Prehistoric Postcards

A few years ago I bought an album of old french postcards themed around prehistoric monuments and natural rock features.

This sparked a short obsession with prehistoric postcards. I bought most of them from ebay and boot sales, setting myself the challenge of paying no more than a pound or two for each card. The obsession burned itself out after a year or two so and I decided to put the collection online for anyone to use. I uploaded about a third of the cards and then kind of lost interest. I’ll return to it one day and finish the job.

If this sort of thing interests you, the collection can be found here

Beacon Moor Scraper

A few years ago I found this lovely flint tool on the field margin a few yards away from the Bronze Age burial mound at the top of Patterson’s Bank.

Ramsdale, The Grey Horse Stone & The Old Wife’s Neck

..Knox was perhaps the first to recognise the stone triangle. He records one from Ramsdale Hill Top, Two miles west-south-west of Robin Hood’s Bay made of stones 4-6 feet high..another near Stoup Brow forms an acute triangle, the tallest stone known as the Grey Horse Stone being not more than 5 feet high.

Early Man in NE Yorkshire. Frank Elgee. 1930

23

Markse Road, Ox Close, Wilton Bank, Pithills, Hob Hill, Four Lanes End, Village Wood, Beacon Moor, Errington Wood, Marske Quarry, Falkland Walk, Quarry Lane, Plummer’s Bank,

The edgelands are slowly dissolving

A dream job

Were the Hobs driven out by the ironstone miners or do they survive in the abandoned galleries beneath the Anglian burial ground?

When it snows, the children of Saltburn invade the golf course to sledge the banks. The greenkeepers don’t like the snow.

The path ends at the road, the road has no pavement, we are forced to walk in the gutters.

An aerial ropeway once spanned the low valley.

The rain arrives

 I collect a few flint fragments from the field margin including a small worked tool.

The terrier and I explore the woods and sandstone quarry. We disturb some deer, the terrier’s eyesight is not so good, he decides not to give chase. A pair of charcoal kilns lie in the quarry bottom waiting for spring to arrive

The quarry is much older than the ironstone workings futher down the slope. Sandstone from the quarry was used in local buildings and walls. The weathered quarry walls contain a number of niches.

Wet through and cold we head home along Quarry Lane.

Upleatham [Upelider DB, Uplithum c1150 Whitby, 1272 Ipm]. ‘Upper slopes.’ Cf. KIRKLEATHAM. U- is higher than Kirkleatham. Uplider DB seems to be a Scandanavianized form, ON Upphlioir.  The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names. Eilert Ekwall 1974

soundtrack 

 

Flints

A lovely little blade found on a molehill at Saltergate

A possible microlith also found on a molehill at Saltergate

The Earliest Use of Cleveland Ironstone?

The display card should read Danby Low Moor

Pannett Park Museum, Whitby.

Danby Rigg

The lithics, though few in number, do provide evidence for activity on Danby Rigg from the late Mesolithic onwards. The fact that it is sparse compared with other areas probably reflects the extent of peat coverage rather than the absense of prehistoric activity

Prehistoric & Early Medieval Activity on Danby Rigg, North Yorkshire.

Harding A

Royal Archaeological Institute 151, 1994