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Kent

<b>Kent</b>Posted by slumpystonesImage © slumpy
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Sites in this group:

3 posts
Ashenbank Wood Bowl Barrow Round Barrow(s)
1 post
Bay Hill Round Barrow(s)
3 posts
Bigbury Camp Hillfort
1 post
Bodsham Long Barrow Long Barrow
5 posts
The Coffin Stone Natural Rock Feature
118 posts
Coldrum Long Barrow
34 posts
The Countless Stones Dolmen / Quoit / Cromlech
5 posts
High Rocks Cave / Rock Shelter
1 post
Iffin Wood Round Barrow(s)
9 posts
Julliberrie's Grave Long Barrow
74 posts
Kit's Coty Dolmen / Quoit / Cromlech
4 posts
Maplescombe Church Stone Christianised Site
2 posts
North Foreland Round Barrow(s) (Destroyed)
8 posts
1 site
Oldbury Hillfort Hillfort
7 posts
Ringlemere Farm Round Barrow(s)
4 posts
Shoulder of Mutton Wood Bell Barrow Round Barrow(s)
4 posts
Smythe's Megalith Long Barrow
14 posts
Squerryes Park Hillfort
26 posts
White Horse Stone Standing Stone / Menhir
Sites of disputed antiquity:
3 posts
Standing Sarsen Stone at Eynsford Standing Stone / Menhir
9 posts
Walderslade Woods Cup and Ring Marks / Rock Art

News

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Bronze Age bracelets found in Kent


Two Bronze Age gold bracelets almost 3,000 years old have been discovered during excavations along the route of the East Kent Access Road. When they were found one bracelet was placed inside the other.

The bracelets were found in an area of the Ebbsfleet peninsula from which four other Late Bronze Age hoards are already known... continues...
thesweetcheat Posted by thesweetcheat
21st September 2010ce

Artefacts hint at earliest Neanderthals in Britain

"Archaeologists have found what they say is the earliest evidence of Neanderthals living in Britain.

Two pieces of flint unearthed at motorway works in Dartford, Kent, have now been dated to 110,000 years ago. "

Full story from the BBC -

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/science_and_environment/10206677.stm
Chris Collyer Posted by Chris Collyer
2nd June 2010ce
Edited 2nd June 2010ce

Lottery Grant to raise Medway's profile


I have spent the last few months battering away at the local Heritage departments in an attempt to improve the knowledge and awareness of the locals and to do something about the pretty sad state of the monuments around the Medway... continues...
slumpystones Posted by slumpystones
31st May 2007ce
Edited 22nd October 2010ce

Road Dig Reveals Iron Age Remains


From an article published on the BBC News web site on 4th May 2005:
Archaeologists have discovered iron age remains under the route of a new bypass around the village of Leybourne... continues...
Kammer Posted by Kammer
9th May 2005ce
Edited 17th February 2006ce

Bronze Age finds to go on display


Excerpts from an article published on the BBC News web site on 3rd February 2005:
Skeletons from the Bronze Age that were found in an archaeological dig in Kent and said to be among the best preserved from that time, are to go on show... continues...
Kammer Posted by Kammer
3rd February 2005ce
Edited 17th February 2006ce

Bronze Age Skeletons Found in Dig


From an article published on the BBC News web site on 28th January 2005:
Archaeologists have unearthed a unique site in Kent which they claim contains the best preserved examples of Bronze Age skeletons... continues...
Kammer Posted by Kammer
1st February 2005ce
Edited 17th February 2006ce

Recreated Bronze Age boat to cross Channel


Archaeologists are planning to build a copy of an ancient boat found in Dover and sail it from Britain to France. The original was found by chance in 1992 in a water filled shaft during roadworks in the town. It was one of the best preserved examples of a coastal vessel from the Bronze age ever found... continues...
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
1st December 2004ce
Edited 17th February 2006ce

Kentish Metal Detectorists Unearth Treasure

In two separate incidents metal detectorists working in Kent have unearthed fascinating hoards of prehistoric coins, axe heads and jewellery.

A number of weeks ago two metal detectorists found an Iron Age hoard on farmland near Maidstone and last Sunday another detectorist dug up a Bronze Age hoard near Wye.
Whole story here
Jane Posted by Jane
15th December 2003ce
Edited 8th February 2006ce

A white horse, 100 metres high, is to be carved into the chalk downs at Folkestone


Turf war over Byers' white horse

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/localgovernment/story/0,9061,675788,00... continues...
Posted by phil
6th April 2002ce
Edited 15th February 2006ce

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Miscellaneous

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In response to Rhiannon's Battle Street conundrum, I drove past there today and made a short detour. Just before the end of the lane, on the right, is a modernish housing development...called Sarsen Close, would you believe...in the drive of one house were 3 stones, and more in the gardens of the other houses in the close. One must have been 12' x 6' x 1' thick, laying flat and used as a planter of all things, a real shame because it was a stunning piece of stone...I didn't go into the field or down the path. not knowing really what to look for.

Also 1/4 mile away I found another stone, an absolute beauty, either heavily carved or bless with the most natural art ever.

Now I have some photos, but if I start posting pictures of sarsens everywhere it will mean chaos!
slumpystones Posted by slumpystones
24th March 2007ce
Edited 24th March 2007ce

When first built, the Medway's long barrows had high rectangular chambers. These, their entrances finally blocked by a focal portal stone, and with a facade, were at the eastern end of considerable, in surviving instances more than 60m in length, long barrows. Flanked by quarry ditches or scoops, they were retained by sarsen stone kerbs, the surviving boulders being mostly of modest size.

On the eastern side of the Medway there is the Lower Kit's Coty House, where, when scrutinized from the east, it can be seen that the chamber's side stones have fallen to the north. Were they, as were those of Chestnuts, merely pulled back into a vertical position, there would be a chamber almost 7m long and 3.5m wide, with an astonishing internal height, at least at the entrance, of almost 2.8m. At Chestnuts this procedure showed that its stones demarcated a chamber 4m long, 2m wide and 3m high. The Coffin Stone's chamber could have been at least 3.5m high.

Such chamber heights are exceptional, and thus the Medway's megalithic long barrows were undiputedly a unique group of the largest and most grandiose of their kind.

Paul Ashbee - Kent in Prehistoric Times.
slumpystones Posted by slumpystones
20th March 2007ce
Edited 22nd October 2010ce

Something else to throw into the Medway mix. I'd not heard of these pits before, perhaps they're not prehistoric at all, but their proximity to Kit's Coty and the rest is interesting, and they are to do with flint..
At several places in this part of Kent, especially on and near the high ridge which runs to the westward, there have been observed deep pits, evidently of a very remote antiquity. They consist of a large circular shaft, descending like a well, and opening at the bottom into one or more chambers..

On Friday, the 23rd of August, 1844, having obtained permission to excavate in the estate belonging to Preston Hall, which extends over the top of this hill, I took some labourers with me.. to examine the ground behind Kits Coty House.. I proceeded further on the top of the hill into what I knew to be the Preston Hall property, and on the ground just within the limits of Aylesford common I found single stones, closely resembling those of which the cromlechs below are built, but lying flat on the ground.

My first impression was that they were the capstones of cromlechs, or sepulchral chambers, buried under theground, and, having singled out one of them, I set the men to dig under the side of it. When they got under the edge they found thye were digging among a mass of flints, which had evidently been placed there by design; I then caused the men to continue the excavation to a greater distance round, and, to my surprise, I found that this immense stone was laid over the mouth of a large circular pit which had first been filled up to the top with flints. To proceed any further without a greater number of men than I had with me would have been useless.

