Tag: Standing Stones

Newchurch-in-Pendle, Lancashire

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Stone Circle (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SD 822 387

Also Known as:

  1. Pendle Stone Circle

Archaeology & History

A destroyed site mentioned by several local historians. It was positioned at the valley bottom just below Faughs, a hundred yards west of Lower Moss End, where today it is simply overgrown meadows with the typical excess of Juncus reeds.  As local investigator John Dixon said, there are “five stones shown on (the 1848) map just west of Spen Brook Mill.”

In the 1970s, one writer described there being several uprights still in place, but a visit here a few weeks back (though I – unusually! – didn’t walk all through the boggy grounds and explore as extensively as I normally would) found nothing.

Its geomancy, however, was striking. The unnamed hill immediately to the north of its position (at the southern end of the legendary Pendle Hill, a coupla hundred yards west of St. Mary’s church) rises up like a great singular ‘pap’ which, to our old ancestors, was animated with female spirit. I sat here in the pouring rain looking up at this hill and its presence in front of the circle was striking.

…And so I walked onto the top of the said hill. Thereupon I found a small gathering of rocks, not unlike a cairn-spoil. When I enquired with a few local people about the age or nature of this rock-pile, I found no-one seemed aware of its existence. Weird. But from the hill itself, the view is excellent – and the small valley amidst which the old circle once stood teems with legends and myth: of cailleachs, ghosts, wells, witches and more. An excellent spot!

The local writer, historian and walker, John Dixon, sent us the following notes of his exploration here:

“Clifford Byrne, the late Nelson antiquarian, mentions in his book ‘Newchurch in Pendle’ the site of a former stone circle that stood just below Faughs, a hundred yards west of Lower Moss End. Today no large stones of any kind can be located anywhere near this spot, the stones having been removed or broken up some time in the past. However, the 1848 6” OS map records the number and position of these stones as being in two parallel lines about a hundred yards apart lined up west to east. The northerly line (SD 823 389) consists of 3 stones, the southerly (SD 823 387) of 4 stones, all being some 3 yards apart.

“It appears that we have an avenue of stones, not a circle. But why their position in the landscape at the headwaters of two valley streams? The Sabden Brook starts its journey westward to meet with the Calder from the stones, while Dimpenley Clough rises from the stones running east to join Pendle Water – could this be of any significance?”

References:

  1. Byrne, Clifford, Newchurch-in-Pendle: Folklore, Fact, Fancy, Legends and Traditions, Marsden Antiquarians: Nelson 1982.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Stinking Stone, Steeton, West Yorkshire

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Standing Stone:  OS Grid Reference – SE 01814 42411

Getting Here

Stinking Stone on 1853 map
Stinking Stone on 1853 map

One of two ways to get here really.  The easiest is from Sutton-in-Craven: go through the village and up the steep hill (don’t take the right turn as you start up the hill).  Go all the way up until the hill starts to level out and on the left-side of the road you’ll notice a boundary stone stood upright (this is the Sutton Stoop).  Stop here.  Of the 2 gates, climb over the top-most one and walk down the path into the adjacent field, heading over to the gap a couple of hundred yards away where the gate to another field is.  That’s it!

Archaeology & History

Stinking Stone, Steeton
Stinking Stone, Steeton

Now here’s a weird one.  With a name like this you’d expect there to be plenty of info or historical comments.  But despite all the books and journals in my huge library, aswell as visiting town libraries and exploring the resources on-line, there’s nowt written about this ‘ere spot.  Not a jot!  Even the usually satisfactory place-name fellas have a thing-or-two to say about sites with names such as this—but even their old tomes are closed-lipped.  Hmmmmm…..

I visited the place several times to try ascertain what this site was, thinking — perhaps — that it was an old boundary stone whose name had been convoluted from some older, more obvious title.*  The nearby Sutton Stoop boundary stone, right by the roadside, seemed a good indicator to such an assumption, as it was a recognised boundary marker with written history and a meeting point along the local perambulation.  But the curiously-named Stinking Stone was neither on the same line, nor ever had been according to old records, and couldn’t be located either.  There had been obvious quarrying and other industrial destruction along the hilltop where the old stone was marked and it seemed logical to assume that it had been destroyed in bygone years by that usual breed of capitalist industrial halfwits.  Until a psilocybin venture one afternoon, last season…

Twas a lovely sunny day, though windy on the tops as usual.  I was out with a couple of neophytes showing them Psilocybes and various other species, chewing them here and there and talking the way of healthy usage.  We passed by an old well, long forgotten, before heading onto Stinking Stone Hill.  Bimbling somewhat, and ruminating about the moss of colour, we decided to sit by the walling in-field and dream for a short while.  As we hit the old gate the Stinking Stone came up right before us.  Literally!

There in the old walling, blunt as you like, stood this four-and-a-half-foot tall standing stone, smoothed on one side by a short aeon of weathering, upright and proud as if it had been stood there for centuries, awaiting attention!  I exclaimed a few triumphant expletives; rubbed myself here and there over the old thing, then sat for a while behind the wind with the old upright, solidly embedded in old earth — then awaited the dream…

Twas a good day…

And then I returned home and later sought what I could on a possible etymology.  Around the hilltop a hundred yards away were small depressions and the faded remains of industrial workings, like I said; and with this in mind the awesome Mr Wright (1905) told us about the existence of ‘Stinking coals’, “an inferior kind of coal” no less.  Referring us to a work from 1818, we’re told,

“The Stinking-coal is noted for containing a great proportion of sulphuret of iron, thick seams or layers of these pyrites running in it.  In consequence of this it cannot be used for smelting purposes.”

Another account from 1868 telling us that:

“On opening the body, it contains a strong sulphureous smell, characteristic of the disease; hence it is called the stinking ill; and the stomach and bowels are prodigiously distended with air, having the same intolerable foetor.”

Worn metal scratch-marks caused when dragged here
Worn metal scratches, made when dragged here?

This old worn gatepost however, perhaps has a history that only goes back a few centuries.  It has been cleaved in half, as you’ll see if you visit it; but its western face is old and worn and it’s been embedded in the ground for a long time.  On its northern face are the curious etchings of carvings, which are more akin to wounds from some past offence (perhaps when it was split in half), cleaved by metal toolings and dragged by farmers to be fixed in into present spot.  It’s history may not be truly ancient.  Twouldst be good to know for sure though…

References:

  1. Wright, Joseph, The English Dialect Dictionary – volume 5, Henry Frowde: Oxford 1905.

* ‘Stinking’, stone-king or King Stone?  Unlikely though…

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Middlesknowes, Oxnam, Jedburgh, Roxburghshire

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Standing Stone (destroyed?):  OS Grid Reference – NT 7420 1487

Also Known as:

  1. Canmore ID 58143

Archaeology & History

There’s considerable Bronze- and Iron-Age archaeology all round here (cairns, settlements, earthworks and more), but it seems that the once-proud standing stone highlighted on the 1899 Ordnance Survey map found on the higher ground a half-mile north of Middlesknowes, no longer stands where it had been standing for all those thousands of years.  What, pray, has become of it…?

References:

  1. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Roxburghshire – volume 2, HMSO: Edinburgh 1956.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Lidstone, Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire

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Standing Stones:  OS Grid Reference – SP 35487 24627

Also Known as:

  1. King Lud’s Stone
  2. Leodwine’s stone

Getting Here

Just get to the top of the hill thru the village and where the sharp bend turns, you’ll find one of the monoliths up against the wall above the roadside (hard to find in the undergrowth sometimes!).  The other stone is on the eastern side of the road through Lidstone from the A44, halfway into the village itself.

Archaeology & History

Lidstone monolith
Lidstone monolith

There are two small stones to be found in the lovely little hamlet of Lidstone.  The main one—Leodwin’s Stone—is at coordinate SP 35517 24656; and the smaller stone further up the hill is at SP 35487 24627.  First described in a treatise from 1235 AD as Lidenstan, the great place-name writer Ekwall (1940) thought this derived from ‘Leodwine’s Stone.” A few years later Gelling (1954) told us that “there is a monolith at Lidstone”, which she thought gave rise to the place-name, and not some chap named Leodwine.  Whichever it may be, we certainly have two small upright stones here — both worth having a look at if such things take your interest. (Tom Wilson and I included them in our short survey of the standing stones of the region in 1999) Further up at the top of the hill from here are the remains of an old tumulus.

Folklore

Said by Caroline Pumphrey (1990) to be the resting place of old King Lud, one of England’s last great pagan kings; another local writer Elsie Corbett (1962) also told a tale well-known to folklore students about this little monolith.  She related how a local man they knew as Mr Hitchcock told them,

“that they used to kid the boys there by telling them that when the stone hears the clock strike twelve it goes down to the stream to drink, and that it was just a ‘catch’ because there was no striking clock in the first place; but it is a ‘catch’ tacked onto some tale that must have been told in the hamlet long ages before there were clocks at all.”

The said stream is a short distance due north of here, down the little valley.  The tale may come from it once acting as a shadow-marker, highlighting midday when the sun was high in the sky due south.  Makes sense of the folktale anyway!

References:

  1. Bennett, Paul & Wilson, Tom, The Old Stones of Rollright and District, Cockley: London 1999.
  2. Corbett, Elsie, A History of Spelsbury, Cheney & Sons: Banbury 1962.
  3. Ekwall, Eilert, Oxford Dictionary of Place-Names, OUP: Oxford 1940.
  4. Gelling, Margaret, The Place-Names of Oxfordshire – volume 2, Cambridge University Press 1954.
  5. Pumphrey, Caroline, Charlbury of our Childhood, Sessions Books: York 1990.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Great Moss Standing Stone, Emmott Moor, Lancashire

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Standing Stone:  OS Grid Reference – SD 969 384

Getting Here

Great Moss Stone - looking north
Great Moss Stone – looking NE

Follow the directions to the Water Sheddles Cross Standing Stone on the Yorkshire-Lancashire border; and when you get to the reservoir, walk straight across the road and head almost straight up onto the moor as if you’re going to the rock outcrop ahead of you on the horizon, called the Wolf Stones.  After just a couple of hundred yards though, amble back and forth to find the stone.  It’s in the heather, close by.

Archaeology & History

Great Moss Stone - looking NW
Great Moss Stone – looking NW

I can find no history about this small stone, just over three feet high, which was almost lost in the boggy heather when I first came here.  Standing in a small pool in the peaty-ground, the stone is very worn, with one of Nature’s cup-markings on top.  There is the possibility that this stone may have been one of the old boundary markers pre-dating the 1614 case which questioned the exact boundary line marking the Yorkshire-Lancashire border — but this is purely hypothetical.  The Water Sheddles Cross is just a few hundred yards east of here.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Harestanes, Ancrum, Roxburghshire

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Stone Circle (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NT 641 240

Archaeology & History

Mentioned briefly by Burl (2000), this site is another of the countless megalithic monuments in our islands that has been destroyed.  References to it are few and far between, though the site was investigated by members of Scottish Royal Commission in March, 1947, and found absolutely no remains left.  In the first volume of their Roxburgh (1956) survey, they told:

“The stone circle that stood in the vicinity of Harestones Cottages had been reduced to a single stone by 1845, and this stone has since disappeared.  No details of the circle are recorded and the evidence for its exact position is contradictory.  Stobie’s Map of Roxburghshire (1770) marks the site a little to the NE of Harestones Cottages, while an estate map of 1795 is said to have placed it at the SW corner of this group of buildings.”

There is the distinct possibility of course that there once stood two independent ancient monuments in the vicinity, which would account for descriptions in the different site locations.

References:

  1. Burl, Aubrey, The Stone Circles of Britain, Ireland and Brittany, Yale University Press 2000.
  2. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Roxburghshire – volume 1, HMSO: Edinburgh 1956.
  3. Watson, G., “The Stone Circles of Roxburghshire,” in Transactions of the Hawick Archaeological Society, volume 20, 1908.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Neriby, Bridgend, Islay

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Standing Stone (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NR 3595 6053

Also Known as:

  1. Canmore ID 37722

Archaeology & History

This is another standing stone whose days are seemingly long gone.  It was last recorded in 1878 as being about 300 yards northwest of the old farmhouse at Neriby.  The old stone stood more than six-feet tall, but appears to have gone.  Anyone journeying this way might wanna scour the ground to see if the fella’s remains can be seen lying around anywhere – though the fact that an old quarry was dug hereabouts doesn’t bode well for a successful hunt.  If we’re lucky, the stone may have been buried or laid into  nearby walling.  There is, however, remains of an old tumulus a bit further up the way…

References:

  1. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Argyll – volume 5: Islay, Jura, Colonsay and Oronsay, HMSO: Edinburgh 1984.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Cnoc Mor, Garbhallt, Argyll

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Standing Stone (destroyed?): OS Grid Reference – NS 005 945

Getting Here

Somewhat out of the way with seemingly nothing left of the site, from Clachan Strachur, take the A886 road southwest along Loch Fyne for a few miles until you turn right (make sure you don’t drive past it!) towards Garbhallt. Go through here and on for another mile until you see a rounded knoll in the forest to your left (if you hit Barnacarry house, you’ve gone too far). Tis upon this hill where our old stone once stood.

Archaeology & History

Nowt much to write really. A description many moons back told there was an old stone standing ‘pon this hill. It was only a small creature compared to many of Argyll’s monoliths, only three-and-half feet tall, all alone, looking across the loch and speaking with the hills a gentle voice. I found it a little odd (though aint been here for many years) and seemed to tell that a tomb was in attendance, but this too seemed long gone. The Royal Commission chaps thought that some of the other slabs of stone lying about here may have been relevant, but we may never know. I reckon a few good days ambling hereabouts would produce some new finds. And the fact that only a half-mile away we find an old cross and holy well seems to indicate a christian rendering of something heathen close by…..

References:

  1. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Argyll – volume 6: Mid-Argyll and Cowal, HMSO: Edinburgh 1988.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

 

Todholes, Weston, Lanarkshire

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Standing Stone (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 038 456

Archaeology & History

This standing stone used to be positioned on the old boundary line between the Carnwatch and Dunsyre parishes.  It might be a good idea to check out the perambulation records to see if owt went off here, before its destruction.  About five-feet tall, it was positioned on a small rise in the ground, 500 yards south of Todholes.

References:

  1. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Lanarkshire: Prehistoric and Roman Monuments, HMSO: Edinburgh 1978.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Standingstone Hill, Lesmahagow, Lanarkshire

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Standing Stone (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NS 759 351

Archaeology & History

The name of the place sort of gives the game away, but sadly we’ve got nowt to see anymore as the forest has covered it. The Royal Commission lads came here in 1971 and couldn’t find it, but later told that it “formerly stood on the summit” of the said hill. An important geomantic spot without any shadow of a doubt, probably having some relationship with an old tomb, either here or around the tree-covered summit of Tod Law, due east of here.

There’s a great deal more that’s been forgotten about up and about this region which will come to light as visits unfold.

References:

  1. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Lanarkshire, HMSO: Edinburgh 1978.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian