Old Sarum

Old Sarum is an Iron Age hillfort just north of Salisbury, later adapted into a Norman motte and bailey castle which contained Salisbury’s first cathedral. Salisbury, only a few miles from Stonehenge, has long been considered one of Britain’s most special spiritual places and this stretches back far into prehistory.

The outer bank of the fort.

The fort is on a natural hill which has commanding views over the Avon valley and surrounding area, and draws the eye from miles around. It was an ideal spot for an Iron Age statement of command and power.

The Iron Age ditch and two banks, which enclose an area around 400m diameter, were cleared and redug in Norman times, the reason for their incredible preservation. A visit is recommended just to see how the vast ditches of places such as Avebury and many other hillforts would have looked before thousands of years of erosion and infilling. Standing on the bank and looking into the thirty-metre deep ditch is a vertigo-inducing experience to say the least. It was about more than simple defence. It was a statement of power.

Old Sarum’s ditch. The very small sheep gives an indication of scale. 

Ironically, little more is known of the early site. The Norman reconstruction which preserved the ditches removed everything else. The fort was first built around 400BC, and occupation continued into the Roman period, where it became known as Sorviodunum. Five Roman roads converge at Salisbury which illustrates the site’s importance. Some of these roads were in use long before the Romans arrived, and may even date back to the Neolithic period, which marks the earliest occupation of the site.

The view east from the bank. The Roman road leading towards London is visible.

Salisbury marks the confluence of five rivers, the Avon, Nadder, Bourne, Ebble and Wylye, which would make it a hugely important place in the time when rivers were the main mode of transport and also the most important landmarks when travelling across a land devoid of manmade features. This is likely a big factor in Sarum’s continuing practical and spiritual importance.

The confluence of the Avon and the Nadder.

Sarum was captured from the British by the Saxons and then abandoned until invading Vikings forced its reoccupation. Saxon mercenaries who guarded the junction of the Roman roads lived and were buried nearby, and other rich Saxon burials were found close to the foot of the fort, including that of a sixth-century woman who was buried with elaborate grave goods including a purse ring made of elephant ivory, blue glass beads and a copper brooch. This high-status woman, who had trade links stretching as far as Africa, illustrates the continuing importance of this district, two thousand years after Wessex had become the richest land in Britain.

It is from this period that the name derives. Sarum is an adaptation of Seresberie, a late Saxon-period burgh and Royal Mint. This later evolved into Salisbury. The prefix Sar or Sear is probably a pre-Saxon personal name.

The Medieval castle, cathedral and town.

The fortified town of Old Sarum and its cathedral were later moved south to New Sarum, or Salisbury town, and the ancient site was abandoned to the wilderness.

The view south towards Salisbury. The new cathedral is visible.

Lydney Roman Temple

This Roman temple is on a precipitous hill in Lydney in Gloucestershire, overlooking the western bank of the River Severn. Rivers were Britain’s arteries in both a material and spiritual sense, and this site, overlooking the waters which dominate the view today and would have been even more spectacular in historic times when the river was a lot closer, was of strategic importance until the Medieval period.

The view from the Iron Age embankment towards the Roman site, with the River Severn in the distance.

The Roman buildings were built on the remains of an Iron Age hill fort, the latter dating to around 100BC. Both Celts and Romans extensively mined the hill for iron ore until the elaborate temple complex was built around 360AD. Its Roman name was Nemetobala, meaning ‘hill sanctuary’.

The temple was dedicated to Nodens, a Celtic God associated with healing, hunting, the river and fishing. Nodens has no other mention in the ancient world. This is probably unsurprising as in Celtic culture, as well as many other cultures worldwide, the true names of revered beings were rarely known and almost never spoken. Disguised names abounded.

Nodens has been linked to the Irish Nuada and the Welsh Lludd, and was probably associated with the healing God Asclepius by the Romans who respected and assimilated many foreign deities into their culture. Asclepius likely means ‘dog-man’, and several plaques and figurines of dogs have been found in the temple. Dogs were often kept in temples and would lick wounds to aid healing. This would have worked: enzymes in saliva are strongly antibacterial.

                           The Roman baths.

Near the temple was a bath house, probably for ritual use, and a long building comprising a series of rooms probably used as dormitories, dreams being powerful and prophetic and interpreted onsite by diviners. A mansio or guest house illustrates the importance of this site which attracted wealthy pilgrims from far and wide.

The temple was in use long after the collapse of the Roman Empire, after which the Iron Age ramparts were repaired and extended. Sometime during the 5^th or 6^th century, it was burned down and the roof and walls collapsed inwards, preserving its elaborate votive offerings and mosaic floors for posterity.

The remains of the ancient buildings remained visible for centuries and like many Roman sites the hill, now known as Dwarf Hill, was avoided as the haunt of fairies or dwarfs.

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.

Meon Hill Iron Age Fort

The wide-ranging view from Meon Hill.

Meon Hill, a prominent hill in south Warwickshire, is the location of an Iron Age hill fort, likely built on an earlier Bronze Age site. The hill is formidably steep with a wide, flat top, and the surrounding ditches and banks, positioned to make full use of the topology, are still several metres deep in places. Little modern excavation work has been done but quantities of Bronze Age, Iron Age and Romano-British finds including pottery and worked stones have been found.

Meon Hill dominates the surrounding landscape and offers commanding views for several miles in almost every direction. Similar to other hill sites, it was designed to be seen. The nearby Ilmington Hill, which is much larger and much more sprawling, has no such eye-catching dominance and although it harbours several ancient features, there is nothing of such dramatic presence.

             The still prominent ramparts

Meon has a powerful atmosphere. A deep sense of magic infuses the hill, and it’s unsurprising that Meon Hill is prominent in local folklore.

Tradition states that the Devil lives beneath it, and rides out on dark nights with his pack of infernal hounds. This is almost certainly a Christianised version of the much older Gwyn ap Nudd, the Celtic ruler of the underworld who was associated with prominent hills and was master of the Cwn Annwfn, a pack of spectral hounds. Gwyn was later synonymised with the Devil.

This story may have arisen due to the spectacular remains of the now long-forgotten site, or perhaps it originated when the site was in occupation and Gwyn was still commonly revered. Perhaps powerful Druids commanded this site.

A more sinister story comes from the 1940s. A farm worker called Charles Walton was found dead on the hill with a pitchfork through his neck. The story was quickly linked to witchcraft. Charles was said to have been murdered because of his link to the Devil. Spectral black dogs were also associated with the crime.

Despite a lengthy police investigation, the murder was never solved, but the story adds to the powerful sense of magic many people feel here.