An intriguing and little-known carved stone whose existence has been brought to our attention by historian and author John Dixon. Its precise history and nature seems unknown; but aspects of the carving possess symbols that are found on early christian remains, as well as some cup-and-ring designs. John wrote:
Artist’s impressionFoulscales Stone
“This enigmatic stone (27 inches height, 12 inches wide, 6 inch thickness), anciently known as the Yolstone and later as the Bonstone, once stood behind Foulscales Farm, near Gibbs. For some reason the stone was removed from this site and taken into the cellars of Knowlmere Manor under the authority of the Peel Estate.
The stone displays possible early native chi-rho symbols that may have a 6/7th century provenance. The lettering ‘HT’ look to be of 16/17th century origin and may refer to the Towneley family who held lands in Bowland.”
Was it a boundary stone? A gravestone? Was it an early christian stone? A Romano-British stone? The carved circles with ‘crosses’ inside them are typical Romano-British period designs, covered extensively in the early works of J. Romilly Allen and found to be widespread across Britain. Any further information on this stone would be greatly appreciated.
From the north side of Killin, take the minor road next to the Bridge of Lochay Hotel at Killin, past the hydroelectric station, through the wooded section until the fields open out again. The first gorgeous old house you come to is on the right-hand side of the road. Stop here! (I could really do with living here misself – tis a truly superb place!) You can ask the lady at the house where the carvings are and she’s very happy to point them out – they’re on the rocky crag near the bottom-end of the field on the other side of the road.
Archaeology & History
Drawing of the main carvings (after R.W.B. Morris)
What a brilliant setting and clump of carvings we have here! As you get to the rocky hillock in the field, you see that there are numerous rocks visible along the ridge, a number of which have carvings on them – some with just cups, but most possess a number of cup-and-rings. It’s an excellent spot! Depending on the time of year when you come here will determine whether or not you get a better look at the carvings or not. I’d recommended April and May as the best time, as the vegetation is at its lowest then. Visiting the site near the end of summer doesn’t give you as good a view — but even then, if you like your rock art, you’ll still love it! The rocks here are mainly quartzite schist, with a number of the surfaces being almost pure quartz. Intriguingly, none of the pure quartz sections appear to have been carved on.
The carvings here were first mentioned in an article by D. Haggart (1895), who described them as “a very remarkable set of incised rock sculptures…discovered lately in this neighbourhood by Mr John McNaughton.” And remarkable they are indeed! In Ronald Morris’ (1981) survey of this site — which he labelled Duncroisk 1 — he counted eight separate rock surfaces that had been carved, marking them as carvings a-h, but there are at least eleven of them here; and in all honesty, if we could strip the surface of the hill of its vegetation, we’d probably find a few more hidden away!
Cup-marked stone
As you’ve walked across the field from the road, past the first unrecorded cup-marked stone near the start of the rocky rise, we reach Mr Morris’s ‘stone A’ near the easternmost end of the ridge, which is just a small slab of stone with “at least 6 cup-marks” on its surface. It’s easily missed in poor light, so watch out. However, if you reach ‘stone b’ (described below), just walk back ten steps and you’ll see it.
Carved Stone B
Ten yards west is ‘Stone B’, seemingly split into two sections, whereupon we find “a cup-and-two-rings and at least 12 cups-and-one-ring, up to 19cm in diameter – some rings gapped, others not, some with and some without a radial groove from the cup, and some with a “runner” or cup in a ring. There are also at least 58 cups” on this section of rock. ‘Stone C’ can also be missed, this time due to its size and the fact that the larger cup-marked surfaces are ahead of you. But assuming you don’t miss it, this carving consists of “a well-preserved cup-and-two-complete-rings 25cm in diameter, and a cup.”
Carved Stone D
‘Stone D’ is just next to ‘stone C’, but with rather more ornate designs etched upon it. This is one of the more archetypal petroglyph designs that are found in the photo-guides and textbooks. Morris (1981) told that it consisted “of a cup-and-two-complete-rings and 2 cups-and-one-complete-ring up to 20cm in diameter, also a cup-and-one-complete-ring and 2 cups.” The photo here shows it pretty clearly.
Carved Stone ECurious ‘bowl’, top-centre
‘Stone E’ is the next one along, just a foot or two away and Mr Morris (1981) told that the carving consists of “2 cups-and-one-ring up to 13cm in diameters, 1 complete, the others gapped, joined by groove to a cup, and at least 33 cups (C.G. Cash counted 42 in 1911).” Most of the carved elements on this rock are around the edges of the stone. A very large faded circular depression, man-made, is also visible on this section of the petroglyph (above left), suggestive of lunar symbolism.
