Stone Circle (destroyed):Â OS Grid Reference – SP 470 464? Â Â Â
Also Known as:
Ringstone Well
Archaeology & History
In 1239 CE we find records of a field-name site called “Ringstoneswelle.” Although the place-name writer Margaret Gelling (1954) initially ascribed this as the watering-place of some dood called Hringstan, it is in fact the only record that I’ve found of a “stone circle by a well” in the village. This etymological root is confirmed in A.H. Smith’s English Place-Name Elements (vol.1, p.265) as a probable stone circle.
Folklore
There is also the curious field-name legend of a place in Cropredy called Kirk or Church Piece, where a christian church was being built, but in the morning all the stones had been uprooted & moved back from whence they came. This happened several times according to the folktale – a story that has with all the hallmarks of a megalithic site. (see Grinsell’s Folklore)Â To me it seems likely that the nearby Cup and Saucer Stone also had something to do with this lost stone circle.
In the same area we have another intriguing bit of folklore that was reported in an early edition of the Banbury Guardian (1932) which told that,
“on one of the top stones of a wall in front of one of the farmhouses is what is supposed to be the Devil’s footprint and there are nail-marks in the stone, but how it gots it name is a puzzle. At the back of the vicarage gardens is a small jetty called HellHole, the old ‘Old Man’ must have visited this village a time or two.”
Are there any local antiquarians or historians who can throw further light on this seemingly lost megalithic ring?
References:
Anonymous, ‘Cropredy and its Legends,’ in Banbury Guardian, December 29, 1932.
Bennett, Paul & Wilson, Tom, The Old Stones of Rollright and District, Cockley: London 1999.
Gelling, Margaret, The Place-Names of Oxfordshire – volume 2, Cambridge University Press 1954.
Grinsell, Leslie V., Folklore of Prehistoric Sites in Britain, David & Charles: London 1976.
Smith, A.H., English Place-Name Elements – Part 1, Cambridge University Press 1954.
From Ripponden, taken the steep road up to Barkisland, but at the crossroads just before the village, turn right (south) and keep going for a mile till you reach the reservoir. At the far-end of the reservoir, take the track down by its side and follow the footpath that bends round the edge of the grasslands. Go up onto this small moorland and, once you’re on the level, head towards where you’ll see a large pile of stones a coupla hundred yards away. That’s it!
Archaeology & History
If we visit this site today, all we are left with is a scattered mass (or perhaps that should that be ‘mess’) of many hundreds of stones: the last remnants of what once would have been a proud circle of one form or another upon this small moorland plain. Its significance was such that the very moor on which its remains are scattered, was named after it: the Ringstone Edge Moor. But as with many sites from our megalithic period, this old place is but a shadow of its former self.
Gone are the upright monoliths which, tradition relates, once surrounded this low scattered circle of small loose stones (which would have made it look not unlike the wonderful stone circle of Temple Wood, Argyll). These standing stones were, so the folk record tells, removed near the end of the 18th century for use in some walling.
Described variously as a stone circle, ring cairn, cairn circle, an enclosure, and more, the site first seems to have been written about in 1775 by the great historian John Watson. When he was vicar of the local parish in Halifax (not far from here) this “ring of stones” as he called them, was “called the Wolf-fold.” Nearly one hundred years later, in F.A. Leyland’s superb commentary to Watson’s work, he wrote,
“The stones which constituted the circle at the time of their removal stood upwards of three feet…and the remain formed a striking object on the moor. The original number of stones of which the circle was formed is unknown, having long been in ruin and reduced in quantity before being finally removed. This was effected about twelve years since by the present tenant of the dam.” – that is, around 1859.
However, when Crabtree (1836) described the circle a decade or two earlier, he made no mention of such standing stones — although we must consider that Crabtree was very much like many modern academic archaeologists who tended to copy the works of others, much less than getting out in the field to see for himself.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the lore telling of the standing stones’ demise was repeated by local historian John Priestley (1903), when he said that: “all the large stones…were carted away about forty years ago” — that is, around 1863.
So it would seem that the very final destruction of the standing stones here, occurred sometime during the four year gap which Messrs. Leyland and Priestley describe.
More than fifty years later, Huddersfield historian James Petch (1924) came here to explore whatever remains he could find, and told:
“On top of a flat plateau on this moor, with an extensive view on all sides save on the north, where there is a gentle slope for some hundreds of yards up to the summit of the hill, there are distinct traces of a circular ring of small stones. Pygmie flints have been picked up within a yard or two, but the only other fact to be noted about this earthwork is that there is a tradition to the effect that much earth has been removed from this site. It is not altogether impossible that this is a scanty remnant of a round barrow.”
This latter remark of Mr Petch seems most probable. The excessive scatter of small stones typifies the remains of many of the Pennine giant cairns, from the Little Skirtful on Burley Moor and giant tombs of the Black Hills near Skipton, to the similar monuments of our Devil’s Apronful, Pendle, etc, etc.
Close to this cairn circle, wrote Sidney Jackson (1968), there used to be the remains of an Iron Age settlement, “marked by wall foundations (but) is now covered by the waters of Ringstone Reservoir.”
Folklore
There is very little folklore that I’ve found here. Watson (1775) throws the usual idea that the place was a site of druidical worship; but other than that we only have a local Ripponden writer’s account, which told that there was once the ghost of a white lady that was once said to walk along the path somewhere between here and the Beacon Hill tumulus, a short distance to the north.
Takes a bitta finding – especially if some dood’s knocked it down again (as happens up here). Best thing to do is get to the Miller’s Grave prehistoric cairn, which is only a few hundred yards away. From Miller’s Grave, walk due west for 200 yards till you hit once a ditched footpaths, where you should turn right. A short distance along you’ll hit a 5-foot-tall boundary stone called the Greenwood Stone with ‘1775’ carved on one side. From here, walk due south into the heather for 75 yards. You’re very close!
Archaeology & History
We resurrected this old standing stone in 1996, several years after first discovering it laid amidst the heather in the early 1990s. It appeared to mark an old boundary line (no longer used) betwixt Wadsworth Moor and Midgley Moor, but its nature is distinctly prehistoric. The remains of a small hut circle (seemingly Bronze Age, though excavation is needed) can be found a short distance to the west, though this is hard to find when the heather has grown. Other seemingly prehistoric remains scatter the ground nearby, none of which have received the attention of archaeologists.
Greenwood ‘B’ on a grey day
As you can see from these grey, rain-swept images, this upright stone is well-weathered (though we need to visit here again soon and get some better photos). It stands some 4-feet tall and may have accompanied one or two other monoliths close by. The suggestion by one Peter Evans that the Greenwood B stone stood “possibly at the centre of a stone circle” is sadly untrue (soz Peter); though it probably had some relationship with the Millers Grave cairn site, a few hundred yards equinox east.
References:
Bennett, Paul, The Old Stones of Elmet, Capall Bann: Milverton 2001.
Way off from seemingly anywhere this one – on the southern foothills of the great Cuillins, by the western edge of a seemingly unnamed loch. (most unusual) Take the Elgol road (A881) south from Broadford, nearly to its end, keeping an eye out for Kirkibost a few miles from the very end of the road. Just past here, stop and walk the track west to Camasunary a half-mile along, through the small forestry-bit, then follow the line of the trees north and keep going a bit more till y’ reach the nice stream that feeds that unnamed loch. Cross the stream!
Archaeology & History
Alexander Thom’s 1967 drawing
A fascinating little site this one! Perhaps consisting of as many as eight stones at one time, only three stand visible today. Alexander Thom (1967) reported finding other stones in this circle “being buried in the peat, but prodding revealed their position roughly” — as shown on his drawing here. There may at one time have been as many as eight stones here, but the site itself is quite small, making a ring of stones only 21-feet across (or 8 megalithic yards as Thom had it). The ruinous state of the site was put down to the stupidity of the Church of Scotland issuing “instructions that all stones in Skye were to be thrown down” a few centuries back.
