Author: megalithix

Brae of Airlie, Airlie, Angus

megalithix

Souterrain (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NO 3102 5187

Also Known as:

  1. Airlie IV (Wainwright)
  2. Canmore ID 32383

Archaeology & History

This was one amongst a good cluster of souterrains that existed hereby, remains of which may still exist beneath the ground.  It was rediscovered in the 19th century through a series of most curious events—owing more to the local belief in spirits and witches than any archaeological rationale.  Mr A. Jervise (1864) told the story in his essay on Airlie parish:

“The circumstances which led to the discovery of one of these weems is curious.  Local story says, that the wife of a poor cottar could not for long understand why, whatever sort of fuel she burned, no ashes were left upon the hearth; and if a pin or any similar article was dropt at the fireside, it could not be recovered.  Having “a bakin” of bannocks, or oatmeal cakes, on some occasion, one of the cakes accidentally slipped from off “the toaster,” and passed from the poor woman’s sight!  This was more than she was prepared for; and, believing that the house was bewitched, she alarmed her neighbours, who collected in great numbers, and, as may be supposed, after many surmises and grave deliberation, they resolved to pull down the house!  This was actually done: still the mystery remained unsolved, until one lad, more courageous and intelligent than the rest, looking attentively about the floor, observed a long narrow crevice at the hearth. Sounding the spot, and believing the place to be hollow, he set to work and had the flag lifted, when the fact was disclosed, that the luckless cottage had been built right over an “eirde” house.  The disappearance of ashes, and the occasional loss of small articles of household use, were thus satisfactorily accounted for; but, unfortunately, although the site of this weem remains, as well as that of another near the same place, both were long ago destroyed, and the materials of which they were constructed used for a variety of utilitarian purposes.”

Or to put it simply: right beneath the fireplace, a small opening into the souterrain below appeared, into which all things fell.  F.T. Wainwright (1963) placed the position of the site “about 100 feet east of the road between Barns of Airlie and Brae of Airlie, about 200 yards from the former.”  On the 1865 OS-map, this spot is marked with a small unnamed building.  No excavation has ever been tried here

References:

  1. Jervise, A., “Notice of Antiquities in the Parish of Airlie, Forfarshire,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 5, 1864.
  2. Wainwright, F T., The Souterrains of Southern Pictland. RKP: London 1963.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Barns of Airlie (2), Airlie, Angus

megalithix

Souterrain (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NO 3052 5152

Also Known as:

  1. Airlie III (Wainwright 1963)
  2. Canmore ID 32385

Archaeology & History

There are no remains left of this old ‘weem’, earth-house, or souterrain as they are now commonly known.  It was one of at least seven separate souterrains beneath the fields between the Barns of Airlie and Brae of Airlie, but very little is now known of this one.  The first and only real note of the site was given in Mr A. Jervise’s (1864) essay on the antiquities of Airlie parish.  Nearly a hundred years later when F.T. Wainwright (1963) went to investigate any possible remains, he found very little, telling:

“A possible location for Airlie III…presented itself on 24 June, 1951, when Mr D.B. Taylor and I noticed a considerable number of boulders and slabs cast up in the field which lies over the wall from the entrance to Airlie I (souterrain).  The farmer was aware that there was a heavy concentration of stones spread over an area of two or three thousand square feet, but he could add no further information.  In 1951 we were not able to do more than record this possibly significant scatter of stones—it lies between 150 and 200 feet west from the present entrance of Airlie I on a bearing of 260º—and to note that it could very well indicate a souterrain settlement.”

Most of the scattered stone was subsequently removed for use in walling and no trace remains of the place.

References:

  1. Jervise, A., “Notice of Antiquities in the Parish of Airlie, Forfarshire,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 5, 1864.
  2. Wainwright, F T., The Souterrains of Southern Pictland. RKP: London 1963.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Hillhead, Forgue, Aberdeenshire

megalithix

Stone Circle (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NJ 638 367

Also Known as:

  1. Canmore ID 18237 
  2. Hillhead of Bogfouton
  3. Wether Hill

Archaeology & History

Described by the early 20th century antiquarian and megalithomaniac Fred Coles (1903) as being situated “about 1¼ mile SE from the church at Ythan Wells,” all trace of this stone circle has long gone, and had already disappeared when Coles was surveying the region, telling merely that it had been here “in open fields.”  All subsequent explorations looking for remains of the site has proven fruitless.

References:

  1. Barnatt, John, Stone Circles of Britain – volume 2, British Archaeological Report: Oxford 1989.
  2. Cole, Fred, “Report on the stone circles of North-Eastern Scotland, chiefly in Auchterless and Forgue,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 37, 1903.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Barrow Hill Stone, Chastleton, Oxfordshire

megalithix

Standing Stone (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SP 257 282

Archaeology & History

We have found only one reference to this lost standing stone that could once be seen adjacent to the very well-preserved Chastleton Barrow Camp to the east of the village. In her scarce little work on the history of Chastleton House, Margaret Dickins (1900) told that,

“the oldest thing to be seen at Chastleton is the prehistoric stone, which till lately served as a field gate post on the Barrow Hill.”

This monolith was one in a series of megalithic sites in and around the village that have been destroyed due to the actions of ill-informed land-owners. In this case, the standing stone was in close association with the subsequent Iron Age encampment (this missing stone should not be confused with the nearby Goose Stones, greatly damaged).

References:

  1. Bennett, P. & Chanter, James, The Complete Rollright Stones, forthcoming
  2. Dickins, Margaret, Chastleton House, Walker: Stratford 1900.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Strand Cross, Westminster, London, Middlesex

megalithix

Cross (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TQ 3077 8093

Also Known as

  1. Stone Cross of the Strand

Archaeology & History

First mentioned in Latin manuscripts from 1274 CE, the best description of this long lost monument, curiously, appears to be in Gover’s Place Names tome.  In a slightly edited format he told us the following:

“There was a stone cross “without the bar of the New Temple” traditionally supposed to have been erected by William Rufus “in devotion to the Holy Cross and for the health of the souls of himself and his mother, Queen Maud… It was in the Strand, possibly on the site of the present church of St. Mary.  It is referred to as crucem lap’ in 1274; la Crois de Piere in 1293; …Stonecrouch in 1337; crucem fractum in 1342…”

In subsequent notes Gover et al (1942) tell of a man they found in historical records to be Thomas le Barber, “described alternatively  as being Thomas le Barber atte Stonecourche” in the Calendar of Rolls records of 1337, and again in the 1339 accounts.

Of the cross itself, information is minimal and scattered.  It was destroyed several centuries ago but is mentioned in a number of old books on the history of the city.  The historian Thomas Allen (1829), for example, told that

“opposite to Chester Inn stood an ancient cross.  On this cross in the year 1294, the judges sat to administer justice, without the City.”

It was also a site where legal pleas for the county of Middlesex were to be held, at “the Stone Cross of lad Straund” as it was then known.  Due to the early administrative function delivered from this cross, it strongly implies the place to have been a moot site prior to the erection of the cross, probably dating from the period in which tribal elders met here.

A Mr Newton tells in his London in the Olden Time that the top of the cross was damaged and knocked off by the crazy christians around the time of the Reformation and that for many years stood headless.  When Vallance (1920) came to describe it, he told merely that,

“the Strand Cross, near Covent Garden.  This cross was hexagonal on plan, and comprised four stages.  It was standing in 1547, but was ultimately removed, its site being occupied by the Maypole, which was spoken of in 1700 as new.”

The Strand Cross would have been on the ancient ley (not one of those ‘energy lines’ invented by New Age fantasists) described first of all by Alfred Watkins (1925)—running from St. Martins-in-the-Field to St. Dunstan’s in Fleet Street—but he seems to have been unaware that the monolith ever existed.  The alignment was subsequently described in more detail in Devereux & Thomson’s (1979) work on the same subject, but its existence seems to have evaded them too!  Chris Street (2010) did include it in his much more detailed walk down the same ley.   A maypole was also known to exist close to the site of the cross; with one account showing that the two monuments existed at the same time in 1543.

As the site seemed to have been an early moot spot, the Strand Cross may have been an omphalos in early popular culture (before the christians of course), or at the very least, a site of popular animistic tradition.

