The Uffington White Horse

This hill figure is carved into the chalk downlands on the Oxfordshire-Berkshire border, near the Uffington Hill Fort and Wayland's Smithy, overlooking the Vale of the White Horse. It is the oldest hill figure in Britain, dating to around 1000BC, the mid-Bronze Age, and was possibly created by the people of Uffington Hill Fort.

It is formed of trenches, originally around a metre deep. Chalk figures are rapidly obscured by grass and erosion, and the figure was scoured clean every seven years as part of a local fair. This was first documented in 1736 and continued until the late 19^th century. It is now maintained by English Heritage.

The horse is very different to other British hill figures, and there is debate as to whether it even represents a horse. It resembles horses depicted on Iron Age coins, which has led to suggestions that it represents a Celtic horse-goddess such as Epona or Rhiannon. Horses were important in Iron Age Britain, and likely that reverence and the Goddesses linked to it originate in an earlier Bronze Age culture.

The figure is intended to be visible. Approaching from the north, it can be seen for miles across the flat vale and the hill itself commands all-round views for several miles. Standing beside the figure, which crowns the top of a punishingly steep valley, the focus seems to sweep down the slope and across the distant vale. It seems to reflect dominance and control of this vast area of the land, both territorially and magically.

The steep valley known as The Manger, above which the horse stands and where legend says it grazes at night.

The figure has been referred to as a horse since at least the 11^th century, but some say it represents a dragon, associating it with ley lines or the earth-spirit which does feel especially strong on this part of the hillside. Its positioning, so it seems to be ‘flying’ up the hillside, perhaps supports this.

Intriguingly, a small hill a short distance from the horse is known as Dragon Hill, and according to legend is the hill where St George killed his dragon. The white patch of chalk where no vegetation grows was where the dragon’s blood flowed.

St George is a medieval addition to British legend, but the legend may have an historical basis. Archaeologists have found evidence of large-scale burning on the artificially flattened hill, perhaps from huge cremation pyres, and those fires may have survived in later legend as the fire of a dragon.

View from Dragon Hill. The topology of the surrounding hillside draws all focus straight back towards the horse.

A local legend states that the horse goes to Wayland’s Smithy every hundred years to be reshod. In 1920, an unknown man, dressed in old-fashioned clothes and a smith’s leather apron, limped into a local pub and ordered a pint. The locals heard a horn echoing through the night and the stranger leapt up and hurried out. They looked up at the hill; the horse was gone. The next day, the horse was back in its place, its hooves shining brightly in the morning sun. Some time next year, this will presumably happen again.

Lady’s Well, Holystone

This holy well in the village of Holystone in Northumberland has been venerated since at least Roman times, and possibly long before. It was situated by a Roman road running from the fort of Bremenium to the coast, and it was probably the Romans who built the stone walls which contain the waters today.  The spring-fed well never freezes or runs dry, and as well as a practical function in providing water to travellers and their animals, it was likely venerated as a sacred place. Springs are venerated in many cultures and the Romans commonly built shrines around them.

It was later dedicated to the Anglo-Saxon Saint Ninian, who performed baptisms here in the 5^th century, and also St Paulinus, who reputedly baptised 3000 Northumbrians at the well in AD627. This is almost certainly legend rather than history. A 15^th century statue of St Paulinus stands beside the well today. The Celtic-style cross is a Victorian addition.

The well was dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the 12^th century when an Augustinian Priory was built in the village, and this dedication remains today.

It’s a powerful and peaceful place today, reflecting the wild nature of the Northumberland countryside and the number of people who have paid their respects to the place over two thousand or more years. The number of coins in its waters are testament to the number of people who still respect its vitality. It was recently announced one of the top ten historic spiritual sites in England.

A second ancient well is found in the village, dedicated to St Mungo, the 6^th century founder of Glasgow. It’s possible this was once a ‘mugger’s’ (tinker’s) well, the saintly dedication a Victorian addition.

Yeavering Bell

Yeavering Bell is one of the northern-most Cheviot Hills in Northumberland, and is the site of the largest hill fort in the area. It overlooks the flat and fertile Milfield Plain, cultivated since the early Neolithic period. Mass clearance of the Cheviot uplands began around 2500BC, the end of the Neolithic period, and numerous settlements, henges, stone circles and rock art panels appear from this time. Many of the prominent and brooding hills overlooking these sites are forts.

Yeavering Bell fort, reached by a punishing but relatively endurable climb – many of the Cheviots are brutal and harbour treacherous and sometimes deadly peat bogs –  extends for 12 acres and is surrounded by a 950m stone wall, originally 3m thick and 2.5m high. It contained 130 roundhouses, suggesting a residential purpose. Little excavation has been done but pottery dating from the Iron Age and Romano-British periods has been found.

