New Views over Megalithia

[macausland]

Archaeologists have found yet another oblong building from 3,800BC.

This one is a 'communal hall' which was burned as a funeral pyre before being buried. They've found artifacts from Yorkshire that were placed after the event and think the place was some sort of pilgrimage site as it's in Herefordshire at Dorstone Hill.

Still they don't think it was a hill fort, for the time being. Perhaps it was an early Anglo Saxon incursion showing the ancients how to do oblong instead of circular.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... henge.html

[hvered]

According to the article the building is Neolithic predating Stonehenge by 1,000 years which raises several questions though it doesn't question whether the dating is accurate.

Oblong seems a more practical shape than circular. Why should it be attributed to Anglo-Saxon technique?

Could an old timber building have burned down accidentally rather as a result of a 'ritual fire'?

[macausland]

The reason I mentioned the AS word was because historians have always claimed that before the Anglo Saxons everybody built round houses. It was the Anglo Saxons who brought rectangular building styles to Britain from the continent.

There could be many reasons why it was burned down. I suppose the archaeologists will pick one that pleases them and that fits into current theories.

There seems to be an increase in the number of archaeological finds in recent years. I hope there will be many more before the country's concreted over completely.

[hvered]

They've found artifacts from Yorkshire that were placed after the event and think the place was some sort of pilgrimage site as it's in Herefordshire at Dorstone Hill.

The OS map has marked a 'fort' on Dorstone Hill so presumably this site or one near it has been known about if not excavated for years.

A likely 'pilgrimage' spot would be Arthur's Stone, a dolmen just north of Dorstone Hill which according to wiki is on the ridge of a hill overlooking the Golden Valley and the Wye Valley, so a useful revictualling place on the Welsh-English border route. The modern Wye Valley Walk seems to more or less follow the old trackway.

[macausland]

Arthur certainly gets about a bit doesn't he, what with his seat at Edinburgh.

The Daily Mail has an article on another find in the Orkneys from a few thousand years ago.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... 500BC.html

Getting back to Arthur we are told the name means something like 'bear' and although he never existed he was a Romano Briton.

I wonder if that is incorrect? Perhaps the 'Ar' part of the name is connected with 'Arc' rather than bears? In which case was he another one of the ancient 'measurers' of the landscape? He did have a round table which could be a compass face or a clock face. 'Frae all the airts' is a well known expression meaning from all directions.

He was also skilled at drawing metal out of stone. Something nobody else could do at the time.

[Boreades]

The Daily Mail has an article on another find in the Orkneys from a few thousand years ago.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... 500BC.html

Reminds me very much of the lozenge shapes found in Wiltshire.
Do the angles of the Orkney lozenges bear any resemblance to the angles of solstices and equinoxes there?

[hvered]

Getting back to Arthur we are told the name means something like 'bear' and although he never existed he was a Romano Briton.

I wonder if that is incorrect? Perhaps the 'Ar' part of the name is connected with 'Arc' rather than bears? In which case was he another one of the ancient 'measurers' of the landscape? He did have a round table which could be a compass face or a clock face. 'Frae all the airts' is a well known expression meaning from all directions.

He was also skilled at drawing metal out of stone. Something nobody else could do at the time.

Ursula or Little Bear, said to be a 'Romano-British princess' a la Arthur, went on a pan-European pilgrimage ending at Cologne where she was murdered, apparently along with eleven thousand virgins.

Cologne's oldest monastery is dedicated to St. Martin of Tours who is the patron saint of Dover.

A straight line between Cologne and Dover goes via Dunkirk. Rather spookily the line extends to Stonehenge. Perhaps part of a great arc or Urs(ul)a Minor route.

There is a metal connection as Dover was one of the ports used by tin traders (a Bronze Age shipwreck was discovered in Langdon Bay, Dover in 2010).

[macausland]

And the Great Bear points to the Pole Star. Very useful for navigating.

By the way, how did they get the tin from Cornwall to Dover?

Was it overland with pack horses or would it have been by coastal shipping, sailing through places like Durdle Dor? If they were using flat bottomed barges rather than deep sea craft it would make more sense to be close to the coast perhaps.

[hvered]

The Langdon Bay wreck consisted of bronze objects many of which are considered to be French in origin. Archaeologists think the finds were scrap metal, probably imported from the Continent, and that the ship would have been making for Dover harbour. The Isle of Thanet which was separated from the mainland until 1672 may have been a 'tin terminus', Ramsgate, Richborough and Canterbury were major ports for the Romans



If Dover was the destination in this instance, it suggests an overland route was preferable to sailing along the Channel since Dover offers the shortest crossing. There are several known prehistoric east-west routes in southern England, the best-known being the Pilgrims' Way, connecting towns to ports. Major routes like the Pilgrims' Way and Ridgeway went on being used as drovers' roads long after the Age of Bronze.

[macausland]

According to this site Watling street used to be known as the Milky Way.

http://www.indigogroup.co.uk/edge/Royalrds.htm

I can't think why unless it had something to do with direction finding and the stars.

Speaking of which, getting back to Ursula, we still use terms like getting or taking ones bearing when going on a long journey.

Everyday language is full of metaphors and other allusions we are usually ignorant of. Perhaps deep seated metaphor in today's language reflects a much more ancient and practical use of words. Ship shape and Bristol fashion like.