enkidu41
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Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wall?
Mar 09, 2005, 10:05
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Does anyone have any evidence that this is a genuine stone row? To my mind the image displayed here shows nothing more than a collapsed modern wall of some sort. There are too many stones too close together. And the (spurious) claim as to its lunar alignment seems ridiculous.
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StoneLifter
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 11:01
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Nobody builds wall in that way; not now, not ever. There are maps of this land from 1600 onwards - the modern period - none show anything other than the wall, which is now broken, that is behind it. The ancient boundary called the Dene Ditch runs beside this now mainly broken wall. If the wall, which divides Bolton from Darwen, was built in the 1700's, say, then the ditch is supposed to be ancient. Possibly Iron Age, possibly even Neolithic. This is the view expressed in the book The History of Bolton (the relevant chapter written by my school history teacher, incidentally).
A claim for a lunar alignment can only be refuted after it has first been tested. You have not done this and I would suggest you are an armchair stonespotter. Please get up onto Bolton Moors and take a look at this small stone row for yourself. Take some pictures even - they will certainly be better than mine. Then I'll be interested in your opinion (rather than before).
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follow that cow
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 14:45
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I was at a similair place yesterday Dumgoyach or Duntreath just north of Glasgow.
http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/site/1502
The stones have a NESW allingment also. Fantastic location. I will post some pics later but here is one from Ancient Scotland web site.
http://www.ancient-scotland.co.uk/pics/blane2.jpg
There is some suggestion thst this was originally part of a long cairn.
Radiocarbon dating of charcoal found during an excavation in 1972 suggested a date around 3500BC.
A wee bit old for a modern wall!!!!
Rock on
FTC
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follow that cow
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 14:56
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I was at a similair site yesterday Dumgoyach or Duntreath just north of Glasgow.
http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/site/1502
This is a terrific location also running SWNE.
I will post some pics later but here is one from Ancient Scotland web page.
http://www.ancient-scotland.co.uk/pics/blane5.jpg
There is some suggestion that these stone may be the remains of a long cairn.
Radiocarbon dating of charcoal found during excavation in 1972 suggested a date around 3500BC.
A wee bit old to be a modern wall!!!
Rock on.
FTC
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StoneLifter
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 15:45
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Thanks - it could be the remains of a little long cairn, this is true. It would fit into the shape of the land and there are other similarly-sized (as it would have been) mounds in the vicinity. The major alignment may actually have been in the other direction - the horizon height is the same either way - when it would have faced the most-northerly moonrise, and quite close to the summer solstice sunrise point. (This long cairn explanation seems the more persuasive of the two). There is on-site Rock Art but it is from the Crusader period (1250). I could post a picture of the better stone - it clearly had megalithic origins.
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Mr Hamhead
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 15:52
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Last summer I spent a few days walking around the stone rows on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall. There was no obvious link between any of them when it came to alignments and I have to say they are made up of rows of single stones. I am in no place to pooh pooh your "stone Row" but it looks far removed from the Cornish ones (which of course it is)
Mr H
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StoneLifter
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 16:17
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The way my rows are situated in the landscape seems most alike those on Exmoor. There are double rows, certainly, there but they seem to wander rather than to align. The proof of the pudding is in the eating and we are at the end of a long Metonic Cycle. The moon has returned to the extremes of northern and southern rising and setting and this is just the right time to test these alignment hypotheses to see if they stand up. Just the first few attempts have revealed useful insights about the monuments and the feeling of reopening long closed branches of human endeavour is rewarding by itself (much artistic inspiration eg).
I have summer observatories and winter observatories and the Bolton ones comprise the winter set. I hoped someone would carry on the observations at Bolton over the summer and a person has appeared that may cherrypick the more convenient ones - he lives in London but his parental home is in Smithills. We'll have to see. He's looking for songwriting inspiration possibly ...
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Lubin
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 18:55
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I have seenmost if not all the stone rows on Dartmoor and many in Cornwall and none look like this.I would like to see a photograph without the snow just to see how close together the stones are.I remain open minded as I would like to think there are undiscovered sites still waiting to be found.I have discovered what appears to be an unrecorded kist on Dartmoor,but without excavation who can realy say.
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StoneLifter
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern wa
Mar 09, 2005, 20:09
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The stones that are in their original sockets are all paired. The gap between them is too small to have allowed a person to pass. I don't agree about excavation providing final proof, for me that rests in the alignment of the stones. It is to be expected that Boltonians create objects that are unusual and weird. I don't agree about only a few monuments being lost - I think their are a lot of undiscovered stone monuments, particularly in the Pennine uplands.
They are undiscovered because nobody has ever taken the trouble to look for them. (This is what irks me about having sites deleted - when they're rubbed off the database then nobody can even hope to find them). Burnt Edge eg and Thurstones eg. They are also unlike other sites that I know but that must be a better reason for keeping them listed.
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TMA Ed
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Re: Prehistoric stone row - or collapsed modern...
Mar 09, 2005, 21:44
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The Counting Hill Stone Row has been removed.
Stonelifter, please refer to our previous correspondences regarding sites that are not widely recognised.
TMA Ed
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