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carol27 wrote: I'd been musing on the Rudston monument for a while ( as you do!)
Hi Carol. Musing on the monument is what we’ve been doing since visiting it on Tuesday! :-) Rhiannon - thanks for posting the 1831 illustration of the Rudson Monolith by N Whitlock on the TMA homepage.
Thomas Allen, author of the book in which the illustration appears, says that it (the monolith) is, “...twenty-nine feet four inches in height...” and that, “Some years ago, the weather having made considerable inroads on the upper parts of the stone, it was covered in lead.” The present height of the monolith is some 25 foot so, assuming that Allen’s twenty nine foot four inches is reasonably accurate, we’re looking for a stone that once tipped the monolith and had (has) a height of some four foot four inches. I’ve suggested here that the outlier stone in the graveyard might be a contender but I might be talking complete bollocks. But take a look at the left-hand shape/angle of the outlier photo in the above link and compare it to the shape/angle in Whitlock’s illustration.
Moss and I were completely gobsmacked by the size of the monolith itself (and it was freezing cold there on Tuesday) that taking measurements (even if it were somehow possible) of the top of the monolith was furthest from our mind. We’ll go out there again when it warms up a bit and I’ll see if anything might ‘add up’ measurement-wise. Meanwhile, if anyone else is heading out there anytime soon I’d be interested in what they might think of the outlier.
PS There’s also a footnote on page 90 of Thomas Allen’s book that states, “An old woman in the village informed the author that she could remember the remains of a similar block of stone [to the monolith], which was situated some yards to the east of the present obelisk.”
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