Gwaith 10: Sites and Drama (9 Oct 2016)

Helo Pawb (Everyone)

As hinted at in my last post, my instincts told me to look to the land southwards of Bryn Celli Ddu for the setting of my protagonist’s village. The Explorer Map showed something called Caer Lêb, situated not far from Afon Braint. I decided to check it out.

After locating the site and its parking, I chatted for a few minutes with two men loading a trench digger onto a trailer. I told them I was exploring ancient sites and one of them noted how you could throw a stone anywhere on Anglesey and hit one. He also told me of a nearby farm that had a standing stone and the remains of two stone huts in its fields.

But first, Caer Lêb, which means Leaven Castle. The site is a low-lying enclosure defined by double banks and marshy ditches. Excavations revealed three stone-built circular huts, one of them having a flagged floor and a fireplace.

Display board at the site

View of ditch and embankment

View of the enclosure itself

The pentagon nature of the enclosure reminded me of Din Lligwy’s shape, though on a bigger scale, and confirmed, for me at least, the likely sacred nature of the number five for the builders of both sites. However, the location is a little too boggy for what I had in mind for my story, so I went looking for the stone huts I was told about.

The official trail signs were a little vague, but I eventually found the remains, in a field in which a herd of Welsh Blacks was grazing. Disappointingly, much of the stone from the huts must have been used for local fences or houses, as there wasn’t much left. After taking a photo of the nearest of the two, I started towards the other one, when the herd moved en mass towards me. Thus began one of the scariest moments of my life as I wondered if they were going to trample me for invading their space.

The first stone hut fragments, with the second one in the distance to the left

The herd of Welsh Blacks noticing me

The Welsh Blacks crowding me as I sat in the stone hut circle. The nearest own to the camera, yellow tag number 34, seemed to be the ringleader. The one in the lower left corner, half out of shot, was snuffling my backpack

I edged back to the first stone hut and sat down in the middle, thinking that the rocky terrain would make it difficult for the cattle to maintain their footing if they decided to rush me. For ten minutes or more, I watched them crowd around me, snorting, bellowing, and pushing at each other to get to the front. I talked to them quietly and made sure I didn’t make any sudden movements.

Eventually, I knew I should try to leave and see what happens. I stood up slowly and gently and strolled as nonchalantly as I could towards the gate. I could feel them following me, but resisted the impulse to see how many were there and what their mood was like. After I made it through the gate, with the whole herd gathered around it, relief flooded me and I was surprised at how calm I had been throughout the whole ordeal. Were they annoyed at me or just inquisitive? I don’t know. Still, the presence of so much horned muscle isn’t something I wish to experience again.

The Welsh Blacks milling around the gate after I went through

Ten Minutes

Hemmed in by 20 or more snuffling, bellowing Welsh Blacks

Bullocking each other to sniff my foodless backpack and me,

I sit on the stone hut fragments I had come to explore…

Talk softly. Don’t shake. Wait. Don’t run. Don’t look back.

After my pulse settled down, I wandered the farm tracks until I found the standing stone. Luckily, no Welsh Blacks grazed in that field.

Interesting shape, with one side flat and facing north

The interesting shape and texture of the stone

The upshot of this particular location scouting is that I will place my protagonist’s village near the site of the old stone huts, which is close to Afon Braint and only a short distance from Bryn Celli Ddu. I may even use the standing stone, though I’m not sure how as yet. As for Welsh Blacks, even though they are descended from pre-Roman cattle, if I feature any cattle in my story it will likely be the Celtic Shorthorn, which is now extinct.

As always, I welcome your comments and I wish you adventurous days, though hopefully not as drama-filled as this one was for me.

Cofion Cynnes (Warm Regards)

Earl

Gwaith 9: Bryn Celli Ddu (9 Oct 2016)

Helo Pawb (Everyone)

I have visited Bryn Celli Ddu twice before and written about the second one here. That blog explained my reasons for exploring it, and also Moel-y-don on the Menai Strait, so I won’t rehash them now. With this new visit, I wanted to check out the site for any seasonal changes I might be able to use in my novel and for anything else that might come up, as I’m sure will happen, given the synchronicities at other sites.

