Prehistoric Hillforts in Southeast Shropshire

By Bernard O'Connor

In the mid-1980s I attended a course on the Archaeology of Shropshire in which I studied some of the prehistoric hillforts found in the county. Little did I know how useful this was when I retired to the Clee Hills in the late-2010s. Studying the local Ordnance Survey maps and walking in the hills of Southeast Shropshire I noticed how many had prehistoric sites on the top.
Having researched the geology, archaeology and history of the Clee Hills, I thought I would investigate the hillforts. Using 19th and early 20th century maps, history and archaeology books, archaeological reports, newspaper articles, documents in the local archives and websites, I have been able to produce a documentary history, a gazetteer of sixteen hillforts including The Burgs, Bayston Hill; Stevenshill, Cound; The Wrekin, Little Wenlock; The Lawley (Lower), Longnor; The Lawley (Summit), Longnor; Caer Caradoc (Church Stretton); The Ditches (Mogg Forest), Rushbury; Norton Camp, Culmington; Caynham Camp, Ludlow; Knowle (Hope Bagot); Nordy Bank, Clee St Margaret; Titterstone Clee, Bitterley; Abdon Burf, Abdon; Clee Burf, Clee St Margaret; Burf Castle, Quatford and Chesterton Wall, Worfield.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jan 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9781447887836

Book preview

Prehistoric Hillforts in Southeast Shropshire

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(http://search.shropshirehistory.org.uk/collections/getrecord/CCS_MSA220/© Shropshire Council/Mick Krupa)

Bernard O’Connor

Copyright © 2023 Bernard O’Connor

 All rights reserved. Attempts have been made to locate, contact and acknowledge copyright holders of quotes and illustrations used in my work. They have all been credited within the text and/or in the bibliography. Much appreciation is given to those who have agreed that I include their work. Any copyright owners who are not properly identified and acknowledged, get in touch so that I may make any necessary corrections. Small parts of this book may be reproduced in similar academic works providing due acknowledgement is given in the introduction and within the text. Any errors or suggested additions can be forwarded to me for future editions.

 Bernard O’Connor [e-mail]

ISBN: 978-1-4478-8783-6

Contents page

Forward

Introduction

The Burgs, Bayston Hill

Stevenshill, Cound

The Wrekin, Little Wenlock

The Lawley (Lower), Longnor

The Lawley (Summit), Longnor

Caer Caradoc (Church Stretton)

The Ditches (Mogg Forest), Rushbury

Norton Camp, Culmington

Caynham Camp, Ludlow

Knowle (Hope Bagot)

Nordy Bank, Clee St Margaret

Titterstone Clee, Bitterley

Abdon Burf, Abdon

Clee Burf, Clee St Margaret

Burf Castle, Quatford

Chesterton Wall, Worfield

Foreword

Whilst researching the geology, archaeology and history of my local area - Shropshire’s Clee Hills - I located a number of prehistoric hillforts marked on the Ordnance Survey maps. In 2019, I published a book on Nordy Bank, near Clee St Margaret, and over the next few years wrote accounts of the ‘Bouldon Iron Furnace’, ‘Air Crashes on the Clee Hills’, the ‘Royal Armaments Depot in Ditton Priors’, the ‘Peaton Shadow Factory’ and ‘Deserted Medieval Settlements on the Clee Hills’.

Whilst researching basalt quarrying on Titterstone Clee, Clee Hill, Clee Burf and Abdon Burf, I read accounts of how these prehistoric hillforts were largely destroyed during excavation work to the disappointment of local and national antiquarians and archaeologists.

When I learned that there was an Atlas of Hillforts in Britain and Ireland with a searchable website, I investigated and discovered that this area of southeast Shropshire had numerous other prehistoric sites. Whilst many were known to early archaeologists several sites were discovered following aerial photography in the 1980s.

This book is a gazetteer, a documentary history of The Burgs, Stevenshill, The Wrekin, The Lawley (Lower), The Lawley (Summit), Caer Caradoc, The Ditches, Norton Camp, Caynham Camp, Knowle, Nordy Bank, Titterstone Clee, Abdon Burf. Clee Burf, Burf Castle and Chesterton Wall.

