Tag: druidism

Rocking Stone, Golcar, West Yorkshire

megalithix

Legendary Rock (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 076 163

Also Known as:

  1. Holed Stone
  2. Holy Stone
  3. Whole Stone

Archaeology & History

Golcar rocking stone in 1799

Like many old rocking stones, this was destroyed due to quarrying operations many years ago and sadly, I believe, we have no illustrations of the place to show the site.  This legendary site—also known as the ‘Holed’ or ‘Holy Stone’—is preserved in the place-name of Rocking Stone Hill and, unlike many other alleged rocking stones, actually swayed to and fro if the old records are owt to go by.  Not far away (and also destroyed some 200 years back) were two stone circles which probably had some mythic relationship to this legendary rock.

The stone was first described by John Watson in his monumental History of Halifax (1775), where he told that is was,

“so situated as to be a boundary mark, dividing the two townships of Golcar and Slaightwait in the Parish of Huddersfield, adjoining to the Parish of Halifax on Wholestone Moor.  The stone as measured by the late Thomas Perceval, or Royton…is 10½ feet long, 9ft 4in or 5in broad, and 5ft 3in thick.  Its weight…is 18 tons, 190lbs.  It rests on so small a centre, that at one particular point, a man may cause it to rock; though some years ago it was damaged a little, in this respect, by some masons, who endeavoured, but in vain, to throw it off its centre, in order to discover the principle on which so large a weight was made to move.”

Mr John Crabtree (1836) included it in his survey, and it was illustrated on the very first Ordnance Survey map in the 1840s where it was described as ‘Supposed Druidical’.  But the old stone sadly didn’t last much longer.  Once the self-righteous Industrialists got here, round about the year 1886, the Rocking Stone was destroyed by quarrying operations.  All that remains of the place today is a small cluster of place-names..

Folklore

Thought by Watson (1775) and his contemporaries to have had druidic associations (without evidence), when Philip Ahier (1942) came exploring this area in 1936, he came upon “an old resident (who) informed me that he had sat upon the stone when a youth and had caused it to rock.”

References:

  1. Ahier, Philip, The Legends and Traditions of Huddersfield and District, Advertiser Press: Huddersfield 1942.
  2. Bennett, Paul, The Old Stones of Elmet, Capall Bann: Milverton 2001.
  3. Crabtree, John, Concise History of the Parish & Vicarage of Halifax, Hartley & Walker: Halifax 1836.
  4. Watson, John, The History and Antiquities of the Parish of Halifax, T. Lowndes: London 1775.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Dun Bhuirg, Iona, Argyll

megalithix

Hillfort:  OS Grid Reference – NM 2649 2462

Also known as:

  1. Canmore ID 21638
  2. Dun Cul Bhuirg

Getting Here

Take the road that cuts across the island, west, until you reach the stupid golf-course.  Walk across it, heading for the coast (not the building at Culbuirg), then follow the little footpath up until you reach the large rocky rise about 500 hundred yards north.  That’s it!

Folklore

Dun Bhuirg on 1881 map

Shown on the 1881 OS map of the region, the small remains of this Iron Age hillfort was said to be the place where St. Columba saw a rain-cloud which he predicted would bring a plague of ulcers to the people of Ireland. To prevent such a plague, Columba thence dispatched a monk called Silnan to Ireland, armed with some bread which he’d blessed. This bread was then dipped in consecrated water and given to those afflicted with the plague, who were thereafter cured.

Wee-ird……

Another tradition told that this old fort was once an important meeting place for the druids, though Geoff Holder (2007) writes that this is little more than a “spurious nineteenth century tradition” which he dismisses as without foundation. Though a short distance from here, he also told how one “Fiona MacLeod” (real name, William Sharp) one night watched the ghost of the Culdee, Oran, a couple of hundred yards away, “and so he never went that way again at night.”  In truth, traditions of druidism tend to be animistic traits: legends remembered from pre-christian days, and blanket dismissals of such folklore are themselves untrustworthy—especially on this Isle of the Druids.

References:

  1. Holder, Geoff,The Guide to Mysterious Iona and Staffa, Tempus: Stroud 2007.
  2. MacLeod, Fiona, Iona, Floris: Edinburgh 1982.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Druid’s Oak, Caton, Lancashire

megalithix

Legendary Tree:  OS Grid Reference — SD 5297 6467

Also Known as:

  1. Caton Oak
  2. Fish Stones Oak

Getting Here

The Druid's or Caton Oak
The Druid’s or Caton Oak

Dead easy! Near the western end of Caton village, right on the edge of the main road (A683) running through the village (south-side of the road), enclosed by railings, you’ll see the remains of this ancient tree, just by the side of the stream.  Keep your eyes peeled!

Archaeology & History

The small scruffy-looking remnant of an oak standing here by the roadside in Caton village, surrounded by protective railings, is the dying remnants of the old tree, standing upon the sandstone steps which were known as the Fish Stones: a curious monument that has been listed as a protected monument by the Dept of National Heritage.  A small plaque on the side tells:

“The three semi-circular sandstone steps, shaded by the oak tree, were used in medieval times by the monks of Cockersand Abbey to display and sell fish caught from the River Lune.  The ancient oak tree, reputed to date back to the time of the druids, and the Fish Stones, have become a landmark and Symbol of Caton.”

Druid's Oak, Caton
Druid’s Oak, Caton

This was probably the local moot spot for villagers and those living in outlying farms and hills in medieval times.  No doubt a market of some sort was also once here; perhaps even an old cross, as the Fish Stones have all the appearance of some village cross steps.  I’ve found little else about this old tree, nor any folklore (but aint looked too hard if truth be had!).  There’s surely more to be said about this once sacred tree.

More sites related in folklore to druids can be found not too far away at the collapsed cairn near Bordley; the Druid’s Altar and nearby Druid’s Well on the outskirts of Bingley; the Druid’s Stone of Bungay in Suffolk and many more…

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Simon’s Seat, Skyreholme, North Yorkshire

megalithix

Sacred Hill:  OS Grid Reference – SE 0788 5981

Getting Here

Simon’s Seat in the centre & the Lord’s Seat immediately east

Tons of ways here.   To those who drive, take the Grassington-Pateley Bridge (B6265) road and a couple of miles past the village of Hebden, you’ll see the high rocks climbing on your southern horizon, with another group of rocks a few hundred yards along the same ridge.  That’s it!

Archaeology & History

This is an awesome site, full of raw power. It commands a brilliant view all round, but it is the north which truly draws the eye’s attention. Beneath the great drop of this huge outcrop is the haunted and legendary Troller’s Ghyll. The scent of as yet undisclosed neolithic and Bronze Age sites purrs from the moors all round you and there can be little doubt that this was a place of important magick in ancient days.

What seems to be several cup-markings on one of the topmost rocks are, to me, authentic. Harry Speight mentioned them in his 1892 work on the Craven and Northwest Yorkshire Highlands – but there are a number of other rocks in this giant outcrop with “possibles” on them.

Folklore

The name of this great rock outcrop has long been a puzzle to historians and place-name experts.  One tale that was told of Simon’s Seat to the travelling pen of one Frederic Montagu in 1838, told that,

“It was upon the top of this mountain that an infant was found by a shepherd, who took it to his home, and after feeding and clothing it, he had the child named Simon; being himself but a poor man, he was unable to maintain the foundling, when it was ultimately agreed to by the shepherds, that the child should be kept “amang ’em.”  The child was called Simon Amangham and the descendants of this child are now living in Wharfedale.”

The usually sober pen of Mr Speight thinks this to have been one the high places of druidic worship, named after the legendary Simon Druid. “It is however, hardly likely,” he wrote, “that he ever sat there himself, but was probably represented by some druidical soothsayer on whom his mystic gifts descended.”

I’ve gotta say, I think there’s something distinctly true about those lines. Visit this place a few times, alone, during the week, or at night – when there’s no tourists about – and tell me it isn’t…

References:

  1. Bogg, Edmund, Higher Wharfeland, James Miles: Leeds 1904.
  2. Montagu, Frederic, Gleanings in Craven, Simpkin Marshall: London 1838.
  3. Speight, Harry, The Craven and Northwest Yorkshire Highlands, Elliott Stock: London 1892.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Rocking Stone, Rishworth Moor, West Yorkshire

megalithix

Legendary Rock:  OS Grid Reference – SD 990 150

Archaeology & History

Rishworth Moor Rocking Stone, 1775
Rishworth Moor Rocking Stone, 1775

The reverend John Watson (1775) first wrote about this place, describing it as, “a group of stones, laid, seemingly, one above another, to the height of several yards, and called the Rocking stone.”  Very little archaeological remains have been described hereabouts, save the odd flint scatters here and there.  Anything which might have been here in the past was likely destroyed when the M62 was built right next to the site.

Folklore

The rocking stone was long ascribed in local tradition to be a  site used by the druids.  It was said that in bygone days the great boulder would rock, but this must have been a long time ago as even when Mr Watson described it, he told how “that quality is lost.”

Close by is the sometimes dried-up spring known as the Booth Dean Spa, which Watson thought might have been related to whatever ancient rituals occurred here.

References:

  1. Watson, John, The History and Antiquities of the Parish of Halifax, T.Lowndes: London 1775.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Gull Stones, Great Yarmouth, Norfolk

megalithix

Stone Circle (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TG 524 035

Archaeology & History

Several local history records describe there being a circle of ten standing stones in a field called ‘Stone-field’ or ‘Stone-piece’ – now covered by a housing estate at Gorleston-on-Sea, south of Yarmouth.  In 1875, C. J. Palmer said that,

“there is a tradition that the Druids had a temple at Gorleston, some remains of which existed down to a comparatively recent period. It is supposed to have stood on a field next to the road to Lowestoft, upon what is called Great Stone Close; and it has been asserted that some huge stones remained standing until 1768, when they were destroyed by digging round their base and dragging them down by ropes. There are also two fields called Further Stone Close and Middle Stone Close, so that it is possible the Druidical circle, if it ever existed, may have had a wide extent”.

A painting of the site was reported to have been viewed by members of the Norfolk & Norwich Archaeological Society in 1888, but I’ve been unable to find out where this has gone.  Anyone out there got a copy?  Or know where it hangs?  An image of this lost stone circle would be hugely welcome!

References:

  1. Burgess, Michael W., The Standing Stones of Norfolk and Suffolk, ESNA 1: Lowestoft 1978.
  2. Palmer, C.J., The Perlustration of Great Yarmouth – volume 3, George Nall: Gt Yarmouth 1875.

Links:

  1. Hidden East Anglia: Ancient Sites & Legends

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Druid’s Stone, Bungay, Suffolk

megalithix

Legendary Rock:  OS Grid Reference – TM 337 898

Folklore

Described in 1926 by local antiquarian and early ley-hunter, W.A.  (1926), as “a fallen monolith” — this old stone is probably just a glacial erratic.  Found in the churchyard of St. Mary’s, tradition tells that in ages past young girls danced twelve times around this old stone, then placed their ears upon it to hear the answers to their questions and wishes. A similar legend tells how children danced around the stone seven times on a certain day of the year to conjure up the devil.  Mr Dutt thought the great rock may have been “a ley or direction stone.”

References:

  1. Dutt, W.A., The Ancient Mark-Stones of East Anglia, Flood & Sons: Lowestoft 1926.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian



Druid’s Altar, Bingley, West Yorkshire

megalithix

Legendary Rocks: OS Grid Reference – SE 0924 3994

Getting There

Druid’s Altar, sitting with mist

Pretty easy to get to. Best thing to do really, is ask a local and they’ll send you in the right direction. From Bingley, take the Harden road (B6429) across the river. As it bends sharply left, note there’s a track going up into the woods to the right. Walk up it! Keep going and, unless you take a detour, you’ll end up at the rock outcrop eventually (where the woods come to an end, Druid’s Altar appears before you with the track running along its top-side).

Archaeology & History

Mentioned in the Tithe Awards of 1849, this lovely outcrop of rocks looking down the Aire Valley on the southern edge of Bingley has “an immemorial tradition” of druidic worship, said Harry Speight in 1898 – though quite when it first acquired such repute is outside of any literary record.  In Sidney Greenbank’s (1929) rare book on this place, he could find little by way of archaeological data to affirm the old tradition, save the odd prehistoric find of flints here and there; though it is said that Beltane fires were burned upon the crags here in bygone centuries.