As I walked to the tomb, I took particular note of the trees and bird life and tracked the stream that ran nearby. The hedge along the track comprised hawthorn, blackthorn, guelder rose and rowan, while plenty of magpies, jackdaws and crows flew about and rasped, cawed and croaked their usual commentaries on the weather, winged life in general, and the interruptions by tourists. Near the tomb itself there were big Scots Pines and plenty of gorse, with a large outcrop of basalt rocks on a nearby hill.

Trees and bushes along the path to the tomb

Afon Braint, from a bridge between two sections of the path

First view of Bryn Celli Ddu, showing the back of the tomb with the reproduction 'Pattern Stone'.

Scots Pines at the nearby farm

Entrance to Bryn Celli Ddu

On the ledges inside the tomb, as I discovered last time, people had left offerings of shells, coins, sweets, crystals and feathers. After I also paid homage to the spirits of the place, I sat on the hard, uneven floor made of stone packed dirt, sketched the walls, the ceiling, and the ceremonial stone pillar, and noted the small pebbles and windblown tufts of grass lying around and the spider webs in the crevices of the walls. Brown dirt stained the bottoms of the massive slabs of rock forming the walls, while green lichen spread further up the slabs.

The passageway, looking out

Offerings on one of the ledges. Note the brown stain from the dirt floor.

The free standing pillar. Note also the green lichen and more offerings

When other visitors arrived, I stayed outside and sketched the tomb’s orientation to the stream and the nearby rock outcrops. I also spent time figuring out where I would place my main protagonist’s village so that he might stumble on the tomb after suffering a beating at the hands of other villages boys.

The lie of the land near the tomb.
(I had taken a video, which should more landscape, but the upload feature isn't working.)

 The entrance of the tomb is aligned to the summer solstice, so I considered having the village to the north. However, the lie of the land didn’t feel right, so the other option was to have the village to the south, on the other side of Afon Braint (Privilege River—What a great name!). This felt more appropriate for the story, even though the character’s discovery of the tomb would be more difficult to explain. Still, I have learnt to trust my instincts in poetic and story matters, and when I looked at my Explorer map, I noticed some intriguing sites downstream. As the next post will show, my investigations showed I had good reason to trust my instincts, though there was also some drama.

Another cloud shot (and you thought I was only obsessed with jackdaws)

As always, thanks for reading my ramblings and I welcome any comments.

Cofion Cynnes (Warm Regards)

Earl

Cyfaredd 16: Research on Ynys Mon--Day One

Haia Pawb

Part of my dark ages novel occurs on Anglesey (Ynys Môn), so I spent almost a week on the island researching megalithic tombs, Iron Age villages (both ruins and reconstructions), and other possible settings. On my first day, I checked out two of these: Bryn Celli Ddu and Moel-y-don.

After visiting Bryn Celli Ddu (The Mound of the Dark Grove) in 2013 and being impressed by the rounded stone pillar inside the central chamber—a raw occurrence, apparently—I decided to use the tomb for an important early scene in the novel. This new visit was a chance to explore the tomb in more detail than the last.

The tomb is located a few miles southeast of Llandaniel Fab. Although the history of the site goes back to 3,000 BC, with the building of a henge and ditch, for my purposes I was interested in the tomb itself, which was built roughly 2,000 BC and would have remained in its original state till it was explored in the early 20^th century. (After excavation, the mound was rebuilt, but only to about a quarter of its original size.)

