Tag: Celts

St. Moluag’s Chair, Lismore, Argyll

megalithix

Legendary Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NM 86972 44042

Also Known as:

  1. St. Maluag’s Chair

Getting Here

St Molaug’s Chair, c.1930

From the Port Appin ferry onto the northern tip of the island, go along the B8045 road for literally 3.5km (2.17 miles) and, shortly after passing Achuaran, a single small white house is on your right. Just yards before here is a small raised rocky knoll. …Or from the Achnacroish ferry, up the road for nearly a mile, then turn right along the B8045 road to Clachan.  A half-mile past the hamlet, go past the old School House, then past Mountain View cottage, and the next small white house on the left has a rocky knoll just past it.  Just over the wall from the road, a sign points out the legendary Chair that you’re seeking!

Archaeology & History

Site shown on 1875 map

St Moluag, a contemporary of the renowned St Columba, was a 6th century Irish saint who came to reside on Lismore—“the sacred isle of the western Picts”—and here taught the early christian doctrines, fused with indigenous animistic traditions.  He used sites of Nature as places of reflection and meditation and this chair-shaped boulder came to be a place renowned as one of his ritual sites, not far from his church.  It was described in Frank Knight’s (1933) huge work as possessing healing properties:

“To sit in it used to be considered a sovereign remedy for rheumatism.”

The site was highlighted on the earliest Ordnance Survey map of the island and its lore was remembered by local people of the time.  The chair had wider ‘arms’ until the beginning of the 20th century when in widening the road, they were accidentally broken off by one of the workmen.

References:

  1. Knight, G.A. Frank, Archaeological Light on the Early Christianizing of Scotland – volume 1, James Clark: London 1933.

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 Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Swinston Hill, Dinnington, South Yorkshire

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Settlement:  OS Grid Reference – SK 5395 8460

Archaeology & History

Bronze Torc found at site
Details drawn by R.Sheppard

In August, 1984, a Mr James Rickett was out with his metal-detector, scanning the Swinston woodland area south of Dinnington, when he was fortunate to locate a superb, ornamental ‘Celtic’-design bronze torc, thought to be of Romano-British origin, and believed to have been made in either the 1st or 2nd century AD.  Following Mr Rickett’s discovery, a small team from the Sheffield City Museum and the South Yorkshire Archaeoloogy Unit got off their backsides and did a survey of the region where the torc had been found —and they weren’t to be disappointed!

An initial assumption based on place-name evidences led them to believe that a settlement of the Saxon period may once have been here; but their investigations

“located the earthworks of a sub-rectangular enclosure, 40m by 25m, and possible fields about 140m south of the discovery site (South Yorkshire SMR record no.PI3021).  The enclosure is sub-divided into a smaller and a larger compound with no surface evidence for ditches associated with the stony banks, which enclose a total area of about 0.1 hectares.  In both size and shape it compares closely with the class of very numerous small ditched enclosures… The origins of some may lie in the late Iron Age, but fieldwork and excavation have produced predominantly Romano-British material. Other local metal detector finds, some from this enclosure, include first- to fourth-century Romano-British material.”

References:

  1. Beswick, Pauline, Megaw, M.R., Megaw, J.V.S. & Northover, Peter, “A Decorated Late Iron Age Torc from Dinnington, South Yorkshire,” in The Antiquaries Journal, 70:1, 1990.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian