Period: Medieval

The hero archetype and Lugh

Museum of Anatolian Civilizations Çatalhöyük Leopard reliefs all in 2019 01

At its core the “hero” is the figure who steps out of ordinary society, confronts chaos or a monster, and returns (or dies) having secured order for the group. In Jungian and comparative-myth terms it sits in the “warrior-champion” slot of the collective story-board; evolutionists would say it crystallises the survival value of decisive coalition leadership in small bands.

Head One – St Michaels Church, Kirklington

Kirklington Head 1 - left side

This head is one of thirteen “Celtic”, or archaic heads that are located within the interior of the church. Twelve of those heads, including this one, are located in four rows of three, which run down either side of the churches arched columns. The thirteenth head is located in the bell tower.

Long Meg and her Daughters standing stone and stone circle

An aerial photo of Long Meg and her Daughters standing stone and stone circle in Cumbria. Part of a site report on britgantesnation.com

Long Meg and her Daughters is a remarkable Neolithic monument located near Penrith in Cumbria, England.

Anciens Arsenaux Neolithic Settlement, Sion – Switzerland

Upper Rhone Valley

Sion lies midway along the upper Rhône Valley, an east‑west trench gouged by repeated Pleistocene glaciers and now flanked by the Pennine and Bernese Alps. The settlement area sits on the alluvial fan of the Sionne torrent, a cone of well‑sorted sands and gravels that projects onto the wider Rhône flood‑plain. 

Wellhill, Dunning Early Neolithic Farm – Perthshire

Dunning Perthshire - Satellite view of Wellhill prehistoric settlement

The village of Dunning in Perthshire, Scotland,  has been revealed through excavation as having traces of human activity dating back 10,000 years. This included evidence of what could be the earliest farming activity recorded in Scotland so far, and also remains of hunter-gathering activity dating back to the Mesolithic period.

Great Roe Wood (Roe Wood) Enclosure – Woodhouse

Great Roe Wood - Sheffield - OS Series 1

Great Roe Wood (often simply called “Roe Wood”) sits on the Magnesian Limestone ridge that carries the Roman Rig between Sheffield and Doncaster, just northeast of the village of Woodhouse (OS grid SK 450 920). This ridge forms a natural corridor overlooking the Don valley, with shallow soils over limestone giving way to deeper alluvial gravels in the valley bottom.

Camp Green (Danes Camp), Hathersage

Danes Camp Hathersage

Camp Green (often called “Danes Camp”) crowns a limestone-capped knoll immediately north-east of St Michael’s Church in Hathersage (OS grid SK 234 819). Perched above the Hope Valley, it commands wide views down the River Derwent corridor and sits at the transition between the Millstone Grit plateaux to the north and the lower limestone and sandstone vale to the south

Roman Rig Defensive Works

The Roman Rig is a defensive dyke built to defend against attack from the south. It runs from Sheffield, past Templeborough and carries on almost to Doncaster. If this is a Brigantian dyke it would certainly add weight to Websters definition of the Roman border in the period.

Guide: Ritual/Ceremonial Mounds

Marlborough mound 20240518 looking southwards

These are raised platforms created first and foremost for cult, procession, assembly or conversion—not for fortification or routine boundary-making. They tend to be much more significant and monumental than other mounds and raised platforms. Some are the largest structures known of their type. In Britain, possibly the best known example is Silbury Hill in Wiltshire.

Guide: Spoil Heaps

Ochre mine in the Lion Cavern in Eswatini southern Africa - Credit - Jörg Linstädter

These are artificial hills made from the unwanted rock, shale and tailings that come up with coal, metal ore, stone or clay when it is being mined or quarried. Because extractive industry is both deep and long-lived, single collieries or pits can generate tens of millions of cubic metres of spoil; pushed out by locomotive, conveyor or tippler wagon and dumped in successive layers, the piles quickly become a distinctive landform.

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