Ewen found another circle stone site. This one is so seldom visited that even he temporarily lost where it was located. He had found it by accident, having gotten lost on a previous trip. These stones are even more primitive than yesterday’s. Not as old as Orkney or Callinish, but older than Stonehenge and older than yesterday’s circular stone circle visit. These stones form a very rough circle and are all of random sizes. They are not so much buried in the ground as simply placed in sort of a circle. What was the purpose? Not religious since they far predate the Druids and any other religion and do not appear to mark either solstice or equinox. Notice that you can actually touch these stones. You can no longer get near the stones of Stonehenge. Too many ignorant tourists have tried to chip pieces away and the oil from millions of hands are damaging the stones.
Note the drawings in the stones.
Interesting that some of the stones are almost completely buried in the ground and appear to be random. What is the significance?
Good photo, Elaine! This shows how the stones sit high up on the hill. And below is the nice grove of trees on the edge of the stones. Of course the stones are much older than the trees, just nice that someone 75-100 years ago thought to plant these trees for us to enjoy. So, make your mark on the future; plant a tree!
We cross the highest point in the Cumbrian Mountains. 1,903 meters (5,709 feet, as high as Denver, Colorado). We are now well above the tree line into what looks like tundra. There is a small café at the peak.
And now we arrive at a new National Park monument, but this one is special. It is the site of Hadrian’s Wall. For those of you who do not know, when the little short Roman soldiers ran into those enormous Scottish warriors in the highlands red hair and with beards to their chest and arms the size of the Roman soldier’s thigh, they decided that the had reached the limit of what they could conquer. So, they proceeded to build Hadrian’s Wall. Emperor Hadrian directed that a wall be built on the northern border of the Roman Empire. It was actually more of an administrative wall to mark the boundary of the Roman Empire than a defensive wall as it could be easily breached in many places. But, it did run the width of England and was the first border between England and Scotland. It dates from 250 CE (for non Jewish that would be 250 BC) and remains intact for much of its area in northern England. The border between the two countries today lies several miles north of Hadrian’s Wall. Still, it is an amazing engineering feet for that era.
Edward is standing on the wall and you can see it going off into the distance. It is not the Great Wall of China but it has lasted and is impressive nonetheless. The wall was drawn by the engineers in Rome to be a straight line across the border. However, when it got to the field work, the local engineers decided to follow the contours of the terrain and took advantage of the natural fault line between England and Scotland. Today, England is actually sinking and Scotland is actually rising each a few centimeters a century as the ancient island of England is driven beneath the island of Scotland.
Above, can you see the two small white dots or objects (people) at the bottom of the cliff setting off on a rock climb to the top? You can see the wall continuing above the cliffs on the left photo that are a part of the fault line.
Above, a map showing the route of Hadrian’s Wall dividing the Roman Empire from Scotland.
Below, we return to Scotland. Interestingly, the side of the rock marking the English side is faded and not maintained. The side of the rock marking the entry into Scotland is proudly maintained. Also, there is no sign going south welcoming you into England like there is going north welcoming you into Scotland. It appears that the English do not recognize that there is actually a border between the two countries and that they are two different peoples.
We cross the Scottish border and arrive in the town of Jedburgh. Jedburgh has a famous abbey (again one destroyed by Henry VIII) and has the home of Mary Queen of Scots.
The home of Mary Queen of Scots before she foolishly attempted to go south and unite England and Scotland under her crown. Mary was the daughter of Henry VIII’s sister, and, given the messed up life of Henry, his many wives and his disputed heir ship, she had a better claim to the throne than did Elizabeth I, her cousin. By the way, the current Queen of England is misnamed Elizabeth II. Elizabeth I (queen during the famous Elizabethan period) was the queen of England, not queen of the United Kingdom. So actually the current queen is Elizabeth I the queen of the United Kingdom. It has been decided that nothing will be done about it as long as Queen Elizabeth is alive, but that after her passing they will need to make an adjustment for this hiccup in history.
Mary Queen of Scots lived in this house and administered the Midlands Area (the borderland area between England and Scotland) before she was captured by her cousin Mary the queen of England and basically put under house arrest in several castles. By the way, the crypt of Mary Queen of Scots in Westminster Abbey is a few inches higher than that of her cousin Mary. Mary Queen of Scots died last and her heirs made certain that she had the higher crypt as benefitted her rank.
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