Legendary Rock (lost): OS Grid Reference –NJ 010 030
Also Known as:
- Cairn Gorm
- Canmore ID 15670
Archaeology & History
The exact location of this site seems privy to a select few and has remained that way since its existence appeared in print in the 19th century. It was first mentioned by Arthur Mitchell (1874) following a holiday that he’d had in the area in the early 1870s. He’d visited a petroglyph at Laggan with a Mr David Ross and when he returned home received a letter from him that told how,
“he had heard from Mr M’Bain of Auchterblair of two huge granite boulders, situated on a shelving rock over an abyss on the Loch Avon side of Cairngorm, with hand-made cups on them about a foot wide and correspondingly deep.”
They were subsequently visited by Thomas Wise (1884) a few years later, who told how these huge granite boulders were,
“20 feet in height,” upon which “there are four basins, 1 foot, or 1 foot and a-half long, and 6 inches wide at the top, rounding off to 1 inch in the bottom.”
Initially Mr Mitchell (1874) was cautious in associating these carved basins with cup-marked stones—and indeed, we concur with this—but seemed to have changed his opinion when he wrote about them a few years later (Mitchell 1881). But it’s the folklore attached to this site that intrigued him – and myself…
Folklore
The traditions attached to this site will be recognised by all students of animism and folklore. Arthur Mitchell (1874) was informed how the carved bowls in the stone helped infertile women and how “sitting on (them) is said to be efficacious in cases of barrenness.” Their importance was highlighted in the fact that there had been “pilgrimages to them undertaken within the memory of people still living.”
This was affirmed by Thomas Wise (1884) who told that,
“They are supposed to be efficacious in barrenness, and people still living remember pilgrims coming to sit upon them for some time, that they might obtain what they wished. A visit to them was by no means an easy task, as the ascent was difficult, and to sit on them required a steady head, as they are on the brink of a rock overhanging a precipice. These basins are the “woman’s stone” mentioned by Tennant. They are supposed to be the resting place or throne of a certain fairy queen; but however efficacious they may have been, they have lost much of their celebrity; and as the shepherd, who acted as guide to the pilgrims, is dead, and has left no successor, they are now rarely visited.”
Does anyone know the whereabouts of this heathen magickal site? If you happen to find it, see if you can get a good photo or two and let us know on our Facebook group.
References:
- Mitchell, Arthur, “Vacation Notes in Cromar, Burghead and Strathspey,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries Scotland, volume 10, 1874.
- Mitchell, Arthur, The Past in the Present, Harper: New York 1881.
- Wise, Thomas, A., History of Paganism in Caledonia, Trubner: London 1884.
© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian