From Cow & Calf Hotel head onto the moor above you, following the same directions to reach the ornately carved Idol Stone (and its immediate companions). Ahead of you on the same footpath, about 100 yards along, as it begins to slope up the hill further onto the moor, you’ll see a large upright pyramid-shaped stone, about 8 feet all, right at the side of the path. Y’ can’t miss it!
Archaeology & History
Deep cups & lines on top
Although ascribed as a cup-marked stone in usual surveys, the cup-markings on top of this rock are seemingly Nature’s handiwork. There is a possibility that cup-markings were carved into the top of the stone, many thousands of years ago, but due to the centuries of wind and weathering, we cannot in anyway assess the curvaceous bowls and lines running across and from the top of this rock to be artificial.
Folklore
The name ‘Idol Stone’ seems to have come about as a result of the judaeo-christian Victorian obsession of satanic idolatry in all things natural – which many of them still fear. Sadly there are no early accounts of practices of idolatry at this rock, until it was used by chaos magickians in the formative years of that Current in the 1980s.
References:
Bennett, Paul, The Old Stones of Elmet, Capall Bann: Milverton 2001.
Boughey, K.J.S. & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Leeds 2003.
Forrest, C. & Grainge, William, A Ramble on Rumbald’s Moor, among the Dwellings, Cairns and Circles of the Ancient Britons, W.T. Lamb: Wakefield 1868-9.
Hedges, John (ed), The Carved Rocks on Rombald’s Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Holmes, J., “A Sketch of the Prehistoric Remains of Rombald’s Moor,” in Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society, volume 9, 1887.
Speight, Harry, Upper Wharfedale, Elliott Stock: London 1900.
Settlement (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 309 336
Archaeology & History
Absolutely nothing is left of the large series of ancient earthworks that were reported to have existed near the very centre of Leeds by Ralph Thoresby, James Wardell and others in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although we do not know with certainty the age and nature of the site, it would seem very likely to have had a prehistoric provenance. However, this wasn’t the opinion of either Thoresby (1715) or Thomas Whitaker (1816). They both thought the remains were of Roman origin – but we must remind ourselves of the inaccuracies made, particularly by Whitaker, when it came to estimating the dates of early monuments (e.g., Whitaker’s assertions of the huge Counter Hill earthworks above Addingham). Sometime later, James Wardell (1853) thought the remains on Quarry Hill were distinctly pre-Roman; though reasoned that the invading force may have used the site at a later date. Wardell wrote:
“Traces of a prior occupation were, until recently, observable on the summit of Quarry-hill, along the western edge of which ran an earthwork of considerable length and magnitude, and of semi-circular form.”
We know little else of the place, sadly, but the shape of the site around the hilltop edges would seem to support the likelihood of an Iron or Bronze Age origin. Further information would, of course, be more helpful…
References:
Thoresby, Ralph, Ducatus Leodiensis, Maurice Atkins: London 1715.
Wardell, James, The Antiquities of the Borough of Leeds, Moxon & Walker: Leeds 1853.
Whitaker, Thomas D., Loidis and Elmete, T. Davison: Leeds 1816.
From Thackley corner, take the Esholt road down Ainsbury Avenue. Walk past the Thackley football ground and another 50 yards on, to your left, there’s a field. Cross this and go through the gate into the trees. Another field is across the footpath, but turn right and walk on the muddy path, keeping parallel with the other field, until the walling bends round to the left. About 15 yards round where the wall bends left, watch out for the silver birch tree and the small cup-marked rock at its base, right up against the wall.
Archaeology & History
This is an archetypal single cup-marked stone known as a ‘portable’ — though in its original state, when the rock was obviously larger than it is today, I doubt anyone could have carried it further than a couple of yards! The stone has been split from a larger rock, and we’re unsure the size of its original form—but presume it to have been perhaps double its present size.
The broken rock stands (now) upright against the wall and nice birch tree (Betula pendula), but wasn’t like that when we first found it, and the cup was barely visible as it faced down into the Earth. As the images show, we have just a single cup-mark on its outer face. It looks typical of those carvings found in the larger Bronze Age cairns scattering the moors to the north, but we have no evidence nor folklore indicating the existence of such a monument hereby. The extensive amount of overgrown multiperiod walling all over this woodland may have used up such a cairn, but we will probably never find out, as the woods have been overused by industrialists, who are now, slowly, turning the woods here into a park.
From Thackley corner, take the Esholt road down Ainsbury Avenue. After a couple of hundred yards, note the metal gateways into the woods. Go through here, following the main path, until you reach another split in the paths where one of those awful touristy signs tells you where you are. Walk past this (not left or right) into the opening of large oaks and other trees on a flat plain. A path swings round the right side of this, and less than 100 yards along, watch out for some rocks on your right, heading towards the wall and small field. You’re damn close!
Archaeology & History
Close-up of cup-markings
This is one amongst a cluster of at least five cup-marked stones very close to each other in the woods here — and probably the best of the bunch. Also found in conjunction with what seems to be an Iron Age walled enclosure 20 yards away, there are at least eight cup-marks on top of this rock, They occur in two groups: one, on a sloping section of the boulder where three fading cups can be seen; and the other is on the topmost section of the stone, where five larger cups distinctly stand out, and occur in conjunction with what seems to be a long carved line running close to the edge of the rock before it drops sharply to the ground.
This and its associated carvings are found in close proximity to some sort of walled enclosure. It’s difficult ascertaining the age and nature of the enclosure walling, as masses of it are found throughout this section of woodland and it appears to be multiperiod in age and nature: from Iron Age to Victorian by the look of things. Neither this cup-marked stone, nor any of its close associates (the closest of which is the Buck Woods 3 carving, less than 10 yards away), were recorded in the Boughey & Vickerman survey of rock art in West Yorkshire.
Come out of Ilkley/bus train station and turn right for less than 50 yards, heading left up towards White Wells. Go up here for less than 100 yards, taking your first right and walk 300 yards up Queens Road until you reach the St. Margaret’s church on the left-hand side. On the other side of the road, surrounded by trees is a small enclosed bit with spiky railings with Panorama Stones 227, 228 and 229 all therein: the least-decorated one on the left being the one we’re dealing with here.
Archaeology & History
This is another of the caged Panorama Stones, found within the awful spiked fencing across from St. Margaret’s Church, just out of Ilkley centre. Originally located ¾-miles (1.2km) WSW of its present position in Panorama Woods (at SE 10272 46995), along with its petroglyphic compatriots in this cage, the carving was moved here in 1890 when a Dr. Little—medical officer at Ben Rhydding Hydro—bought the stones for £10 from the owner of the land at Panorama Rocks, as the area in which the stones lived was due to be vandalized and destroyed. Thankfully the said Dr Little was thoughtful and as a result of his payment he had some of the stones saved and moved into their present position.
Original location of stonesJ.T Dale’s 1879 sketch
It was first described by the northern antiquarian and petroglyph pioneer, J. Romilly Allen (1879) , who saw it in the now-destroyed “rough inclosure”, as he called it, along with the other stones now in the same Ilkley ‘cage’. Its present position does it no justice whatsoever in terms of its original position. It was ostensibly a rocking stone: this seemingly trivial-looking boulder was sat on top of the much-cropped Panorama Stone 228 (a yard east of the three in this outdoor cage). Allen (1879) was fortunate enough to have seen the stone before it was uprooted, telling us how this topmost stone, “has eleven cups, wo of which are surrounded by single rings.” The modern archaeologist John Hedges (1986) told it to be in a “bad state,” with “very worn carvings, fourteen cups, one with partial ring and groove.” Its situation deteriorated further, as stated by rock art students Boughey & Vickerman (2003), who noted,
“medium-sized, roughly triangular rock, its surface recorded as in a bad state in 1986 and now (2002) even worse. Fourteen cups, one with partial ring, one groove.”
And its condition isn’t helped by its inaccessibility, when groups like the ‘Friends of Ilkley Moor’ or the local archaeologist should be at least annually cleaning this and the adjacent carvings. If they’re incapable, there are sincere people in antiquarian, history and pagan groups who would probably help out…
John Hedges 1986 sketchFaint cupmarks visible
In truth, this carving cannot be seen in isolation, nor merely reduced to a numeric catalogue in some rock art corpus. We must contextualize its relationship with the once much-larger multiple cup-and-ring stone on which it sat and then see it as it was in the landscape. Originally of course the rocking stone was Nature’s very own creation. As humans began migrating over and eventually occupying this once-wooded arena, the rocking stone became intimately related with animistic magickal rites and, over time, petroglyphs began to be etched upon the stone. Most probably the flat underlying rock surface was carved upon first, and a symbiotic relationship was forged between Earth’s surface and the small rocking stone, both of which were used in oracular and other rites. Over centuries, as the cups and rings on the earthfast stone grew, the mythic status of this small rocking stone allowed for the encroachment of carvings, and eventually cup-marks began to be etched upon it too. Later still, as the neolithic period moved into the Bronze Age, the people began to build a low-walled stone enclosure around this and the nearby multiple-ringed carving – similar to the multi-period enclosure at Woofa Bank and other sites on these moors. It was all a very long and gradual process.
In truth, the mythic status of this once-impressive site would have been maintained—in one form or other—well into the medieval period. But that’s another matter altogether…
Bennett, Paul, The Panorama Stones, Ilkley, TNA: Yorkshire 2012.
Bennett, Paul, Aboriginal Rock Carvings of Ilkley and District, forthcoming.
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Leeds 2003.
Cowling, Eric T., Rombald’s Way, William Walker: Otley 1946.
Downer, A.C., “Yorkshire Archaeological and Topographical Association,” in Leeds Mercury, August 28, 1884.
Eliade, Mircea, The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion, Harcourt, Brace & World: New York 1959.
Hadingham, Evan, Ancient Carvings in Britain, Souvenir Press: London 1974.
Hedges, John, The Carved Rocks on Rombald’s Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Heywood, Nathan, “The Cup and Ring Stones of the Panorama Rocks”, in Transactions Lancashire & Cheshire Antiquarian Society, Manchester 1889.
Speight, Harry, Upper Wharfedale, Elliott Stock: London 1900.
Acknowledgements: With huge thanks to both Dr Stefan Maeder for help in cleaning up the stones; and to James Elkington for allowing use of his photos in this site profile.
From Ilkley centre, take the road up to Cow & Calf, going past the hotel and along Hangingstone Road for a half-mile until you meet some walling on the right of the road. Stop and walk up the small beck, veering to the left as you approach the brow of the hill. Keep walking up the beck onto the moor where you’ll eventually reach its source, as shown in the photo here!
Archaeology & History
This once fast-flowing spring of fresh sparkling water has seen better days. The site has two openings in the Earth about 10 yards east and west of each other, both discernible by the notable difference in vegetation on the moors here, where richer hues of green created by the waters cut a small channel down the moorland slopes through the usual hues of heather.
The waters taste fine when they’re in flow, but much of the land here has fallen into shallow marsh and with the inevitable falling of the water table thanks to the stupid arrogant Industrialists, very little of the goodness is available. But it wasn’t always like this. Certainly when our prehistoric ancestors carved the rock art close by the source of the waters, then later constructed the large ritual enclosure immediately west of the springs, the waters would have been very important—and in much greater profusion—for simple nourishment and for rituals enacted at the site.
Whether you’re coming here from either Baildon, or Shipley, head for the Cricketer’s Arms on Green Road (ask a local). About 50 yards uphill from the pub, on the other side of the road, notice the small pool on the green surrounded by large rocks. That’s y’ spot!
Archaeology & History
First illustrated on the 1851 6-inch to the mile Ordnance Survey map of the region, this little known medicinal spring of water appears to get its name from the northern dialect word, crutch, meaning a plough, a plough-handle, a spade and variants thereof. (Wright 1898) There is another possibility of it deriving from “an ash or hazel pole” that were given as payment to workers each day in bygone times—a curious custom in itself! But we actually don’t know for sure and could even assume that people came here on crutches to be cured, or something along those lines.
The place has clear running water and had a chapel built near it in the early 19th century. The old public house across the road (Cricketer’s Arms) has spring water from this well running underneath it, which was said to never run dry and also keeps the drinks forever cool in warm weather! A few yards above the source of the spring, on the grass to the north is a small cup-marked stone. Another cupmarked rock listed by archaeologists as a prehistoric carved stone nearby on the same grass verge is probably of more recent industrial origin.
References:
Baildon, W. Paley, Baildon and the Baildons – parts 1-15, Adelphi: London 1913-1926.
Wright, Joseph, English Dialect Dictionary – volume 1, Henry Frowde: Oxford 1898.
Whether you’re coming here from either Baildon, or Shipley, head for the Cricketer’s Arms pub on Green Road (ask a local). About 50 yards uphill from the pub, on the other side of the road, notice the small pool on the green surrounded by large rocks: it’s the small stone about 15 yards behind the source of the spring. The goats living there usually give the game away!
Archaeology & History
This small stone, found amidst a cluster of others surrounding the medicinal Crutch Well, has its name from the friendly goats who live hereby and, when I came here for the first time in a while the other day, had trouble getting one of the little fellas to shift from his stone! We first found this when we did a lotta venturing around the area when we lived nearby as kids. This particular stone was noted during one of our many exploratory rambles round here, albeit briefly, when I wrote:
“Before going up the slope to Robin Hood’s House we looked at the stones around Crutch Well and found one with some cup-marks on it, on the grass behind the waters.”
I can’t say for sure, but think this carving was later added in the Boughey & Vickerman (2003) survey as stone no.193. They described the stone as:
“Creamish coloured rock about 1m N-S and less than 0.5m high carries two possible shallow cups to centre of surface and a possible third cup (doubtful) to N.”
Close-up of the cups
This would seem to be the stone, though there is another faded fourth cup, between the ‘doubtful’ cup and the two distinct ones, with a faded carved line running from it. Their grid-reference isn’t accurate for this and a companion single cup-marked rock (which I’d say was dodgy!), so I’m not 100% sure that we’re dealing with the same carving. There are a lot of small rocks here and in the fields opposite, many with industrial marks on them which, over the years, have faded and give the appearance of cup-markings — which most are not!
References:
Bennett, Paul, Of Cups and Rings and Things, unpublished: Shipley 1981.
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Wakefield 2003.
First highlighted on the 1850 Ordnance Survey map of western Addingham in the same year William Howson described it, this large oval embankment sits on the eastern side of Counter Hill, amidst its gigantic earthworks, with attending tumuli, cup-and-rings, buried standing stones and other enclosures, like one huge prehistoric family of ancient sites! The earthworks here are in slightly better condition than the nearby ones at Marchup, as we can still make out the ditch marking the site.
There have been many literary visitors to the Round Dikes and its cluster of sites. One of the early ones was by the renowned historians and antiquarians, Forrest & Grainge (1868) who, in the second part of their ‘rambles’ exploring the prehistoric sites on and around Rombald’s Moor in the 1860s, told us:
“The Camp—known locally as Round Dykes—is of an irregular oval shape, the longest axis measuring over all 300 feet, and the shorter 250 feet. The trench outside the vallum is about 15 feet wide, and 4 or 5 feet in depth. The area is level, showing no indications of buildings or works of any kind. A feeble spring of water rises at one corner. The trench is regular and even, and does not appear to have ever been used as a series of pit dwellings. This work commands a large and splendid view of Wharfedale…”
Although suggested by Thomas Whitaker (1878) in his magnum opus on the history of Craven, to have been constructed by the Romans—who laid a road nearby on top of another earlier trackway—the site is obviously prehistoric. But when the late great Harry Speight (1900) ventured over for a gander at the end of the 1890s, he too thought it might be Roman. Finding the place to be “thickly overgrown with ling,” it was still in very good condition he said, telling “how its outline is almost as perfect as when made seventeen or eighteen centuries ago.” He continued:
“The form bespeaks a rather late date, having the characteristic angles, which makes the ordinary streight-sided rectangle into an octogan, giving it the appearance superficially of a round or oval. Its dimensions are based on the most approved form of castramentation, the length being one-third greater than the breadth, namely sixty yards wide and eighty yards long. A watch-mound has been thrown up within the southwest angle, and the whole camp defended with a double rampart having an intervening ditch. There is an old and excellent spring of water on the east sie of the camp; the site having been well chosen, commanding as it does, a splendid view of the valley and Street as it runs towards Olicana.”