As well as acknowledging the work of professors Gary Lock and Ian Ralston for producing the Atlas of Hillforts, I also need to acknowledge earlier academics like the compilers of the Victoria County History of Shropshire and archaeologists Rev. Charles Hartshorne, Henry Lines, Rev. Edward Downman, Glynn Harding-Webster, Lily Chitty and Robert Lee-Roberts. Matt Williams of Fearn Heritage and Archaeology led the field 2021-2 field excavations on Nordy Bank and with Giles Carey, Shropshire Council’s Historic Environment Records Officer, and Andy Wigley, Policy and Environment Officer of Shropshire’s Historic Environment Team, were particularly helpful in providing access to documents. Local people provided details of their archaeological finds, many of whom contributed the artefacts to museums in Ludlow, Craven Arms, Much Wenlock, Bridgnorth and Shrewsbury. However, it is likely that, over the millennia, much archaeological evidence was ’robbed out’, taken for building purposes or as souvenirs, and not reported.

Rona Cobb, archivist of the Ditton Priors Museum, and Bob Handley of Ditton Priors Railway Museum were particularly helpful in providing access to documents and answering my many questions. Senior Archivist Sarah Davis and Senior Archives Assistant Karen Young at Shropshire Archives in Shrewsbury; Kate Harris, Rowena Streatfield and Angie Watkins at the Ludlow Library and Museum Resource Centre, and the staff at Ludlow Museum helped in locating and providing documents and answering my queries.

The National Library of Scotland needs especial mention for providing online access to the first and second edition 1-inch, 6-inch and 25-inch Ordnance Survey maps. The Shropshire Natural History and Antiquarian Society and Shropshire Archaeology Society published the transactions of their meetings which included members’ accounts of their visits to these hillforts. A number of websites including Shropshire History, Historic England,  the Modern Antiquarian, Megalithic and Hillforts have provided opportunities for contributors to add comments and photographs, notably Tim Prevett, Chris Bickford, WhiteRider, A. Brookes, 2 jags, thesweetcheat and thelonius. I thank them for sharing their knowledge, skill and understanding.

Should readers be aware of more documentary evidence relating to these hillforts or have photographs they can contribute, please contact Bernard O’Connor at [e-mail] so that they can be added to subsequent editions.

Introduction

Most Ordnance Survey map evidence of prehistoric settlements in Southeast Shropshire is found on high land like the Wrekin, the Lawley, Caer Caradoc and the Clee Hills. This is because lowland areas were covered in forest thousands of years ago.

Although stone tools and footprints of the extinct species of early man have been found at Happisburgh on the Norfolk coast dating back about 800,000 years, the oldest human bones, about 500,000 years old, have been found in Boxgrove, Suffolk. At that time, Britain was connected to the continent by the Weald-Artois Anticline, a chalk ridge uplifted as part of the Alpine mountain building period about 50 million years ago, when the continent of Africa compressed the marine sediments as it moved north to meet the European plate.

During the Anglian Glaciation, 478,000 to 424,00 years ago, the ice that covered most of Britain was over 1.6 kilometers thick in places. The immense weight of the moving ice eroded many hundreds of metres of the underlying rock and, when the ice melted, a megaflood broke through this ridge to create the English Channel. Up to 45 metres of glacial deposits, sand, gravel and boulder clay, covered the surface.

When the temperatures increased, rising sea levels inundated coastal areas; the wind and birds from the continent dropped seeds and, over time, much of the lower land of what we now call Britain became covered with largely impenetrable deciduous forest and swamps inhabited by wild animals like aurochs, bears and wolves. Highland Britain with its thinner soils was dominated by less dense coniferous forest. Above the tree line, scrub and moorland gave way to bare rock.

Early Neanderthals from what is now north Germany (the valley of the River Neander) had mastered the art of ‘coracle’ building (a bent wooden frame covered in animal skin) to cross the Channel and explore river valleys in their search for food. Their earliest fossils, which date to around 400,000 years ago, have been found in Swanscombe in Kent. By this time, fire was being used for cooking, heating and scaring away predators. Fossils of classic Neanderthals, about 225,000 years old, have been found at Pontnewydd in North Wales.

Palaeolithic or Early Stone age people date from between c.500,000 and 12,000 years ago. These early groups of hunter-gatherers lived a nomadic life searching the coasts, forested river valleys and wooded hills and mountains for animals, fruit, nuts and mushrooms. Bones of woolly rhino, mammoth, the great Irish elk, lions and bisons dating back 30,000 years have been found in this area of southeast Shropshire as well as sharp fragments of worked flints suggesting that the people hunted with spears, arrows and axes.

