This category was originally 'The Peak District'. Some sites may now be listed under the wrong county - please leave a note in the forum if you spot one.
Old news (2010) but as there can't be many sundials or sculptures that namecheck stone circles, worth noting.
A NEW sundial sculpture showing the distance to 42 stone circles and earthworks in Derbyshire has been unveiled at Chatsworth in time for this year's summer solstice... continues...
Archaeologists have made the stunning discovery of a 5,500-year-old Stone Age village, home to Derbyshire's first farmers and potters. Ben Johnson and his team made the ancient find during a painstaking dig in Peak District fields, near Wirksworth.
From the recently released Manchester Uni Continuing Ed. guide:
With Helen Caffrey - A walk by the Limestone Way to investigate the cluster of Bronze Age, Iron Age, and later sites in the Peak landscape. We shall see:
Nine Stones Close
Iron Age enclosed settlements
The Hermitage
A perfectly-preserved 4,000-year-old flint dagger unearthed at the dig in Mellor, Stockport, is being hailed as one of the most significant finds of its type in the region... continues...
Archaeologists have unearthed evidence of a Roman fort and a Stone Age settlement near a pub in Chesterfield.
Experts were called in when developers discovered the artefacts on land underneath the Old Feather's Pub on Lordsmill Street.
Some of the pottery dates back to the 1st Century AD... continues...
The remains of people who lived in Derby (England) 3,500 years ago have been found on the site of a derelict hotel in Littleover. Archaeologists say the Bronze Age cremation site, containing burial urns dating back to 1500 BCE, is the oldest historical exhibit found intact in Derby... continues...
Revised proposals have been submitted to the Peak District National Park Authority for the reopening of the controversial quarries at Stanton Lees near Matlock (England). Stancliffe Stone Ltd is seeking to commence work at the quarries, which have been dormant for several decades... continues...
A second prehistoric log boat has been unearthed in a Derbyshire quarry less than a mile from where a similar find was discovered five years ago.
Archaeologists found the 3,500-year-old log boat, which dates back to the Bronze Age, at Shardlow Quarry, Shardlow, in an area that used to be river channel into the Trent... continues...
A Quarry worker could have discovered proof of prehistoric life close to the River Trent (England). Part of a skull was found at a working gravel pit off Pasture Lane, Long Eaton, by a worker from RMC Aggregates (Eastern). Initial tests date it back to the prehistoric age... continues...
Not really an antiquity as such, but Thomas Bateman dug over 200 barrows in the Peak District, sometimes up to 6 a day. He wrote two books on his works, 'Vestiges of the Antiquities of Debyshire' in 1848, followed in 1861 with 'Ten Years Digging....'.
Some of his finds are displayed in the Sheffield and Buxton museums.
Inside the chapel the tomb lays behind, there used to be a carved marble memorial to Thomas Bateman....it is Now in Sheffield Museum. A strange thing to do with the grave and chapel still there.....I can imagine Batemans wry grin at the thought of it..
The aim of this project is analyze the Bateman archive of manuscripts, correspondence, and drawings and to look at the archaeological objects from his collection largely located at Sheffield's Weston Park Museum.
Information on excavations and sites in Derbyshire and South Yorkshire.
Lots photo's, watercolours and info on Peak District sites. Good sections on Arbor Low and Gib Hill, Stanton Moor and various barrows.
(Amazon link). This book really opened up the Peaks for me. Just the index, which covers over 100 sites, is enough. The photography is wonderful, and the text enlightening and atmospheric if you can shut yourself off to the tone and ignore the dodgy 'poetic' bits...
Fig. 12, Plate VIII. is a South-east view of three remarkable hills at the South end of Stanton moor, on which there are Druidical monuments (a). Careliff rocks on the top are a rocking stone and several rock basons; at the foot of these rocks at (b) is a hermitage. The rocks marked (c) form Graned Tor, or Mock Beggars Hall; the hill (d) is Dutwood Tor, where (e) is a rock canopy that hangs over an augurial seat; on the top of this Tor are three rock basons, evidently cut with a tool. This view was taken from near the bottom of the hill [f], on which there are several large rocks called Bradley rocks; on the top is a large rocking stone.
I flatter myself you will agree with me in lamenting, that these curious remains of antiquity should have been so much neglected, and that the want of attention, in not making accurate observations on the form and construction of these rock monuments, should occasion a disbelief of their being Druidical.
I am, with great respect,
Dear Sir,
Your sincere and much obliged
humble Servant,
H.Rooke
An Account of the Druidical Remains in Derbyshire. In a Letter to the Right Honourable Frederick Montague, FAS. By Hayman Rooke, Esq. FAS. In Archaeologia v12 (1796). Careliff = Cratcliffe? and Dutwood also seems to be variously Dudwood and Durwood?
On the other side of the rock (f) in fig. 9, Plate VII. is an exact circular hole, as is seen in fig. 11, Plate VIII.* which is a South view of the Tor. I found there was no possibility of getting near enough to examine this rock, but I should suppose, from the little channels on the other sides, that there are rock basons on the top.
There are many large rocks scattered about, which must have fallen from the top, where, when they stood erect, filling up every part of this elevated Tor, the effect must have been sublimely striking to the superstitious Britons, who had been taught to venerate those sacred rocks.
That the Druids had fixed upon this hill for the celebration of their religious rites, I think cannot be doubted; it was usual to inclose their places of worship, and here a fence of large rough stones now plainly appears to have surrounded the rocks near the bottom of the hill.
Some druidic imaginings in An Account of the Druidical Remains in Derbyshire. In a Letter to the Right Honourable Frederick Montague, FAS. By Hayman Rooke, Esq. FAS. In Archaeologia v12 (1796).
I cannot see (f) in fig. 9 here but I guess it's the one right at the top.
(*seems to be labeled no.12, but that is my bad cropping of the picture.)
At the South-west end of Stanton moor, in the Peak, and in Hartle liberty, is an assemblage of rocks, which stand on the summit of a circular hill called Graned Tor, but more commonly known by the name of Mock Beggar's Hall.
When I had the honour of communicating to the Society some years ago an account of the Druidical monuments in that neighbourhood, I had not an opportunity of examining this Tor with that accuracy which is necessary in the investigation of these ancient monuments; but having been since in the vicinity of these rocks, at the house of my worthy friend Bache Thornhill, esq. to whose politeness I am much indebted, I requently examined every accessible part of this Tor, and, notwithstanding the many large rocks that have fallen from the top, there is sufficient evidence of its having been a curious group of Druidical monuments.
Fig. 9, Pl. VII. is a North-west view of Graned Tor; the rock marked (a) with four rock basons, is 29 feet in circumference, and plainly appears, from its present position, to have fallen from the top. The three stones (b, c, d,) seem to have been placed by art, and the uppermost is, I think, very likely to be a rocking stone, but there was no possibility of getting near enough to make the experiment.
Whilst I was taking a drawing of this Tor, an old man who stood by, told me that he remembered when he was a boy, his grandfather's pointing to the stone (b), and saying, it had always been called the Great Altar, and that several other rocks had names, but he had forgot what they were. We are led by traditional accounts to form probable conjectures; and, as the Heathens always placed their altars on their highest ground, there is great reason to suppose that this elevated rock was a Druidical altar.
At the bottom of the third rock from the top, marked (d), is a large rock bason of an oval shape, diameter 4 feet by 2 feet 10 inches, which evidently appears to be cut with a tool; the rock (e) is placed slopingly against the rock (d), and forms a kind of cavity, big enough to hold three or four people, in which is the rock bason above-mentioned.
Fig. 10 is a near view of this aperture, whence there is a very extensive prospect, of course well calculated for the purpose of divination.
Stone (a) is the one on the left with four big holes in it. Stone (b) is the highest on the right, with (c) and (d) beneath it, and (e) being the pointy one overlapping (d).
From An Account of the Druidical Remains in Derbyshire. In a Letter to the Right Honourable Frederick Montague, FAS. By Hayman Rooke, Esq. FAS. In Archaeologia v12 (1796).