But, just as I was leaving it, some of the cottagers on the top of the hill - squatters - informed me that these pits were frequently found on that hill, and that they generally had one or two of the large stones at the mouth. When, a few years before, a new road was made over the brow of the hill, and flints were sought for that purpose, the labourers discovered these pits and partly emptied some of them, which they found much more profitable than seeking the flints on the surface of the chalk. One was shown to me which had been emptied to a depth of about ten feet, and had been discontinued on account of the labour of throwing the flints up.
p565 in The Gentleman's Magazine for 1852, in an article on 'The Valley of Maidstone - Kits Coty House and the Cromlechs around' by Thomas Wright.
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
21st January 2007ce
Edited 22nd October 2010ce

Right out of the Medway valley area we have hints of another megalithic structure, near the village of Cobham, some five miles west of Rochester. Here in an orchard off Battle Street remains today one sarsen, but we know that a group of great stones once existed here because Payne gives extracts from the diary of the farmer who carted them away in 1770-3, while others were removed in 1842 to make a rockery at Cobham Hall. Lucas reported in 1854 on the probability of a megalith once existing here, and states that a native told him that Battle Street led to 'The Warrior's Grave'.

...The supposed Cobham megalith was also associated with a battle. Lucas visited this district in 1854, twelve years after the last of the stones had been removed, and eighty years after its destruction, but he reports that it was known locally as 'The Warrior's Grave', and this name was coupled with that of the lane which led towards the monument, which was called Battle Street. This name still endures and is certainly of some antiquity, for we have a record of it as such in 1471. There is no historical record of a battle being fought thereabouts.

George Payne, Collectanea Cantiana 1893, p153.
W C Lucas, Journ. Arch. Asscn., 1854, vol ix, p427.
This comes from p38 and p42 of 'Notes on the Folklore and Legends Associated with the Kentish Megaliths, by John H. Evans, in Folklore, Vol. 57, No. 1. (Mar., 1946).

Cobham is at TQ6768, and 'Battle Street' is marked on the 1:25,000 OS map. Does the stone exist or not? The author's obviously confused! Perhaps someone local knows.
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
25th September 2006ce
Edited 25th September 2006ce

Links

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Exploring Kent's Past


Searchable Historic Environment Record for Kent. If you look at the sites on a map you can also choose historic maps for the area.
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
3rd June 2011ce

Dover Museum


'The Dover Bronze Age Boat', said to be the world's oldest known sea-going boat.

Explanations, photos and diagrams of how the boat was constructed, how it was excavated, and how it was conserved. Basic but nice. Perhaps a trip to the museum to see the boat in person is in order..
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
19th September 2006ce
Edited 3rd June 2011ce

Latest posts for Kent

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Coldrum (Long Barrow) — Fieldnotes

I've been meaning to visit Coldrum for what seems like an eternity. It would pop into my head as I was lurching around the M25 after a hard days slog in London, but usually I'd find myself too tired, the light would be fading or the weather not quite right. So despite the on/off rain showers Mrs. C and I decided to try a visit on the way to friends in North Kent and as it turned out it couldn't have been much better. I was a bit surprised once we'd located it that it wasn't perched on the edge of the North Downs, which is how I'd always pictured it, but nestling in the valley below on a small raised platform of a hill. The views from here, however, are quite wonderful as your gaze tumbles along the bottom of the downs and across the surrounding fields and I doubt whether that view will have changed very much in the past 5000 years considering its isolation. Somebody else who turned up while we were there informed us that most of the surrounding land is to become a vineyard in the near future and I wondered how that might impact on the site.

As we were there as the sun was going down everything seemed to have that warm glow about it and the light gave the stones that extra strength and definition so reminiscent of childhood evenings in Wiltshire when we'd drive out to places like West Kennet and Avebury and the stance of the site is not unlike the Wiltshire sites also. The only detraction was that some imbecile had written the word 'DEVIL' on one of the burial chamber stones in charcoal but it must have been a while ago and it had faded and would probably disappear with the next good rain fall. The other thing that was interesting and which has been noted here before is the strange blueness of the stones once they're in shadow. I couldn't work out if this was just due to the comparison between the lit and unlit stone or perhaps something to do with the lichens that cover them and how they interact with light?

So what a delight and a place that I'm itching to get back to, along with the nearby Chestnuts at Addington, which we didn't get to see on this occasion, but would be interesting to compare.
A R Cane Posted by A R Cane
1st February 2012ce

Coldrum (Long Barrow) — Images (click to view fullsize)

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1st February 2012ce
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