones.  It would also tell us if there was ever a burial or cremation here, but the interior of the ring has been dug out, seemingly a century or two ago…

References:

  1. Collyer, Robert & Turner, J.H., Ilkley: Ancient and Modern, William Walker: Otley 1885.
  2. Faull, M.L. & Moorhouse, S.A. (eds.), West Yorkshire: An Archaeological Guide to AD 1500 – volume 1, WYMCC: Wakefield 1981.
  3. Forrest, C. & Grainge, William, A Ramble on Rumbald’s Moor, among the Rocks, Idols and Altars of the Ancient Druids in the Spring of 1869, H. Kelly: Wakefield 1868.
  4. Speight, Harry, Upper Wharfedale, Elliott Stock: London 1900.
  5. Wardell, James, Historical Notes of Ilkley, Rombald’s Moor, Baildon Common, and other Matters of the British and Roman Periods, Joseph Dodgson: Leeds 1869.

© Paul BennettThe Northern Antiquarian