Features I found of interest included

• The entrance, which is aligned to the summer solstice. The passageway is over 20 feet long and has a low shelf, which might have been used for storing cremated bones, on the right side as you come in.
• The stone pillar, as mentioned, which stands over six feet tall and is freestanding, meaning it doesn’t have a structural function but possibly a ceremonial one. The pillar has some markings on it, which some sources claim represent important astronomical events. However, given light doesn’t reach the pillar through the passageway (only through the rear opening, which is not an original feature), I don’t feel this assessment is correct.
• The sprinkling of offerings (feathers, flowers, crystals, candles, shells, bundles of twigs and material) on shelves around the chamber. This is a recent activity, as I saw nothing of this at my last visit.
• The ‘Pattern Stone’, with its serpentine wave and spiral shapes, which was found buried near the centre of the mound, which itself had a stone slab with an ear bone beneath it. The original slab is now in the National Museum of Wales, but a replica has been set upright outside the southwest side of the mound, a spot felt to be its placement before the original henge was destroyed to make way for the chamber tomb.

As for the chamber itself, it has a packed dirt floor and walls formed from six massive slabs of rock, with pebbles and small rocks filling crevices between these and between the walls and the two slabs used for the roof. The chamber is tall enough to stand in, but one needs to duck when traversing the long passageway.

After pacing out the dimensions of the chamber, I spreading my jacket on the floor and spent a long while soaking in the atmosphere and imagining how my important scene would play out. Luckily, no other visitors interrupted my meditations. When I was happy with my explorations inside the mound, I went outside to survey the undulating landscape and a distant long, flat-topped hill and again imagine what it might have looked like in the sixth century. Flights of rooks above woods thick with underbrush probably extending right to the tomb. Sounds of animals foraging and hunting. A fox skirting an open field in which a few long-horned cattle from the nearby settlement graze. A chiming brook whittling its way through soft, rich earth.

I then jumped into my hire car and drove through Llanfairpwll towards the Menai Strait (Afon Menai), which separates Ynys Môn from the mainland of Wales. I was investigating Moel-y-don, a possible site for the Roman invasion of Ynys Môn c. 61AD.

Another early scene in the novel is a vision of this brutal battle when the Romans crossed the straight with cavalry and flat-bottomed boats carrying infantry. The only known description of the battle is given by the Roman Historian Tacitus in his Annals XIV:

He [Suetonius Paulinus] prepared accordingly to attack the island of Mona, which had a considerable population of its own, while serving as a haven for refugees; and, in view of the shallow and variable channel, constructed a flotilla of boats with flat bottoms. By this method the infantry crossed; the cavalry, who followed, did so by fording or, in deeper water, by swimming at the side of their horses.

On the beach stood the adverse array, a serried mass of arms and men, with women flitting between the ranks. In the style of Furies, in robes of deathly black and with dishevelled hair, they brandished their torches; while a circle of Druids, lifting their hands to heaven and showering imprecations, struck the troops with such an awe at the extraordinary spectacle that, as though their limbs were paralysed, they exposed their bodies to wounds without an attempt at movement. Then, reassured by their general, and inciting each other never to flinch before a band of females and fanatics, they charged behind the standards, cut down all who met them, and enveloped the enemy in his own flames.

The next step was to install a garrison among the conquered population, and to demolish the groves consecrated to their savage cults: for they considered it a pious duty to slake the altars with captive blood and to consult their deities by means of human entrails. While he was thus occupied, the sudden revolt of the province was announced to Suetonius.

That the island, with its sacred groves, was the centre of Druid religion in Britain is commemorated by one of the ancient poetical names for Anglesey: the Old Welsh Ynys Dywyll (‘Shady Isle’ or ‘Dark Isle’). The sudden revolt, of course, was the one by Queen Boudica.

I arrived at the shoreline in drizzly weather. Strips of seaweed on a beach on shells and pebbles. Seagulls wheeling overhead. Mud and sand lining the beach and stretching around the point, which seems to align with a nob of land sticking out from the opposite shore. The distance across the strait, about 500 yards, seems short enough for the use of onagers and the crossing by boat and horse.

After again taking time to absorb the scene and imagine the battle itself, and with the drizzle turning into lashing rain, I returned to the car and drove back to my hotel.

So, at the end of day one on Ynys Mon I had explored two important sites for my novel. A successful day of research.

All comments are welcome.

Cofion cynnes

Earl