References:

  1. Allen, Thomas, The History and Antiquities of London – volume 4, Cowie & Strange: London 1829.
  2. Anon., Rotuli Hundredorum – 2 volumes, G. Eyre and A. Strahan: London 1812.
  3. Aungier, George James, Croniques de London, Camden Society: London 1854.
  4. Devereux, Paul & Thomson, Ian, The Ley Hunter’s Companion, Thames & Hudson: London 1979.
  5. Gover, J.E.B., Mawer, Allen & Stenton, F.M., The Place-Names of Middlesex, Cambridge University Press 1942.
  6. Newton, William, London in the Olden Time, Bell & Daldy: London 1855.
  7. Stevenson, W.H. (ed.), Calendar of the Close Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office, HMSO: London 1900.
  8. Street, Christopher E., London’s Ley Lines, Earthstars: London 2010.
  9. Vallance, Aymer, Old Crosses and Lychgates, Batsford: London 1920.
  10. Watkins, Alfred, The Old Straight Track, Methuen: London 1925.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Cow Cross, Finsbury, London, Middlesex

megalithix

Cross (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TQ 3180 8181

Archaeology & History

Site of Cow Cross on 1896 map

Site of Cow Cross on 1896 map

Not far from the long lost Fag Well could once be seen this old stone monument.  Although not illustrated on the first Ordnance Survey maps of the inner city, it is highlighted on the 1896 edition (as shown here), just where Cow Cross Street meets Charterhouse Street—right by the boundary line—and is marked as ‘Site of Cow Cross’.

The cross gained its named from the cattle market that was held here from very early times, on the boundary of the lands of the Knights Hospitallers in the 12th century.  Cattle itself–both horses and cows—were actually slaughtered at the market by the cross: a practice that has thankfully stopped (in public at least).  Despite the place-name being referenced in many early accounts, actual descriptions of the cross are few and far between due to it being destroyed at quite an early date.  When John Stow came to write his history of London in 1603, he told that it was no longer standing.  Whether the cross replaced an earlier standing stone, we simply do not know…

References:

  1. Gover, J.E.B., Mawer, Allen & Stenton, F.M., The Place-Names of Middlesex, Cambridge University Press 1942.
  2. Temple, Phillip (ed.), Survey of London – volume 46, LCC: London 2008.
  3. Vallance, Aymer, Old Crosses and Lychgates, Batsford: London 1920.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Broken Cross, Westminster, London, Middlesex

megalithix

Cross (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TQ 322 812

Archaeology & History

In truly that most unholy of places in England—Westminster, London—there was, in bygone times, a slightly more sacred site which, earlier still, might have been where a standing stone stood…. Might….  But such days are long gone down there.  A gathering place of local people in very early times, the Broken Cross was, according to Vallance (1920),

“erected by the Earl of Gloucester in the reign of Henry III (1216-1272), but it did not stand very long.  Its site is said to have been ‘the place of the meeting of the Folkmote…near St. Martin’s-le-Grand, about midway between the Northgate of the precinct (of St. Paul’s) and the church of St. Vedast.’  On 5th September 1379, agreements were drawn up for letting the stations about the Broken Cross to five divers persons.  The cross was bodily taken down in 1390.”

Yet its name was maintained in street-names for many years later, simply as ‘Broken Cross’.  Its position would have been very close to Cheapside.

George Gomme (1880) pointed out that such early folk moots were the development of tribal gatherings grafted from megalithic meetings onto early christian assemblies, pointing out how such assemblies for laws and councils were made at nearby St. Paul’s as early as 973 AD.

References:

  1. Gomme, George Laurence, Primitive Folk-Moots, Sampson Low: London 1880.
  2. Gover, J.E.B., Mawer, Allen & Stenton, F.M., The Place-Names of Middlesex, Cambridge University Press 1942.
  3. Vallance, Aymer, Old Crosses and Lychgates, Batsford: London 1920.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Power Station Road, Sheerness, Isle of Sheppey, Kent

megalithix

Settlement (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TQ 932 733

Archaeology & History

An extensive site that was uncovered when a housing estate was being built on the south-side of Power Station Road at the end of the 20th century.  During the Spring and Summer of 1998, the Canterbury Archaeological Trust began cutting trenches across the land and did some minor excavation work on the west side of the area, finding some traces of early human activity.

A second series of investigations was then undertaken by the Hertfordshire Archaeological Trust  over the Autumn and Winter months of 1998-99, with the Kent Archaeological Rescue Unit then taking over for the rest of the year.  Their team split the land into eight large sections and began a more detailed analysis and uncovered a huge number of finds.  Amidst this, wrote Brian Philp (2002), there

“included an important collection of Bronze Age material, including large clay-weights, perforated baked-clay slabs and a good range of pottery types.  Of special interest was the spinal bone of a large whale, perhaps washed up on the nearby shore.

