9th July 2024 - Warrior's Dyke

  Well keeping my eye on our member of parliament - Josh Fenton-Glynn, there was a mention in the BBC news that several new members had problems with the trains from the North, either being cancelled or late.  Which is so ironic, as the cheerful photo of yesterday with him leaving Hebden Bridge was followed by a wait for a late train.  But photos this morning shows him grinning happily (dressed in a suit) on the steps of Westminster.  I just hope his innocence and drive for a better country is not shredded by the machinations of parliament.

So this morning I have been perusing the Gutenburg Project after a very famous vicar called Sabine Baring-Goulding.  This man wrote over a hundred books, his knowledge spanned innumerable subjects, whether folklore, history, biography, ghost stories.  He wrote about my favourite place St. Davids Head in Wales, for he was like many vicars of the 19th century an amateur archaeologist, and of course he also wrote about Cornwall and Dartmoor.

He wrote standing up, and was obviously obsessive about writing, the book I have been reading on the Gutenberg website is called 'Cliff Castles and Caves of Europe' , basically because I had found a reference to Daniel Gumb who lived on Bodmin Moor with his family, in a rock structure he had constructed under the Cheesewring Tor. Another day for him, he was an extremely intelligent man who carved the words on gravestones.  

Because what I was thinking about this morning were the round huts of the prehistoric people, how when coming back from St. Arthur's Hall there was also a settlement of houses, their shapes scattered amongst stone.

Baring-Gould wrote of those that live on the fringes of society, in caves like troglodytes, he was fascinated with the fantastic, whether werewolf or vampire.  So one views his mind through a somewhat judgmental attitude but............ Under the veil of Mythology lies a solid reality .

There is an argument that many stories and folktales collected in the 19th century were made up by those who collected them.  But we who live in an age of the written word forget that people all through the centuries could not read.  Stories were carried on over the centuries, as wild plants had history and stories, so did the landscapes in which people lived.

St. David's Head, defensive banks of stones of Warrior's Dyke

So to get back to the round huts on St, David's Hear at Warrior's Dyke, a small cliff top hill fort, well defended by the sea on one side and still retaining some of the defensive walling as you approach it.

Earlier blog

Warrior's Dyke on its spur

Hut circle area