| Summary : Crown End Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement, field system and cairnfield. The field system includes a Bronze Age cross ridge dyke, a standing stone and hollow ways. The cairnfield may contain up to two hundred small irregular stony cairns, some of which have been argued to be barrows, burial cairns, ironstone pits or hut circles. The field system is centred on a stone banked rectilinear enclosure with internal dimensions measuring 35m by 38m, surrounded by a series of field boundaries, altogether enclosing a wide area. A number of cairns and buildings are located within this field system, with more cairns lying further to the west. Iron slag evidence may suggest a bloomery here. At the centre of the settlement is an excavation trench dating from the 1870s. Most of the features are visible as earthworks on air photographs and were mapped by the North York Moors NMP. Those features not obscured by dense vegetation cover are visibly extant on the latest 2009 vertical photography. Scheduled. |
More information : Centred NZ 6680 0743: Settlement [N.R.] Tumuli [N.R.]. (1)
Area centred NZ 6660 0725: Crown End Settlement. It is more of the compact village and is unusually well preserved. At the highest point there are nearly two hundred small cairns and others are sprinkled over most of the area. The most remarkable feature of the site is its drystone walling forming enclosures on the eastern end of the spur and descending on the north side to about 100 feet above the stream in Baysdale. A few barrows occur both within and without the enclosures. One enclosure is circular with walls from 2-4 feet high and broken by two openings opposite one another. It served most probably as a cattle enclosure or pen. The walling on the north side of the spur is distinctly lynchetted and bounds broad low terraces one above the other of considerable length. These were certainly cultivation plots and associated with them are many characteristic dry shallow pits. Other structures less easy to trace. One is the remains of the cross-ridge rampart which defended the settlement. This work lies about a mile west of the end of the spur. [NZ 6606 0713]. It forms an irregular scattered line of upright stones straggling across the spur. (Plate XXI, fig. 1). A close inspection disclosed that they formed part of what had once been a continuous wall of vertical stone slabs and blocks running along a low rampart with a shallow trench or fosse on the east or settlement side. Some unhewn stones, none of which are more than 3-4 feet high, still stand side by side. We also observed signs of a second rampart on the settlement side of the trench. The work, though very fragmentary and defaced, had no doubt originally traversed the spur as a single fosse with an inner and an outer rampart crowned with a more or less continuous
stone stockade. Though no dateable relics have been discovered on Crown End it can be ascribed to the Early Bronze Age. (2)
The circular enclosure seems orthostatic in type closely resembling those described by Griffiths in North Wales [a]. 130 feet north to south by 123 feet east to west with a 9 feet gap to the centre of the east walling and a 10 feet gap in width with large stones set on edge and the interior filled with rubble. Near the north side 50 feet in is a disturbed area and small 12 feet mound. This disturbance may be recent. In it I picked up pieces of iron slag. Indeed the "pits" [published on OS 6"] may be ironstone bell-pits of a later date or storage pits. They seem too small and deep for dwellings. Many turf roads of later date cut the plots. Main features are the two lynchets on the north side of the slope and the plots enclosed by the very irregular boundary wall. This closely resembles those at Struntry Carr [Goathland] and Live Moor especially on the west side. One corner of the north boundary seems to contain a circular site. Another can be seen in the south east area where more irregular plots are seen after recent heather burning. On the whole the Davies plan [Authority 2] is pretty accurate. The cairns are similar in size to other sites. Note 2 long cairns to the west of the group. There is no definite proof that a line of upright stones did cross the rigg as Elgee [b] suggests. No traces of earthwork or ditch, even if stones were robbed. A cup and ring stone was pointed out to me by A Smith of Whitby [NZ 66610742] but this may be erosion. [NZ 6606 0713] Three or four stones in line. Holloway or ditch to east part of cross ridge work (Elgee p.142 [b]). Doubtful whether this is correct. No trace of removed stone holes. (For details of the Settlement earthworks see AO 2026). [NZ 6608 0698] Monolith Elgee Plate XXI fig 1 [b]. [NZ 66230704] Two long stoney mounds.(3)
[NZ 66200708] Barbed and tanged arrowhead picked up by Mr Thornley in Sept 1957. (4)
The enclosures and earthworks of this site have been resurveyed at 1:2500 and the published survey (25" 1928) of the cairns revised. On the whole, the definition of the site is not as good as the preceding descriptions imply, though much of what has been described is still traceable. Little was added to the general plan as the nature of the ground precluded a thorough examination. Most of the site is covered by 3-4 feet high heather and it is only the large circular enclosure at NZ 6688 0739 that can now be readily seen. This has drystone rubble walling to an average height of 1.3 metres. The published mounds too can now only be traced with difficulty. They are mainly small cairns (0.5-0.6 metres high) apart from five exceptions. Pits were identified by ground inspection as ironstone bell pits. The monolith, cross marked stone, and alleged rampart were all located and surveyed. Little could be determined from the present remains, though the impression was gained that the work represented not a Bronze Age cross ridge rampart, but a boundary wall of more recent origin. Most of the stones forming the wall had isolated depressions
alongside them though no form of continuous ditch was seen. It seems possible that the monolith on the south and the cross marked stone on the north marked the termini of a boundary wall. The site is approached by numerous hollow ways one of which enters the enclosure at the north west corner. Others become indefinite on reaching the summit of Crown End. (5)
