Tried to church crawl St Peter & St Paul in Over Stowey recently but it was locked. The graveyard over the the road was interesting too.

1/4 Did a lot of valuable exploring this weekend.
First up was this wonderful #churchcrawling experience at St Mary’s Church, Stogumber

Beating The Bounds

One train of investigation is tracing what is at named Parish boundary points. I visited a hit list of these today, along with checking in on some other spots to see if seasonal changes reveal more.

First stop the refurb of Hayman’s Pond which fed the Tannery in Holford combe.

Halsgrove’s Community Histories series are a wonderful collection of local history combined with old photos.

Sadly the Nether Stowey book marked as forthcoming never happened.

Local Cllr Ken Lee who was working on it in 2001 passed in 2021.

@andykaitken.bsky.social
@drrjwarren.bsky.social
@saocousins.bsky.social
@indikon.bsky.social
@holnicotenh.bsky.social
@jayjewels70.bsky.social
@artistsarahjh.bsky.social

The Quantocks Yesterday.. the light was stunning ..and what a sunset!

“I hope a modicum of Quantock legends will long survive unscathed to continue to add their colour to it’s landscape."

Peter Haggett - The Quantocks: Biography of an English Region (2012)

#FolkloreFriday #FolkyFriday

The Church of The Virgin Mary aka St. Mary The Virgin in Holford. Finally got around to #churchcrawling this lovely gem.

The most famous Quantock "Folklorist" is the enigmatic & problematic figure Ruth Lyndall Tongue (1898-1981)

Like other later writers, I can tell I'm working closely with the same original sources & can connect them to dissect her fabrications & embellishments.

#FolkloreFriday

Did you know that, following the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act of 1949, The Quantock Hills became the first English Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in 1957. In 2023 AONBs were rebranded as National Landscapes in-line with National Parks.

#AONB #NationalLandscape #NationalPark

Some Quantock #LIDAR items for #HillfortsWednesday

Dowsborough (Danesborough) Hill Fort,
Ruborough Camp,
Plainsfield (Cockercombe) Camp,
(Nether) Stowey Castle,
Cannington Camp (Cynwit Castle),
Norton (Fitzwarren) Camp Hill Fort,
The Trendle Ring.

(Inspired from a post by @mikegill.bsky.social)

A find today means I can drop a new quadriptych of Quantock related books.

Usually these are found for sale, or view, when church crawling.

Often there are nuggets of folklore & stories related to artefacts, like carved bench ends or the Icthyosaur in the floor of Stogursey’s North Transept.

Modern mapping keeps GPS traces I've made over the past 10 years relevant & enables me to look at past explorations in a new light.

Curiously, Longstone Hill is named after a diminutive stone on it's northern side often hidden by gorse taller than itself.

With GPS anyone can find The Long Stone!

Office day in Taunton today & grabbed a moment to Christmas shop resulting in an accidental local history book binge at the ever fantastic #independentbookshop Brendon Books in Bath Place. #bibliophile

One of the lesser known standing stones on The Quantocks. The long stone, on longstone hill.

Hard to find even when you’ve been there a few times. Me checking it hadn’t been moved in 2020. See reply image for scale.

#StandingStoneSunday

This reference to an old map in Quantock Country (1952) initially drove me nuts. It's long gone from public display.

I later found it in the Somerset Heritage Centre Archives under somerset-cat.swheritage.org.uk/records/DD/S... I've decoded more places of interest, the geography isn't far off..

Hello, welcome!

What if you studied every book, journal paper & map about the Quantock Hills and chased the unresolved questions they leave? What lies almost forgotten beyond the well known, oft-repeated folklore? The curated collection on the bookshelf here is just the tip of the iceberg.