Aubrey Burl’s later ‘four-poster’ summary
Aubrey Burl reported that “there were once at least 4 stones here, the tallest being of 6ft 6ins (2m) high,” and wondered whether this was one of the many ‘four-poster’ stone circles that scatter Scotland and elsewhere. An issue he seemed comfortable to proclaim a few years later in his survey of such sites. (Burl 1988) Of those stones still standing, the tallest is just 5 feet high; but there’s the impressive 11½-foot long monolith laying on the southeast edge of the ring! Mr Burl also pointed out that some
“casual digging inside the ring around 1860 uncovered a blackpolished stone about 1½ ins (4cm) long, ‘somewhat resembling a small pestle.'”
I found the proximity of the Cille Mhaire burial ground a mile west of here more than a bit intriguing (though didn’t have time to assess its geomantic relationship further). And the reported presence of prehistoric cairns nearby imply that the Na Clachan Bhreige ‘circle’ had some relationship with death and burial.
Folklore
The folkname of ‘The False Stones’ comes from that well-known tale of the site “supposedly being the remains of three men turned into stone for deserting their wives.” Something which Otta Swire (1964) thought was likely told by christian converts. It would have probably replaced an earlier tale of the stones being the site where some ancestral spirits lived. Swire also told that,
“these were once, if tradition is to be believed, Stones of Wisdom who could both foretell the future and show justice as between man and man.”
Burl (1988) also points out how,
“The name, Na Clachan Bhreige, has been variously pointed translated as ‘the judicial stones’, a place where medieval law courts were held, as in several other Scottish rings. It has also been interpreted as ‘the stone of lies, or falsehood.'”
References:
Burl, Aubrey, Four Posters: Bronze Age Stone Circles of Western Europe, BAR: Oxford 1988.
Grinsell, L.V., Folklore of Prehistoric Sites in Britain, Hale: Newton Abbot 1976.
Swire, Otta F., Skye: The Island and its Legends, Blackie & Sons: Glasgow 1961.
Thom, Alexander, Megalithic Sites in Britain, Oxford University Press 1967.
Thom, A., Thom, A.S. & Burl, Aubrey, Megalithic Rings, BAR: Oxford 1980.
From the Askwith Moor dusty parking spot, walk up the road for 160 yards where, on each side of the road, you’ll see a straight line running across the moors. On the left-side (west) walk onto the moor for 50-60 yards along this line, then dead straight west into the heather for another 50-60 yards and look around. It’s hard to see if the heather’s grown.
Archaeology & History
Found by Richard Stroud on July 20, 2004, this single hut circle is in faint evidence. About twenty feet across with a section of the low walling either missing, or more probably buried in the peat. Although no other hut-circles were immediately visible, this was probably because of the excessive heather-growth. I have little doubt that others will be close to this one, as the area is littered with prehistoric sites. The petroglyph catalogued as Askwith Moor 529 is very close to this hut circle.
Tumulus (destroyed):Â OS Grid Reference – TF 232 018
Archaeology & History
Very little was known about this now lost burial mound. It was one of several nearby but, thankfully, the local historian and archaeologist E. Thurnam Leeds (who once lived at the nearby Eyebury Farm) sent a letter to the Society of Antiquaries in London, describing some pottery and other remains that he’d found there:
“The small pot of a late Bronze Age type and the other sherds exhibited were found in a tumulus known as Oliver Cromwell’s Hill, at Eyebury, near Peterborough. As only a portion of the tumulus has been examined as yet, it is proposed to defer a full account of the excavations until further progres has been made. The tumulus is of the round type, about 40 yards in diameter and 5 feet high at the centre. On three sides traces of a ditch were met with, containing soil which had evidently been burnt. Close to the gravel in the centre of the tumulus there were two distinct layers of charcoal, and in two places apparently remains of hearths. The small pot was found only 1½ feet down on the south-eastern side of the mound, 39 feet from the centre. In the centre itself at various depths were found sherds, some of Bronze Age forms; but a pice of a rimmed vase found at a depth of 3 feet 6 inches, about 6 inches above the first charcoal layer, appears to be of Roman date, in which case the centre of the tumulus must have been disturbed in those times, though the charcoal floors were never pierced. Bones of various animals, including sheep, pig, dog and hare, and a large flint flake were also found.”
As far as I’m aware, no further detailed examinations took place at this curiously-named hillock, whose folktale I’ve yet to read.
