New Find at Ketley Crags ?

Dashed down to Chatton in mid afternoon today - because the sky looked beautiful and I just fancied an hour or two mooching around. Managed to get some better shots of panel 5 but didn’t bother much with the main panels - apart from gazing respectfully. Then I wandered across to Ketley Crags because the low sun was very bright and very clear - and I thought I might get some even better shots - I did. I thought I would take a wider look at the boulders and outcrops on that slope, which have wonderful, swirly organic forms that must have appealed as much to our Neolithic ancestors as they do to me today. Found a few interesting things but nothing decisive. Then - I decided to go down the very bottom of the slope to look at a very large boulder - about 6 feet cubed - which is by far the most prominent rock at the base of the slope next to a wooden gate and a stone dyke. This is what I found on top of the boulder. I am hoping this is a new find because I can’t see any reference to this on BRAC. If it is already known I apologise.

It appears to be a carved basin with at least three rings around a central depression. The whole figure is about ten inches in diameter and there is a carved channel - possibly an enhancement of a natural feature - which drains the basin down the face of the boulder.

Here is a shot taken standing on top of the boulder looking vertically down. It gives more idea of the length of the carved channel.

There are what seem to be various cups pecked into the stone to the left of the basin

.OK here is a long shot taken from the boulder at the base of the entire slope -looking up to the main group of Ketley Crags with the existing Rock Art Shelter being in the very centre of those large outcrops. The monolith is plainly visible on Flash Earth, which gives its position as: Lat: 55 deg 33′ 44.3 N Long: 1deg 52′ 58.8″W

Here is a view from the known rock art panel looking down the slope to the massive boulder which is on the extreme right of the picture. This also gives a good idea of why this site is so beautiful.

I found some other interesting boulders of the ‘brain coral’ variety further along the slope, which to me suggest that artificial work has been done to enhance existing features, but I’m too tired to edit those pics now. Just wanted to share this with you all and - hopefully - get your views as to whether this is a ‘new’ find. If you think it is - then I suspect there is a possibly more to be discovered at Ketley since this is just 40 yards from the main rock art feature that has been known for many years.

Graham

Possible New Find, Chatton

I came across this basin with what appears to be an artificial channel alongside the main track which ascends Chatton Park Hill. It is about ten yards to the left of the landrover track and about 50 yards below the summit of the hill where the main carved panel is (1a). The channel is about 2″ wide and looks distinctly man-made.

Here is a more vertical shot of the same basin and channel - with a smaller circular, or horse-shoe shaped feature on the rock below it (which may be natural).

The Flash Earth reference is (approx) Latitude: 55 deg 33′ 15.3″ Longitude: 1 deg 52′ 50.7″

What do you think? Man made channel?

Easter on Chatton Park Hill

Happy Easter rock people,

Feeling weighed down with cabin fever - due to frequent hail, snow and wind showers over the last few days - decided to go and loiter near Wooler, check the garden centre (I was the only customer) and if there looked a break in the weather made a dash for Chatton. I did take photos of Chatton two weeks ago but the light was so poor it wasn’t worth using them.

I could see two great walls of snow clouds - about 10 miles apart - so drove to Chatton in light fluffy hail. Timed it perfect - ran up the hill and arrived in patches of glorious sunshine. Had about 15 minutes to snap away before a great wall of sweeping snow cloud bore down from the North East. Ran down and arrived back at the barn with one side of my face frozen. Certainly gets the blood going this rock art business.

Here is a sample shot.

Chattton Park Hill Panel 1a

Shaped Cups on Scarp Edge in front of main panel 1a. This is just ten feet forward of the ‘basin’ which lies at the top of the main channel on panel 1a. If you go to the top of the main rock pavement at Chatton (i.e. West) - there are a number of rocks emerging from the edge of the pavement. These small basins are about 6″ wide and appear to be ‘improved’ natural features, like the larger basin which feeds the channel that runs from top to bottom of panel 1a. The basin on the left has an obvious raised edge which is surely not natural? The one on the right has a sunken ring around the central cup. I assume these are not often mentioned because they are of little interest by comparison with the spectacular carvings just ten feet away?

So, dodging the snow showers was worth it - Chatton is an amazing place.

Graham

Northumberland From The Air

Hi Folks,

Just received the cover of Stan Beckensall’s latest book “Northumberland from the Air”, which will be published by Tempus in June/July. I haven’t seen the inside yet, but I would be surprised if there’s not a rock art chapter in it. Enjoy!

Old Lyham, Chatton, Kettley

Spring seemed to have sprung today so I set off ’stravaiging’ -
figuring I would head for one of the ‘empty spaces’ on the map - Old
Lyham Crags and Bowden Doors - using the logic that these are great
sandstone scarps with stunning views across the Milfield Plain - so why
are there no recorded cup and ring marks for these areas in Stan’s
definitive guide? This sandstone scarp is a beautiful place to visit -
strongly recommend anyone going there. I found that, as usual, a lot of
small scale quarrying had been done over the centuries; there were some
millstone ‘blanks’ on the crags as well. I also got the strong
impression that there has been massive wind, rain and ice erosion over
the centuries - it is very high and very exposed - so maybe any motifs
were just eroded?

Possible New Finds ?

I did find something that looks like a cup and ring. It is about 6 inches in
diameter and was right on the crag edge - but on a section where
quarrying had not taken place. It looks like one of those cases where a
natural basin has been adapted - as at Old Bewick - but I’m not sure
about it. Can’t see how the raised cup can have formed naturally?

On another part of Old Lyham Crags I found a row of what looked like
eroded cup markings. They are conical, shallow and soft edged - so I’m
pretty certain they are not anything to do with 19th C quarrying - they
don’t look like metal tools have made them and were on a stone
pavement that showed no sign of quarrying.

I realized that the front edge of the scarp was so badly eroded that it was unlikely anything would have survived here - so I looked on the

back slope. Nothing specific - but I found large piles of very large
‘grooved boulders’ (like miniature Duddo stones - which looked like
they may have originated from the scarp edge at some time. There seems
to be an association between the ‘brain coral’ kind of water erosion
that you see on the crag edges at places like Cuddy’s Cave, Goat Crags
and Dod Law - and rock art. These boulders are definitely
natural-eroded scarp-edge material - which raises the question why they
have been dumped on the back slope? Wonder if any of you have surveyed
Old Lynham or Bowden Doors. It feels like there ’should’ be rock art
here - but there isn’t any recorded?

Kettley Crags

I decided to give Bowden Doors a miss then went across to Chatton Park
Hill - which was superb - but the light was not good for photography.
Found the large enclosure and got some pics of Chatton 4. Then - as it
was gone 4.30pm I decided to make a last push for Ketley Crags - even
though the light was poor by now. It took me ten minutes to find it -
and it was largely Stan’s emphasis on badgers that drew me to the
correct rock - big badger excavations all around. To say I was ‘blown
away; by Kettley would be an understatement - Stan Beckensall’s comment
that ‘this is one of the greatest rock art sites in the whole world’ is
not an exaggeration. This is truly, truly amazing. Then to cap it all
the sun dropped below the thick bank of cloud that had hidden it for
the last two hours - and I got the most superb sidelighting for my
first visit to Ketley. Here are a couple of shots.

I did hurry off to try and find Chatton 5 & 6 - did find the latter
but light was fading fast. All in all a wonderful first visit.

Weetwood 6 - New Find?

After my trip to Fowberry yesterday I went over to Weetwood Moor and revisited the main motifs. At one point it started to rain and I ran for shelter into the woodland where the Weetwood Panel 6 motifs are. After the rain I walked back along the rock outcrop where it leaves the wood and runs back towards the main area of panels at Weetwood. Just outside the wood - on the outcrop edge - I noticed what look like faint traces of rings on a large boulder outcrop - about 10 metres from the wood edge. Do you think this is a ring pattern or just natural? when I ran my fingers over it I could feel what seemed like concentric circles. Wishful thinking?

The suspected motif is about 8″ in diameter. My eye was drawn to it by the circular patch of lichen and the low angle light which seemed to reveal circle patterns and pecks. It is very close to the two large motifs which are inside the edge of the wood - and the outcrop is a continuation of the main rock which they are carved on.

Fowberry Mains Park Find

Hi rock friends,

I risked life and limb going back to Fowberry Mains Park today in a 60mph gale with blustery showers- though the light was wonderful - if you could stand upright. If Turner had been alive he would have been painting the Cheviots and that enormous sky.

I spoke to Lance Strother earlier in the morning and he was most welcoming - merely asked that I didn’t take a dog into the field as he has cows about to calve; as it turns out they were almost a mile away from the motifs. So I got much better photos at mid afternoon. I also paced out the distance from the main group of rock motifs - it is 30 paces ‘uphill’ (south-west) from the end of the rock outcrop and 15 paces ‘inland’ from the line of the outcrop. It is 50 paces in a direct line to where the ‘chicken’ motif and main motifs are. The rock is detatched but earthfast.