As flint is only found in the chalk strata of southeast England, the flint knappers who made the tools and weapons must have travelled to those areas to acquire flint nodules or traded for them with people who brought them to this area.

As well as edible animal meat and fat, the skin and fur provided clothing and bones were used for tools and weapons. Shoulder blades were used for digging, as were antler horns. Also hunted or collected were birds, birds’ eggs, fish, crabs, shellfish, fruit, herbs, seeds, nuts, berries, honey, mushrooms and toadstools. Tools and weapons made from flint and obsidian, a black glass-like rock, have been found, which, as these rocks are not local to Shropshire, show that they were brought from elsewhere or traded for local products. Smaller attractive shells and stones were used as decoration.

Although some shelter from the sun, wind, rain and snow would have been found in caves, these were rare in southeast Shropshire. A tent made from animal skin fastened to a wooden frame would have provided temporary shelter. For longer stays in upland areas where there was more space, a circular pit could have been dug into the earth and the earth piled up around the outside to form a bank or rampart with an opening for an entrance. Trees and branches were cut down using stone or flint axes to make a central post and wooden frame over the pit, tall enough to be able to stand up and with an opening in the roof to let the smoke from a fire out. The frame was covered in thatch, bundles of reeds, bracken, ferns or long grass.

It is thought that the earth floor would have been covered in cut grass to make it more comfortable to sit or sleep on. A clearing in the middle would have been the hearth for the fire with blocks of stone surrounding it to prevent sparks setting the dried grass alight.

Evidence of these pit huts can sometimes be found in shallow depressions and ‘post holes’ but also in what archaeologists term a ‘drip ditch’. Water draining along the thatch would have dripped down around the edge of the shelter producing a circle of damper ground, eventually forming a shallow ditch in which more vegetation grew. This denser vegetation can be detected using geophysics. A magnetometer carried over the surface of the test area can detect traces of iron in the soil and produce a map of the underlying ground. Concentrations of iron show up as white marks on the map. Careful analysis can show evidence of human settlement. 

Competition between groups for hunting grounds, water and food supplies led to conflict and stone and wooden weapons were developed. Hand axes and flint arrow heads have been found in southeast Shropshire, but the wooden handles, bows, arrows and spears have rotted away.

In B.E. Simmonds’ book on Brown Clee Liberty and Clee St Margaret, it was commented that,

Packmen travelled the immemorial greenways carrying stone axes from the axe factories behind Portdinllaen in Caernarvonshire and from Ireland far into England and bringing back pottery and jewellery for the aristocracy, even from the continent. One of these arteries has been traced across the area crossing Titterstone Hill, where several trackways and minor roads joined it. It is possible that one of these tracks led to the base of the Brown Clee along the old Blackford to Tugford road.’ (Simmonds, B.E. Brown Clee Liberty and Clee St Margaret, Unicorn Press, 1992, p .2)

Knowledge and experience passed down from generation to generation included fieldcraft and technology, how to survive, hunt, fish, gather, build, make houses, weapons, pottery, ornaments, even religious totems, burial sites and places of worship.

Another ice age between 180,000 and 80,000 years ago either killed off or forced the Neanderthals to migrate south. When the ice melted and temperatures increased again, the first groups of humans arrived in Britain, about 40,000 years ago. By this time, the Neanderthals had either become extinct or were killed. Intermittent ice ages and warm spells made Britain uninhabitable for long periods and it was only when the last ice age melted, about 11,700 years ago (thought to have been the result of asteroid impact on the North-eastern European icecap), that continuous occupation has been possible. 

Whilst Palaeolithic (Ancient Stone Age) people were largely nomadic, it was Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age), people from about 12,000 - 6,000 years ago, who practised agriculture which allowed them to have a more sedentary lifestyle. Having developed pottery, baking pressed and shaped clay in a fire, possibly heating the fire with bellows made from animal skin, they made bowls and pots to hold water, seeds, vegetable oil and animal fat.

Agriculture did not start until about 11,500 years ago. Seeds kept dry over winter were planted in spring and the earliest crops include emmer and einkorn wheat, then hulled barley, peas, lentils, bitter vetch, chickpeas and flax. Goats and sheep were domesticated about 10,000 years ago for their milk, wool, skin and meat.

Dogs too were domesticated for hunting, fetching and guarding. Being able to construct woven paling fences and stone walls meant that people could better control chickens, pigs, cattle and horses.  Domesticated beasts of burden, cattle and horses, were used for ploughing, pulling cut logs and carts, carrying sacks of goods as well as for riding.