By the time Eric Cowling (1946) came and looked at these earthworks, the opinion had truly swayed to seeing Round Dikes as a prehistoric site and not Roman. Cowling placed it firmly in the Iron Age! His profile of the site told:
“On the Western slope of Counter Hill and with a wide view of Wharfedale to the east is a second enclosure with five sides. Three of these form the three sides of a square and the remaining two bend outwards to enclose a spring on the lower eastern side. This enclosure is one hundred feet across from east to west and in the opposite direction the greatest measurement is seventy-three feet. The ditch is fifteen feet wide and varies in depth from three to five feet and there appears to have been an entrance in the eastern angle. There is an unfinished look about the earthwork; the inner and outer banks vary in height and are not continuous. The position is badly sited for defence, being overlooked from the higher ground to the west. The site would be very suitable for excavation, for it has been untouched by cultivation and is undisturbed.”
E.T. Cowling’s plan
And as far as I’m aware, no such excavation has yet been done here; and as we all know the local archaeologist is pretty poor when it comes doing such things round here, so god only knows when the real explorers and scientists will ever get their teeth into the place! However, the writers and archaeology consultants John and Phillip Dixon told that “a limited survey of parts of Round Dykes defined nine hut circles or parts of circles and possible hearth sites” in the 1980s. And although they ascribe the large earthwork as being Iron Age, the tumulus which sits near the southern edge of the enclosure is ascribed as Bronze Age.
It’s likely that the internal tumulus (a separate profile of it is forthcoming) was of communal and religious importance at Round Dykes. There was probably ritual function here within the enclosure, though only at certain times, when and where the ancestral spirits in the tomb awoke or were required to help the living. The spring of water on the eastern side of the enclosure, above the tumulus, was obviously not just the main drinking supply for the people who stayed here, but would also have had ritual importance (water, forget not, is tantamount to blood in ancestral cosmologies, and not a ‘commodity’ as the half-witted retards in modern culture have profaned it in their shallow beliefs). In the Lands of the Dead, water is vital for gods, spirits and the sustenance of the underworlds. (Eliade 1979) You might not think that; judæochristians might not think that — but the worlds of experience are much wider and deeper than the failing beliefs of atheists and monotheists…
…to be continued…
References:
Bennett, Paul, The Old Stones of Elmet, Capall Bann: Milverton 2001.
Bennett, Paul, The Prehistoric Sites of Counter Hill, Addingham, forthcoming 2013.
Cowling, Eric T., Rombald’s Way, William Walker: Otley 1946.
Forrest, C. & Grainge, William, A Ramble on Rumbald’s Moor, among the Dwellings, Cairns and Circles of the Ancient Britons in the Spring of 1868: Part 2 – Counterhill and Castleberg, W.T. Lamb: Wakefield 1868.
Dixon, John & Phillip, Journeys through Brigantia – volume 1: Walks in Craven, Airedale and Wharfedale, Aussteiger Publications: Barnoldswick 1990.
Eliade, Mircea, A History of Religious Ideas – volume 1, Collins: London 1979.
Howson, William, An Illustrated Guide to the Curiosities of Craven, Whittaker: Settle 1850.
Speight, Harry, Upper Wharfedale, Elliott Stock: London 1900.
Whitaker, Thomas Dunham, The History and Antiquities of the Deanery of Craven in the County of York, (3rd edition) Joseph Dodgson: Leeds 1878.
Follow the same directions to reach the Little Skirtful of Stones giant cairn. From here, walk 200 yards straight north until you hit the footpath at the top of the Woofa Bank crags. Walk left along the footpath and where it begins to slope downhill, note the large boulder right by the path and another 30 yards further on. Between these large rocks, turn left into the heather some 20 yards. You’re damn close!
Archaeology & History
Close-up of covered tomb
Rediscovered on March 17, 2012, this small untouched prehistoric stone cairn, measuring 3½ yards by 2½ yards across and about 1 yard tall, was found thanks to the moorland heather being burnt, which has stripped the covering vegetation from the monument. It rests just a couple of yards away from a small, almost dried-up stream, seemingly in isolation. There are scattered remains of medieval workings nearby, between here and the Little Skirtful—some of which have intruded upon and destroyed earlier sites—but this particular cairn has a prehistoric pedigree. An excavation here would be worthwhile sometime in the future; but the problem is, there’s so much neolithic and Bronze Age material all over this area, it’s hard to know where to start!