Carved Stone F
‘Stone F’ is less than 10 yards further west and has the greatest number of cup-markings of the entire group here, as Morris described: “3 cups-and-one-complete-ring up to 9cm in diameter, and at least 80 cups, a few of which are widely scattered over a big area sloping steeply further south, beyond the attached diagram.” It’s perhaps the most notable of the carved rocks along the ridge here — not by virtue of its design, more its geological physique than anything else.
Carved stone G
‘Stone G’ is next along and has a curious look about it, suggestive of more modern times. At first sight it doesn’t seem to have quite the magnitude that Morris’ description affords it, but on closer inspection by rolling some of the covering turf back away from the rock, you can see what he meant. This stone has “10 cups-and-one-complete-ring, up to 10cm diameter…and also 15 cups.” One of the cup-and-rings on this section was found by Morris to have been “the smallest so far recorded by the author in Scotland.”
Then we reach ‘stone H’ at the eastern end of the carved ridge, consisting of simply 3 cup-markings. One of them has a faint arc pecked around it. Further along the rock, a complete cup-and-ring is visible close to the edge.
This entire line of petroglyphs is a fine place in a fine setting, perfect for meditative practices! Other carvings can be found close by: Duncroisk 3 is a coupla hundred yards east across the field just over the fence by the riverside; and Duncroisk 2 is on the other side of the fence down towards the River Lochay on the same side of the adjacent burn less than 100 yards away (though this is trickier to reach). Other prehistoric sites can be found not too far away…
Folklore
Local people tell of having seen curious lights flitting along the edges of the field, river Lochay and roadside close to the carved rocks hereby.
From East Morton village, take the moorland road, east, and up the steep hill. Where the road levels out there’s a right turn, plus (more importantly!) a trackway on your left which leads onto the moor. Go up this track for a few hundred yards until you’re on the moor proper (by this I mean the track’s levelled out and you’re looking 360° all round you with all the moor in front of you). Just before the track starts a slight downhill slope, go into the heather on your right, for about 80 yards. You’re damn close!
Archaeology & History
I first came here many years back in my mid- to late-teens with an old school-friend Jon Tilleard, wandering about adventurously, occasionally stopping here and there when I found some stupid cup-mark or other seemingly innocuous scratch on the rocks, gerrin’ all excited and jumping about like a tit! But when we visited the place again a few days back my response was somewhat different. I was worse! But for good reason…
Primary features of CR-107Close-up of main features
The potential variations visible in this carving are peculiar, to say the least. Ones first impression shows a carving similar in many ways to that shown in Hedges (1986) fine survey; but upon closer inspection a number of initial visual responses begin to look murky. A seeming cup-with-double-ring aint what it seems! To me at least (sad fella that I am!), it’s far more intriguing and far less certain, with a number of oddities still left.
The central feature of the carving is the lovely near-cup-and-double-ring! As we can see in the photo here, there are some insecurities in the top-right of the outer ring. To the upper right of this is another cup-with-partial-ring that was not included in the Hedges (1986) survey, nor Boughey & Vickerman’s (2003) updated work. There are some obvious pecked carved lines — whose specific definition yet remains unclear — in and around this area of the petroglyph; but in the “official” illustration these elements or ingredients were somehow missed.