Whilst early clothing was made from animal furs and skins, by about 7,000 years ago, looms and weaving using flax had been developed. Wool was developed for clothing about 4,000 years ago by the Neolithic, New Stone Age, people.

An ancient routeway runs west to east between Clun, west of Ludlow, and the Clee Hills. The Port Way runs north-south over the top of the Long Mynd, both avoiding the heavily wooded valleys. There are numerous tumuli, mounds of stones and soil which are thought to be burial mounds, on the Long Mynd, more than on Wenlock Edge and on the Clee Hills.

The world’s earliest stone temple has been found in Göbekli Tepe, Turkey, dating from about 10,000 BC and includes carvings of animals on standing stones. Whilst the earliest stone houses, dating from about 8,500 years ago, have a been found in Turkey, the earliest in Britain are in Orkney, Northern Scotland, where stone burial chambers have been uncovered.

About 5,000 years ago, the Neolithic (New Stone Age) people started to erect isolated standing stones, thought to be way markers for long distance paths, which would be still visible during winter snow. Archaeologists think neolithic people lived in organised communities, led by a tribal chief or king with warriors, a religious leader, tenant farmers, servants and slaves. The tribes living in what is now Shropshire would have traded for metal tools and flints for making fire and weapons. They may well have bartered animals and food with those tribes in Wales, the Midlands and further afield.

Their Druid religion was animist, a belief in spirits, and archaeological and historical evidence suggests there were animal cults like worshipping the bear, and human sacrifices. Druid priests or shamans provided a link between their lives and the spirit world.

Living mostly on the upper slopes of the hills above the forested valleys, the thin soils meant that, to protect dead bodies from being dug up and eaten by animals, they had to bury them beneath cairns, stone-lined chambers covered in local rocks and soil. In some places these piles of stones became overgrown and can be seen marked on Ordnance Survey maps as a tumulus (plural tumuli) or barrows. Some groups had round barrows, others had long. 

There was a belief in the afterlife with domestic pots, weapons and jewellery being buried with the bodies. However, over subsequent millennia, most of these barrows have been ‘robbed out’, anything of value stolen. Some items can be found in museums in Ludlow, Shrewsbury, Much Wenlock, Bridgnorth, the Craven Arms Discovery Centre as well as in universities and the country’s major museums.

The Neolithic people also erected wood henges, rings of tree trunks, thought to have been for religious and burial purposes. Later, stone circles were constructed like those at Calanais in Scotland and Stonehenge in Wiltshire. The most significant stone circle in Shropshire is Mitchell’s Fold, on the hills west of the Long Mynd. It has been estimated that it would have taken 100 men 220 days to cut trees, haul stones, dig holes, ditches, causeways, and cursus (long embankments), and erect the stones. Two smaller stone circles are found on the Long Mynd, 40 barrows and an estimated 30 hillforts.

Gradual deforestation allowed the construction of communal settlements, sometimes protected by a ring ditch with a raised embankment and wooden wall or palisade. Small agricultural communities made fields for growing oats, wheat, barley, rye, peas, beans, onions and cabbage. They kept herds of cattle, sheep, goats and pigs in enclosures and bred horses as draft animals and for riding. The absence of Iron Age pottery in the Shropshire area suggests the people used wooden or thin stone plates.

Hill top settlements benefitted from pasture land on the thinner soils for grazing animals, It was easier to walk as there were less trees and easier to spot the approach of potential enemies. There are several ridgeways, prehistoric walking routes, in South Shropshire that run along the top of the hills thereby avoiding the difficulty and dangers of walking through dense woodland and marshy lowland and minimising river crossings. The ridgeway from Clun had to ford the Lud and ascend along the ridge of the Clee Hills towards the Wrekin. Another, which became known as the Portway, ran across the Long Mynd towards the hillforts near Wenlock Edge.

The climate was generally warmer during the Iron Age, so early varieties of wheat, barley and root crops could be grown on higher land. Trees were cut down on hillsides and, to benefit from sunlight, field systems constructed on the south and west-facing slopes, sometimes marked on OS maps as strip lynchets. A cut was made to produce flat land and a stone wall built to prevent rain from washing the soil away. Some of these ancient terraces, now heavily eroded, can be found on the hillsides above Corvedale. 

