https://www.landtraces.com/sussex daily 0.75 2016-08-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437676902305-2J9WANS5K6RDAKVH6VVX/Boscawen-Un-02.jpg Cornwall - Boscawen-Un Bronze Age Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406126626292-XZJ5MSY5DTRJ31GPWLIR/Zennor+Quoit-01.jpg Cornwall - Zennor Quoit Neolithic dolmen emerging from the Cornish mist This really was a trial to find. It was, however, confounded by a really thick mist that had been hanging around the peninsular for two days (in late July!) and I think if I hadn't had an OS map I might never have found it. Starting from the car park at Zennor I crossed the main road near the telephone box and took the footpath that runs along the bottom of the hill and I remember wondering at the time whether there were any snakes around? We'd already seen a number of very small lizards on the cliff path to Gurnards Head when just in time I stopped myself from stepping on an Adder at the side of the path! Usually when I've encountered them in the past they've slithered off as soon as they know they've been spotted, but this one stood its ground and even allowed me to get relatively close to take its portrait! Having jumped over it I carried on along the path when, blow me, I encountered another which, thankfully, disappeared into the undergrowth. Passing the farm buildings I then started to make my way up the hill towards the Logan Stone but having reached the top, encountering yet another adder, I found myself completely disorientated because I couldn't work out where the sun was due to the mist and wandered around for about half an hour becoming increasingly panicky. Then, just as I was about to despair and make my way back down, there was a very brief break in the mist across the moorland and I could just about discern what must surely be Zennor Quoit about 300m away. Rechecking the map as the mist rolled relentlessly back in I made a mad dash to get there and felt a huge relief as it came into view just the other side of a low stone wall through the ferns and gorse. My first reaction on coming up close to it was its sheer size, it had looked quite insubstantial from a distance, but this really is a whopper and quite beautifully constructed. I didn't realise the significance of the five pillars alongside it at the time so I was quite intrigued by them and also the tiny holes which appear all over the structure. I think the combination of it being hidden in the swirling mist and having had to really struggle to find it gave it a special kind of significance for me and it presented itself as an award if you see what I mean. Well worth visiting but I would advise anyone attempting to find it in adverse weather conditions to have a map and a compass...... oh, and look out for snakes.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406126643864-W5D7MWW8L7T235814HK0/Chysauster-01.jpg Cornwall - Chysauster Iron Age village https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406126734345-IA884YVD9DMYUV0WRQ4M/Gun+Rith+Standing+Stone.jpg Cornwall - Gun Rith Neolithic standing stone https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406126743430-K2779CZHBQYZHWTXURDR/The+Merry+Maidens.jpg Cornwall - The Merry Maidens Neolithic stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406058153188-ZKJ6MKOIUHHT3X6RZP2F/Mulfra+Quoit.jpg Cornwall - Mulfra Quoit Neolithic dolmen https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406559299445-1UZI47SJMAJ9SFZDT7O2/The+Pipers-Bodmin.jpg Cornwall - The Pipers Bronze Age standing stones on Bodmin Moor https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406558084029-F7PX36P1JNJAE31KGAHU/Pipers-01.jpg Cornwall - The Pipers Neolithic standing stones, Penwith https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406558266451-XBWSM0B3IGU5CSDYORK6/Tregiffian+Long+Barrow-01.jpg Cornwall - Tregiffian Neolithic entrance grave https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437673097875-NA7Y87MK8J6IUE2SF6PR/Ballowal-01.jpg Cornwall - Ballowal Barrow Bronze Age funerary tomb https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406126797067-9E0YPLYAR29IZFKG6MZF/St+Levans+Church.jpg Cornwall - St. Levan's stone (un)natural stone feature https://www.landtraces.com/isle-of-wight daily 0.75 2016-11-28 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406301550108-85LXVHF3N7062YGV61Y0/Brighstone+Down-01.jpg Isle of Wight - Brighstone Down Bronze Age barrows Brighstone Down encompasses quite a large area and also includes Gallibury Hump which sits just outside the forested area. The Tennyson Trail passes through the middle of it and it's quite accessible by foot from Brighstone village to the South or from the road connecting Brighstone and Calbourne. This area of Downland forms the spine of the Island running East to West and is quite rich in tumuli of varying sizes and states of decay. Of the barrows in the woodland we really only encountered about three and it was quite a surprise to find quite large barrows hidden in the depths of the forest. These were situated just off a track which runs up from the reservoir (bounded by the Tennyson and Worsley Trails) on the southern edge of the forest. The map indicates three barrows near the bend and I was anticipating Bell barrows. As far as I could tell there were only two quite handsome barrows at this position about 2m high and 5-6m wide, but strangely there was a large but quite faint circle comprising a shallow ditch surrounded by a small bank about 7-9m in diameter. This either had to be a small enclosure (there are others not far away) or a reasonably large disc barrow! This was quite difficult to make out properly due to the density of the undergrowth and poor light on an overcast day, but if it does turn out to be a disc barrow then it's possibly the only one on the island as far as I can tell. Having researched I can find no mention of this anywhere else. If anyone has any more information I'd be glad to hear it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406302721947-WJHPQEU2FOPS16YP71BI/Cheverton+Down.jpg Isle of Wight - Cheverton Down Bronze Age barrows This small gathering of barrows can be reached from the fantastic viewpoint of Limerstone Down, just off the Worsley Trail, about 30 minutes walk North East from the village of Brighstone. There are four barrows visible at the top of the Down, a further two about 100m west (though they may have been ploughed out as they weren't exactly obvious) and two large barrows at the end of the spine of the hill at Cheverton Farm. There are great views across the island in most directions but the barrows aren't exactly what you'd call 'awe inspiring' and the weather was also a bit flat the day we trudged through. Perhaps more intriguing are the strange earthworks around the viewpoint at Limerstone Down a few hundred metres South West though I can't find any information about them so I've no idea just how old they are.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406191250168-YBO3A3QTBH3KBJKGVYLY/Afton+Down.JPG Isle of Wight - Afton Down Bronze Age barrow cemetery in the midst of the Freshwater Golf Club Afton Down is a strange site as it's often difficult to tell what's old and what's been added. What looks like a Bronze-age barrow from one angle turns out to be a sand trap from another. It's obviously a barrow cemetery consisting of two groups of 3 and 8 barrows and a dyke or two, but has been severely messed about by the morons that are the Freshwater Bay Golf club. How do these people manage to get away with it? You would think that this historically interesting area which is wonderfully beautiful and relatively unspoilt for the Isle of Wight would have had some sort of preservation order placed on it, but they've simply carved it up for the benefit of a few garishly-clad plonkers who tut at you when you stop to take a few photos because it's 'interrupting their game'. It might be quite interesting to have a closer look at some of the barrows in the evening after the golfers have gone home as you can't get near some of them because you're restricted to the footpath. On a nicer note, you can visit Dimbola Lodge, the home of Julia Margaret Cameron, pioneer Victorian photographer in Freshwater Bay which is a real treat.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406301473540-NOVZWYKA6B71X918B8O5/Ashey+Down-01.jpg Isle of Wight - Ashey Down Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406301509676-TUO4IV23DBLSP4QQDFW1/Brading+Down.jpg Isle of Wight - Brading Down Bronze Age barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105229370-0QN6FYTI44SIO0V9AII9/Five+Barrows.jpg Isle of Wight - Five Barrows Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406302528933-WRIPKZ0NAFGGSY0ZRP64/Five+Barrows+Settlement-02.jpg Isle of Wight - Five Barrows Iron Age promontory fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406302596092-CX46ETJATAHQKIUIPVFE/Gallibury+Hump.jpg Isle of Wight - Gallibury Hump Bronze Age barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406302643729-Y6ODIT3RZE1LFWGBTITG/Gallows+Hill-01.jpg Isle of Wight - Gallows Hill Bronze Age barrow (also known as Michael Morey's Hump) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406191188462-Z0F40K0MQN528RF6486J/The+Harboro.jpg Isle of Wight - The Harboro Bronze Age barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406191351382-CMTPABI7JWTDP31SE8PN/DSC_4203.jpg Isle of Wight - The Mottistone Long Stone https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406191288242-BABZ5LLVNRVN2J26V232/Pay+Down.jpg Isle of Wight - Pay Down Bronze Age barrows https://www.landtraces.com/hampshire daily 0.75 2019-05-28 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406817648696-PN4UWDXITFXWLBA9F3N2/Beacon+Hill-01.jpg Hampshire - Beacon Hill Iron Age hill fort My memory takes me back to 1972 and I have just queued up with my family for what seems like a lifetime on a drab day outside the British Museum. We have just managed to get into the room where the treasures of Tutankhamun are on show and I am finally in front of the famous death mask taking in the awesomeness of it all, when an over zealous mother elbows me out of the way and thrusts her own children forward, the brief vision now fading away in a milieu of struggling families. Goodness, it was like a rugby scrum in there! Forty two years later I'm walking around the top of Beacon Hill towards the grave of Lord Carnarvon, sponsor of Howard Carter's 1922 excavation in the Valley of the Kings. It's a beautiful day and being a Monday there's hardly a soul about, just the ever present hum of the A34 a long way below me. The last time I came up here must have been before 1972 when my parents would bring us here for a Sunday afternoon runabout and tell us about the Tutankhamun stories. It's all pretty much as I remember it, the grave surrounded by railings, the view to Highclere Castle, the stout earthworks of the hill fort, the wild flowers and butterflies and the singing of skylarks above. In fact the only thing that has changed is the A34 which must have been a very quiet affair pre-1972. It's the A34 that got me back here as well, having travelled up and down it on numerous occasions, always strongly aware of the hill's presence, but it was always a case of 'in too much of a hurry, not the right weather or nobody else in the car wanting to do the mammoth climb to the top'. Well today is my day and all the conditions are spot on. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1416239383730-8STA9AM3VLB2Y5HMLUEX/Ashurst+Lodge-01.jpg Hampshire - Ashurst Lodge (New Forest) Bronze Age Enclosure We stumbled on this small charming enclosure while ambling around the New Forest. It's not very big, popular with local bovine herds, probably no more than about 20-25m in diameter and the banks no more than 1.5m high (mostly on the southern side). I imagine in the winter months it's probably very boggy around here and the northern and eastern sides are bounded by the beginnings of the Beaulieu River which acts as a natural defence. Pastscape describes the earthwork as a Bronze Age enclosure or early Iron Age univalate Fort. I'd go for the former as the earthworks don't seem like they were ever defensive and more about preserving a bit of dry ground in a very flat area. There are also a number of (presumably) Bronze Age barrows nearby which might support that. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1497015952761-RU6U1G55LM41UZNO8HUS/The+Butt-01.jpg Hampshire - The Butt, Fritham Situated on the edge of the New Forest village of Fritham, this prominent bowl barrow's name suggests that it was used in later times for archery practice. Later still during World War II it had a brick built construction on top of it which may have been an observation post for the nearby airfield at Ocknell (RAF Stoney Cross). The surrounding ditch is still visible, though obviously filled up slightly over several millennia. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1497020131603-WY2075GH7O0UTPX34NAZ/Furzley+Common-01.jpg Hampshire - A large Bronze Age bowl barrow slightly South West of Stagsbury Hill Aside from Stagsbury Hill which dominates Furzley Common there are 2 or 3 sizeable barrows to be seen here along with various field systems and earthworks/boundary markers which could be contemporaneous with the barrows or possibly medieval. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1497018364738-FK3HZNLVXO3W0FAZ0A2V/Stagsbury+Hill-01.jpg Hampshire - Stagsbury Hill, one of the highest points in the New Forest I thought initially that this was a small univalate Iron Age hill fort or enclosure with a few Bronze Age barrows thrown in, but later research claims it to be a rabbit breeding enclosure and the medieval people that worked here simply re-used the barrows as 'pillow' mounds and what appears to be an IA ditch and bank, was just built, along with a fence of sorts, to keep the rabbits on the hill top. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1542821179186-AX81MW7R5Q2043LHP4HI/Petersfield+Heath-01.jpg Hampshire - Petersfield Heath Bronze Age barrow cemetery Over the last few years I’ve come to realise that in the areas North of the South Downs, particularly in Hampshire and West Sussex, there are far more barrows and barrow cemeteries on low lying Wealden areas than there are on the Downs themselves. Why this is I’m not sure, but a recent visit to Petersfield Heath made me wonder if it was more to do with water. The cemetery at Petersfield is very close to a small lake, arranged slightly to the North East of the lake with some barrows almost overlooking it. There’s always been a connection between Bronze Age sites and water as water was deemed to be something sacred and large amounts of offerings have traditionally been associated with lakes and rivers. Maybe this is the case here too, though I’ve no idea if the lake is really old or a more modern bit of man-made landscaping! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1559070815847-E82MZ2Z9A7MA9312LCGQ/Danebury-01.jpg Hampshire - Danebury Iron Age hill fort You can’t really experience Danebury hill fort until you’re almost inside it, but the tree cover also adds to the atmosphere conjured up by this extensive fort. Set on a small hill in an otherwise flat landscape it boasts three sets of banks and ditches, covers 5 hectares and was occupied for 500 years. It’s also one of the most excavated forts in the UK with almost 60% excavation of its total area carried out by Barry Cunliffe in the 1970s. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1421332298320-KW2C7PE4PG87H2D85BXB/Strodgemoor+Bottom-01.jpg Hampshire - Strodgemoor Bottom Bronze Age Barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406213923744-ULRZQY24ZF7LVTVW6U6A/Telegraph+Hill.jpg Hampshire - Telegraph Hill Bronze Age barrow on the South Downs Way https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406128400550-R2HYEIGQYUM1DJBZM4LK/Old+Winchester+Hill-04.jpg Hampshire - Old Winchester Hill Iron Age hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406817680644-PD0J1ZIGDRJ71UP8ERGJ/Seven+Barrows-01.jpg Hampshire - Seven Barrows Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1421330208336-OY611RWJ761Z5W85R1EM/Castle+Hill-01.jpg Hampshire - Castle Hill Iron Age hill fort https://www.landtraces.com/blog daily 0.75 2019-02-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1407064715750-3EO44L3FGQDFC5ZKSHD8/Steve+Speller.jpg Blog https://www.landtraces.com/blog/2019/2/12/brighton-museum-archaeology-gallery monthly 0.5 2019-02-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985705821-SLT5EW9DFNZSBL5ICJHX/Archaeology+Room-01.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985710057-HU60QBZZGM179G7PITZE/Archaeology+Room-02.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985713696-YB8CPGG0BL4ILONYXMSQ/Archaeology+Room-03.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985715957-8W0GYMJ8JV3XH59BTGQP/DSG_4163.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985718734-WCWEUG3ZKQZ3D4R6QE41/DSG_4164.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985722506-EO0E99YNEHJ1XYBP74JC/DSG_4167.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985722883-OB2PA57R1BNM2M4MMYOK/DSG_4168.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985728712-A05H81SDNS0GHPQYVWSR/DSG_4171.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985728343-OPG6LULXCAHR4MAKKSI9/DSG_4172.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985732825-V49XRRXNCJ41O8H3XS0H/DSG_4173.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985734041-9IURT717F0AH1TA7F2UB/DSG_4175.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985737472-M3PEYQ120S74WZ965IZ2/DSG_4177.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985739838-6ZULC2LR5XP3R56BYMVS/DSG_4179.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985742377-PVAA6HJJN5W7RORJ5LBJ/DSG_4181.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985743266-ESUN6F0CHO6Z2T9BUPWW/DSG_4183.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985746231-FZPGMZ354YH54352FZXM/DSG_4184.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985746974-TIDHBQ501UA1V2JBR5M2/DSG_4187.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985750729-9N6FDAVWITWHXJLPFGVF/DSG_4188.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985752267-HPY8Z1B61PIGX3ANIBF3/DSG_4190.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985755378-R6328P6J0MQN2ES0LV3L/DSG_4192.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985757758-PQ7WIWDNOICXIQAP8MKN/DSG_4194.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985760272-IDDCQSFGX337O39PPX3S/Img6235.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985761659-D7OJ1VIN68T2SYJC0YPC/Img6242.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985763785-URKWG5VH5AV8QFH04U8L/Img6247.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985767942-59CGHLG2XEOWGA9KT2FN/Img6276.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985770614-HL0U3UVLUYK01HCBZ8CC/Img6281.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985770727-205W4MUKL43YV8DPXZVD/Img6284.