The Grey Mare Stone

A large earth-fast boulder on open moorland below Glaisdale Head

The stone marks an ancient boundary, it has been carved with the dates of estate perambulations.

The carvings read EGTON, RG 1713, 1719, 1735RC, E1745, F1752, 1779, 1799, 1821, 1844.

Three stones

Blakey Ridge – The Honey Poke – Flat Howe – Esklets – Sweet Banks – South Flat Howe – Bimshaw – Blakey Gill Head

It was a fine day on the coast so I thought I’d take a walk onto the moors. As I climbed onto Castleton Rigg the wind picked-up and the skies started to darken. I decided to wander over to the head of Westerdale via Flat Howe and the remains of the Blakey colliery bell pits.

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The moorland path starts at one of the most accessible of the moorland prehistoric standing stones, Margery Bradley. The view is to the south into Rosedale.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThe path is marked by small walker’s cairns and the occasional estate boundary stone. This one, marking the boundary of the Feversham Estate, has been broken for many years.

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Moorland sands wash out from the peat and collect on the trackway.

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Towards the head of the valley the remains of ancient trees are visible where the peat has eroded away.

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Sediment profiles taken at nearby Esklets also provides a vegetation record from the late Mesolithic, showing a heavily wooded landscape dominated by alder and hazel, perhaps indicating low stature woodland, rather than oak forest.

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Netting made from natural fibres has been laid on the worst of the eroded areas, presumably to give the moorland grasses a foothold and try to limit the erosion of the peat.

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The weather suddenly changes as a storm blows-in from the west. As the storm increases I decide to head back.

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The storm has passed, I arrive back on Blakey Ridge close to the old road mender’s boundary stone.

SourceĀ  North East Yorkshire Mesolithic Project Phase 2 Report by Mags Waughman

White Cross

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White Cross survives as a base of local fine gritstone…The shaft is dressed in a chevron pattern indicating a post medieval date probably in the 19th century. The base is dateable to the medieval period. The east face of the base has the inscription – White Cross. Each face of the shaft is carved with a simple cross with equal arms 0.22m across. The east face has an OS bench mark cut near the ground. The cross has been whitewashed over the years according to the practice of the Downe Estate. The cross stands in its original position 2m from the edge of the old route from Castleton across Danby Low Moor. It also acts as a boundary marker for the medieval parishes of Danby and Commondale and now the county constituency of Cleveland and Whitby. The original shaft for this cross is in a museum at Whitby.

EXTRACT FROM ENGLISH HERITAGE’S RECORD OF SCHEDULED MONUMENTS