The discovery that some rocks kept close to the fire released liquids which solidified when cooled and could be hammered into different shapes gave rise to the Bronze Age. Mixing copper ore with tin ore found in Cornwall and Wales produced bronze which could be used for arrow and spear heads, axe heads, swords, daggers, helmets, armour as well as eating and drinking utensils.

Ironstone, identified in rivers and streams by its orange, red or brown colour from the iron oxide, was found on the Clee Hills, but when it first started to be mined is unknown. Similarly, when it was discovered that crushed ironstone - iron ore - could be smelted at high temperatures using bellows is unknown but it allowed a wider range of metal goods to be produced Whether it was smelted locally and shaped to make iron tools, weapons and coins is unknown. 

As more groups of people moved into the area, there was competition for land. As well as oxen being used to pull wooden ploughs and carts, they were a source of meat, fat, leather and bones. Burnt and crushed bones, like animal droppings, were good fertiliser. Cows could provide milk and calves. Horses dragged logs, pulled carts and could be ridden. When the crops were harvested, the amount of fodder helped determine how many cattle could be fed over winter. The surplus could be bartered or slaughtered. Goats and the early sheep, long-haired Soay, were grazed on the hillsides tended by goatherds and shepherds.

During the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age, about 4,500 years ago, there was an immigration of what became known as the Beaker People or Beaker Folk. Their new pottery making skills and trading practices influenced those tribes they encountered in Shropshire and Wales.

The tribe’s wealth was measured by the number of cattle it had. As cattle raiding is thought to have been common, stockades made of tree trunks, branches and thorn bushes offered some protection but during the late Bronze and Iron Ages, better defences were needed. The prevalence of warfare amongst Bronze and Iron Age tribes resulted in more sophisticated defences. High land with commanding views was chosen for the site of hillforts. A deep ditch was dug along the line of the contour near the top of the hill with the soil and rocks dug out and piled up on the inside to create a high, circular rampart, protected by a wooden wall or palisade with a fortified wooden gateway or gateways.

Researchers from the University of Edinburgh, University of Oxford and University College Cork spent five years collecting data about ancient hillforts in Britain and Ireland and in 2017 professors Gary Lock and Ian Ralston produced an online atlas showing the location and providing details of 4,147 sites. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-40359829)

However, Peter Dorling and Andy Wigley’s 2012v‘Assessment of the Archaeological and Conservation Status of Major Later Prehistoric Enclosures in Herefordshire and Shropshire’ argued that not all hillforts are on hills and not all are forts.

The scale of the excavations needed to construct huge earthworks suggest a large, well-organised workforce was needed, supplied with accommodation food and water. Some archaeologists suggest slave labour was used.

From the bottom of the ditch to the top of the wall was a difficult climb. At Oswestry hillfort it was about 30 metres in places. Evidence suggests the front of the outer wall was lined with stone blocks to keep the soil in place as well as creating a dramatic visual impression from a distance. Some archaeologists have suggested that in some ditches sharpened wooden spikes were stuck into the base and the sides to deter attackers. It has been suggested these spikes were sometimes adorned with their slaughtered enemies’ heads and body parts, banners, tribal totems and flags.

The area inside the walls ranged from 0.25 acres (0.1 hectares) to 200 acres (49 ha) but most were between 15 to 30 acres (0.6 - 12.1 ha). Post holes show that inside the ramparts were round houses and square or rectangular granary towers, raised above the ground to deter rats from eating the grain. A depression near the centre of the hillfort has been suggested as a possible well which has collapsed inwards. Without excavation, it is impossible to verify. A major disadvantage of hillforts was that water had to be carried. Maybe packhorses were used or lines of people passed leather buckets or clay pots filled with water from the nearest spring or brook to be poured into pot containers inside the fort. Another possibility is the construction of a dew pond which collected water each night.

Celtic tribes from Southern and Western Europe started arriving on the west coast of Wales about 500 BC and gradually moved inland and settled. The Romans arrived in Britain about 55 BC, initially for trading purposes but in 43 AD, at the request of southern Iron age tribes, Emperor Claudius sent an invasion force which subsequently began occupying the country. When Roman soldiers arrived in Shropshire is unknown, nor whether the local tribes welcomed them. However, there is evidence that the Wrekin and Caer Caradoc hillforts were attacked.

The Celtic Iron Age tribes who inhabited Shropshire at the time of the Roman occupation were termed by Plotemy, the Greco-Roman geographer, as Cornovii. According to the romanobritish website,

The Cornovii were a Celtic people of Iron Age and