Eclipse Stone, looking west
When we visited the stone the other day, the naturally eroded lines on the rock seemed pretty obvious; but the more we looked, the less secure we were about some of them. Thankfully the light kept changing about, allowing us to get different perspectives — and with the low sunlight of evening casting itself across the rock, some additional features seemed obvious. In particular, what seemed like two natural “scratches” on the stone turned out to have been pecked and carved and the straight lines ran into the double cup-and-ring on the left-side. One of these — the lower and shorter of the two — seems to run into the central cup, but this aint certain. The longer top line has an even more circuitous venture: entering the outer ring, it passes onto the top-inner ring and then bends along its edge, before exiting again on the right-hand side, through the outer ring and heading out towards the large natural eroded cutting a few feet away (see my crappy drawing to get an idea). Other faint aspects on this stone may have the hand of man behind them…
My shit sketch!Hedges 1986 sketch
There are certainly a few other cups on the stone: one with a near semi-circle on its lower and right-hand side. The long nature-worn cut, right-of-middle, may have had the hand of man cutting into the cup at the bottom; and another couple of “is it? — isn’t it?” enhanced natural cups seem possible on the left side of the rock. There is also what looks like a distinct single cup-marking on the west-facing vertical face of the stone (you walk towards it from the track). It looks pretty decent, but I’ll let them there “professionals” assess the validity or otherwise of that one! But the other unmistakable and very curious ingredient is the deep, worn arc beneath the primary double-ring feature. This is, as the photo shows, separated by a long natural crack running halfway down and along the stone, above which possibly the double-ring feature touches. This large ‘arc’ feature gives the distinct impression of being a big smile! However…
Turn the image of the central feature upside down and you get a very different effect indeed. A rainbow above the surface of the Earth, with (perhaps) a pool in which the sun has reflected? Or an underworld venture? Looking at it from a few angles gives the impression of a comet moving across the sky, aswell as an eclipse with the diamond-ring effect. But as with cup-and-ring in general, there are plenty of other potentials! Which also begs the question: was it to be looked from the top or bottom (or left or right for that matter)?
I could waffle about this particular carving for much longer, showing that it had quite an effect on me. Check it out and sit with it for a while… It’s superb!
References:
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS 2003.
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks on Rombalds Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Cup-and-Ring Stone: OS Grid Reference – NZ 0774 7048
Archaeology & History
1928 photo of carving
Found inside a prehistoric tomb that was excavated in the late 1920s “by Messrs R.C. and W.P. Hedley at Pike Hill, near Stamfordham,” this fascinating-looking carving was found on a stone that “was overlying the primary burial” cist in the middle of the tumulus, measuring “2 feet 9 inches long by 2 feet wide and 12 inches deep, with an orientation on the longer axis of NE.” As we can see in the old photo that accompanied Mr Hedley’s (1928) short article in Antiquity journal, four single cups are arranged in a rough square and are joined with each other by a single line, running from cup to cup, outlining a clear quadrilateral formation. Two other single cups are outliers on the left and right side of the ‘square.’
A second smaller cist was also found inside the same mound and on the central inner face of this was another, more simplistic carving described as “a very fine cup-mark 1½ inch in diameter and ¾-inch deep.” These carvings are no longer in situ (I think they’re in Newcastle Museum) and apparently this second single cup-marked stone can no longer be located.
References:
Beckensall, Stan, Northumberland’s Prehistoric Rock Carvings, Pendulum: Rothbury 1983.
Beckensall, Stan, Prehistoric Rock Motifs of Northumberland – volume 2: Beanley to the Tyne, Abbey Press: Hexham 1992.
Hedley, R. Cecil, “Ancient British Burials, Northumberland,” in Antiquity Journal, volume 2, December 1928.
As with many of the other Baildon Moor carvings, get up to Dobrudden caravan park and walk into the grasses immedietaly northeast onto the Dobrudden necropolis plain for 100 yards or so. It’s not far from the track and one of the many bell-pits is very close by. Look around!
Archaeology & History
A lovely little carving (sad aren’t I…?), first recorded and illustrated in Glossop’s (1888) famous essay on the ancient sites of Baildon Moor. He described there being 18 cups etched onto this rock — a fact echoed a few decades later in Mr Baildon’s (1913) magnum opus. The modern surveys thankfully still count 18 cups here.
Mr Baildon’s 1913 imageGlossop’s 1888 drawing
This is another one of the Baildon Moor carved stones included in Mr Holmes’ (1997) astronomical survey, where he thought the cup-markings here represented stellar maps and other prehistoric astronomical events. A damn good investigative notion, but it sadly aint true. However, those self-same ‘central design’ curves found at a large proportion of other carvings on and around Baildon Moor are plain here for all to see…
References:
Baildon, W. Paley, Baildon and the Baildons (parts 1-15), St. Catherines Press: Adelphi 1913-26.
Boughey, K.J.S. & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Leeds 2003.
Colls, J.N.M., ‘Letter upon some Early Remains Discovered in Yorkshire,’ in Archaeologia, 31, 1846.
Cowling, Eric T., Rombald’s Way, William Walker: Otley 1946.
Cudworth, William, ‘Baildon Moor & its Antiquities,’ in Bradford Antiquary 3, 1900.
Glossop, William, ‘Ancient British Remains on Baildon Moor,’ in Bradford Antiquary No.1, 1888.
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks of Rombald’s Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Holmes, Gordon, 2000 BC – A Neolithic Solstice Odyssey, SASRG 1997.
Takes a bitta finding this one, mainly cos it’s only a small stone – but worth the walkabout. It’s on the Low Plain, north of Dobrudden, about 10 yards down the path from the caravan park.
Archaeology & History
W.P. Baildon’s 1913 drawing
As with other stones on this roughland plain, it was first recorded and drawn by the local historian W. Paley Baildon (1913), who counted at least 15 cups here, with one complete cup-and-ring. Some of the cups have very distinct half-rings upon them; whilst others are connected by faint lines (as his drawing clearly shows). The later surveys of Hedges (1986), and Boughey & Vickerman (2003) counted 17 cups on this stone. This was another of the carvings which local astronomer Gordon Holmes (1997) thought may have been based on the constellation of Cassiopeia (like the nearby Cassiopeia Stone, found on the same moorland plain).
References:
Baildon, W. Paley, Baildon and the Baildons (parts 1-15), St. Catherines: Adelphi 1913-26.
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS 2003.
Glossop, William, ‘Ancient British Remains on Baildon Moor,’ in Bradford Antiquary, 1888.
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks on Rombalds Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Holmes, Gordon T., 2000 BC – A Neolithic Solstice Odyssey, SASRG Press 1997.
Best way to find this is to get up to the Dobrudden caravan site on the edge of Baildon Hill, near the cinder-dump, then follow the same directions as for the Baildon Moor carving no.171. It’s on the same plain amidst the grasses – but you’re gonna have to zigzag about for a while before you find it!
Archaeology & History
W. Paley Baildon’s drawing
A simple plain cup-marked stone which Boughey & Vickerman (2003) reckoned to have 14 of the little babies etched on its surface. Ninety years earlier, the reliable Mr W.P. Baildon (1913) — who seems to have been the first person to describe this carving — showed there to be 15 cups when he came here.
This was one of the many carved rocks that astronomer Gordon Holmes (1997) looked at in his attempt to give a celestial explanation for the designs. Not too sure misself…
References:
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS 2003.
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks on Rombalds Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Holmes, Gordon T., 2000 BC – A Neolithic Solstice Odyssey, SASRG Press 1997.
From East Morton village, take the moorland road, east, and up the steep hill. Where the road levels out there’s a left turn where a trackway leads onto the moor. Go up here & keep walking till you hit a moorland ‘footpath’ signpost. Stop here and walk due west (your left) onto the gently sloping rise and into the mass of the Stanbury Hill enclosure system. Keep walking for 200 yards or so, where the land begins to slope down to the end of the spur; and just 50 yards before it drops down to the stream below you’ll find a cluster of carved rocks like the Lunar Stone, the Teaspoon Rock, Spotted Stone, etc, all scattered about. Near these, you’ll find this one!
Archaeology & History
Not to be confused with the carving of the same name on the northern side of these moors (near the Green Crag Slack enclosure), this carved rock gets its name specifically from looking like a lay-out plan of some settlement or enclosure. It’s unlikely that this title or description has anything to do with the carving, but its the impression it gave me when I first saw it! But then once you look at the carving from another angle it takes on a different impression.
Enclosure Carving from above
First thought to have been found by Stuart Feather in 1978, it is one of many carvings that occur in what seems to be an extensive prehistoric enclosure or settlement. There’s a complete cup-and-ring near the western end of the rock, with another distinct cup-marking by its side, and what looks to be a natural cup at the top-end of the stone. But it was the other section of the carving on the central and eastern side which intrigued me: a curious ‘enclosure’ of lines, with a cup-marking in each section. Cutting between the cup-and-ring and the enclosure lines is a natural long crack or fissure running roughly north-south through the rock. It seemed to me (though I could be wrong) that a line had been pecked running along this natural crack — although in Boughey & Vickerman’s (2003) drawing they don’t highlight this. It also seemed that the carved lines from ‘enclosure’ linked up to the pecked line that was carved along the natural fissure in the rock (as illustrated in my crap drawing!).
Shit drawing of CR99
As with the Lunar Stone nearby: it appears that either this stone was carved at different periods; or else for a long period of time much of the stone was exposed to the elements, whilst a section of it remained covered. For the distinct cup-and-ring on the western-end is more worn, with more eroded evidence of pecking, than the extended lines on the eastern end of the rock. I need to go back here and get some better images — and certainly do a much better drawing!
References:
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS 2003.