References:
Leeds, E.T., ‘Letter,’ in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, 22:1, 1910.
Not far south of the smaller Lesser Cursus monument, this huge linear earthwork was the very first cursus to be described, by William Stukeley no less, who thought it to be an old race-course for charioteers and the like! He stumbled upon this: a curious gigantic linear earthwork feature, stretching for nearly two miles roughly east-west and as wide a football field, cut into the Wiltshire Earth, betraying all notions of ‘primitive’ histories as proclaimed by the ‘intellectuals’ of his day. They were clearly wrong! This immense enigmatic structure, still baffles the same creed of intellectuals to this day — but at least our old ancestors have been granted greater abilities than previously believed. In his book on Stonehenge in 1740, Mr Stukeley described this,
“most noble work, contriv’ed to reach from the highest ground of two hills, extended the intermediate distance over a gentle valley; so that the whole cursus lies conveniently under the eye of the most numerous quantity of spectators. To render this more convenient for site, it is projected on the side of more rising ground, chiefly looking towards Stonehenge. A delightful prospect from the temple, when this vast plain was crowded with chariots, horsemen and foot, attending these solemnities with innumerable multitudes.”
Sir Norman Lockyer propounded its function as astronomical, aligning with the Pleiades around 2000 BC — a date we now know to be inconsistent with its construction, although as John North said in his Stonehenge (1997):
“Lockyer’s chronology was certainly better than the general archaeological consensus at the time.”
But further archaeological alignments and leys have been suggested running eastwards from here. And as Paul Devereux pointed out, “In the case of this cursus, archaeology got there first.” J.F.S. Stone, who carried out some excavations at the cursus in 1947, noted that
“its axis, if projected 1500 yards east, strikes Woodhenge and passes the Cuckoo or Cuckold Stone by the way.”
This was endorsed in 1981 by archaeologists John Hedges and David Buckley:
“In addition to aligning upon Woodhenge, the Greater Stonehenge cursus also sights upon the Cuckoo or Cuckold Stone.”
Alignment to Beacon Hill
In Roy Loveday’s (2006) survey of cursus monuments he told how this alignment goes much further, telling how it aligns “on the lower, northernmost prominence of Beacon Hill 8km away”, crossing Woodhenge on its way. Such suggestions used to bring outcries of derision from the archaeological fraternity, but it seems archaeologists themselves are making such claims more and more these days. At the forefront of modern alignment research in previous decades was Paul Devereux — and it was he who first noted the line-up with the distant Beacon Hill from the Great Cursus, telling:
“The course of the alignment can be extended eastwards a few miles beyond Woodhenge to cross the barrow-dotted ridge of Beacon Hill — a perfect example of a Wakins-style ‘initial point.’ The ridge is highly visible from Woodhenge. It disappears from view as one walks westwards down the cursus, but reappears clearly as the west end is approached. Indeed, the west end is so placed that it is at about the furthest point from which the Beacon Hill ridge , and the intermediate on which the eastern end of the cursus fall, can be seen together.”
…to be continued…
References:
Burl, Aubrey, A Brief History of Stonehenge, Robinson: London 2007.
Hedges, John & Buckley, David G., The Springfield Cursus and the Cursus Problem, Essex County Council 1981.
Loveday, Roy, Inscribed Across the Landscape, Tempus: Stroud 2006.
North, John, Stonehenge, Harper-Collins: London 1997.
Pennick, N. & Devereux, P., Lines on the Landscape: Leys and other Linear Enigmas, Hale: London 1989.
Stone, J.F.S., ‘The Stonehenge Cursus and its Affinities,’ in Archaeological Journal, 104, 1947.
In the midst of the great henge monuments at Thornborough — specifically, the central henge — archaeologist Ian Longworth (1965) said there “was built …a still earlier structure known as a cursus.” This giant monument was one of the earlier such sites located in Britain. Longworth continued, saying:
“This was a ceremonial avenue, running for nearly a mile in a northeast / southwesterly direction. The avenue is defined by ditches 144 feet apart with a bank running along the inside of each ditch. The ditches are now completely filled with plough soil and, as with other cursus monuments in the county, were discovered from the air as two dark lines in the cereal crop… Probably used for ritual ceremonies, no clues remain to show what actually took place.”