Like many Iron Age hill forts, it is focused on much older features. Some hill forts in the area enclose ancient rock art or tombs, and it’s been suggested that their function is at least partly ceremonial or ritual rather than defensive. The southern entrance to Yeavering Bell aligns on the distinctive Hedgehope Hill, suggesting a function in a larger landscape network. There is a sense of a vast, spiritual web linking these important sites.

The site was significant long after the Iron Age. In the valley beneath it, the remains of the capital of the Anglo-Saxon King Edwin can still be seen. This was built with respect to a Bronze Age cemetery, comprising a number of cairns and barrows by this time around 2000 years old.

‘Yeavering’ derives from the Celtic ‘Din Gefron’, which means ‘hill of the goat’. Today it is the home of the Cheviot goats, some of the only wild goats in Britain. They are descended from the livestock the Neolithic farmers brought with them from the Middle East. The hill is also linked to the goat-headed God Pan, who reflects the wilds of the natural world and is linked to the Celtic Cernunnos. Perhaps this site was once a centre for his reverence. It’s certainly appropriate.

Walking this area involves struggling through sodden heather and bracken, which disguises deep peaty holes and ankle-turning rocks, with wind gusting strong enough to knock a person over. And then the wind whips the clouds away to reveal a vast and beautiful landscape dazzling in the sunlight, before the rain closes in again. This is a land where nature tolerates its human intruders.

And when I was climbing down the steep hillside, I saw what I thought was a horned statue sitting by a stream. When it turned to look at me, I nearly fell off the mountain! I never did identify what I’d seen, but perhaps it was a manifestation of Pan or Cernunnos who has such a long connection with this place. When I wrote my novel The Story of Light, in which Yeavering Bell is a key place, I put that in the story for posterity.

The Rollright Stones

The King’s Men stone circle.

The Rollright Stones in Oxfordshire consist a stone circle called the King’s Men, a Neolithic burial chamber called the Whispering Knights, and a lone standing stone called the King Stone.

The Whispering Knights, dating to c3800BC is the earliest of these. It is a portal dolmen, a tomb consisting of several upright stones with a capstone. There were probably originally more stones. A fragment of human bone was found inside it.

          The Whispering Knights.

The King’s Men is a 30m diameter stone circle consisting around seventy irregular-shaped stones – legend claims them uncountable – gathered from the nearby area. It was probably built c2500BC, the start of the Bronze Age. Originally there were around 105 stones, set in a continuous circle with an entrance on the southeast flanked by two portal stones. The tallest stone in the circle is directly opposite it.

The circle is slightly off the top of the hill and focuses the eye on the wide valley to the south; all along this, it is clearly prominent on the skyline. The Whispering Knights the same. The location of the circle was probably chosen because of this now ancient and dramatic tomb, from which it seems to be set at a polite distance.

The south-facing valley is possibly the best farmland in the immediate area and has been cultivated continuously since the Neolithic period when early farmers, perhaps those who raised the Whispering Knights, cleared woodland and rocks and began to work the soil. The circle was a gathering point, and celebrations which overlooked the valley and vice versa would have sealed the inhabitants’ lives and stories into the collective memory of the area. It may also have been a trade point. Similar stone circles are found in the Lake District, and Lake District stone axes are found right across Britain.

The King Stone. Its unusual shape is a result of 19^th century drovers chipping talismans from it.

The King Stone is set a few metres from the top of the hill, by a rise which seems artificial. This no doubt gave rise to the legend of its origin.

The Danish warlord Rollo had invaded England with his army and a witch told him:

Seven long strides shalt thou take,

If Long Compton thou canst see,

King of England thou shalt be.

Rollo strode forward, sure of victory, shouting: Stick, stock, stone! As King of England I shall be known!

The witch caused a hill to rise in front of him, obscuring his view, and proclaimed,

As Long Compton thou canst not see, King of England thou shalt not be.

Rise up stick and stand still stone, for King of England thou shalt be none.

Thou and thy men hoar stones shall be, and myself an eldern tree.

Incidentally, Rollright derives from ‘Land of Rollo’. In the 19^th century it was said there were enough witches in Long Compton to draw a load of hay up Long Compton Hill.

The King Stone is associated with a series of Bronze Age burials dating to c1800BC. It’s unclear whether the burials were positioned in relation to the stone or whether the stone was raised as a marker for them.

The view of Long Compton which Rollo was a few strides from seeing.

The stones are rife with folklore. The Whispering Knights, in common with megaliths across Britain, are said to go to the brook to drink at New Year or when they hear the church bells. Local girls ran naked around the stones on Midsummer’s Eve to see the face of the man they would marry. When a local farmer dragged the King Stone away to make a bridge, it took eight horses to draw it. After a plague of ill-luck, he returned it. Only one horse was needed for the uphill return journey.