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks on Rombalds Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Dead easy! Avoiding Keighley (as common sense dictates), but going to its outskirts, get to the huge Cliffe Castle (tis free) on the northern outskirts of the town. Go inside and look around!
Archaeology & History
Carving in Cliffe Castle MuseumClose-up of cups & rings
Initially located in the ground a few yards south of Dobrudden caravan park amidst a large gathering of other carved rocks, this grand-looking cup-and-ring stone is no longer in situ. As with a several other carvings, this has been on a bittova wander in the last century! It was first uprooted from the Earth and archaeologically transferred to Bradford’s Cartwright Hall Museum sometime after World War 2, where it lived peacefully for a number of years, before being moved to Cliff Castle Museum, where it still lives, quietly (along with another prehistoric carved rock, the Comet Stone, that was nabbed from the uplands near the Roms Law circle).
W.P. Baildon’s 1913 drawing
As we can see from the photos (taken in poor lighting in the museum – sorry…) there are five cup-and-rings with one cup-and-2-rings standing out (plus about another 10-12 cups scattered here and there); though when W. Paley Baildon drew a picture of the stone around 1913, he could clearly see another cup-and-ring etched onto the stone, but this has faded somewhat in the last century. Messrs Boughey & Vickerman (2003) were unable to see it.
References:
Baildon, W. Paley, Baildon and the Baildons – parts 1-15, Adelphi: London 1913-1926.
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Leeds 2003.
Hedges, John, The Carved Rocks on Rombald’s Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Jackson, Sidney, ‘Cup and Ring Boulders of Baildon Moor,’ in Bradford’s Cartwright Hall Archaeology Group Bulletin, 1, 1955.
From East Morton village, take the moorland road, east, and up the steep hill. Where the road levels out there’s a right turn, plus (more importantly!) a trackway on your left which leads onto the moor. Go up this traclk and keep walking till you hit a moorland ‘footpath’ signpost. Stop here and walk due west (your left) onto the gently sloping rise of Stanbury Hill. Keep walking for a 250 yards or so, where the land has sloped gently down to the end of the spur; and just 50 yards before it drops down tot he stream below you’ll find a cluster of rocks scattered about. One of the stones here is this one!
Archaeology & History
This is an excellent carving first recorded, it seems, by Stuart Feather in 1977, as cited in the Yorkshire Archaeology Journal’s ‘Listings’ for 1978. It can be found some 27 yards west of a prehistoric cairn near the top of the ridge (14 yards east of the same cairn is the Spotted Stone carving).
Lunar Stone carvingSoutheast section, with 3 cup-and-rings?
We have to assume that when Mr Feather first located this stone that the faint cup-and-rings on the topmost southeast section of the rock had been exposed to the elements from Day 1, so to speak: as the designs here are quite faint and well-worn. Another not unreasonable assumption is that Mr Feather then proceeded to dig away at the rest of the rock, exposing other features on the stone which had laid under the soil for countless centuries, as the northernmost part of the carving has minimal erosion effects on it. Indeed, unless this is true, we have to start thinking that the carving was made over quite lengthy periods of time, due solely to the greater and lesser effects of weathering on different sections of the stone.
As seen in both the diagram and photos, this is a quite extravagent design. Consisting of several cup-and-rings, aswell as a double-ring, it is found amidst a small cluster of equally impressive, albeit very different carved rocks, all appearing to have a quite specific relationship with death and ritual. This and the other stones are found on the western end of a small serpentine ridge of land (Stanbury Hill), with streams flowing on the north and western sides and small remains of marshland to the south. The geomantic feature here, if relevant, relates to movements between the Earth, water, death and the setting sun: quite potent and important issues in the lives of the neolithic and Bronze Age peoples who lived hereby.
Northern section of carving – with calendrical cups?
The title of this stone carving — the Lunar Stone — should be quite evident: the design has all the hallmarks of celestial lunar movements around the ridge of the heavens; or here, pictured along the edges of the rock (symbolic of the firmament), upon and amidst which the moon travels in its rhythmic motion through the heavens. But don’t take that too seriously: it’s just an imaginative flutter that struck my otherwise distraught inability to know what I’m talking about!
References:
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks of Rombald’s Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
NB – Since writing this and analysing the imagery, it seems there’s another cup-and-ring on this stone which was missed by Messrs Hedges, Boughey and Vickerman and which we missed in our survey from just a few days ago. We’re going back up to assess the design again in a few days time and it seems very likely that we will have to amend the diagram above.