Here below is a photo looking North East to the North Plantation. The main group of motifs is on the highest edge near the top of the picture, where the bracken ends.

In the much better light it was obvious that there is only one ringed-cup - at the right hand end (eastern end) and it is linked to a triad of cups by a cruciform groove. There are nine cups in all on the rock and there are serpentine grooves linking the two most central large cups.

Here you can see a close-up of the ringed cup with a cruciform groove linking three small cups at the Eastern end of the rock panel.

Here you can see faint but clear serpentine grooves linking the two right hand cups.

Late light shot which reveals slightly more detail.

I find this whole experience quite remarkable - the fact that this rock has been lying here with most of the cups visible for decades - only 50 metres from the main rock art panel - and nobody stumbled upon it. Gives me hope that there are other small discoveries to be made out there.

Graham

Amerside Law

This was an expedition that had been long in the planning, and that’s why I’ve written such a right old lengthy load of waffle. I’m chuffed, and I can’t help it, I don’t get out much. Anyone who reads this entry right the way through, in one go, wins a packet of winegums.

The fact that these carvings were effectively lost had rankled for many a year. Since the area of Drakestruther Moss had been ploughed and planted, a number of attempts had been made to try and relocate the carvings, Ian Hewitt being the last person to find anything, namely the small enclosed cup motif which Stan Beckensall lists as being ‘Near’ panel 3b.

Previous to that, at some point in the 1980s Maarten Van Hoek tracked down panel 3a:

However, the ‘main’ panel, (On the Beckensall Archive here) is located in an area in which the trees thrived. The density of planting being that characteristic of the 1970s and early 1980s, when the idea seemed to be ‘cram as many in as you can’. The trees are less than 1m apart in places, and consequently, within a few years an impenetrable barrier of interlocking larch had formed, effectively scuppering any attempts to see the carvings. As Stan remarked, the it was impossible to find the carvings, even if one knew where to look. It must have been quite frustrating, but this would have maybe been ameliorated by the knowledge that the carved outcrop had at least been spared from planting and ploughing. The one nagging concern being that when the trees were one day felled, would the outcrop be recognised as such, to avoid the possibility of damage. Though the plantation looks to have a good few years of growth, In the 26 years since these carvings were last seen, it has changed hands, and the current landowner has widened the forest trail around the edge of the plantation. Satellite images available initially on CD-ROM and more latterly on the internet via Flash Earth, showed that the width of the trails indicated that some serious amounts of wood may be due to be shifted. This made the accurate relocation of the carved panels a tad more needful.

Fowberry Mains - New Find

Hi guys,

Had a great visit to Fowberry Mains and Weetwood Moor today - still learning to read maps and Stan Beckensall’s directions. It was a rather gloomy day but I found the Fowberry Mains motifs easily.

I took photos of all the main ones on the outcrop edge - which has been extensively quarried. Then I wandered uphill about 30 metres and found an earthfast rock with 8 cups on it. The rock is about 0.75 of a metre in length and the cups are very well defined - about 2 inches across and fairly deep. Six of them are in a dead straight line - and the fourth prominent one from the top has the remains of a circle around it - just visible in this shot. I will go back on a sunnier day and get a better shot. I can’t see this collection of cups on the BRAC gallery for Fowberry Mains and it doesn’t appear in Stan’s graphic record of the site. I apologise if this is just wishful thinking - but is this a new one?

Cheers

Graham

Gled Law - New Find

Hi rock people; I sent a bunch of photos to Jan the other day from my recent wind blasted afternoon on Gled Law near Doddington. To my amazement Jan responded to tell me that he thinks this is a ‘new find’ - which would be remarkable if it turns out to be so. I knew that this entire area has been curry combed for decades - so was not expecting to find anything new- moreover, I could not find any of the large sets of motifs anywhere on Gled Law - it is a very large area, Ended up going to Buttony where I found the main motifs in the wood behind the WWII Pillbox.

As you can see from the photo this is an isolated boulder which sits right on the scarp edge at Gled Law, about 500 yards East of Cuddy’s Cave - on the same contour - more or less. There is a farm vehicle park in the field below with my car in it - which is directly in line with Cuddy’s Cave above it. There are a lot of isolated boulders and rocks on this scarp face but this was was close to an obvious line of ascent. Hope it really is ‘new’. Thanks to Jan for including it on BRAC.

Graham