The majority of the cairns undoubtedly represent stone-clearance. This is substantiated in places (where the heather has been burnt) by lines of gathered stones and fragmentary baulks between the cairns, whilst on the north, the lynchetting makes the field pattern more apparent. The enclosures are grouped outside the complex of 'fields' and form the probable settlement area. (6)
Situated along a ridge on Westerdale moor running north east to south west and known as "Crown End" is an extensive field system (centred at NZ 6645 0725) marked by fields, walls, stone clearance heaps, lynchets, pits, some probable buildings and an enclosure (centred at NZ 0687 0737). The
system is divided roughly into 2 the best preserved area being on the north east spur of the ridge where the fields are clearly defined by tumbled drystone walls and well made lynchets some with clearance laid along their upper edges. The mounds (depicted on the 1928 25") are stone clearance heaps, some of them elongated. A few appear large enough to be cairns. At NZ 6672 0746 are the turf-covered footings of a sub-rectangular building (surveyed at 1:2500) measuring 5 metres east to west by 4 metres north to south between the centres of a tumbled stone wall of indeterminate thickness with an ill-defined gap in the south east indicating a possible entrance. This building has been built on a platform visible as a semi-circular 'lynchet' around its lower downhill north east side. A building enclosed in a 'field' about 54 metres east to west by 32 metres north to south. Two similar hollowed mounds (at NZ 6677 0752 and NZ 6686 0726) may have been buildings but are too mutilated for positive identification. In this area of the field system are several conical depressions averaging 2.5 metres in diameter and 0.5 metres. Many but not all are shown on the 1928 25". Most probably these are storage pits for grain or water (not ironstone bell-pits) as they
appear to be associated with the fields. The sub-circular enclosure (centred at NZ 6687 0737) is about 42 metres in
average diameter between the centres of a drystone rubble wall about 1.3 metres maximum height and about 3 metres average width. The original entrance is marked by a gap about 3 metres wide in the north east. The gap in the south west is probably modern mutilation. The central enclosure was probably used as a stock enclosure. Several hollow ways approach the field system at this north east end and one
at the north west appears to have cut through a field wall. No trace was found of any 'cup and ring' marked stone and it was most likely due to natural weathering. The remaining part of the field system to the west is defined mainly by clearance heaps, the walls and lynchets are hardly discernible. Situated at NZ 6607 are the footings of a sub divided rectangular
building with rounded corners measuring 8.5 metres north east to south west by 5 metres between the centres of a wall about 0.8 metres average width and 0.3 metres maximum
height. The entrance is about 1 metres wide in the north end of the south east wall of the south compartment. The irregular line of upright stones (NZ 6606 0717) is the remains of a wall running north to south across the centre part of the ridge and of entirely different contruction to the walls of the field system and probably later. Field System delineated on 1:10 560. Enclosure and some walls and lynchets surveyed at 1:2500.(7)
Crown End listed as a Bronze Age extensive settlement. (8)
NZ 668 073. Westerdale Moor cairn cemetery and settlement. Scheduled No NY/1000. (9)
Prehistoric farming remains on a rigg of moorland between Westerdale and Baysdale. At the western end is a Bronze Age cross ridge dyke, a 70 metre long alignment of upright stone slabs which line up with a standing stone 130 metres to the south. Along the east side of the southern half of the alignment is a shallow ditch and bank. East of the cross dyke is a Bronze Age cairnfield of about 100 small irregular stony cairns which are fairly random although a number form intermittent lines. A few are more regular in form and may be round cairns. 2 trackways marked as linear hollows run up the north and south sides of the rigg into the cairnfield providing access to the water courses and lower lying land.
Overlapping the cairnfield to the east by 50 metres is a Late Iron Age field system defined by low stony banks. Those running east to west across the hillside are most prominent and form lynchets. There are a number of other boundaries which are visible as narrower banks or a single line of large stones mainly in the north western and south eastern parts of the field. These fields are mainly rectangular with sinuous boundaries, the occasional small enclosure and about 10 hut circles scattered across them forming an unenclosed settlement. 2 sets of hollow ways to the north and north east run up the hillside into the field system. In the eastern part of the field system is a square enclosed settlement site formed by stony banks of up to 1.5 metres high. It has 2 entrances one near the south west corner and another opposite. The reamins of iron slag in the banks suggest the buried remains of one or more Iron Age bloomeries in this area. At the centre of the square settlement is an excavation trench dating from the 1870s. Scheduled. (10)
The Bronze Age/Iron Age field system, settlement and cairnfield are visible as earthworks on air photographs, centred at NZ 6681 0741. The focal point of the archaeology is on a rectilinear enclosure with internal dimensions measuring 35m by 38m. This is integral to a field system consisting of stoney banks extending to the north forming irregular enclosed areas. Spread throughout these are a large number of cairns measuring up to 8m in diameter, some of which have a central hollow suggesting either previous excavation or that these may be hut circles. Those features not obscured by dense vegetation cover are extant on the latest 2009 vertical photography.
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