1894 photo of Druid's Altar (courtesy Clive Hardy)
1894 photo of Druid’s Altar (courtesy Clive Hardy)

There was a 19th century account from the Ilkley Scientific Club where a member described there being a cup-and-ring carving “near the so-called Druid’s Altar, at Bingley,” but I’m unaware of the whereabouts of this carving and Boughey & Vickerman’s (2003) said nothing about it in their survey; though a possible cup-marking can be seen on one rock less than 100 yards west, which might account for the report. (a bit dodgy though!)

Folklore

Harry Speight (1898) makes what sounds like a rare flight of fancy when he described faerie being seen atop of the many oaks beneath the Druid’s Altar.  In Clive Hardy’s (2002) work (from whence the old photo of the Altar is taken), he tells how “local antiquarians say that the cobbled way running from the Brown Cow Inn towards the site, is an old processional route walked by the druids.”

One, possibly two wells, each beneath the Altar rocks, are also reputed to have been associated with the old pagan priests, as their names tell: the Altar Well and the Druid’s Well – though the Altar Well has seemingly fallen back to Earth in recent years.

References:

  1. Greenbank, Sidney, The Druid’s Altar, Bingley, R.G. Preston: Bingley 1929.
  2. Hardy, Clive, Around Bradford, Frith Book Ltd: Salisbury 2002.
  3. Moores, Les, Ancient Monuments and Stone Circles, Francis Frith Collection: Salisbury 2005.
  4. Speight, Harry, Chronicles and Stories of Bingley and District, Elliott Stock: London 1898.
  5. Turner, J. Horsfall, Ancient Bingley, Thomas Harrison: Bingley 1897.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Holy Well of Isle Maree, Loch Maree, Ross & Cromarty

megalithix

Holy Well:  OS Grid Reference – NG 9310 7236

Also known as:

  1. Canmore ID 12049
  2. Mourie
  3. St. Maelrubha’s Well

Getting Here

Loch Maree, looking south. Painting © Bryan Islip
Loch Maree, looking south. Painting © Bryan Islip.

We were up here again in July 2009, but I’ve still not been across onto the island itself — just stared from the lochside, dying to swim across and spend a night or three alone on the island amidst this legendary landscape.  Basically, get to Talladale on the A832 (halfway between Gairloch and Kinlochewe), then walk up to the loch-side to your right (east) for a mile till you reach the small wooded outcrop.  Look north, betwixt the two isles and its the one in the middle with the Crag of the Bull and Maire’s Cairn rising up the mountain face behind.  But you can reach it via a boat trip from one of the local harbours.  Staying there overnight however, would seem more troublesome.  It seems that a winter visit seems best!

Folklore

This ‘holy well’ has a prodigious occult history which, sez my nose, is still maintained by one or two old Highland folk up here.  This small island (one of many in this long loch) was the Isle of the Druids in old days: legend telling it to be the teaching ground of these shady priests. Even the Iona druids came here. The main relics on on the island are the old holy well, accompanied by an old legendary tree into which all local people flocked and wedged coins at least once in their life. This devotional rite eventually took its toll, with so many of the coins covering the old tree with metallic scales to a height of nine feet, eventually killing it.

The well itself was said to cure insanity — no doubt the remedial quality given to the waters after neophyte druids had spent many days of ritual solitude here, eventually sipping its life-giving fluid to revive them from their ordeal.

It eventually became sanctified by the Church: legend saying it was St. Maelrubha (the same dood who turned the healthy Applecross heathens into church-goers) who was the guilty party.  Indeed, the name Maree itself, was proclaimed as deriving from this old saint, though local lore tells it to derive from the pagan ‘ane god Mourie.’

Elizabeth Sutherland (1985) reported that remains of the sacred tree were still visible. It is also said that no-one makes ritual commemmoration here anymore. Hmmmm… don’t always believe what you read.

In the 18th century, when Thomas Pennant visited this sacred well, he described that,

“in the midst is a circular dike of stones… I expect the dike to have originally been druidical, and that the ancient superstition of paganism had been taken up by the saint (Maelrubha) as the readiest method of making a conquest over the minds of the inhabitants.”

References:

  1. Dixon, John, Gairloch in North-west Ross-Shire, Co-op: Edinburgh 1886.
  2. MacKenzie, Kenneth C., Loch Maree: The Jewel in the Crown, privately printed 2002.
  3. MacKinlay, James M., Folklore of Scottish Lochs and Springs, William Hodge: Glasgow 1893.
  4. Morris, Ruth & Frank, Scottish Healing Wells, Alethea: Sandy 1982.
  5. Pennant, Thomas, A Tour in Scotland and Voyage to the Hebrides, MDCCLXXII, John Monk: Chester 1774.
  6. Polson, Alexander, Gairloch, George Souter: Dingwall 1920.
  7. Sutherland, Elizabeth, Ravens and Black Rain, Constable: London 1985.
  8. Watson, W.J., Place-Names of Ross and Cromarty, Northern Counties Printing: Inverness 1904.

* This beautiful painting is one of many done by local artist, Bryan Islip.  It is taken from his 2010 Calendar, Scotland’s Wester Ross, and is available direct from him. If you’d like to know more, or want copies of his calendar or other artworks, email him at:  pico555@btopenworld.com – or check his website at www.picturesandpoems.co.uk

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Painting © Bryan Islip


Druid’s Well, Bingley, West Yorkshire

megalithix

Sacred Well:  OS Grid Reference – SE 09394 39894

Getting Here

If you’re a bittova unhealthy dood, give this site a miss, as it takes a bitta getting to!  Otherwise, get to the rocks at the very bottom of the Druid’s Altar and walk to the right (east) until you hit the walling a few hundred yards along.  Near the bottom of the slope, where the land levels out, there are several lovely moss-strewn boulders in their music of graceful hues.  One of them, you’ll see, has water emerging from it base.  You’re here!

Archaeology & History

The Druid's Well, Bingley
The Druid’s Well

I first visited this old site with the holy wells writer Edna Whelan sometime in the early 1980s, when we went in search of the sacred spring of water known as the ‘Altar Well,’ shown on early maps to be just a short distance beneath the small cliffs called the Druid’s Altar.  We didn’t find it!  Another visit with Graeme Chappell and Edna (again) sometime later also proved fruitless – but something else was found which we didn’t know about on our first sojourn: the Druid’s Well, or more accurately the Druid’s Spring. (no stone trough y’ see)  Not far from the spot that the Altar Well could once be seen, this beautiful spring of sweet water emerges beneath the rich lichen-encrusted boulder, painted with dappled mosses and an overhang of vivid ferns.  Tis a fine oracular site, if ever there was one!

The waters run slowly from beneath the great old rock, upon which grows a fine specimen of a birch tree – a truly old thing!  And if there was ever any truth about this regions association with the druids, one of their most important sacraments grows profusely here when the season is right: no, not mistletoe (though it can be found sparingly upon the old oaks), but a wealth of the sacred Amanita muscaria, to whose spirit visionary journeys were bestowed.

Close-up of the waters beneath the boulder

The name of the woodlands in which our Druid’s Spring emerges — the Hollin Wood — might also have had some associative relationship with this well, or the Altar above (modern maps call it the Hollin Plantation, as much of the old woods have been felled and copsed by modern man).  Place-name texts ascribe this to be the ‘woodland of holly trees’, but during our wander through the woods a few weeks ago (when we got the photos of the Druid’s Well) holly trees were not common.  It may be that the Hollin Wood originally derived from ‘holy wood’, as this old well and the Druid’s Altar above would have surely made the site sacred to the druids.  Just a thought.  We will probably never know (if someone finds out for sure, one way or t’other, lemme know and I’ll amend where necessary!).

References:

  1. Greenbank, Sydney, The Druid’s Altar, Bingley, R.G. Preston: Bingley 1929.
  2. Speight, Harry, Chronicles and Stories of Old Bingley, Elliott Stock: London 1898.
  3. Whelan, Edna & Taylor, Ian, Yorkshire’s Holy Wells and Sacred Springs, Northern Lights: Dunnington 1989.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian