Castlerigg, a 5,000-year-old stone circle

Castlerigg Copyright D McIlmoyle

There are a lot of stone circles in Cumbria; about 65, in fact. Some are huge¹, and some are tiny². Some have massive standing stones that can hardly be missed from miles away as long as you have an eye line¹ and others are so stumpy that you could literally trip over them before you realise they’re not sleeping sheep³.

Cumbria’s most famous, and most visited stone circle is Castlerigg, which is a pleasant 1¹/₂ mile walk or few minutes’ drive from the centre of Keswick. It’s often been said that it’s Castlerigg’s sublime location that makes it so beautiful; on a flat-topped hill, surrounded by serious mountains including Skiddaw, Blencathra, Helvellyn and Lonscale Fell. To one side, there are open views into one of the Lake District’s classic ‘u’-shaped valleys with picture-postcard patchwork fields, a white-washed farmhouse and speckling of mature trees.

Castlerigg is believed to be about 5,000 years old⁴. That’s amazing, isn’t it? It’s old, even for a stone circle.The circle is slightly squashed, with a diameter varying from 33m to 30m, but it seems pretty round to the visitor. As well as the circle outline, it has what we have always called ‘the porch’ on the south-east side; this is a rectangular shape of ten stones projecting into the circle.

Castlerigg view south copyright D McIlmoyle

Opinions vary about the number of stones. This may sound like nonsense – especially as stone circles across Britain are often associated with the story of uncountable stones⁵ – but it can be difficult to work out whether a ground-level stony bit is meant to be part of the circle. Sometimes it is, as it’s a stone that fell over a long time ago, and sometimes – and this seems to be the case at Castlerigg – it’s actually a smallish stone that was wedged against another to hold it upright when the circle was first built. The National Trust’s current story is that it has 40 stones (you’ll hear anything between 38 and 48).

We don’t really know why our ancestors built stone circles, but we can hazard a few guesses. Quite a few people have invested a lot of time in establishing links between stones, visual landmarks and significant solar and lunar events, as we all know from pictures of people greeting the midsummer sunrise at Stonehenge. Cumbria’s own Long Meg is aligned with the midwinter sunset. Alexander Thom established that the tallest stone at Castlerigg aligns with the mountain-top of Higg Rigg at Imbolc/Candlemas, with other links for midsummer and midwinter⁷. David Barrowclough reports a more recent theory that Castlerigg is a rare example of a circle aligned with lunar, rather than solar, cycles⁸.

We also know that locally-made Langdale hand axes are found at Cumbria’s northern stone circles. It is perhaps overstating things to suggest that stone circles were made as marketplaces for the hand axe trade, but they are certainly found there; three were unearthed at Castlerigg – when people were allowed to burrow around for their own amusement! – in the 18^th and 19^th centuries⁹. I’ve written more about Langdale hand axes in this post.

Castlerigg view north copyright D McIlmoyle

Castlerigg probably wasn’t used for burials. In 1882, an early reporter¹⁰ said there were the remains of three cairns in the circle, although these have since vanished. There was also a buried fire pit in the ‘porch’ area. It’s not unusual for cremated remains to be buried at stone circles – but  in the Bronze Age, long after the circles were originally erected.

Until relatively recently in Castlerigg’s long life, we didn’t think it had any ancient carvings, like the ones you see at Long Meg. But we were wrong. One day in late September, 1995, a young lady called Hannah Casement was visiting the circle just as the sun went down. To her amazement, ‘I glanced behind me at the stone, and saw that it appeared to be glowing orange and had this huge spiral coming out of the rock…‘¹¹. Two students succeeded in photographing it later that year, in low winter sunlight, in the presence of a number of archaeologists. It’s definitely there, but virtually invisible without the finest equipment or the blessing of just the right natural light.

And this, just in case you need to be told, is the reason not to climb on neolithic monuments. How many more pairs of scrabbling walking boots would it have taken to render this carving invisible forever? Just don’t do it, folks. But I’ll see you there on September 22^nd, 2012.

 ©Diane McIlmoyle 06.06.12

NB. Please don’t pinch my photos, or I’ll go and count the stones at Long Meg

Castlerigg Stone Circle’s page at English Heritage (it’s owned by the National Trust but managed by English Heritage).

1. Long Meg. It’s about 100m in diameter.
2. Little Meg. A third of a mile from Long Meg, and about 5m in diameter.
3. Gamelands. It might have a large diameter (about 44m), but I really did think the stones were sheep.
4. The Stone Circles of Cumbria by John Waterhouse (1985)
5. In fact, if you succeed in counting the stones at Long Meg and her Daughters, you will find out that they are witches, turned to stone for dancing on the sabbath. You have been warned.
6. Prehistoric Cumbria by David Barrowclough (2010), p101.
7. As reported in The Stone Circles of Cumbria by John Waterhouse (1985), p97.
8. Prehistoric Cumbria by David Barrowclough (2010), p131.
9. As reported in Prehistoric Rock Art in Cumbria by Stan Beckensall (2002), p71.
10. As reported in Prehistoric Rock Art in Cumbria by Stan Beckensall (2002), p71.
11. Prehistoric Rock Art in Cumbria by Stan Beckensall (2002), p70.

Tags: castlerigg, castlerigg stone circle, cumbrian history, cumbrian stone circle, lake district stone circle, stone circle