“The picture now emerging is that of a substantial Bronze Age settlement site, spread across several acres and probably farming the adjacent land… It seems likely that three large ponds and…eight stone-lined pits were primarily for water-storage, both for watering cattle and for other agricultural or semi-industrial purposes… All this seemed to be happening about 900-400 BC on what still appears to be the largest Bronze Age settlement so far discovered on this important island.”

The archaeocentric place-name of Barrows Hill rises a mile to the southwest.

References:

  1. Philp, Brian, Archaeology in the Front Line, KARU: Dover 2002.
  2. Schuster, Jorn, “The Neolithic to Post-Medieval Archaeology of Kingsborough, Eastchurch, Isle of Sheppey: From Monuments to Fields,” in Archaeologia Cantiana, volume 130, 2010.

Links:

  1. Kent Archaeological Review

© Paul Bennett,  The Northern Antiquarian 2016


Dumpton Park, Ramsgate, Kent

megalithix

Tumulus (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TR 389 661

Archaeology & History

A little-known site which archaeologist Brian Philp (2002) called “a Bronze Age barrow”.  When the old Greyhound Stadium at Ramsgate was being demolished for a new housing estate, planning conditions required an archaeological evaluation and so Philps and his team set out to explore the area in February 2000.  They weren’t to be disappointed!  Unearthing a ring ditch nearly 20 yards (18m) across, they found that it had been cut into the local chalk some three feet deep.  Although there was no obvious entrance, the northeast section of the ancient monument,

“was found to be covered by a compact layer of flint metalling.  This was a wide and well-made surface or platform, perhaps of Iron Age date, which clearly covered the silted ring-ditch,  Nearby was a large male skeleton in a very shallow grave and with head missing due to later disturbances.”

The excavated ring ditch (after Philp 2002)

The excavated ring ditch (after Philp 2002)

The crouched skeleton (after Philp 2002)

The crouched skeleton (after Philp 2002)

But the best was yet to come!  In another section of the circular monument, cut into the chalk itself, they found a complete male skeleton laid in typical foetus position, on its left side, with a large beaker pot positioned in front of it.  These beakers are pretty common and tend to be seen as once holding food enabling the dead to eat in their journey into the Land of the Dead.  It makes sense.  The entire monument has since been completely destroyed.

References:

  1. Philp, Brian, Archaeology in the Front Line, KARU: Dover 2002.

Links:

  1. Kent Archaeological Review

© Paul Bennett,  The Northern Antiquarian 2016


Baston Manor, Hayes, Kent

megalithix

Settlement:  OS Grid Reference – TQ 407 649

Archaeology & History

This settlement site was found thanks to the good work of the Bromley & West Kent Archaeology Group in the 1960s, when they decided to do follow-up work to what Brian Philp (2002) described as “doubtful sites reported mainly in the 19th century.”  Time and again these “doubtful sites” at least turn into something of value — and such was the case here!  The group commenced digging selective trenches in July 1964 in a small wooded area near to Baston Manor and they soon came across “a stratified deposit of late-Neolithic (2500 BC) pottery and flint.”

In successive returns to the site over two years, 5630 items—primarily fire-cracked stones, flints and more than 200 pieces of pottery, some of which was highly decorative—were unearthed and the site was recognised as an important settlement arena many thousands of years ago.  In Kent, this was a rarity!  Philps’ resumé of the site and its many remains told,

“Sometime about 2500 BC, a group of late-Stone Age farmers had selected this quiet hillside (now just in Hayes) to settle and live.  Here they must have farmed  small cultivated areas close to their huts and herded sheep and cattle to fresh areas and nearby streams.  These were the first occupants of the West Wickham valley over 4000 years ago…”

References:

  1. Philp, Brian, “The Discovery of a Secondary Neolithic Site at Hayes,” in Kent Archaeological Review, no.5, 1966.
  2. Philp, Brian, Archaeology in the Front Line, KARU: Dover 2002.
  3. Smith, Isobel, “Prehistoric Pottery from Baston Manor, Hayes,” in Kent Archaeological Review, no.18, 1969.

Links:

  1. Kent Archaeological Review

© Paul Bennett,  The Northern Antiquarian