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985774737-MGJ0I4D8EY9TN1R7WANP/Img6296.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985774731-JZQOLXMW6JCAFFUJFYM5/Img6315.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985776834-JJ3TUXLPD0L5LN32I5DR/Img6320.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985778588-MUG9DNILZFPI6J4QDOY2/Img6348.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985781324-IJUDM3KW6211K1L5ALPS/Img6353.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985785099-YRN3VFP3WOKNV7ZU79HT/Img6355.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985786098-DOG6S6AEVBLY5PH39J80/Img6359.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985787597-LXJMS5O83DUGDJAWFSYG/Img6366.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985789972-UUV77XY4OV8WKA6PA61K/Img6370.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985793143-7232USHYKG3CZOXIEU8L/Img6372.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985792262-O87L32BHA701BDUG9C4I/Img6376.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985794775-6MKQLSCAEX7HIUT0HYPU/Img6379.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985797270-JCQSJTNF1BZ8H7NWRRQU/Img6390.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985798435-FEQ6Y9YPI1OA9R7U97WQ/Img6397.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1549985800219-PTFUYEP120JNEJVOK085/Img6794.jpg Blog - Brighton Museum Archaeology Gallery https://www.landtraces.com/blog/2017/11/1/a-sutherland-cycle-tour-and-the-380-stone-circle monthly 0.5 2017-11-02 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548272976-HGLZNCW7MVJ5HO2XNHP4/DSF_8336.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Loch Naver hut circle (not necessarily prehistoric) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548273599-H5883AU1YH4ZZSIZHCAB/DSF_8337.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Possible cup marked rock https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548276064-LI27BPTB77WSTLWZVBYC/DSF_8338.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548276521-PRZIYJTA3OIOTF27BHBK/DSF_8341.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548277742-Z4F92JWA3UX9KA2BKZKN/Loch+Naver+hut+circles.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547879895-ZSBOEU4EN8G577NKV253/DSF_8288.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Achinduich stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547879885-JW4MOSDIONEHF9GUFGC2/DSF_8296.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547881627-O5XZ55YW8EBLBMEX8L6T/DSF_8304.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547881461-YBDHMHIJ4QKUXCV49FZ7/DSF_8307.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - A possible outlier to Achinduich stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547966456-9SJ3E57C11VW17WHVLBT/DSF_8313.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Achnagarron standing stones https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547966440-LCNFYKG6P6HOM3YIPEY1/DSF_8320.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547968203-G3NBTI2A1F3B1FJN4V44/DSF_8321.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547969374-8T720NB7VYVGAHR3Y1KK/DSF_8326.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548497483-V3RHQPW3J1DESIJHUEQV/DSF_8410.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Achany chambered cairn https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548497603-DVAOLHXYXKLW1BH7UM18/DSF_8411.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Stone facade halfway along https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548499922-HT6IZFFFLRIHEXGA7729/DSF_8415.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Cist set into the top of Achany https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548499373-WUXE20FO9N2YQJPUZG26/DSF_8417.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548524971-VDPW9DKHVC073HUML58D/DSF_8423.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - The sad ruin of Ferry Wood Broch https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548524529-4QP5U0X8A71KD7HNCGX7/DSF_8421.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548585384-U6C0UP05YBFVIKNB0C3O/DSF_8426.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Sallachy Broch overlooking Loch Shin https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548585686-FTMLA17RMLIXQ10KOEN3/DSF_8450.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - The entrance to Sallachy Broch https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548587104-ZQ1GEZ3OXS4G20R03CL4/DSF_8451.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548587211-6HXOKVBACS9SQZZDXE97/Sallachy+Broch-02.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548588855-8TGMY8EOD46JGRFXP5XL/Sallachy+Broch-04.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - The interior of the broch https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548589963-CGSRD9CJU45KFRXTRW4F/Sallachy+Broch-05.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509548590399-N42CGJYNR9A5FIXD73SJ/Sallachy+Broch-06.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547420824-WV8E3TCX8GX107ZCYSN2/DSF_8237.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Tirryside Broch https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547454525-AXI6DWKZII8A3PF90EGQ/DSF_8250.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Ord South https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547478714-SDG3VMOMW45OSOEXEY5R/Ord+South.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Ord South viewed from Ord North https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547512617-UZAGQEQ6TEXNUOIFEVIN/DSF_8254.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Ord North https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547546841-HWBXWREH8C7G68Y7WURB/DSF_8272.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - The ruined entrance to Ord North https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547544775-XAISZJ8SR8UJPBV6QSWO/DSF_8274.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509547546626-5XSSMA0UOH169HWSCEZL/Ord+North-01.jpg Blog - A Sutherland Cycle Tour and the £380 Stone Circle - Ord North https://www.landtraces.com/blog/2016/10/31/the-orkney-saga monthly 0.5 2016-11-04 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1478203035767-KHLPEMF43KSQALBUSXL1/DSF_3926.jpg Blog - The Orkney Saga The Standing Stones of Stenness https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1478202907391-LB31MZ7XL0K6GE1C7QOW/image-asset.jpeg Blog - The Orkney Saga The Broch of Gurness https://www.landtraces.com/blog/2014/8/3/the-ridgeway-part-3 monthly 0.5 2014-08-03 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/2014/8/3/the-ridgeway-part-2 monthly 0.5 2014-08-03 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/2014/8/3/the-ridgeway-part-1 monthly 0.5 2014-08-03 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/prehistory monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/education monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/Brighton+Museum monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/Oscar+D.+Nilsson monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/archaeology monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/steve+speller monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/blog/tag/photography monthly 0.5 https://www.landtraces.com/gloucestershire daily 0.75 2024-08-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211207524-R46USDZM0SADGE01OXSM/Blackenbury-01.jpg Gloucestershire - Blackenbury Camp Iron Age promontory fort This one was a bit of a happy accident as I had no idea it was here. We'd set off for a Sunday afternoon walk with my brother-in-law's family to the Tyndale Monument (the Nibley Knob as it's known locally) which was erected in 1866 to the memory of William Tyndale, a local man from North Nibley, who'd had the bare faced cheek to translate the bible from Latin to English and was strangled and burned for his trouble in France! Making our way along the escarpment from Wooton-under-Edge through dense woodland I was suddenly aware that we were walking along the edge of some massive banks and ditches and I asked if it was what I thought it was and was given an affirmative. As we traversed the edge it became clear that it was quite a good size and a typical Iron Age bivallate promontory fort, not quite as impressive as it’s nearby neighbour at Uley Bury and certainly a lot more overgrown with vegetation, but there had been obvious attempts to clear some of this from the outer ditches. On the South Western edge there was an entrance way, but it was difficult to know whether this was original as it looked a bit too new and there were bits of limestone building material visible under tree roots. Possibly it had recently been enlarged to enable the gradual clearance of the interior. However, at the moment the interior is still quite choked and almost impenetrable. It would definitely be worth a revisit during the late autumn when the foliage has thinned as the views over the surrounding area to the South and as far as Bristol are just stunning. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406199879857-T4I4NPGX4HMRKEGBBHYW/Belas+Knap.jpg Gloucestershire - Belas Knap Neolithic long barrow On my way to Twigworth in Gloucestershire to pick up an exhibition I decided that I probably just had time to make a flying visit to Belas Knap, a place that had stuck in my mind since a childhood visit many, many years ago. This really seemed to be quite a remote and difficult site to find, but eventually it found me and I scrambled the fifteen minute walk to the top of the hill. I had the place all to myself for some time and it all came back to me in the serenity, tidiness and beauty of this enigmatic barrow. After wondering about for around twenty minutes I realised that someone else had arrived there and we exchanged nods. A few minutes later he stopped and asked me if I could take his picture next to the barrow using his iPhone and we fell into conversation. It transpired that he was from Tasmania visiting family and had lived nearby as a boy and had emigrated at the age of 12. He said that he’d forgotten just how much this place had meant to him and how these ancient places got under your skin. “We don’t have these same layers of history as you guys do back here and I really miss it”. That was about the age that I’d been on my last visit there also and though I’ve never lived outside the UK I think I understood what he meant. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406199836210-XVDF4NAOTUVTTTZACD4A/Nympsfield-01.jpg Gloucestershire - Nymphsfield Neolithic long barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406199911868-IF84X0YYIW827T2OXWN4/Hetty+Peglers+Tump-02.jpg Gloucestershire - Hetty Peglers Tump Neolithic long barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1674063298255-0Y9AZ4HZHFWMHSZ8DTL6/Uley+Bury_2.jpg Gloucestershire https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1724763437233-RYOTKSUGEUNR74G8OUSI/DSI_5709.jpg Gloucestershire - Windmill Tump Neolithic Long Barrow (aka Rodmarton Long Barrow) Firstly I'd just like to apologise for the recent windy weather which seems to have been triggered by our incursion on to Windmill Tump Long Barrow in Gloucestershire, or at least that's how it felt to us at the time! We were just returning from a business trip in Taunton and decided to take a diversion to this wonderful Neolithic long barrow which I'd never visited before and knew very little about. It was constructed around 3800 BC and is a Cotswold Severn type barrow and like Belas Knapp has a false front and two side chambers which contained the remains of 13 people along with funerary items like flint arrow heads. Another interesting fact is that there is no evidence to suggest that a windmill ever stood on this site! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211269618-0EHXFQB8TQ6C4HLIXZML/The+Longstone+of+Minchinhampton-01.jpg Gloucestershire - The Longstone of Minchinhampton https://www.landtraces.com/dorset daily 0.75 2021-12-15 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406059290593-RB2KVRV1989PB8B25HOD/Badbury+Rings.jpg Dorset - Badbury Rings Iron Age hill fort This was my first visit to Badbury Rings. Despite the fact that I'd been to college in Bournemouth some 25 years before, and was now here for the day taking my eldest son to an interview at my old college, I'd never made it out here. It was one of those bitterly cold days when you're not sure quite what the weather is going to do - one minute snow showers, the next bright sunlight. The approach to the Rings is quite spectacular in itself as you come along the Blandford road through an amazing avenue of tall, mature beech trees bereft of their leaves at this time of year and then swing into the carpark past three of the large Bronze Age barrows to your right. It's only a short walk from the carpark to the Rings and as you progress up this fairly low hill you'll notice a fourth barrow on your right and beyond the ramparts away from the other three. It reminded me very much of Danebury in Hampshire which is also on a fairly low hill, multivallate and with a small wood planted within its enclosure. The entrance differs to that at Danebury, and to its enormous neighbour at Maiden Castle nearby at Dorchester, in that it goes straight in towards the centre instead of zigzagging, so you can imagine they must have had some formidable gates here to prevent an easy ingress. Having walked anti-clockwise around the inner rampart to the Northern side you can see a couple of hundred yards off what looks like a low bank running roughly SW/NE which I guessed to be either a fourth defence or boundary marker. This is infact the Ackling Dyke, a Roman Road which takes a turn to the left just North of the Rings and continues towards the Dorset Cursus. Another interesting thing on Google Maps is the cropmark of what looks like an echo of the Rings reflected in the line of the road. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303096339-OJ16L6SXSBE899XPIEAW/Agglestone-01.jpg Dorset - The Agglestone natural rock feature The day was bright and having found a place to park up we set off over the wild heathland behind Studland and meandered our way through muddy lanes and low trees. We’d just stumbled on some of the best cep mushrooms we’d ever found when Alison looked up and suddenly exclaimed “Is that it?” pointing through the undergrowth to a monstrous boulder on the horizon. And there it was, looking completely out of place and out of scale with its surroundings, more like Dartmoor than Dorset. Having lived three years of my life in relatively close proximity to this amazing natural feature I was surprised that I’d never heard of it, let alone seen it and I’d been anticipating something much smaller like a gnarled old standing stone. As we got closer we noticed that we weren’t alone. There was a climber there, which slightly annoyed me, and for the first half an hour we had to endure him doing the same clumsy climb over and over again. Well I guess that’s what sandwiches were invented for and eventually he got bored and fell off (or did I push him?) and we had the place to ourselves. It really is awe-inspiring in its size and sheer strangeness and really looks otherworldly, like an organic UFO that’s crashed into a small hill. If you’d lived in this area thousands of years ago how could you not venerate it, there’s nothing like it for miles around and it’s set off with that glorious view over Poole Harbour and Brownsea Island. Even the hillock on which it stands doesn’t seem entirely natural, though to be fair there are other smaller hillocks thereabouts, some of them perhaps man-made. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303295354-2XID6YY2WLV984JFBGZJ/Kingston+Russell+SC-01.jpg Dorset - Kingston Russell Bronze Age stone circle After the surprisingly wonderful ruined circle at Rempstone I have to say that I was slightly under-whelmed by Kingston Russell, not a feeling that I’m used to when encountering prehistoric sites. Did Aubrey Burl have the same feeling too? Maybe that’s why it doesn’t appear in his book. It just didn’t seem to have the ‘oomph’ factor and the views from this setting are kind of so-so rather than wow! (as at Hampton). I think possibly the flatness of it all as well, the anticipation built up by the spotting of two very large stones in the hedgerow (one next to the farm entrance where you can just about park and the other about half way between there and the circle) and the lack of a dramatic sky to set it off probably didn’t help either. The only thing that I thought might redeem it would be to go there at night with a clear sky, some time in the near future, and try some very long exposures. That should do it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303513986-92A0S2B94M8VNVO1IUPW/Rempstone+SC-01.jpg Dorset - Rempstone (ruined) Bronze Age stone circle Everyone seems to be in agreement on this one, in that this is quite an enigmatic and peaceful place and I have to agree that we found it be so too. Maybe it’s that romance we have with ruins that does it, as obviously there’s only about half of the original circle remaining, the rest scattered about, moss-covered and (almost) forgotten. We found it quite easily after parking up almost opposite the site on the road between Corfe and Studland and I was hoping to catch the last rays of sunlight to illuminate the stones. However the fir trees surrounding them were so dense that almost all the light was shut out so I had to resort to long exposures and flash. Having set up we were suddenly surprised by another person marching purposefully through the woods and half expected to be asked to leave (it is apparently private property), but it turned out to be a friendly local pagan who regularly visited the stones and who told us about where and how the circle was originally, before bidding goodbye and disappearing into the now increasingly murky depths of the woods. Having reeled off a few shots we explored the half circle (festooned with coins, well about £3 worth anyway) and decided that it was now too dark to carry on taking photos and that we’d return in the morning. The following morning, clumping around in the undergrowth and magically finding one stone after another, the better light revealed just how large this circle once was and the relatively large size of the comprising stones. I think if there was a strong candidate for the repositioning and raising of it’s stones then this circle would be right up there. It seems a terrible shame that it should have been so disarranged and neglected and now almost pushed aside by the serried ranks of pines, but in so doing would it not lose it’s enigmatic nature? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406213271918-HY8E7NCBYE5HLCQZRQ4G/The+Grey+Mare+%26her+Colts-01.jpg Dorset - The Grey Mare & Her Colts Neolithic long barrow You only have to glance at an OS map to know that the triangle of Dorset between Dorchester, Bridport and Portland is one of the richest and most interesting prehistoric areas of England. Better still is driving along the A35 on a bright day after leaving the colossus of Maiden Castle and heading towards Winterbourne Abbas and that amazing view of the rolling hills and cliffs and the sea to your south. It’s so uplifting it makes you want to sell up and move down there – now! Today, however, it’s not bright and we’re heading east after a few days of walking and fossil hunting in Lyme Regis and we seem to be keeping just ahead of a huge rainstorm heading in from the south west. So it seemed a good time to stop off at the Grey Mare just before the impending deluge. It’s not a terribly easy one to find and seemed to be further from where we parked than we’d imagined, infact so much so that Alison gave up and headed back to the car before she could hear my triumphant exclamations as I climbed over a gate into the field where it stood. Despite it’s relative remoteness it’s a charming piece of work and has the feel of a diminutive WKLB or Wayland’s Smithy with it’s big stone façade and has a very different look to The Hellstone which is a not too distant neighbour. The back of it appears to have been a largely stone construction as there are very large flanking stones visible in various places which you don’t often see at long barrows unless they’ve been seriously denuded of their earth covering. It’s also very well sited as there are tremendous views over the Dorset countryside and, if I’m remembering rightly, a view of Chesil Beach and Portland Bill to the south east. Having stretched my “just 10 minutes” into half an hour I made my way back across the fields vowing that I must return for a long weekend to this regional treasure trove. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1526730314471-79LLCF9BHSKLUTD4J3E6/Hambledon-01.jpg Dorset - The Northern end of Hambledon Hill with it's multivalate ramparts overlooking Child Okeford https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1583860087839-8BIVS02S0VL1LWQVM3JE/Cerne+Abbas+Giant-01.jpg Dorset - The Cerne Abbas Giant I’ve included him in my collection despite the uncertainty of his age. He’s probably not as old as I assumed him to be as the earliest mention of him is in the 17th century, though it’s quite possible that he was covered up for a long period. William Stukely was the first person to compare his likeness to the Roman depiction of Hercules so it might be that his origins are in the Romano British era. There’s also an Iron Age earthwork on the crest of the hill named ‘The Trendle’, (just visible as a faint dark line on the crest of the hill), which gives that idea some credence. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303318771-W6QINC4L91M82Y30WKOM/Maiden+Castle-01.jpg Dorset - The southern ramparts of Maiden Castle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406059724960-XIUATQ8ZJ847APYJJMMX/Knowlton+Henge.jpg Dorset - The main henge at Knowlton Knowlton Henge, or I should say, Henges is a complex ritual landscape consisting of at least three Neolithic henges, a very large Bronze Age bowl barrow, a Norman church and various anomalies. The church sits in the centre of the middle henge and is all but ruined but the henge itself is in pretty good nick even though it predates the church by more than 3000 years. Oh, and it’s also reputed to be one of the most haunted sites in the UK! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303154988-L1JWD9S6HCNWKSWMK8KP/Fishing+Barrow.jpg Dorset - Fishing Barrow Bronze Age barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303127787-L6WDEO3A3O86R0P8V9HO/Hampton+SC-02.jpg Dorset - Hampton Down Neolithic stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406059773981-N38J4UPOHO5CRNSMB48E/The+Hellstone.jpg Dorset - The Hellstone Neolithic dolmen https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303193614-QHCTHTV4KX6LAWCZSZLR/Hengistbury+Head-01.jpg Dorset - Hengistbury Head Iron Age promontory fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406286413594-1EFU3J5VSBXQZYL62WRC/Maumbury+Rings-01.jpg Dorset - Maumbury Rings Neolithic henge monument https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303426094-XDF9WU76WYJEOQDFFZH3/Nine+Barrows+Down-01.jpg Dorset - Nine Barrows Down Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406059754629-4W6ZN7J1GFY7ETCNB6XA/Nine+Stones+of+Winterbourne+Abbas.jpg Dorset - The Nine Stones of Winterbourne Abbas Bronze Age stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406059767675-E4XGDCHR8MZXGUT41400/Pilsdon+Pen-01.jpg Dorset - Pilsdon Pen Iron Age hill fort https://www.landtraces.com/somerset daily 0.75 2020-03-21 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1525966462628-GU19K5S1WM3L2IH7LWS1/Cadbury-01.jpg Somerset - The huge earthworks of Cadbury Castle near the North East entrance https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1559917565677-BEJKHMXO0TJN1GDWAMDV/DSH_3339.jpg Somerset - Stoney Littleton Neolithic chambered long barrow Just South of Bath in North Somerset, this is one of the best preserved long barrows in the UK. It’s in quite an isolated bit of countryside and not terribly easy to locate unless you have a large scale OS map and enough time on your hands. The main attractions are that you can go inside it, that it has seven burial chambers, is over 5,500 years old and that one of the entrance stones has the impression of a fossilised ammonite in it. What more could you ask of a site? Though it is well preserved it has been subject to some renovation over the centuries so just how authentic it is is open to question. Our Georgian and Victorian ancestors showed no remorse in reassembling some of these sites with a little bit of artistic or fanciful license. Excavated in the early 1800s the burial chambers contained the bones of several individuals and some of the bones had been burnt. Possibly there had been a change from excarnation to cremation of the dead at some point in the barrows use. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1584792513914-OWPHFY3TU7FIL0I2GNVW/Hamdon+Hill-01.jpg Somerset - Hamdon Hill Iron Age hill fort towering above the village of Stoke-sub-Hamdon Hamdon Hill, or Ham Hill as it’s also known, is the largest hill fort in Somerset with about 3 miles of earthworks encompassing various stone quarries (mostly now disused), a pub and a War memorial. It’s difficult to understand exactly what’s going on in the interior because of the quarrying as, what look like earthworks, often turn out to be spoil heaps stretching back some 500 years. The hill itself also predates the Iron Age as traces of Neolithic and Bronze Age habitation have also been found. Various burials discovered during excavations in 2013 revealed a rather grisly period in the fort’s history where young women’s bodies, sometimes just their skulls, were deposited in what may have been food pits. Now the hill fort is a pleasant place to take a walk with staggering views in almost all directions. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105723689-3778XQ12LNXO4M12PYRP/DSC_0109.JPG Somerset - The Great Circle at Stanton Drew https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406128827283-81VZZA4V6NMLM5Z8ZNR4/DSC_1968.jpg Somerset - The Cove at Stanton Drew Neolithic chambered tomb https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406128926258-U9ZVVPGJRL1UZJNVIG97/Castle+Neroche-01.jpg Somerset - Castle Neroche Iron Age hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406129008206-8RHUMQLX5SHS2SN2SET7/Robin+Hood%27s+Butts.JPG Somerset - Robin Hood's Butts Bronze Age barrows https://www.landtraces.com/berkshire daily 0.75 2018-02-21 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406057978473-NA2CSZQ9XA0T5K25R8MD/Seven+Barrows.jpg Berkshire - Lambourn Seven Barrows Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://www.landtraces.com/oxfordshire daily 0.75 2024-08-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1688297997007-KLP26SU6XVXKMBTPRDKS/DSI_3737.jpg Oxfordshire - The Devil's Quoits late Neolithic/early Bronze Age stone circle and henge monument This is a modern reconstruction of the site as it would have appeared around the time of the Roman Conquest of Britain. Many of the 36 stones which make up the circle had either been tumbled, destroyed (the fate of many ancient sites linked with the Devil) or pushed into the henge ditch in Medieval times. The final indignity was the levelling of the site to build the RAF Stanton Harcourt airfield at the beginning of the Second World War. Then back between 2002 and 2008 Oxford Archaeology and a local aggregates company rebuilt the monument. It remains a strange place , mainly due to its proximity to landfill tips, aggregate extraction lakes and a recycling business (maybe that’s apt!) Sadly there’s virtually no evidence of the other monuments which made up the ritual landscape which once thrived here and included burial mounds, a wooden circle and graves and pits containing funerary offerings. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105507260-U9UIH6EUMJT7TSUD6JVX/DSC_4696.JPG Oxfordshire - Wayland's Smithy Neolithic long barrow I first visited Wayland’s Smithy on a family excursion when I was about 9 years old. It made an instant impression on me, not so much because of its thousands of years age (time’s a difficult concept for most young children) but more to do with its simplicity and scale. People long ago had erected massive sarsen stones by hand, without the aid of machines and buried their dead inside the structure’s small chambers. What’s more, you could still go inside these small chambers, but the bones were long gone, though I did find what I thought was a human rib bone on the path from the monument back to the Ridgeway, but my dad dismissed it as belonging to a cow or pig. For some time after this visit I was engrossed in trying to build a replica model of Wayland’s Smithy out of stones and earth in my own personal mud patch next to the side door of our home. It was some years after this that I discovered that the long barrow had been excavated and largely reconstructed (sympathetically) between 1962-63 by archaeologists Stuart Piggott and Richard Atkinson. Having looked at old photos of the site my mud patch version was more like the pre-reconstruction version. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406659927006-CJRZS28820TCDVU3YL3C/Uffington+White+Horse.jpg Oxfordshire - The head of the Uffington White Horse with the Manger and Dragon Hill beneath The thing that really gets me about the Uffington White Horse is how did they know what they were doing back in the Bronze Age? It can only be seen as a whole figure if you’re some distance North in the plain below or almost directly above it in the air. Of all the 16 white horse figures in England this is the oldest, most abstract, most beautiful and easily the most animated hill figure. As far as I can work out the only way they could do it was that they roughly planned it with chalk-whitened sticks placed in the hill side and then someone about a couple of miles away running back and forth making slight adjustments until they were happy about its appearance, then they could start cutting. Just a theory! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1724775957358-G6T64VKJJFIQSCFJUF49/DSI_4918.jpg Oxfordshire - The Wittenham Clumps (Round Hill and Castle Hill IA hill fort) The Wittenham Clumps are an enigmatic group of small hills in the Thames Valley of Oxfordshire and visible from the Ridgeway long distance path, much like the Didcot Power Station cooling towers until they were demolished. They consist of Round Hill, Castle Hill and its Iron Age fort and sometimes Brightwell Barrow to the South East, depending on who you ask! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406659858840-JA2MP5WB1EAENY0AJJEX/Uffington+Castle-01.jpg Oxfordshire - Uffington Castle Iron Age hill fort from the Ridgeway https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105526111-F7WH035G93SEVFNK57XX/The+Whispering+Knights.jpg Oxfordshire - The Whispering Knights Neolithic chambered tomb https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406660061260-O4727NMX5UEKNQ52DTQK/Segsbury+Camp-01.jpg Oxfordshire - The ramparts near the northern entrance to Segsbury Camp https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406660023145-3MSIDUZ0HAVD0UTUPYXW/Scutchamer+Knob-01.jpg Oxfordshire - Scutchamer Knob late Iron Age barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406128440872-W7WNAKKR9YENCC2L8Q4A/Rollright-02.jpg Oxfordshire - The King's Men late Neolithic stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406659786334-UW78V5QPQ9RXX1BFF2TK/Grims+Ditch-01.jpg Oxfordshire - Grim's Ditch Iron Age boundary marker https://www.landtraces.com/wiltshire daily 0.75 2021-12-21 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1464706473933-O8E3AI8B2XCA76E6R0XT/Swallowhead+Spring-01.jpg Wiltshire - Swallowhead Spring. A sacred spring and source of the River Kennet https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1464707282633-VMTXNZ1YGQJ46G3EMOSG/Old+Sarum-01.jpg Wiltshire - The earthworks of Old Sarum with the modern city of Salisbury and it's cathedral in the background. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1464710103512-OOZEZ2P6VT5K3Q2ANV1F/The+Giant%27s+Grave-01.jpg Wiltshire - The Giant's Grave nestling in a copse near Aldbourne. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406373236186-64R8JK0F4R3N2VS74ALO/Windmill+Hill-01.jpg Wiltshire - One of the Bronze Age barrows within the causewayed enclosure This is another (once) local site that I haven’t visited for probably decades, but today I’m here with my sister making our way from Avebury Trusloe the day after we’d been down to Devon for an uncle’s funeral. The weather looks like it’s on the point of raining all afternoon, but today we are lucky and it holds off and the air is suffused with the fresh smell of Spring. Walking through the hamlet the first thing that strikes us is the number of large sarcens in peoples garden walls (particularly Swan house in Bray Street) and, given the proximity of Adam and Eve across the adjacent field, we can’t help wondering if some of these stones came from the Beckhampton Avenue? Maybe not as whole stones, but perhaps pieces from destroyed stones. Making the gradual climb up to the top of Windmill Hill it seems odd that a hill as low and unremarkable as this seems to have been so important, acting as it were, as a springboard for the whole Avebury ritual landscape. So much activity in quite a small space though, as you begin to take in the faint rings of the inner circles, the lower tumuli beyond the outer circle and, most obviously, the large bell barrows nearer the centre of the monument. The position of the hill is also quite interesting as it affords views down on to Avebury (though you can’t see any stones due to the surrounding trees and vegetation, but maybe you could when it was being built), Silbury Hill to the South, the Ridgeway to the East and Cherhill Down and Oldbury to the South West. Having walked around the outer ring we discover some recent mole activity and begin to kick over the little spoil heaps. Almost immediately I’m rewarded with a small piece of ceramic about 2.5 x 1.5cm in size and shaped roughly like the Isle of Wight. There are two very faint parallel grooves incised on its outside curve. In addition to this we find two small globules of iron that look like failed castings of musket balls (any ideas?). We sit for a while and contemplate our surroundings before making our way back down across the fields to Avebury and the circle. Just in time for tea. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1472136348253-RE4NYW9R1GEEXSTRBM6S/Shipley+Bottom-01.jpg Wiltshire - The larger of the barrows further down the valley I was actually trying to get to the Giant's Grave further down the road and turned off far too early. Another car pulled up shortly after me and a guy got out and put on walking boots which further confused me. After twenty minutes walking along the valley bottom I realised my mistake, but as it turned out there was something to see after all. Shipley Bottom (or Shapely Bottom as I like to refer to it) doesn't have a huge amount to offer archaeologically, but it does do 'serene', which is not surprising considering its proximity to the Ridgeway path less than half a mile to the west and Liddington Castle a mile to the north. There are two or possibly three barrows along the valley bottom, the western one being the more impressive and better preserved. The eastern one(s) are almost flattened or ploughed out, difficult to say as they just looked like a patch of weeds, but at least that shows that somebody made the decision to stop degrading them.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305884306-KBZ18PQ95ZPKEKZA114Z/Winterbourne+Bassett-01.jpg Wiltshire - Winterbourne Bassett stone circle Despite some promising low spring sunshine when we set off, by the time we’d walked along Vize Lane from Broad Hinton, thick cloud had largely set in. The only thing that gives a hint of the site when viewed from a distance is the re-erected stone at the crossroad. Only when you’re almost on top of them are you aware of the six recumbent stones in the field to your left. However, with the vegetation being still mostly leafless in this prolonged winter weather, if you look in the hedgerow to your right you’ll notice a pile of substantial sarsens that have been cleared from the surrounding fields. Now this begs the question of whether they’re (a) from the ruined circle to your south, (b) from a nearby barrow to the north-east (ploughed out, but visible on Google Maps) or (c) simply cleared natural stones from surrounding fields? As they’re easily as big as the stones within the incomplete circle, it makes you wonder why the circle wasn’t completely cleared at some point, as cultivation has been going on there for a very long time judging by the evidence of faint strip lynchets. Of course if this isn’t the ruined stone circle, as has been suggested, and that it was originally the other side of the Clyffe Pypard road, then it hardly matters at all about the provenance of the hedgerow stones! Also worth having a good look at is the whopper of an outlier to the south-east of the circle. This stone is about the same size as the re-erected crossroads stone, but infinitely more interesting in shape. Shame they couldn’t have re-erected this one also or maybe they were worried about accidentally crushing the Alpacas that currently occupy the field. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1484310882169-FB8IBROBHN1M8ZN0C34K/Oldbury-01.jpg Wiltshire - Earthworks on the South Western side of the hill fort I called here on my way to my parents near Swindon and hadn’t been here for more than 20 years prior to this. It’s very easy to locate owing to the Lansdowne Monument, a 38m stone obelisk on Cherhill Down visible from both the A4 and the A361. Because of its proximity to Avebury, Silbury Hill, West Kennet Long Barrow, et al., the area is littered with sites from the Neolithic to the Iron Age and also includes more recent works like the white horse cut in 1780. I parked at the run off East of the hill fort in what must have been the Old Bath Road before it was metalled and straightened somewhat and made my way past the gallops and up towards the top of the Down. The path isn’t very obvious from this direction, but you do get to see a lot of earthworks which may, or may not, be connected with the hill fort. Some may be hut circles or animal pens, others might be dew ponds or slightly unambitious chalk quarries. Reaching the South East corner (it’s not round!) of the hill fort you get great views of the surrounding hills to the South and West including the linear Bronze Age barrow groups on Morgans Hill and also an impression of the scale of the mighty banks and ditches of the fort itself. Early evening is almost always the best time to visit these kind of sites, particularly if you have low raking sunlight. It brings out the best definition and colour in the landscape and makes it almost heartbreakingly beautiful and, for me, tinged with nostalgia. Moving around the earthworks in a clockwise direction you come past the Lansdowne Monument and get a good view of the long barrow, the oldest element in the vicinity, standing on a slight promontory just below it. By this time it’s becoming clear that the Western horizon is filling with rain clouds and so I head North East again taking in the white horse and then exit via the hill fort’s Eastern opening descending back towards the A4. As you get to the bottom of this track you’ll notice a fine barrow in the corner of a field (Cherhill 4 - not very romantic is it?) and if you turn right you’re back on the Old Bath Road track which is where the parking place is. By now the weather was going into overdrive and though the torrential downpour I’d been anticipating hadn’t yet materialised, the sky was now leaden and a fantastic rainbow appeared at the end of the track urging me onwards. Before you get to the parking spot there’s another large barrow right beside the track which, although I didn’t notice at the time, has a World War Two bunker built into the North side of it. This makes strategic sense in terms of the now disused Yatesbury airfield just the other side of the A4. I reach my car just in the nick of time as the raindrops descend. What luck! What weather! What poetry! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406107091400-TX8YU16LAZCZKB3ESQX6/Silbury+Hill.jpg Wiltshire - Silbury Hill viewed from West Kennet Long Barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1493128509746-QLE48B41LJEVC70FEO21/Whitesheet-02.jpg Wiltshire - Aerial view showing the causewayed enclosure, barrows and IA earthworks (Courtesy of Felix Speller) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1493130949387-ET8DN31LFEZGFYBOCDLV/Scratchbury-01.jpg Wiltshire - A solitary Bronze Age barrow within the ramparts of Scratchbury IA hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1493132378958-LL92OTDKRSHMG7DCRHJR/Battlesbury-01.jpg Wiltshire - Panorama of the interior of the hill fort looking East towards it's neighbour Scatchbury hill fort (Courtesy of felix Speller) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1498647454338-UQQA8UDLPDJ7NH4E10QP/EKLB-01.jpg Wiltshire - East Kennet Long Barrow viewed from just South of the village of East Kennet Sited not too far from it's more famous sibling at West Kennet, this massive long barrow exudes character and deserves more recognition than it gets. The blunt end, possibly it's entrance, is orientated toward the South East, possibly aligned on the Winter Solstice. It's certainly larger than West Kennet, but lacks that famous sarsen facade and is not as easily accessible. Apparently it's never been properly excavated so it's hard to know if it contains the same internal chambered structure as WKLB. The only clues to it's interior come from the diggings of rabbits and badgers and there might be additional damage caused by the roots of the several beech trees which crown the earthwork. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1519157855203-EVXSRDT2VA6MCFGHPAZU/Binknoll+Castle-01.jpg Wiltshire - Bincknoll Castle IA promontory hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1528637616080-0KG7MRGCH0I1IU0WT8IB/Four+Barrows-01.jpg Wiltshire - The view from the most Southerly of the linear group of four looking North West This is a Bronze Age linear barrow cemetery just North East of Aldbourne, Wiltshire. A fifth barrow further down from the ridge (the 4th photo) and quite close to The Giant's Grave on the opposing ridge, appears to be a large disc barrow, but could just have been partially ploughed out over the centuries. It was excavated by William Greenwell in 1878 and it may have been this barrow that had the most interesting grave goods contained within it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1529590248716-B8UL257ZY1MHUO3WW8ND/West+Kennet+Avenue-01.jpg Wiltshire - Three of the standing stones which make up the avenue which once connected Avebury stone circle and The Sanctuary (destroyed stone circle) on Overton Hill https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211734269-IGIH48GWFQCDAYHAZD0P/Adams+Grave-01.jpg Wiltshire - Adam's Grave Neolithic long barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1529664816485-W2SD0WC00U4L5MRQSVM1/Knap+Hill-01.jpg Wiltshire - The climb up to the top of Knap Hill, the banks of the enclosure just about evident. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1547216046551-AKG50GICX6RQYGVKXFMU/DSG_3511.jpg Wiltshire - Eve (the only remaining stone of the Beckhampton Avenue) Adam & Eve, also known as The Longstones, stand in isolation in a field South West of Avebury Stone Circle. Adam, the larger stone of the two, is the only remaining stone of a cove which may have been at the terminal of the Beckhampton Stone Avenue (of which Eve is the only remaining stone). William Stukeley recorded the avenue back in the 18th Century, when it was already partially destroyed. Adam fell over in 1911 (probably after a heavy session in the Waggon and Horses, Beckhampton) and was re-erected in 1912 by Maud Cunnington , apparently in the wrong place. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1559072260405-9THBTAK9YYPW1FQ0V86V/Long+Stones+Long+Barrow-01.jpg Wiltshire - The Long Stones long barrow The Long Stones long barrow is situated very close to the Beckhampton roundabout near Avebury and was possibly the terminus of the Beckhampton stone avenue which once snaked out westwards from the Avebury stone circle and included the adjacent Long Stones, alternatively known as ‘Adam & Eve’. It’s a very substantial barrow with the look of a Severn Cotswold type barrow due to its having what appears to be a ‘forecourt’, though this could also be due to agricultural mutilation or clumsy excavation. It was only partially excavated back in the 1800s when a Bronze Age cremation burial was found in an urn, so who knows what might be inside it! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1493126504341-EI0WVRDG82JX9V6J3ZVT/Cley+Hill.jpg Wiltshire - Cley Hill viewed from the East. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1571054269750-G7F2YOMYJQ5JFA22UVK2/Durrington+Walls.jpg Wiltshire - The Western and Northern earthworks of Durrington Walls This is one of those monuments that comes across as slightly dull on first examination, but when you examine its history it becomes startlingly significant! This site and its surroundings once contained a vast Neolithic village of possibly 1000 dwellings and around 4000 people and, given its proximity to Stonehenge, Woodhenge, The Cursus, The Avenue, etc., it’s more than likely that the people living here over the course of its 500 year lifespan, were the builders of this amazing ritual landscape. They weren’t all local either as animal bones found on various excavations provide evidence that people had travelled considerable distances around Britain to build and celebrate on this site. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406212185328-7Y2ML29VZ595NVDAUA6O/Stone+Henge.jpg Wiltshire - Stonehenge https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1572697987261-8IL6I747ZZWIN6JDXI39/Woodhenge-1.jpg Wiltshire - Woodhenge adjacent to Durrington Walls camp https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1572698930263-LDVWCZ30BG1J55G12TU1/Cuckoo+Stone-2.jpg Wiltshire - The Cuckoo Stone Neolithic fallen menhir https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1572699357514-NY107BS73OKPHE2FO0IT/Cursus+Barrows-1.jpg Wiltshire - The Cursus barrows running parallel to the stonehenge cursus https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1572700249784-IOV8QHNH2INSGM39BVM8/New+Kings+Barrows-1.jpg Wiltshire - New Kings Barrows Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406107106211-L2EF5SLZICD9130PS1T2/West+Kennett+Long+Barrow.jpg Wiltshire - West Kennet Long Barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406106956234-9HDWTNDVW6S5RSEQZ1SH/DSC_1840_1.JPG Wiltshire - Barbury Castle Iron Age hill fort Musings from my blog https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1640105651492-KY1ZNLUZ1W5WP7UU1U73/DSC06222.jpg Wiltshire - Figsbury Ring Iron Age hill fort On the face of it Figsbury Ring near Salisbury is just a standard univalate Iron Age hill fort, but once you’ve passed through the entrance there’s a near perfect circular ditch with what appear to be two causeways. Interestingly the two causeways appear to line up with Old Sarum which is a couple of miles further West. So I’m thinking, hang on a minute , this looks like a Neolithic causewayed enclosure? Not uncommon. Many hill forts started out like that. However there is little evidence from excavations by the Cunningtons in the 1920s to date it as a Causewayed Enclosure, so the other possibility might be that it was originally a Henge monument. Unfortunately nobody seems willing to verify this, so it remains a mystery. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406107079303-LAA6WXYSG87P49N9VHCY/DSC_7741.JPG Wiltshire - Overton Hill barrows viewed from the Avenue https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406107240127-Z2KMY4FY03ZO3TDRGNY1/The+Sanctuary.jpg Wiltshire - Concrete blocks mark where stones once stood at The Sanctuary https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406107064839-RX5BOR1Y4TGT6TKUT183/The+Devils+Den.jpg Wiltshire - The Devil's Den Neolithic dolmen https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406373211953-3WN5N8VM79201X4URFAR/Avebury-01.jpg Wiltshire - Stones of the southern inner circle with stones of the outer circle beyond https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406107018026-WDRZJLS4QOBXMANZLA9W/DSC_7728.JPG Wiltshire - The Kennet Avenue leading from the southern entrance at Avebury https://www.landtraces.com/kent daily 0.75 2020-06-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105342093-9KDCV00IHR59GU48Z2M8/Kits+Coty.jpg Kent - Kit's Coty Neolithic chambered tomb Kit’s Coty is one of the best known and enigmatic prehistoric structures in Kent and the UK . This Neolithic dolmen is all that remains of a large chambered long barrow and is one of the Medway Megaliths. Excavations over the decades turned up very little as the rear part of the barrow had been ploughed out and the curb stones removed. Just a few pottery sherds and a solitary flint arrow head are the only known burial artefacts. Shame about the railings but considering how much graffiti there is on it, much of it Victorian, it’s probably for the best! I should also point out that it’s not that easy to find. Although it’s not hidden away or anything, it’s situated just off the Old Chatham Road which is just off the A229 and there are few places you can park near it without obstructing someones drive. Possibly the best thing to do is to cycle to it if you can. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305017345-UD3KYIFG3DP1VLA3MC2S/Little+Kits+Coty-02.jpg Kent - Little Kit's Coty Neolithic chambered tomb Otherwise known as ‘The Countless Stones’ this is actually very close to Kit’s Coty. If you follow the holloway from Kit’s Coty down the hill about 200m it comes out at a road junction. Carry on carefully in the same direction along the edge of the road (there’s no pavement and people drive too fast along it) and you’ll come to a slight pull in to your left which is where you’ll find this somewhat tragic monument. These are pretty big stones but sadly they’ve all collapsed over the centuries. This too was a long barrow and may well have been larger than its neighbour judging by the quantity of remaining sarsens, though obviously you can’t count them. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1590691744578-5ZSO1XM4GCTN1144D2KB/Whitehorse+Stone_1.jpg Kent - The Whitehorse Stone This is possibly the remains of a chambered long barrow and is also referred to as the Upper Whitehorse Stone, the ‘Lower Whitehorse Stone’ having been broken up in the 1800s. It’s quite near The Countless Stones (Little Kit’s Coty), just the other side of the A229 and the High Speed Rail link between London and Paris. It’s a good size at 2.9m wide and 1.65m high and there are numerous smaller sarsens scattered around. However, excavations didn’t find any evidence of an earthen mound which would have accompanied such a structure, so it remains a bit of an anomaly. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1591604777739-YH6MNEDNXSKLQ2P8XS7P/DSH_6921.jpg Kent https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105329636-NW7NJNHRCK1RIFKZWZ0E/Coldrum.jpg Kent - Coldrum Neolithic long barrow I’d been meaning to visit Coldrum for what seemed like an eternity. It would pop into my head as I was lurching around the M25 after a hard days slog in London, but usually I’d find myself too tired, the light would be fading or the weather not quite right. So despite the on/off rain showers my wife Alison and I decided to try a visit on the way to friends in North Kent and, as it turned out, it couldn’t have been much better. I was a bit surprised once we’d located it that it wasn’t perched on the edge of the North Downs, which is how I’d always pictured it, but nestling in the valley below on a small raised platform of a hill. The views from here, however, are quite wonderful as your gaze tumbles along the bottom of the downs and across the surrounding fields and I doubt whether that view will have changed very much in the past 5000 years considering it’s isolation. Somebody else who turned up while we were there informed us that most of the surrounding land is to become a vineyard in the near future and I wondered how that might impact on the site. As we were there as the sun was going down everything seemed to have that warm glow about it and the light gave the stones that extra strength and definition so reminiscent of childhood evenings in Wiltshire when we’d drive out to places like West Kennet and Avebury and the stance of the site is not unlike the Wiltshire sites as well. The only detraction was that some imbecile had written the word ‘DEVIL’ on one of the burial chamber stones in charcoal but it must have been a while ago and it had faded and would probably disappear with the next good rain fall. The other thing that was interesting and which has been noted here before is the strange blueness of the stones once they’re in shadow. I couldn’t work out if this was just due to the comparison between the lit and unlit stone or perhaps something to do with the lichens that cover them and how they interact with light? So what a delight and a place that I’m itching to get back to, along with the nearby Chestnuts at Addington, which we didn’t get to see on this occasion, but would be interesting to compare.   https://www.landtraces.com/cumbria daily 0.75 2016-09-05 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1461505786062-ANCWIJX0WU2HJQV55HQI/Castlerigg-01.jpg Cumbria https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1461506688873-2QLBCIQS0GCLP06MG3O0/Sunkenkirk-01.jpg Cumbria https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406058346522-QZ7C3IV9ZE1JZZMBGKP5/Long+Meg.jpg Cumbria - Long Meg, ring marked standing stone https://www.landtraces.com/surrey daily 0.75 2014-08-08 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406199715969-82B4Y21T2FSQDN0QMA0V/Holmbury-01.jpg Surrey - Holmbury Iron Age hill fort https://www.landtraces.com/derbyshire daily 0.75 2024-08-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406058541570-903DAFTGHJT6TQBVMUX7/Lords+Seat.jpg Derbyshire - Lord's Seat Bronze Age barrow and Mam Tor Iron Age hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1513588683135-WZAML7RHJG0R6JXL206R/Arbor+Low-07.jpg Derbyshire - On a cold and frosty, but beautiful morning in early December, 2017 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1513590117693-XGF9TEGMQ2RK1FG52NAJ/DSF_8779.jpg Derbyshire - Gib Hill Interestingly this is supposed to be a Neolithic 'oval' barrow with an early Bronze Age barrow superimposed on it. It's sited about 300 metres West of Arbor Low henge and stone circle. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1618144849120-PI5DMD1OP02RE0QE33YW/Nine+Ladies-07.jpg Derbyshire - The Nine Ladies of Stanton Moor Just how I like my ancient monuments, devoid of people, but not devoid of character. The Nine Ladies stone circle may be small, but it’s one of the highlights of a highly ritualistic landscape and very enigmatic. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406302952255-F9IK9ICCZQWD87Z4DHW8/The+Bull+Ring-01.jpg Derbyshire - The Bull Ring Neolithic henge at Dove Holes in the Peak District https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406212583520-UP3I4YO0L4UPNHTJL3D3/Castle+Naze-01.jpg Derbyshire - The south-eastern entrance to Castle Naze https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406286249663-STPQLB7LX1O6T39T6X5V/Five+Wells-01.jpg Derbyshire - Five Wells Neolithic chambered tomb https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406058644046-OTLN6UXCQBHXUOOQLAZ2/Nine+Stones+Close.jpg Derbyshire - Nine Stones Close Bronze Age stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406286265334-PJGB3R3ZOQVW4AE0TIUL/Rowtor+Rocks-01.jpg Derbyshire - Rowtor Rocks Bronze Age cup and ring-marked stones https://www.landtraces.com/east-sussex daily 0.75 2020-10-17 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211523851-OEAT1QGR2D2UULTS3AQ6/Lewes+Tump-01.jpg East Sussex - The Tump (possible) Bronze Age mound The Lewes Mounds If you lived in a small town in East Sussex and there were three large Silbury-like mounds within close proximity of the town centre would you not be curious as to why? Well this is the case for Lewes, the county town of East Sussex. The most prominent mound is the one currently occupied by Lewes Castle and is designated as a Norman Motte dating from 1069 and built by William de Warenne, brother-in-Law of William the Conqueror. This stands broadly in the town centre overlooking all of its surroundings and the motte itself must stand at about 50 feet in height. The second, known as Brack Mount, is also designated as a Norman Motte and was contained originally within the curtain wall of Lewes Castle and Lewes Castle is one of only Two Norman castles in the UK to have two mottes, the other being Lincoln. It is believed that Brack Mount was the original castle with a wooden barbican and that the superior stone barbican that we see today at Lewes Castle took some 300 years to complete. Brack Mount is about 40-50 feet high depending on where you're viewing it from and is built on a slope slightly North East of the castle and is now completely surrounded by houses and a pub, the Lewes Arms, that back onto it. There have been 2 partial excavations of this site, the first being in 1838 when workmen discovered an inhumation and boars head in the north side of the mound and the second, more recently, found a chalk lined well in the top of the mound believed to be Norman in origin. Despite the fact that the garden of the Lewes Arms cuts into the mound there seems to be no evidence of any finds on that occasion or at least no report of anything of interest, though there have been recent assertions that the mound is pre-Roman in origin. Now we come to the third mound, or the 'Tump' as it's known locally, whose history is far from clear. It stands almost in isolation just South of the railway line that skirts the South of the town and is adjacent to the ruins of Lewes Priory. It too is about 45 feet high and takes the form of a ziggerat. Various explanations have been put forward to try and explain its origins. One is that it's a Calvary built by the priory monks and was part of a punishment whereby misbehaving monks were made to carry a cross to it's summit (there was until recently a socket still visible there for a cross erecting ceremony carried out by local Christians at Easter). Another theory is that it's simply a large pile of earth left over from either the building of the Priory on it's western side or from the 'Dripping Pan', a large salt pan (though the salt pan too is doubtful) on it's eastern side now occupied by Lewes Football Club. As far as I know there has never been anything like a proper excavation of this site. The only nearby find was of a ground Neolithic hand axe which was discovered when railway abutments were created in 1911 just to the north. So three large mounds and little archaeological evidence to work out just how old they are. But is it just three? Evidence suggests that there were at least another five tumuli within the vicinity. A Historic Character Assessment Report for Lewes carried out in 2005 reveals that there were another four tumuli in almost a linear arrangement running north east from Brack Mount. The report lists them as follows: • Churchyard of St John-sub-Castro – two mounds, possibly representing Romano-British or Anglo-Saxon, or earlier, barrows. That destroyed by the building of present church in 1839 contained secondary inhumations, cremated human bone, boar and other animal bones, and an urn and spearhead. The second mound was in the south-east corner of the churchyard, and was destroyed in 1779 with no record of any finds. Several Roman coins were also found in the churchyard in the 19th century [HER reference: ES7176]. • Abinger House (Abinger Place) – mound, possibly representing Romano-British or Anglo- Saxon, or earlier, barrow. Destroyed in the early 19th century without record, though apparently contained internments and pottery. • Elephant and Castle (Whitehill) – mound, possibly representing Romano-British or Anglo- Saxon, or earlier (e.g. Bronze Age) barrow, and possibly used as a medieval and later gallows mound. Destroyed when Elephant and Castle public house was built in 1838. A further barrow seems to have been destroyed in 1834 during the creation of a reservoir near St. Anne's Church where a Bronze Age inhumation and other cremation burials were discovered. This too lies within the town centre. So are we looking at a large Bronze Age barrow cemetery, a sacred site of monumental mounds in the vein of Silbury (particularly in the light of the recent dating of the Marlborough Mound) or merely a disparate collection of barrows of different ages and usages? Because most of these barrows were destroyed in the gradual expansion of the town it's very difficult to know which era they actually belonged to but I'm of the opinion that all these tumuli were of roughly the same period, probably Bronze Age, and the Normans merely utilized two of them in the highest positions, in the construction of their castle. Nearby Neolithic, Bronze and Iron Age sites on the South Downs would also suggest that Lewes's mounds were of a pre-Roman era.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1472048496604-25E05FXP0XUDMVHRQR02/East+Hill+Hastings.jpg East Sussex - Overlooking Old Town Hastings East Hill dominates the Eastern side of Old Town Hastings and you are struck immediately by it’s impregnability as you walk beneath the sandstone cliffs to the south or climb the steep steps on it’s western flank. Though we were here for a day trip and hadn’t come prepared with maps or ideas of a long stroll along the cliff tops it was evident once we were up there that this hill had history. There are perceptible undulations here and there across the turf indicating possible cross dykes or cultivation strips, but these are over-run with flattened areas suggesting more recent use as a putting green. Towards the crest of the hill is a broadly rectangular enclosure that I wasn’t entirely sure about as it’s now devoted to barbecuing, but it’s in the right place and has an air of ancientness about it. Walking on Eastwards across the hill you get magnificent views of golden limestone cliffs towering defiantly over a churning English Channel and just as you begin to dip downwards you come across the biggest piece of evidence so far in the form of a huge dyke running North to the other side of the hill. It’s largely overgrown and quite difficult to make out but it seems to be a whopper and suggests that this is indeed an Iron Age promontory fort. Further research also revealed that the modern beacon you pass near the top of the steps stands on what was probably a large Bronze Age barrow. This was reused for burials in Saxon times possibly by the towns earliest Saxon arrivals who gave the town its name. West Hill, which stands across the valley from Old Town Hastings, also has prehistory and was also used to build one of the original Norman Castles following the conquest.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406128672245-5613M6G8A71W3LWZNIN7/Goldstone-03.jpg East Sussex - The Goldstone in Hove Park We don't really do big stones much down here in Sussex so it felt quite an honour to photograph this monster. I'd seen old photos of the Goldstone and didn't quite appreciate just how damned huge this stone is. This could stand proudly with anything at Avebury or a number of any other megalithic sites, it's just the surroundings which make it all a bit surreal, the twee fencing, the rumble of traffic on the Shoreham Road only fifty metres away and the Burger King, DFS and Comet showrooms on the other side of the road! The Goldstone and the nine smaller stones surrounding it (from a different location, as is the Goldstone itself) is very similar to the stones I saw at Winterbourne Abbas, a conglomeration of flint and sandstone. The smaller stones also seem to have suffered more from erosion over the last hundred years or so judging by the older photos or maybe they've just been laid on their sides. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1449663800826-P55ZLLAEJ2QNLKF8YY55/Whitehawk-01.jpg East Sussex Looking North towards Brighton Race Course. The centre of the enclosure is on the Southern side of Manor Hill (Road) just in front of the Grandstand. I was going to post about Whitehawk more than a year ago after I volunteered for the dig which took place there in August 2014. I refrained from doing so at the time as I was supposed to be photographing (for Brighton Museum) the ‘more interesting artefacts’ which they hoped to uncover in the process of the dig. Sadly, despite intensive digging in 3 separate areas on Whitehawk Hill nothing particularly interesting was found. Geo-physics had shown up some anomalies on the Southern side of the hill which the archaeologists hoped might be a fifth outer ring, but this proved to be unfounded. Most of the very small things found were pieces of worked flints (possibly Neolithic), masses of broken glass, the inevitable willow-pattern ceramics shards and miscellaneous bits of ironware which were probably bits of broken gardening tools (most of the hill has been given over to allotments in the past and still is today). I personally found a 1945 farthing which back then would have bought you a whole house in Brighton. The other thing that was found in abundance were pieces of relatively modern cars and scooters which is quite interesting in itself. The practice of sacrificing expensive offerings to the gods on this site was still happening in the here and now, a clearly continuing tradition, except now they like to torch them first rather than burying them or flinging them into a watery place. There’s not much to suggest that you’re standing in a Causewayed Enclosure when you’re up there as most of it has been encroached upon by modern housing, allotments and the enlargement of Brighton Race Course, but here and there you’ll notice a slight undulation, a small squeak to remind you of the sheer scale of the site. The positioning of it too, is wonderful and a true focal point, commanding expansive views over the sea and South Downs of which it forms part. The panoramic images posted here were commissioned recently by Brighton Museum for educational purposes to highlight the importance of this truly ancient and wonderful place. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406061005807-3KJBHZ3B6LNY6P4UDZ34/Castle+Hill.jpg East Sussex - Castle Hill Iron Age enclosure Castle Hill is situated in a stretch of downland between Brighton and Lewes in an area of outstanding beauty owned by the National Trust. The easiest way to get to it is to leave your vehicle near the houses on the northern edge of Woodingdean (off the Falmer Road, B2123) and then make your way round the hideous radio mast towards the valley at Standean Bottom. You can either follow the valley all the way round until you come round to the northern edge and then up the hill towards the enclosure or you can take a short cut down to the bottom of the valley and straight up the hill. The enclosure is at the top of the hill, roughly rectangular in shape and has splendid views back across the majestic valley and south towards the cliffs and sea between Brighton and Newhaven. The banks are only a couple of feet high now but still quite distinct with a few depressions visible inside them, possibly from huts. There's a bank and ditch which extends from the western side of the enclosure for a short distance down towards the valley. It feels like an outpost from the slightly more busy South Downs Way but you're really not that far from other major earthworks at Whitehawk and Hollingbury on the outskirts of Brighton and indeed it's not difficult to come across something on almost any hilltop in this area. Obviously a highly populated place even thousands of years ago.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1583857856610-IZEK8S3E4BAUXA39618S/Rottingdean+Long+Barrow-01.jpg East Sussex - Rottingdean Neolithic long barrow facing out towards the English Channel You might be forgiven for thinking that the Rottingdean long barrow was actually two small, lowly, conjoined round barrows, but that’s because it’s been severely hacked about over the last 4,000 years and almost lost. It was also partly truncated by the local cricket club at some point when they extended their pitch to avoid losing cricket balls over the cliff. It’s even reputed that local resident Rudyard Kipling (creator of exceedingly good cakes) once stood upon the barrow before pootling off home to write a poem. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1583855250221-HZUP4AHRJGOIW3VH6GUJ/Firle+Beacon-03.jpg East Sussex - Firle Beacon Bronze Age barrow cemetery This section of the South Downs in East Sussex has one of the highest concentrations of individual round barrows and barrow cemeteries in the entire National Park. Also scattered among them are the older Neolithic long barrows and a fair number of cross dykes which also span the Iron Age. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1586779299803-OZGB3KRQMYS38YT4Q6TK/Windover+Hill-01.jpg East Sussex - The track up to the top of Windover Hill Windover Hill is best known as the home of ‘The Long Man of Wilmington’ a chalk cut hill figure once thought to be prehistoric, but now believed to have been created in the 16th or 17th Century. The reason for attributing it to prehistoric times was probably the siting of a barrow cemetery on the summit of the hill consisting of a large Neolithic long barrow and a great many Bronze Age round barrows, in particular a very large bowl barrow at the highest point. In addition to all of these are a profusion of earthworks such as cross dykes and pits (though many of the pits are almost certainly from flint mining, but not Neolithic). So it’s very much a ritual landscape in common with many other high points on the South Downs like Firle Beacon to the West through to the Eastbourne escarpment to the East. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1586423332900-NRD4O1R9NP25SKZ2HQ1V/DSH_6431.jpg East Sussex - mount caburn iron age hill fort Mount Caburn is one of the most distinct and enigmatic hills in East Sussex. An outlier of the South Downs, cut off by the rivers Ouse and Glynde, it is crowned by an Iron Age hill fort constructed in the 5th century BC. However recent excavations of the 140+ pits in its interior have uncovered deliberately placed votive offerings including weapons, ceramics, disarticulated bones, etc., which make it appear to be more of a sacred and ritualistic site. Less than half a mile away and just visible to the left in the first image is Ranscombe Camp, an unfinished Iron Age hill fort. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1602940079244-6VR4M3F2M973YX8WCPD2/Lords+Burghs_1.jpg East Sussex - Lord's Burghs bowl barrows viewed from the track between the South Downs Way and Blackcap Farm This pair of substantial bowl barrows are adjacent to Blackcap Farm just South of the SDW at Firle Beacon. Strictly speaking they’re on private farmland, but if you’re careful and cunning you can get to them without upsetting anyone. They’re slightly unusual in that they’re tucked away from more clustered barrow groups back up on the escarpment which has done them a huge favour by having less visitors trampling all over them. They’re also currently covered by wire fencing presumably to stop rabbits burrowing into them, although this has come away in places making them appear a little untidy. Like all the local barrows they’ve been dug into at some time and probably pillaged, but there’s very little information to be found about them. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211480729-XPKLHMIXU1ELGI2UKAOH/Brack+Mount-01.jpg East Sussex - The Norman Motte Brack mount probably built on an existing Bronze Age mound https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211581869-R5XIY2PIA5AQU6PNEGSE/The+Camels+Humps+Long+Barrow.jpg East Sussex - The Camel's Humps Neolithic long barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406211330991-T7ZTEMFUGW58KDC571J1/Saxonbury+Hill.jpg East Sussex - Saxonbury Iron Age hill fort with the Victorian Rapunzel Tower in its centre https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406061035603-JDNJ96ZFNIV0PWFP3SMJ/Woolstonbury+Hill.jpg East Sussex - Woolstonbury Iron Age hill fort https://www.landtraces.com/yorkshire daily 0.75 2025-05-18 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1481107722964-8OY1CQKHN5YIM371SK2E/Devils+Arrows-01.jpg Yorkshire - Two of the three standing stones which make up this aligned group These three massive standing stones, which are aligned NNW-SSE, stand very close to the A1 Motorway near Boroughbridge in North Yorkshire, making it an incredibly noisy place to be. It's believed that there were originally five stones in the group, but two were toppled by locals as late as the 18th Century. They're all shaped stones (menhirs) and composed of Millstone Grit which is relatively local to this site and have a distinct groove-worn look to them from 5,000 years of weather. The tallest stone is 22.5 feet high making it the second tallest standing stone in the UK after the 25 feet tall Rudston Monolith in East Yorkshire. Interestingly, if you park in Boroughbridge and don't have a local map and ask the whereabouts of the stones, nobody seems to have heard of them! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1640961412768-XBH2CWPCDDVI6SEWOUUZ/The+Twelve+Apostles_1.jpg Yorkshire - The twelve apostles bronze age stone circle This diminutive Bronze Age stone circle on Ilkley Moor (bar tat), Yorkshire, a much desecrated monument which once had about 16 - 20 stones in it (what was it called before?) and possibly a burial cist in its centre, has seen ridiculous levels of jiggery pokery over the centuries. By 1971 most of the stones had fallen and somebody decided to re-erect them, probably into an Alpine rockery, but it’s difficult to know if the subsequent re-re-erection is correct or not! Anyway it’s all suitably wild and mysterious and, according to my map, we should have been tripping over wonderful Neolithic rock art every 20 feet or so. That’s obviously much better hidden. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305466452-BAG9GG5Z4DSN0KW4SUSB/Rudstone.jpg Yorkshire - The Rudston Monolith late Neolithic standing stone Interestingly there are four cursi (or cursuses) nearby, three of which converge on the monolith. Cursi are Neolithic parallel ditches or dykes which can often run for miles (the Dorset cursus is one such example) and resemble race tracks or some sort of ceremonial pathways. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1664646936880-IOWTG8FJD6CSFSOBS4B4/DSI_2434.jpg Yorkshire - The enigmatic hill of Blakey Topping This is a bit of a strange one. Quite remote, a ruin, very little information about it and a name that sounds like a 1970s instant desert in a sachet. Is it a stone circle, is it an alignment or just a strange gathering of standing stones? It also seems like an opportunity missed, as if the builders had dragged the stones to the top of 'Blakey Topping', the enigmatic hill from which the stones take there name, it would have been stupendous! Anyway let's not dwell on the negatives, let's be thankful it's there at all despite one of the stones being a gate post and another recumbent. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1664476268049-D76L6M9535W3S02786RE/DSI_2348.jpg Yorkshire - Skipsea Castle Iron Age Mound It looks like Silbury. It sounds like Silbury. It smells like Silbury, but it isn't Silbury! It's the motte of Skipsea Castle in the East Riding of Yorkshire and what makes it even more interesting is that the motte isn't Norman like the rest of the site and predates the castle by 1500 years making it Iron Age! Core sampling back in 2016 by Dr. Jim Leary as part of the Ancient Mounds project revealed its true age. It's about half the height of Silbury at about 13m and is the largest Iron Age man-made mound in the UK. What they couldn't work out, much like Silbury, is what its function was. Hmmm...now let me see. Burial mound, Earth Godess, pyramid, landmark for guiding Iron Age folk through a low lying marshy area? Who knows? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305478249-14QQ6042TR5VGCYVFX2B/Duggleby+Howe.jpg Yorkshire - Duggleby Howe Late Neolithic round barrow Duggleby Howe Neolithic round barrow is one of the largest and rarest round barrows in the British Isles standing some 22 feet high (and probably higher than that originally) and 120 feet in diameter, difficult to convey in a photo taken on a wet , flatly lit day. It’s also one of four of 'The Great Barrows of East Yorkshire', the others being Willy Howe (see my earlier post), South Side Mount and Wold Newton Barrow and they all seem to be in close proximity to The Gypsey Race, a mysterious intermittent chalk Winterbourne. Unlike Willy Howe which, when excavated, appeared to contain no burials, Duggleby Howe had at least 53 deposits of cremated remains following on from the first inhumation of a crouched male body in a shaft grave suggesting a very long period of use. So it was more of a Neolithic cemetery or necropolis or a popular hotel you could never leave (I seem to be coming over all Eagles there)! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1668526381452-AS1RCK102IRPY883BEVS/Willy+Howe+BA+Barrow_2.jpg Yorkshire - Willy Howe late Neolithic/early Bronze Age barrow They don't do things by halves here in Yorkshire. If you're going to build a bowl barrow might as well make it a biggun. However, Willy Howe, as it's called, cannot decide whether it's Neolithic or Bronze Age. It was originally round and not unlike the not too faraway (round and Neolithic!) Duggleby Howe, but two Victorian chancers certainly messed it about and displaced most of it in a quest to discover its hidden treasures. However, neither of them found treasure or indeed evidence of a burial. Whoever it was constructed for never turned up for the gig! Though that doesn't mean it was a vacant lot as they could well have been looking in the wrong spot. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1681390244545-SRX1KGIYN8A9QEK7VQ3N/DSI_2023_1.jpg Yorkshire - The Bridestones (natural rock feature) Looks unfeasible but it’s definitely real. This is one of the Bridestones (from the Danish ‘Brink stones) in the Dalby Forest near Pickering, a result of natural weathering over thousands of years. There are two groups of rocks, the High and Low Bridestones and, due to their bizarre appearance and the amount of cairns and other archaeological features roundabout, the stones were clearly of some sacred significance. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1724764417088-2AJVWWII5LI5TBMLO8PJ/DSI_4741.jpg Yorkshire https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1689416205833-ZWQN0O2FSUACI215FCJ2/DSI_3773.jpg Yorkshire - Huggate Dykes Bronze Age earthworks Huggate Dykes is a rare beast. It's dated to the Bronze Age but may still have been in use and possibly enhanced in the iron Age. Situated in the hillier section of the Wolds in East Yorkshire, it consists of a series of parallel banks and ditches, or dykes as they're referred to in these parts. Nobody knows quite what their purpose was as they obviously aren't defensive and are a mixture of single banks up to a mile in length and multiple close-knit (up to four dykes as in the opening photo)at the North Eastern terminus so possibly they're elaborate boundary markers or maybe had some ceremonial purpose? At any rate it took a lot of digging! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1747564420564-F287Y8GTBHGJPZPP875T/DSI_6304.jpg Yorkshire - At almost the highest part of the Wolds and running parallel to the modern A166 (which was an ancient trackway) Most of the time in the Yorkshire Wolds when you find the word ‘tumulus’ or ‘tumuli’ written on an OS Map it turns out to be a ‘site of’ rather than the real thing, mostly due to ploughing out. So it was a surprise to find actual burial mounds at Garrowby Wolds strung out along the edge of the A166 in a linear(ish) arrangement which means that the A166/Garrowby Street is probably an ancient trackway. The barrows are presumably Bronze Age and all of similar size except the most North-Western barrow which is much smaller with a single tree growing on it and partially ploughed out like it had been given a last minute reprieve by the ancient monuments police. In addition to this these barrows are separated from their Eastern chums by an earthwork which looks and feels like a holloway https://www.landtraces.com/buckinghamshire daily 0.75 2014-08-14 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406659570908-4FWDDIL80HNUGZIYXKUE/Whiteleaf+Hill+Neolithic+barrow-01.jpg Buckinghamshire - Whiteleaf Hill Neolithic barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406659680233-Q4VXVVT565W3UVLYD97R/Ivinghoe+Beacon-01.jpg Buckinghamshire - Ivinghoe Beacon Iron Age hill fort https://www.landtraces.com/work daily 0.75 2021-03-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1454358165371-B8RKZDA2M9CL4WSL6BDM/Halnaker-01.jpg West Sussex Halnaker Hill Neolithic Causewayed Enclosure & 18th Century Post Mill. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1458207456781-BBKGB1SAAQ9E3QIED4TY/image-asset.jpeg West Sussex - The Trundle Neolithic causewayed enclosure and Iron Age hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406057662040-9JF8N3IUN3718TP7WTV9/Cissbury.jpg West Sussex - Cissbury Rings western ramparts and pits left from flint mining activity Cissbury Rings is one of my favourite walking places in West Sussex. Standing on the South Downs and within walking distance of my home town of Worthing it’s an excellent place to wander and refresh yourself. Even in the depths of winter you’ll find some hardy folk along with their canine companions walking the ring or brivetting about in the undergrowth. It’s quiet seclusion also offers spectacular views in all directions covering the Downs, the sprawl of the south coast conurbation from Brighton to Bognor Regis and on a clear day you can even see the Seven Sisters to the east and the Isle of Wight to the west. Hard to believe then that this was once one of the powerhouses of Neolithic industry in the UK. Though mostly known as an Iron Age hillfort it actually began it’s fantastically varied life as a source of raw flint in the Neolithic era and the south western area of the hill bares testimony to this with it’s hundreds of shallow, and sometimes enormous, pits. This ‘moon-cratered’ surface represents the backfilled shafts of flint mines dating back some 5000 years and although not visible today some of them were between 40-45 feet deep and gave onto galleries and chambers that sometimes connected to other shafts. Cissbury and the nearby Church Hill and, slightly further afield Harrow Hill and Blackpatch, were some of the primary sources of flint throughout the Neolithic period. Only the slightly later mines at Norfolk’s Grimes Graves were any significant rival. The quality of the flint mined here was obviously very high as mining continued well into the Bronze Age and tools created from the flint have been found across Britain and mainland Europe. Between the four Sussex locations there were probably in excess of 400 shafts. Some of these were the subject of a number of archaeological digs between Victorian times and as recently as the 1970s. The earliest interest for the Cissbury site comes from 1849 when the Reverend Edward Turner, addressing the Sussex Archaeological Society, stated confidently that the hollows were formed for ‘Druidical celebrations’ but didn’t specify what these might be! The first excavations were carried out in 1857 by George Irving, but he failed to get to the bottom of the pits both physically and metaphorically and interpreted them as ‘animal pens’ due to the finds he came across. In 1867 Colonel Augustus Lane Fox was the first person to suggest that the pits were associated with flint mining while investigating hillfort construction on the South Downs, but he too failed to fully excavate the mines to their actual bottoms. However, the discovery of shafts beneath the fort’s ramparts made them realise that the shafts pre-dated the Iron Age and discovery of a polished axe within the ring and to the east of the pits firmly planted the shafts in the Neolithic era. Ernest Willet, who in 1868 had been looking at similar features to Lane Fox on nearby Church Hill, began working at Cissbury in 1873 and was the first person to get to the bottom of a shaft after digging down 4.2m through the back-fill in one of the earlier excavated pits where he discovered a series of chambers and galleries. Sadly his site notes from the dig were lost. More diggers came and went for the next 60 years but one of the more interesting figures to explore Cissbury was a local working class, self-taught archaeologist named John Pull. He’d already achieved notoriety in the area following his discoveries at Blackpatch in the early 1920s and suffered at the disparaging hands of the Worthing Archaeology Society for his methods and site recording procedures. Most of this was down to pure snobbery on the Society’s part and given the towns Conservative nature hardly surprising. He did however rejoin the Society in 1947, taking over as president in 1952 and started new works at Cissbury the same year which gave rise to the most comprehensive studies of the Cissbury mines ever undertaken. Sadly he was shot dead in a bank raid in 1960 while working as a security guard at the Durrington branch of Lloyds Bank. For further intriguing reading on the subject take a look at Miles Russell’s fascinating book ‘Flint mines in Neolithic Britain’ (Tempus Books, 2000). https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1454358013644-KBDCUSBVTYVXO77SB59U/Court+Hill-01.jpg West Sussex - Court Hill Neolithic Causwayed Enclosure Maybe there should have been a notice placed near the top of Court Hill saying ‘Move along now, nothing to see here’, but that wouldn’t be strictly true. Having conveniently parked at the little church at East Dean village we made our way up the track, past the ancient droving tracks descending from the Downs, and onwards to a copse which covers most of the hill top. The only evidence of the enclosure is a slight bank which comes around the South Eastern edge of the hill before disappearing through the fence into the copse. You can’t get into the copse because of a barbed wire fence and there seems to be a lot of stuff connected with the pheasant slaughtering industry in there, but you can definitely see evidence of the bank running through the trees (this is more evident if you look at a satellite image). Also from the top you get wonderful views along the valley towards Charlton, Goodwood Race Course and The Trundle (which has a Neolithic Causewayed Enclosure inside it’s Iron Age fortifications) and you’re also only about 3 miles from Halnaker Hill, another NCE. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1421331645707-SXQBWXX608ZVQ05N8DJ7/Gallows+Hill-01.jpg West Sussex - One of four recently cleared barrows on top of Gallows Hill on Graffam Common Gallows Hill, as the name suggests, was once a place of execution, but long before that it was a Bronze Age barrow cemetery (if you can count four large mounds as a cemetery). It's part of the larger Graffham Common area which contains quite a large number of tumuli, with barrows at Little and Great Bury nearby. These heathland barrows are typical of the surrounding area, occurring in patches along the northern side of the South Downs at places like Lord's Piece, Sullington Warren, Lavington Common and Iping Common. In fact it's fair to say that there are probably more monuments in these areas than directly on the ridge of the South Downs where they are more noticeable, though any signs of habitation, defence, etc. have long since disappeared from the heathland areas, buried by cultivation, villages and towns. The barrows at Gallows Hill are once again openly visible having spent the last hundred years covered in pine forest with trees actually growing on some of them. Recent cutting and clearance reveals four quite large and handsome mounds in a fairly lofty position on the edge of an escarpment overlooking swathes of woodland and the valley of the River Rother.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305158335-QCXO762YNYV2RU80126N/Iping+Common-01.jpg West Sussex - Iping Common Bronze Age barrow cemetery We probably picked the wrong day to visit here as it was damned cold and quite overcast but the thought of possibly finding a cemetery of up to twenty barrows tucked away in the wilderness of mid-Sussex proved too much of a temptation. Parking is relatively easy as there's a conveniently placed carpark just off the A272 between Midhurst and Petersfield and was very popular with the local dogowners the day we were there, just a shame they couldn't be bothered to pick up after them. I always tend to think of Sussex as being quite highly populated, and I guess the bit I live in on the coast is, but inland you'll find large tracts of land with barely any sign of habitation much like this. Here there seem to be endless glorious vistas of open heather with the occasional birch tree, small patches of conifer and the blue-hued hills of the South Downs on the distant horizon. It's probably looked like this for centuries, possibly millennia. The first barrows you come to after leaving the carpark are a very small pair, possibly conjoined and only just discernible as they're covered in heather, so it's almost impossible to gauge just how big they are, or were. Travelling further South you come around a small pond and follow a track to a linear arrangement of five larger barrows which are part of Fitzhall Heath. The tallest of these is about 30-40 feet across and around 10 feet high, again heather covered and at some time in the past severely mauled, and from here you can see two other large barrows, one of which has been cleared of heather. On top of this we found the tattered remains of a sign politely asking the public to refrain from walking on the barrows and to use the cleared pathways around them. Whoops, sorry. Passing through the middle of all this apparently is a Roman road as well, though I couldn't really work out where it was supposed to be, only surmising that it started in Chichester to the South. We only managed to seek out seven barrows on this visit, but given the size of the common it would take a good day to tramp around the whole area where I know there are at least another eight marked on the OS map. We'll return when it's warmed up a tad. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303951172-3PF7TH5YMYQISMSIMNDD/Lords+Piece-01.jpg West Sussex - Lord's Piece Bronze Age barrow cemetery Lord’s Piece is a strange little triangle of heathland just south of the River Rother near Fittleworth. As somebody else aptly put it, “it’s like a little bit of the New Forest placed in the heart of West Sussex”. Where the name derives from I’ve no idea, butwithin the few acres of this conservation area are at least five barrows made up of a linear group of three and a pair (one large, one small) on a small ridge to the south. Also visible are a number of boundary markers criss-crossing the land which I at first thought were contemporary with the barrows until I came to the middle barrow of the linear group and discovered a ‘boundary marker’ passing right through the centre of the barrow, which seems unlikely to have been the barrow builder’s original intention. The linear group are all roughly the same size, about 10-12m across but not very high at about 2m max and they’ve all recently been cleared of vegetation and are now adorned with giant wire ‘hair nets’ (or at least that’s what it looked like from a distance) which I guess keeps the local rabbits and badgers at bay. The two barrows on the ridge are interesting because of the disparity in size, the larger being about 10m across and 2.5m high whereas the smaller barrow about 30m distant is only about 4m across and barely rises more than 0.5m. The larger barrow also has a curious hole at its northern edge almost suggesting that this was the source of its material, though it’s so messy no Bronze Age barrow builder worth his salt would ever admit to this below par workmanship! It’s probably more modern than that, possibly a dried up drinking hole for cattle. Parking is very easy as there are two small carparking areas on the western side of the heath. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1472137890562-7UBV1D80TZOOLDJ4ANY9/Steep+Down-01.JPG West Sussex - Looking down the dyke to the South West This is not just your usual wimpish 'cross dyke' that you find over most of the South Downs but quite a sizeable beast more in line with Rackham Banks near Amberley. The easiest approach is from the mindless racetrack of the A27 between Worthing and Lancing. Take either the Sompting Abbotts Church turn off for Steyning or the Dankton Lane turn just after, then it's just a short walk along tracks from either of these roads. The main dyke runs for almost half a mile up the hill and consists of a ditch which is mainly overgrown, and probably served as a track in the past, and the dyke itself which in places is about 4 feet above the level of the surrounding fields. From the top are spectacular views across the South Downs to Cissbury Ring to the west and the chapel of Lancing College in the east. Oh, and if anyone finds a 77mm lens cap around there it's mine. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406713061815-YNP5XMVLIJFMEMSE6Q46/Sullington+Warren.jpg West Sussex - Sullington Warren Bronze Age barrows Much like Lord’s Piece a few miles further west this is one of those strange little heathlands that doesn’t quite fit in with the rest of the Sussex landscape, more New Forest with gorse, heather and pines, than rolling open downland. There were once probably large tracts of land similar to this dotted all along the bottom of the escarpment north of the South Downs, but gradually with the expansion of villages and agricultural clearance these spaces are now surrounded by the houses of the well-to-do, oblivious of what’s really on their doorstep. Sullington Warren is not big by any means, probably less than a ¼ of a square mile, but the minute you enter it you have the feeling that it’s an ancient landscape. There are nine, possibly ten barrows in the vicinity, but it’s really quite difficult to make any of them out as they’re all hopelessly overgrown. There is one linear group of three, which is reasonably easy to see, and the rest are scattered randomly. Also you can’t quite work out whether they’re small barrows on top of ‘small hills’ or if the ‘small hills’ are in fact huge barrows! Intriguing. The other thing of note is a small cross dyke/boundary marker which runs roughly east-west and stands out quite well, but having looked at the site on Magic this isn’t shown so could actually be relatively modern. A word of warning! There is a car parking space in Water Lane to the east of the site, but I made the mistake of parking in Heather Lane, which apparently is private and there was a snidey little note on my windscreen when I got back saying that my number plate had been noted by the local Neighbourhood Watch. Otherwise a nice place to wander.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406191574245-3PWIV3D4JKS4YSLHY3YK/Kingley+Vale.jpg West Sussex - Kingley Vale Bronze Age barrow cemetery These are probably the largest barrows in the whole of Sussex, the highest being about four metres high, bigger even than the probably more famous 'Devil's Jumps' directly due north from here. Not the easiest place to get to and few signs to aid your navigation it's well worth a visit whether you're into lumps and bumps, walking or just being plain spaced-out. The views are also something else as you look south towards the cities of Chichester, with it's landmark cathedral spire, and Portsmouth further west. You can also quite clearly see the Isle of Wight in the distance. To the north are superb views of the spine of the South Downs. There's an absolute wealth of material to look at here within an area of about two square miles including the various ditches and banks around the four main barrows, two very moderate long barrows on Stoughton Down, an un-named rectangular enclosure slightly further north-east and about a mile further from there is the almost hidden and slightly inaccessible small Iron age hill fort of Goose Hill Camp. Nearest parking if you're coming from the south is near the village of West Stoke. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406191740367-YXKG9RCL8E65O1CGUXQ2/Goose+Hill+Camp_03.jpg West Sussex - Goose Hill Iron Age enclosure near Kingley Vale I recall trying to find this fort a few years ago on a previous visit to the Kingley Vale Nature reserve but it had been difficult to make out due to the excessive undergrowth. This time around it proved much easier as there has been a lot of clearance throughout the reserve recently and after stumbling over a few dead vikings we found it once again. It's an interesting site as the outer and inner banks and ditches are unusually far apart and the whole thing is filled with a profusion of ancient yews. The day we were here was splendidly sunny and warm and peaceful but having been here at other times when the weather was less clement the whole reserve has a rather sullen and slightly oppressive feel to it which I think is largely due to the dense yews. The fort sits on a hillside, not quite at the top, looking east over the downlands and is roughly oval in shape. Interestingly there's another earthwork about half a mile from here as you walk back to the huge barrows on Bow Hill, but it's not named and is distinctly rectangular in shape. Can't seem to find any information about this.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406106061483-5F5JQPGOTDNZWF5RJQU4/Heyshott+Down.jpg West Sussex - Heyshott Down Bronze Age barrow cemetery Quite by chance we stumbled upon this barrow cemetery while walking a section of the South Downs Way. Its not as large and impressive as 'The Devil's Jumps' which is a few miles further west from here and the largest barrows are only a couple of metres high at the most, but there are actually two more barrows and a couple of cross dykes intersecting the group. They're aligned roughly East/West unlike The Devils Jumps which are apparently aligned to the setting sun at the summer solstice. The best access point is probably from Cocking and a brief walk east along the SDW footpath. It's not signposted but appears on the OS explorer map 121 (Arundel and Pulborough) and you have to look hard through the hedgerows to spot it. It's also interesting to note that along this section of the SDW there are few solitary barrows and that they always seem to be in linear groups. There is another example near Westburton Hill near Bignor of a group of four barrows which lie in a valley(!), but sadly are no longer visible having been ploughed out over time. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1407343786527-07KWZ8IX2J7DCNK25SBY/Thundersbarrow-01.jpg West Sussex - Thundersbarrow Bronze Age barrow The barrow, although not so interesting in itself, stands on a promontory of the South Downs which leads down to Southwick and Shoreham. However, from this elevated position you get breath-taking views of the whole coastline from the east of Brighton to the west of Worthing, the River Adur as it snakes past Lancing College and the stretch of the South Downs to the North with Trueleigh Hill directly behind you. There was also a settlement here dating from the Iron Age, stated to be a fort, but really just an enclosure. It was getting too dark to actually get a look at this aspect of the site so another visit will ensue. It's worth visiting just for it's isolation, peacefulness (apart from the roar of the A27 which passes just beneath it) and the abundance of natural flora all around it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1498577202860-5SOMRBBDHCV34NYJ4W1R/Waltham+Down-01.jpg West Sussex - The largest barrow of the cemetery, dug into and hollowed out Waltham Down barrow cemetery sits on the edge of the South Downs near East Dean, consisting of four reasonably large barrows and one particularly large mound. They're quite well hidden in the deciduous forest there, but the trees were only planted just after World War Two, so it may have been quite open originally and easily seen, not too dissimilar to the relatively close 'Devil's Jumps' site further West just off the South Downs Way. The largest barrow in the group is slightly isolated from the other four and has been dug into at some time and almost hollowed out. Still standing over two metres in height it appears to be unusually constructed of flint nodules, more like a cairn than a barrow, as most barrows in this area are chalk rubble and earth constructions. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105836402-7V5O433XTQ1J9DCFWXFF/Barkhale-3.jpg West Sussex - Barkhale Neolithic Causewayed Enclosure https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1532779254409-R1Z0F0BV37DX3Y2Z4EQJ/Burpham+Camp-01.jpg West Sussex - Burpham Camp viewed from the road from Warningcamp Not necessarily an obvious site for a hill fort, but it is surrounded by water on three sides and 2500 years ago probably even more so before the flood plains of the River Arun were drained for farming. It may well have started life as a trading place as well as a settlement, controlling the land East of the Arun. Later it became a Saxon 'burh' and as late as World War 2 had a Luftwaffe bomb dropped on it! The fort runs roughly North to South, long and slim in shape with a slight squeeze in the middle. There is little sign of former ancient occupation in the interior, though there are some low earthworks on the Northern side separating it from the medieval village of Burpham. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406105920747-ZRT3FUPOBTC3XP0VHUSL/Devils+Dyke.jpg West Sussex - Devil's Dyke Iron Age hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305263462-UO8E0GUPCHQOY4306B78/War+Dyke-01.jpg West Sussex - War Dyke's substantial bank and ditch running West from the A284 I'm always amazed when I find something of considerable size near my own neck of the woods that hasn't been visited before (On TMA). Given that it's horribly overgrown and at least half of it is inaccessible (unless you're a paying visitor to Arundel Castle) maybe it's not so surprising. The part you can access on the western side of the A284 can be reached by parking at the cafe carpark where all the local bikers meet at the weekend just off the roundabout and then walking south west along the A29 till you come to a footpath which brings you up into Rewell Wood. There are actually two quite substantial parallel dykes here with a ditch between them and they run for about 1/4 of a mile on this side and about 1/2 mile on the Arundel Estate side. Whether this was simply a boundary marker or some sort of defensive earthwork is hard to ascertain, but I think the latter due to it's size and the fact that the high ground of Rewell Wood is littered with former settlements. A recent dig by Worthing Archaeological Society at Goblestubbs Copse 1 1/2 miles south west discovered remains of late Iron Age settlements in the relatively untouched woodlands. Anyway, worth visiting if you like thrashing about in the undergrowth like a mad person. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303700477-NQ66592NYYXUHHYSZR9H/The+Burgh-01.jpg West Sussex - The Burgh Bronze Age barrow This solitary barrow sits on the edge of a track which diverts from the South Downs Way at Springhead Hill leading South West towards Burpham and North Stoke. There are superb views across the rolling downland hills and on this particular day a spectacular sunburst above Arundel Castle (Camelot!) I like the fact that this barrow has a name as so few round barrows do, although I suppose they all did to begin with, they just got lost in the mists of time. This one, I believe, is a Saxon name and might possibly be connected to the strange earthwork slightly South of it. This looks like a giant dew pond but apparently isn't. Possible explanations include a siege fort or animal enclosure. The latter would seem a more obvious choice as there are nearby field systems (celtic or medieval?) and it's deep in livestock grazing country.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406057768004-5C28V9QV1AOXA2EMTBO5/Chanctonbury.jpg West Sussex - Chanctonbury Ring Iron Age hill fort https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406106131799-WTY1DFNFK2ARS76P9EHD/The+Devils+Jumps.jpg West Sussex - The Devil's Jumps Bronze Age barrow cemetery https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406106015367-A3ES8JBRF1XWF8AFGD3Z/Harrow+Hill.JPG West Sussex - Harrow Hill Neolithic flint mines https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305733652-5JV19EKA2EVIN4SYZNYY/Kithurst+Hill-01.jpg West Sussex - Kithurst Hill Iron Age cross dyke https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305220235-Q0G5P49NQRL00KPRBJR7/Springhead+Hill.jpg West Sussex - Springhead Hill Bronze Age barrow https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406305301337-Z8OP9OEFZYXMQ3XCGOPA/The+Steyning+Stone.jpg West Sussex - The Steyning Stone in the porch of St. Andrews church, Steyning https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303990960-3PCQMR44NO6E7WK60HCQ/Sullington+Hill-01.jpg West Sussex - Sullington Hill viewed from the South Downs Way https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406303897014-ZLX1MHH2JTDJMLU67JE4/Rackham+Banks-01.jpg West Sussex - Rackham Banks Iron Age cross dyke https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1458210712271-PEJQZRWH4SPZI67OMD05/Highdown+Hill.jpg West Sussex https://www.landtraces.com/norfolk daily 0.75 2016-08-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406373128630-1N0HPXTRQ1QD0G2OR4I2/Grimes+Graves-01.jpg Norfolk - The pitted surface left by back-filled flint mines It's strange where you end up sometimes. We just happened to be up near here collecting a moped from nearby Thetford and decided to pop over to take a look. It was of particular interest to me as living near Cissbury, another flint mining site, it would give an opportunity to actually go down inside a mine, which you can't do at Cissbury as they're all filled in. The visitor centre is quite interesting, but you can't help feeling it's primary function is to enthuse parties of young school children, not a bad thing, but the real draw is the mine itself. Living in a safety-conscious and litigious age you have to wear a hard hat, descend the ladder one at a time and listen to the man carefully, though he is very friendly and informative. Unfortunately once you've descended the ladder and grown accustomed to the dark you realise that that's as far as you can go! All the galleries are barred after a few feet, but lit just so you get a tantalising idea of what might lie beyond. Having seen Neil Oliver on TV scrambling around on all fours down here, I imagined that we'd all be allowed to do that. Damn. The overriding feeling is one of slight claustrophobia and it must have been quite an arduous task bashing pieces of prime flint out of chalk with nothing more than a deer antler and a weak light to guide you, but the lure of those massive layers of shiny black stone was very strong. The other thing that strikes you is how did these prehistoric miners know that this stuff was down here? I can sort of understand it at Cissbury as nearby chalk cliffs east of Brighton have seams of flint running through them, so it would stand to reason that if you dug down through chalk hills you might find unspoilt layers of flint. At Grime's Graves it seems to be a completely different proposition. It's mainly flat, forested and the only clue might be the chalk just beneath the turf. Because Cissbury, Harrow Hill, etc. predate Grime's Graves I wonder if that mining knowledge was passed on to people living in East Anglia. Maybe there were nomadic miners roaming the country searching for tell tale signs of the treasures beneath their feet? Later when we arrive at the home of the guy selling the moped, covered in chalk we explain how we've just been down Grimes Graves. He tells us that as a kid he and his friends used to descend the shafts down rope ladders with torches and you could crawl around large areas of the subterranean galleries and ascend from different mine shafts! We should have come here 40 years earlier, or maybe 4000. https://www.landtraces.com/county-down-northern-ireland daily 0.75 2014-08-13 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406374038234-BSSJOU0W00UVHKP1LTQ9/Giants+Ring-3.jpg County Down (Northern Ireland) - The Giant's Ring henge monument https://www.landtraces.com/county-tyrone-northern-ireland daily 0.75 2017-11-02 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406374459011-A10UAYUPY5WGR8RRNQCR/Creggandevesky-01.jpg County Tyrone (Northern Ireland) - Creggandevesky Neolithic court tomb It seems few people visit this site without getting a soaking or having difficulty finding it. Well the former was true for us, but I think the signage must have improved considerably as we found it fairly easily. It's a bit of a trudge from where we parked next to a waterworks(?) on the main road (why does it always seem to take longer to walk 'to' somewhere rather than 'from'?), but well worth a visit. The tomb stands majestically on a slightly elevated position overlooking the Lough with the Sperrin Mountains as a backdrop. I'm sure it would look even more enigmatic in low Autumnal sunlight on a dry day, but that's for another time. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406374378930-3XWE6CDVFBL28LIBATUM/Beaghmore-01.jpg County Tyrone (Northern Ireland) - Beaghmore multiple stone circles, rows and cairns Beaghmore is one of those sites which is a ‘must see’ if you’re in Northern Ireland and, although having seen pictures and read fieldnotes prior to our visit, I was quite taken aback by the size, variation, complexity and general weirdness of it all. It really is like no other place I’d visited before. I mean, sure, there are places on Dartmoor that encompass stone avenues, circles and cairns, but not on this scale, or of this complexity, that I’m familiar with. Seven circles, numerous cairns and possibly twelve stone rows – what was going on here? And, more intriguingly, what else was out there so far undiscovered, because apparently the site was uncovered by peat cutting in the 1940s and there may well be other artefacts still hidden beneath the peat nearby. I’d certainly put my money on it anyway. When we arrived the weather was on the cusp of a mighty downpour, with massive threateningstorm clouds above, and although we were lucky enough to avoid it, the sunny weather was slow to recover so we decided that we’d have to make a return visit in the hope of better light. Of course this also meant there was a dearth of other visitors so we had the place pretty much to ourselves. Over the course of the two visits (day 2 turned out to be perfect with bright sunlight and atmospheric clouds – my favourite!) I must have spent nearly three hours wandering around sucking up the exquisite beauty of the place with its sombre Sperrin Mountain backdrop. Circle E, the largest circle, with its interior scattering of smaller stones known as ‘the dragon’s teeth’ (and on this occasion charmingly interspersed with daisies). Circle G with its larger ‘entrance stones’, almost mirroring each other in appearance, though if you look carefully the right hand stone isn’t actually part of the circle at all. It’s the second stone of a tangential double row aligned roughly East North East, possibly towards the Summer Solstice sunrise, and, like many of the other avenues, the stones on the other side are all small, giving an odd lopsided appearance. The cairn adjacent to circles F and G is also interesting as it seems to be the only one here with a ring ditch with the alignment of smaller stones, just mentioned, pointing straight at it. By chance on the first day I thought I’d discovered a small cist in a pile of stones near the end of the row coming from Circle B, but as it turned out it was just a small hidey hole in which was secreted a geocache, so if you’re there anytime in the near future you too can add your name in the notes. So, a justifiably ‘must see’ destination and one that’s certainly in my top ten sites visited.   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406374645046-J8TXGP19G4CHXINWJCTU/Davagh+Water-01.jpg County Tyrone (Northern Ireland) - Davagh Water Bronze Age standing stone This looks like a relatively easy place to get to if you know what you’re doing. We didn’t. We figured that it must be close to the river, according to the OS map, but, having parked up and set off down the track towards the water it soon became evident that there was no real pathway to follow and the conifers here were very dense and fallen trunks were covered in thick, luxurious moss giving the whole place a look like a children’s illustration of primeval forest. A fleeting glimpse of a stegosaurus wouldn’t have surprised me. Fighting our way out, chased by a velociraptor, we headed back to the van only to discover a discreet footpath just behind it. Duhhh! At the end of it was a sunny woodland clearing with a lovely standing stone, almost 2m in height, surrounded by a rough circle of about eight or nine smaller stones. There may have been more but the grass was quite thick and dense. Having looked at my copy of Burl I now know there were and that this is quite a complex little site comprising more than one oval ring, stone alignments and a possible cairn, a bit like a poor relative to the nearby mind-blowing Beaghmore site. I also realise now that it’s referred to as ‘Davagh Lower’, which means presumably that there’s a Davagh Upper (or what I’ve named Davagh Forest). Slightly to the north of the standing stone is what I took to be a ruined cairn, but again this seems to be in dispute as it could just be a ruined stone hut. Whatever it might be, it’s still a very peaceful tranquil spot and well worth a visit. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406374707589-RUWAMAYZUNK5PMVSCNHN/Loughmacrory+II+Court+Tomb-01.jpg County Tyrone (Northern Ireland) - Loughmacrory II Neolithic court tomb https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406374763073-0DMBIB80L4EOGVC20R3Q/Loughmacrory+III+Wedge+Tomb-01.jpg County Tyrone (Northern Ireland) - Loughmacrory III Neolithic wedge tomb https://www.landtraces.com/devon daily 0.75 2017-10-13 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1469960564711-IFJQTVPYUK6924TFM9CV/Down+Tor-06.jpg Devon - Panorama of the cairn circle and row on Dartmoor. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406304415671-0RK76GOTFFNHB3WG4ZAC/Woodbury-02.JPG Devon - Woodbury Iron Age hill fort Very easy to find as the B3180 passes straight through the middle of this handsome Iron Age fort. We happened to be staying about half a mile from here while working in Honiton and were vaguely aware of it's presence the first night of our stay as we drove through. The next morning gave us more tantalising glimpses as we made the return drive to Honiton with perfect low sunlight filtering through the copper coloured leaves of the beech trees on and within the banks of the fort. The fort itself sits just slightly atop a wild and open area of common land and the OS map shows evidence of a number of tumuli in the surrounding area but sadly, we never had time to investigate these. The banks which are quite substantial in places are made up largely of smooth rounded pebbles from an ancient river bed and a little further down the road from here is a company extracting the same material for aggregate. This area must once have been a large alluvial plain stretching between the River Exe in the West and the River Otter to the East. A great place to wonder around on a sunny autumn day with stunning views across the common in all directions   https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1507894921659-KPGH2WOIY3Y2DA6D75O7/Scorhill-01.jpg Devon - Scorhill stone circle and it's outlier Two days prior to the visit of Scorhill in the North East of the Dartmoor National Park we had tried to take friends to see Yellowmead concentric stone circles over on the Western side. We'd spent about an hour sloshing around an area of no more than a quarter of a square mile in driving rain and high winds (apologies to Rosie and John) and failed to locate it, even though we'd been there a couple of years before. So it was a relief to locate this circle so easily in profoundly better conditions. That's what Dartmoor is like! Having visited numerous stone circles and ancient sites on the moor over the years I have to say this is one of my favourites and also very easy to get to. You don't really see it until the last moment as it's in a slight valley and the stones themselves are not really very tall, the biggest being about two metres, but with the strong sunlight and brooding skyline they appeared to shine invitingly. Apparently it's never been tampered with in the sense of re-erecting some of the fallen stones, though it's obvious that stone cutters have tried to split some of them in more recent times as they bare small drill holes, so it has an air or pure authenticity. Well worth a visit! https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1507574090925-SO9B82NYN3A7IIGNTF8R/Merrivale-01.jpg Devon - Merrivale Bronze Age stone row, sometimes referred to as 'The Plague Market' https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406629847973-8IYREJDHXEKVHFL7G8NF/The+Spinsters+Rock-01.jpg Devon https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406629705230-Q80DLZQQA7M02ZW9KJOB/The+Greywethers-01.jpg Devon - The Greywethers Bronze Age double stone circle on Dartmoor https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406304691222-5DE6INB120IK95DWBZJ4/Grimspound-02.jpg Devon - Grimspound Bronze Age enclosure https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406629874157-0RXJBPBVVMQSC8O50FWV/Yellowmead-01.jpg Devon - Yellowmead Bronze Age multiple stone circles https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406629543536-YCQLNXR286E1HT9K5M4L/Brisworthy-01.jpg Devon - Brisworthy Bronze Age stone circle on Dartmoor https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1406629786337-GD2AVLMO9K2H1RTZMYY5/Fernworthy-01.jpg Devon - Fernworthy Bronze Age stone circle on Dartmoor https://www.landtraces.com/swansea-ula daily 0.75 2018-10-13 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437736559985-K2B2HVX4PNES561IZLQB/Maen+Ceti-01.jpg Swansea ULA - Maen Ceti (Arthur's Stone) Neolithic chambered tomb https://www.landtraces.com/pembrokeshire daily 0.75 2016-11-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437733689431-KIA6EAEXHKBYV8K51WEU/Gors+Fawr-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Gors Fawr late Neolithic/early Bronze Age stone circle https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437730584918-OOC29AIEA4W4H9N4F0YP/Bedd+Arthur-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Bedd Arthur stone alignment (age disputed) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437730774498-WGC3U140D8VP12R2N178/Careg+Coetan-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Carreg Coetan Arthur Neolithic cromlech https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437731257346-J1E01UI5Q4M41XF5DRV9/Careg+Sampson-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Carreg Sampson Neolithic cromlech https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437731657595-AUSLJLRISSG9PQL1QHLK/Cerig+y+Gof-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Cerrig y Gof Bronze Age burial chamber https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437732320570-2DBSMYG9LC424PH7XTBV/Coetan+Arthur-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Coetan Arthur Neolithic cromlech https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437733215299-X0E36IJTSI6WBHKS56X4/Ffyst+Samson-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Ffyst Samson Neolithic chambered tomb https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437734235850-A6H7BP686A65IVPMOQK8/Pentre+Ifan-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - Pentre Ifan Neolithic cromlech https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1437734851975-5KY40R53OA26MJ0S3JOD/St+David%27s+Head+Camp-01.jpg Pembrokeshire - St David's Head Camp Iron Age promontory fort https://www.landtraces.com/invernessshire-1 daily 0.75 2016-10-28 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477665207408-854BG0MQV6HD94IE0BHK/Clava+Cairns-01.jpg Inverness-shire - The most Southerly of the cairns https://www.landtraces.com/orkney daily 0.75 2016-10-29 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477665863526-PGQWAVYW5ZD9BXC5G0G0/Barnhouse+Settlement-01.jpg Orkney - Barnhouse Settlement overlooking the Lock of Harray https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477666382400-9EELTAUHLDL14BD1PGXK/Broch+of+Gurness-05.jpg Orkney - The Broch and outer dwellings https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477667046629-CTWVUH24LZSMREM7GUJW/Maeshowe-02.jpg Orkney - Maeshowe https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477732945905-4K04CUUDY25ZWDE5LC74/Skara+Brae.jpg Orkney - Panorama of the semi-subterraneum dwellings overlooking the Bay of Skaill https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477678147332-UDCZQ658TEWWT6AMJPO0/Ring+of+Brodgar-02.jpg Orkney - Looking North East towards the Loch of Harray and the Stones of Stenness https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477734987828-VGJVTHG0IO2WD6BNOYDD/TOTE-03.jpg Orkney - The entrance to the cairn via a low, narrow passage https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1477736151526-Y89D39PW0O4RDDSJDB3A/Unstan-01.jpg Orkney - The cairn is situated on a small promontory extending into the Loch of Stenness https://www.landtraces.com/cambridgeshire-1 daily 0.75 2018-04-02 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1491839936459-1KW0QMVLV0ZM22Y5I4VU/Wandlebury-01.jpg Cambridgeshire - The ditch and banks of Wandlebury Iron Age hill fort Wandlebury Hill fort is quite an impressive size and forms part of Wandlebury Country Park just south of Cambridge in the Gog Magog Hills. It's difficult to see the hill fort as a whole as it's mostly tree covered with beeches and yews, but the earthworks are still quite well defined and you can do a complete and pleasant walk around them, about a mile in length. In the centre of the earthworks once stood Wandlebury House, home of, amongst others, Francis Godolphin, but now only a huge stable block remains. https://www.landtraces.com/sutherland daily 0.75 2017-11-03 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509550035875-NZFMR6A8YJEBHZ8OACCE/DSF_8417.jpg Sutherland - Achany chambered cairn See the blog 'A Sutherland cycle tour and the £380 stone circle' https://www.landtraces.com/blog/ https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509622596489-SDOKKH8FTRVXF3K4Z96Z/DSF_8384.jpg Sutherland - Linsidemoor Neolithic Cairn https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509621973784-VP4I8KPF6BTHN9EGTGPE/DSF_8423.jpg Sutherland - Ferry Wood Iron Age Broch near Lairg Very little remains of this broch which once stood at the foot of Loch Shin with great views looking North East back up the loch. It now forms part of a local nature trail through woodland near Lairg. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509626601769-S3F1RU534X479PRDPUC2/DSF_8237.jpg Sutherland - Tirryside Iron Age Broch One of many ruined brochs in the area surrounding Lairg. There is little remaining of this one on the banks of Strath Tirry, other than a large mound and the faintest traces of stonework on top. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509623852483-DMTCLA73OWGWOBR2AVXK/Sallachy+Broch-06.jpg Sutherland https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509625916061-I6KXE479E0GG8AIJDEA4/DSF_8250.jpg Sutherland - Ord South Neolithic chambered cairn Ord South is the slightly older of the two main cairns within 'The Ord' landscape and is topped by a small arrangement of five small standing stones. With its wonderful setting and views looking directly up Loch Shin it's sadly compromised by the siting of an ugly telecoms mast, but hey, that's only one view and you do get to see the whole of the Ord area, the wee town of Lairg and a good view of the neighbouring Ord North. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509625314967-SONMO4KP9PFFXXZ5E6FR/DSF_8254.jpg Sutherland - Ord North Neolithic chambered cairn viewed from Ord South This is a splendid mound of stones adjacent to the slightly older Ord South. It's not quite as grass covered as its neighbour and the entrance, marked by two large lintel stones, is no longer accessible. Excavation in the 1960s revealed a sloping passage and an octagonal chamber within. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509550578766-YFFC99H1YS4Z416CN0M3/DSF_8288.jpg Sutherland - Achinduich Bronze Age Stone Circle This ruined circle is fairly easy to find as it stands on a hillside a few miles South of Lairg just off the A836. It was a double concentric circle but now only consists of two small arcs, the outer of five stones and the inner of three smaller stones. Originally it would have been about 9 metres in diameter with splendid views over the Strath Shin valley, but like The Ord cairns just outside Lairg, it's spoiled by a badly sited electricity pylon. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509621437987-289PNPB8SBM6YA88I3Q9/DSF_8313.jpg Sutherland - Achnagarron Standing Stones This is a pair of quite hefty standing stones about 1.5m high each with a multitude of other large recumbent stones scattered about. Situated in the Rogart district on the slope of a small knoll it's possible that they once formed a stone circle. Some believe it and some don't. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1509623011024-R8952Y1VN0UGQ6I3MXGE/DSF_8336.jpg Sutherland - Loch Naver hut circles near Altnaharra The area around the Southern shore of Loch Naver is scattered with ancient remains consisting of hut circles, standing stones and cup marked stones. However the hut 'circles' turned out to be rectangular mostly, so it was difficult to know whether they were truly prehistoric or simply the remains of crofts left over from the Highland Clearances some 250 years ago or less. Equally the standing stones were the other side of a river descending from Ben Klibreck which forms the background to the area. The river, sadly, was uncrossable on this occasion so I didn't get to see them. I did, however, come across what appeared to be cup marks on a rock next to the river while trying to search out the standing stones. Whether they really are man-made cup marks or just natural erosion is hard to say. https://www.landtraces.com/anglesey daily 0.75 2021-03-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1535733233694-U5OUVKJSP8J21HLTFQW4/Caer+Leb-01.jpg Anglesey - Caer Leb Iron Age defended farmstead This double banked defended farmstead was probably constructed between 200 and 100BC and is situated in the South East of Anglesey. It was later re-used in the Romano British period and in Medieval times, but later ploughing has destroyed any traces of habitations. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1535734049206-K1XGWGS0G6ANQ8B89W3U/DSG_1944.jpg Anglesey - Bodowyr Neolithic cromlech (burial chamber) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1536500206599-OA0UF4ARQXN5AFW73L88/DSG_1960.jpg Anglesey - Bryn Celli Ddu Neolithic chambered tomb Situated near the small village of Llanddaniel Fab, not far from the Menai Strait and with a view towards the Snowdonia National Park (on a clear day!), Bryn Celli Ddu has a long and interesting history. It started life around 4000BC in the late Mesolithic consisting of just five post holes (purpose unknown) and then came a henge monument and stone circle of 17 upright stones in the Neolithic at around 3000BC. After a further 1000 years the whole circle was demolished and a passage grave constructed with the inner tomb containing a mysterious upright stone pillar and the passage orientated towards the rising sun of the Summer Solstice. On the outside is another solitary standing stone with a strange zig-zagging piece of artwork on one side. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1536854359618-VXZPC2BWZSH6D7VQQ5JI/DSG_1971.jpg Anglesey - Plas Newydd burial chamber in the grounds of Plas Newydd House Although this interesting and unusual double cromlech is situated within the private grounds of the house it is quite visible from a short distance. I was lucky enough to get up close to it, fleetingly, and get a better look. There’s some debate as to whether the smaller cromlech is an antechamber to the larger or if it’s a burial chamber in it’s own right. The guy that I was talking to there also seemed to think that the whole thing might be slightly fanciful and possibly re-erected by over zealous Victorian antiquarians. Not unknown by any means. It’s certainly very large with massive capstones, well sited and would have had commanding views over the Menai Strait before the house was built, and probably witnessed the destruction of the Druids by the Roman army just a bit further North up the strait. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1537025233921-RWPH7GOI10E5QNGHWWP4/DSG_2019.jpg Anglesey - Din Lligwy Iron Age Village https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1537025466759-JKLHESP6ON9VX94NTFAX/DSG_2039.jpg Anglesey - Lligwy Neolithic burial chamber https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1537025887880-WE62RH8YULUL45HWPPEE/DSG_2139.jpg Anglesey - Llanfechell Bronze Age Standing Stone https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1537115635745-MSU1ZIC61SG9XOZEE1WM/DSG_2127.jpg Anglesey - Mein Hirion Bronze Age standing stones https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1537116105614-TTUGFYTNFYLJSTPFPWET/DSG_2177.jpg Anglesey - Holyhead Mountain Iron Age Hut Group https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1537116548409-5J4MQ49YYKF293C5LQD2/DSG_2069.jpg Anglesey - parys mountain bronze age copper mine There is probably little trace of the earliest workings, but the mine began it’s life way back in the Bronze Age as an open cast mine. Most of the major extraction took place later when copper ore was rediscovered in 1768, later making it the largest copper mine in Europe with a large number of deep shafts by the time it closed. https://www.landtraces.com/northumberland daily 0.75 2021-12-16 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1638879175192-L2PHGN11LD7PLY8Q16O7/Duddo+Five+Stones_01.jpg Northumberland - Duddo Five Stones, sometimes known as Duddo Four Stones before they re-erected one that had fallen Like clenched fists smashing through the earth’s surface! Duddo Five Stones (once seven) is a small early Bronze Age stone circle of huge sandstone megaliths just 4 miles from the Scottish border in Northumberland with fantastic views of the Lammermuir Hills to the North and the Cheviot Hills to the South. Four thousand years of weathering has created fissures in their surfaces giving them a very distinctive appearance. They’re relatively easy to find but about a mile from the nearest road through fields that can be quite boggy. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53ce3c52e4b0efb67d7048f2/1639659670604-D091V5M9Y3K8HHSHUVQH/DSI_0673.jpg Northumberland - Chatton Neolithic rock art Chatton, or Chatton Park as it’s also known, is an area of exposed sheet rock which has numerous Neolithic rock art designs carved into it. These consist of a mixture of concentric circles (some with lines extending from the centre outwards and some almost converging circles of different sizes) and cup marks which occur singularly, in lines or in ‘egg box’ type patterns. Nobody, as yet, has come up with a meaning for these patterns, but because they occur in large numbers and are vey similar across large areas of Northern England and Scotland it’s difficult not to attribute some sort of explanation to them. Possibly it’s some sort of local mapping or way-finding symbolism or maybe it’s astronomical. At the very least it could be saying ‘Private land. Keep out!’, something we’re all familiar with. https://www.landtraces.com/new-cover-page daily 1.0 2022-02-15 https://www.landtraces.com/about daily 0.75 2025-01-06