Two parallel grooves run along burnt ground.
A series of parallel grooves run along burnt ground.
The cart tracks of the North York Moors. Last year’s devastating fire on Fylingdales Moor has revealed archaeology in graphic detail. Medieval holloways and seventeenth and eighteenth-century cart tracks are visible for the first time and look as fresh as the day they were made.
Perhaps some of them used these trackways.
Yes, that’ll be very interesting.
Burnt trees on burnt moorland.
Burnt trees on burnt moorland.
None of these would have been revealed without the fire. But the devastation is shocking - ecosystems, whole woodlands even, gone. It looks apocalyptic and will take decades to recover.
Deep, straight grooves in burnt ground.
A rusted iron object.
Rusted tracks forming a circle.
Rusted tracks.
In places, Second World War tank tracks overwrite the cart tracks. Lying in one is even the rusted remains of a tank fire extinguisher. And in places, actual tank tracks have been reused as bollards.
Lines of grooves run into grass and heather.
Here, a wide array of tracks runs from a burnt area into an unburnt one, where they become invisible again.
Three parallel lines run through burnt moorland.
The carts were likely taking salt fish from Whitby, and most likely predate 1740 when a turnpike was opened. Here you can see a cart’s tracks with a groove in the middle formed by the pony’s hooves. You can almost hear the sound of the mud squelching and the cart creaking.
Two parallel grooves run along burnt ground.
A series of parallel grooves run along burnt ground.
The cart tracks of the North York Moors. Last year’s devastating fire on Fylingdales Moor has revealed archaeology in graphic detail. Medieval holloways and seventeenth and eighteenth-century cart tracks are visible for the first time and look as fresh as the day they were made.
A photo of the Rudston Monolith with a church behind it and gravestones around it. Green grass and daffodils in the foreground.
I was back doing some fieldwork at one of my favourite Neolithic monuments yesterday. The neck-craning, almost 8m Rudston Monolith, a great, grey Yorkshire leviathan. The warden of the Wolds. No other standing stone in the UK beats it in sheer stature.
#StandingStoneSunday
Happy days. I probably have a photo of that somewhere.
A photo of the Rudston Monolith with a church behind it and gravestones around it. Green grass and daffodils in the foreground.
I was back doing some fieldwork at one of my favourite Neolithic monuments yesterday. The neck-craning, almost 8m Rudston Monolith, a great, grey Yorkshire leviathan. The warden of the Wolds. No other standing stone in the UK beats it in sheer stature.
#StandingStoneSunday
That’s rather fine! Mine is undoubtedly a David Inshaw.
Yep, nope, nope.
😝 There’s some truth in that!
Thanks Sue. Absolutely true!
Thanks Mike. Yes, that’s true.
Academia! 🙄
Thanks Dan.
Glorious is the word!
Absolutely - a wonder monument that forces everyone to utter a ‘wow’.
You must! There’s nothing like it anywhere else.
I still remember Vicki Cummings review of the monograph in Antiquity stating that the work was ‘small-scale’ and ‘we’ve learnt nothing new’! A multi-million pound project in which we spent a year inside the mound fundamentally revising the phasing! Or MPP saying the we ‘failed to find a reason’ 😜
I found it a huge privilege and am immensely proud of what we did. Because it wasn’t a university project it never received the recognition it deserved from Neolithic specialists - especially those involved in Avebury and Stonehenge - and that’s to their shame. It was an iconic excavation.
A photo of Silbury Hill taken from the lay-by, showing the green grass-covered mound surrounded by a water-filled ditch.
The heart-quickening sight of an old friend. #SilburyHill - the largest prehistoric mound in Europe. A Neolithic monument I once spent a year inside. It is a mass of ancient matter, and quicksilver - substantial, heavy, brilliant, yet can’t be pinned down. #Neolithic
Thank you! These are very useful.
Sorry I missed this. Ditto reply to quote.
Thank you.
Thank you, that’s interesting! I guess repeated low heat would also eventually change the colour of the stones and heat damage them.
A photo of York students excavating a Saxon building with Skipsea castle in the background.
A photo of York students excavating an early medieval timber hall with Skipsea castle in the background.
A photo of York students excavating a Saxon building with Skipsea castle in the background.
A photo of a Saxon building.
Get your popcorn 🍿 ready for tonight - 8pm BBC2, our excavations at #Skipsea in Holderness will be on #DiggingforBritain.
@uoyarchaeology.bsky.social
🎂🥳