Cup-Marked Stone: OS Grid Reference – SE 145 739
Also Known as:
- Fountains Earth (6)
This one really takes some finding. Take the high moorland road running between Lofthouse and Healey villages, and at the very top by the cattle-grid, park up. Walk across the road and walk east. A mile or so on you’ll pass the Shooting Lodge house: keep walking for nearly another mile where another track goes left. Walk down here about ½-mile and you’ll see a crag down the the slope on your right. From here, walk uphill to your left; over the wall, and keep going about 500 yards until the moorland levels out. Hereby is a small outcrop of rocks. Look around!
Archaeology & History
Recently rediscovered by young antiquarian Mackenzie Erichs in May 2021, this flat rock—roughly 5 feet by 3 feet— is one of many amidst the heather which, when fully grown, is gonna be hard to see. This is one of the many petroglyphs possessed with both natural and artificial elements roughly of the same number here.
Upon the mainly southern-side of the stone is a cluster of cup-marks with several on the edges of the rock, most of which are probably natural, or naturally affected. The main cluster of cups—about eight in all—have differing levels of erosion, suggesting differing periods of execution. The most obvious cup is the deep one near the middle of the stone; a group of 3-4 very eroded ones are closer to the edge; and 2-3 three others of varying shallow depths can be seen. One of the cups at the edge of the rock also seems to have been partly worked.
© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian
Acknowledgements: Big thanks as always to James Elkington for use of his photos.