Thornborough Cursus (& henges)
This cursus runs almost at right angles to the alignment of the three Thornborough Henges, on the southern side of the central henge, and was first found through the aerial photography of J.K. St. Joseph between 1945 and 1952. When excavation work was carried out, “a crouched burial was found in a stone cist within the southwest end” of the cursus. This end of the monument is rounded, like the Stonehenge Cursus; whilst the northeast end of the monument has not been located. The southwest end of the cursus begins at OS grid-reference SE 2799 7906 and its northeasterly end is roughly at SE 2881 7954. The middle of the known cursus is roughly in Thornborough’s central henge.
Paul Devereux (1989) said that the monument, “which had become silted-up and grass-covered by the time the henge was built, had two main orientations, with a curvilinear, irregular section just to the east of the henge.” Although Norris Ward (1969) thought that the cursus actually went all the way down the River Ure, it stops some distance beforehand, though may obviously have had some important relationship with the waters.
References:
Longworth, Ian H., Regional Archaeologies: Yorkshire, Cory, Adams & Mackay: London 1965.
Pennick, N. & Devereux, P., Lines on the Landscape, Hale: London 1989.
Thomas, Charles, ‘Folklore from a Northern Henge Monument,’ in Folklore Journal, volume 64:3, 1953.
Ward, Norrie, Yorkshire’s Mine, J.M. Dent: London 1969.
Long Barrow (destroyed):Â OS Grid Reference – SO 169 357
Also Known as:
Croesllechau
Archaeology & History
It appears to have been Theophilus Jones who first mentioned this all-but-lost megalithic tomb, more than 200 years ago. He told that,
“In a field called Croeslechau about two miles eastward of (Talgarth), but in the parish of Bronllys and on a farm called Bryn-y-groes, is a cromlech, not merely interesting on account of its antiquity, but from the circumstance of a white thorn growing close, and indeed under part of it, which has gradually raised the horizontal or covering-stone several inches out of its original position; it is therefore not only venerable as a relic of very ancient days, but as a natural curiosity.”
Croesllechau tomb in 1809
Thankfully he gave us the fine old drawing of the tomb, here reproduced.
Although shown on an 1832 map of the region, when Crawford (1925) came to describe this old tomb it had already been destroyed. He told that,
“the site is unknown and all memory of it is has completely vanished in the neighbourhood. Mr Evan Morgan had visited the site and reports that no traces of the ‘cromlech’ were visible; nor were enquiries of the farmer at Bradwys any more successful in identifying the site. It is not unlikely that the monument was destroyed when a new road was made…”
References:
Crawford, O.G.S., The Long Barrows of the Cotswolds, John Bellows: Gloucester 1925.
Jones, Theophilus, History of the County of Brecknock, volume 2, George North: London 1809.
It seems that very little remains of this site, and there is some doubt over its authenticity. Described in Alex Gibson’s (1999b) essay on the cursus monuments of Wales, he said this ‘cursus’ consists of,
“A cropmark of two parallel ditches orientated SE-NW, 15m apart and traceable for some 130m. It runs perpendicular to the present course of the River Wye 50m to the NE. No terminals are visible, but there is a large ring ditch across the river 450m to the NW. A closely-grouped cluster of some 8 ring ditches is visible on a gravel terrace some 150m to the E,” but adds finally that “the identification of this site is suspect and may represent a fossil field system.”
The likelihood of the site being genuine seems to come from the “cluster of eight ring ditches on the gravel terrace some 150m to the east.” Gibson (1999) also thinks how “the parallel ditches seem to be aligned on a ninth large ring-ditch 450m to the northwest and across the river.” Ley-hunters have been scorned by archaeo’s for making such confounded comments!  The presence of a long cairn south of the cursus was also thought to add weight to the sites veracity.
Does anyone know what the present position on this site happens to be?
References:
Gibson, Alex, The Walton Basin Project, CBA: York 1999.
Gibson, Alex, ‘Cursus Monuments and Possible Cursus Monuments in Wales,’ in Barclay & Harding’s Pathways and Ceremonies, Oxbow: Oxford 1999b.
