"The one near Odindale Head is similar, at first sight inspires a truly Ossianic feeling. It is situated on a hill of "dark brown heath," it is formed of an outer circle of thirty stones not so large as those at Gunnerskeld, twenty-five yards in diameter, within which is another circle of twenty-one stones closely packed to each other seven yards in diameter; within this are a number of other stones irregularly laid, similar to Gunnerskeld. It was opened in presence of Rev. J. Simpson, but nothing was found excepting a small portion of black carbonaceous matter. A peculiar feature is that there is an upright stone placed outside the inner and within the outer circle on the south-east side. On the north side about seven yards distant is the remains of another circle, fourteen yards in diameter, having another within of four yards, but many of the stones have been removed.
Respecting the origin of these circles authors differ considerably, some considering them to be the temples of the Druids, within whose mystic bounds sacrificial rites were performed; while others attribute them to a later people, the Pagan Saxons, Angles or Danes.
Odindale, like Gunnerskeld, is a name significant of the latter people. Odin was the one great god of the Gothic nations, from whom they all claimed descent, and to whom, of course, their greatest honours were paid."
The Vale of Lyvennet
J.S. Bland
Published 1910
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'There are also other circles much smaller in size and each on elevated ground, one near Threaplands is formed of seven granite boulders, and is five yards in diameter; some of the stones are six feet in length. '
The Vale of Lyvennet
J. Bland
1910
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"On the east side of the road, soon after you leave the village [Shap going S], observe a double range of huge granites, pitched in the ground, and at some distance from each other, leading to circles of small stones, and increasing the space between the rows as they approach the circles, where the avenue is about 27 paces wide. They are supposed to have run quite through the village, and terminated in a point. It has long embarrassed the antiquaries what to call this very uncommon monument of ancient date. Mr. Pennant has given a plausible explanation of it from Olaus Magnus, and supposes the row of granites to be the recording stones of a Danish victory obtained on the spot, and the stony circles to be grateful tributes to the memory of consanguineous heroes slain in the action."
Guide book, A Guide to the Lakes
by Thomas West,
published by William Pennington, Kendal
1821
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THE PARISH OF ST. COLOMBE, WARCOP.
Including the Manors of Sandford, Burton and Bleatarn.
ANTIQUITIES.
In this parish we have the "Druid's Temple, "half a mile N.E. of Scober.....a stone circle 50 paces in diameter
From: 'Parishes (East Ward): St Colombe, Warcop', The Later Records relating to North Westmorland: or the Barony of Appleby (1932), pp. 227-36.
http://193.39.212.223/report.asp?compid=43515.
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In his book The Stone Circles of Cumbria, John Waterhouse states that all that remains of the Annaside Circle is 'a huge boulder of coursely crystaline-granite 1.37m high and 3m long'.
From
The Stone Circles of Cumbria
John Waterhouse
Pub. 1985
Phillimore & Co Ltd
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Regarding Stan Beckensalls comments on the origins of the grooves on the Ash House stone.
John Waterhouse speculates that they 'may have resulted from abortive attempts to topple the stone during the destruction of the circle'.
Megalithic Portal contributor, Jack Morris- Eyton states that the grooves were caused by wartime timber felling operations.
See his comments here
http://194.9.32.142/modules.php?op=modload&name=a312&file=index&do=showpic&pid=15910
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In his book The Stone Circles of Cumbria, John Waterhouse quotes the following reference to the destroyed circle.
'At Hall Foss are the remains of a Druidical Temple called "Standing Stones" consisting of eight massive rude columns, disposed in a circle 25 yards in diameter".
From
The Stone Circles of Cumbria
John Waterhouse
Pub. 1985
Phillimore & Co Ltd
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This circle was described by Pennant in his 18th century Itinary of Scotland & Northern England. he described the site as a large circle of grit stones about 60ft in diameter surrounding a vast cairn of stones. Pennant located the site to opposite Mayburgh on the other side of the Eamont. Waterhouse says that this would place the circle in the southern outskirts of Penrith.
The OS grid reference supplied here comes from the Cumbria County Councils Historic Environment Record.
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An Awd Steean Stoup
A grey steean stoup oot yonder stands,
on t'hill-sahde bleak an cawd;
It catches ivvery storm at blaws
Fre t'dale an t'moorland rooad,
A great steean posst, all weather-bet -
There's few at kens hoo awd.
"What use is sike?" Ah hear em say,
When gauvin roond seea fond.
If t'snaw-flags stoored upon yon moor,
An you gat lost, mah frind,
You might be wayant an pleased ti see
Yon awd stoup set on end.
F.W. Dowson
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"Grey recumbent tombs of the dead in deserted places,
Standing stones on the vacant wine-red moor,
Hills of sheep, and the howes of the silent vanished races,
And winds, austere and pure."
Robert Louis Stevenson
1850-1894
From Songs of Travel
Blagged from an Aberdeenshire Council pamphlet "The Stone Circle."
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In a paper published in the journal Antiquity (June 1939) entitled "Stone and Earth Circles in Dorset", Stuart & CM Piggott had this to say about The Valley of the Stones.
"This is a most interesting, roughly D-shaped enclosure made of small closely-set stones, and it seems likely that it is to be associated with the surrounding lynchet system, and to have been a cattle enclosure of Iron Age or later date."
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"Also in this shire (Mernis) are to be seen two large and remarkable Monuments of Antiquity, at a place called Auchinoctie, five miles from Aberdeen. One of these, is two Circles of Stones, the outward Circle consisting of thirteen great ones (besides two that are fallen, and the broad-stone towards the south,) about three yards high above-ground, and between seven and eight paces distant from the another; the Diameter of which is twenty four large paces. The inward Circle is about three paces distant from the other, and the stones thereof three foot high above-ground.
Towards the East from this Monument, at twenty six paces is a large stone, fast in the ground and level with it, wherein is a cavity, partially natural and partially artificial, which (supposing this is a temple) may be imagined to have served for washing the Priests, the Sacrifices, and other things that were esteemed sacred among the Heathens.
The other Monument (which is full as large, than that already described, and distant from it about a bow-shot) consists of three circles, having the same common centre. The stones of the greatest Circle are about three yards above-ground, and those of the two lesser Circles three foot; the inner-most Circle being three paces diameter, and the stones standing close together. One of the stones of the largest Circle on the east side of the Monument, hath upon the top of it (which is narrow, and longer one way than the other) a hollowness about three inches deep, in the bottom whereof, is cut out a trough one inch deep and two inches broad (with another one crossing it) that runs along the whole length of the cavity, and down by the side of the stone a good way: so that what-ever liquor is poured into the cavity upon the top of the stone, doth presently run down the side of it by this trough; and it should seem that upon this stone they poured forth their Libamina or liquid sacrifices. There is also another stone in the same circle, and upon the same side of the Monument (standing nearest to the broad stone on edge, which looks towards the south) with a cavity in the upper end, cut after the fashion of the cavity in the top of the other stone already described, and a natural fissure, by which all the Liquor pouted into the cavity, runs out of it to the ground."
Camden's Britannia 1586
Translation and edition of 1722 by Gibson.
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"A little before Loder joins the Emot, it paffes by a large round entrenchement, with a plain piece of ground in the middle, and a paffage into it on either fide: the form of which is this:
http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/post/54181
It goes by the name of King Arthur's Round Table: and it is poffible enough; it might be a jufting-place. However, that it was never defign'd for a place of frenth, appears from the trenches being on the infide. Near this is another great Fort of Stones, heap'd-up in the form of a horfe-fhoe, and open towards it; call'd by fome King Arthur's Caftle, and by others Mayburgh or Maybrough. "
Taken from
Britannia
By William Camden
1586
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"I've sat on Rosebury with many a bard
Whose harp-strings, once so musical, are mute
On earth for ever : we full well did suit
Each other, in congenial regard
For the loved landscape here unfurled to view.
Yonder towers Guisboro's fine old ruined Arch,
Memento of the Past - our onward march
Mark'd by yon blast furnaces ; churches not a few,
Towns, farmsteads, rivers, fields of every hue -
As grass and corn, and fallow - and o'er all
The watchet ocean ; prospects that ne'er shall pall
Upon one's taste : the picture is ever new.
We may roam far and wide before we see
A finer sight than here from Rosebury."
George Tweddle
published 1870
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In his 1967 paper for The Society of Scottish Antiquities entitled 'The Cup and Ring Marks and Similar Sculptures of Scotland: A Survey of the Southern Counties Part II'. Ronald W. B. Morris noted;
"On standing stone (8 1/2 feet high, 4 1/2 feet wide), built in to roadside fence, over 80 cups, up to 4in in diam, 3/4in deep, some run together as rough dumbells."
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In his 1843 book, The Wonders of the World, in Nature, Art, and Mind, Robert Sears quotes "the celebrated female writer" Mrs Radcliffe . This is what Mrs Radcliffe had to say about Castlerigg.
"Whether our judgement was influenced by the authority of a Druids choice, or that the place itself commanded the opinion, we thought this situation the most severely grand of any hitherto passed. There is, perhaps, not a single object in the scene that interrupts the solemn tone of feeling impressed by its general character of profound solitude, greatness and awful wildness. Castle-Rigg is the centre point of three valleys that dart immediately under it form the eye, an whose mountains for part of an amphitheatre, which is completed by those of Borrowdale on the west, and by the precipices of Skiddaw and Saddleback, close on the north. The hue which pervades all these mountains is that of dark heath or rock; they are thrown into every form and direction that fancy would suggest, and are at that distance which allows all their grandeur to prevail."
"Severely grand" I'll take a large portion of that please.
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At Rudston and Boroughbridge, in Yorkshire, are supposed examples of maenhirs. Near the latter place there are four standing in a row, which are called by the country people the Devil's Bolts; but, from their relative position, it is not unlikely that they are the remains of a large circle. Source: An Archaeological Index to the Remains of Antiquity of the Celtic, Romano-British and Anglo-Saxon Periods, by John Yonge Ackerman F.S.A., 1847
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The following letter from a person who signs himself 'DRUID' appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine 1844:Druidical Temple near Shap
NOTWITHSTANDING the alleged increase of good taste at the present day, I find the intention of the projectors of the Lancaster and Carlisle Railway to carry their line through and destroy, a most interesting remnant of antiquity, the remains of a Druidical Temple situated in a field the property of the Earl of Lonsdale, on the road from Kendal to Shap, and about 2 miles from the latter place. I am surprised the noble Earl should permit such barbarity, with such influence as he possess over the company.
The accompanying Sketch of this curious monument, which will probably be in a short time no longer in existence, may be interesting to your leaders. It consists of 13 stones of Shap granite, the largest of which is 7 or 8 feet high, placed in a circle about forty feet in diameter.
Yours, &c. DRUID.
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