Week 32
So you will all remember the great excitement over the Causewayhead dolphin? An amazing discovery of international significance? News of its fame and importance even reached across the Atlantic and CNN were keen to find out more…even stranger the upper echelons of the Council became aware of my existence and wanted to speak!
However, as we began removing the dolphin it became clear that it had been butchered…but with a saw. Hmmm…..saws are modern. What was going on?
We then looked again at who lived in the house and in particular the artist Joseph Denovan Adam Smith who ran an art school in the house. This included drawing from skeletons…….
It looks like we have a dolphin carcass that Joseph intended to draw, he buried it in his garden to de-flesh it with the intention of coming back to re-assemble it but forgot!
Argggggg……needless to say CNN, STV and the upper echelons of the Council were no longer interested!
ha ha …however, the museum still wanted it!
Stirling Field and Archaeological Society.
The Society’s next outing is on Tuesday 8th August, leaving the car park at the Smith Art Gallery and Museum at 6.30 pm to look at what remains the Bridge of Allan copper mine, where the metal may have been extracted for millennia; it was last worked in the 19th Century. It is said that its copper was used to make the Bawbees (sixpence Scots) that were distributed at Queen Mary's coronation in 1543. Water from the mine was the foundation of Bridge of Allan’s fame as a Spa Town for the treatment of skin complaints, although its high levels of arsenic could be fatal if consumed in large quantities. We will see the mine entrance and spoil heaps and pass by the Fountain of Nineveh, the pump house and Allanwater Hotel. Note that although the walk is no more than a mile in total on good paths, it does involve two short, steep climbs.
It is a busy week for us. On Saturday 12th we have an all-day outing leaving the Smith at 9.30am to visit the Corb Glen, a short but dramatic gap in the Ochils, was both a drove road and the site of early industry. Glendevon, another droving route, contains superb glacial features, a 17th Century tower house, the site of a First World War prison camp and the reservoirs constructed by prisoners to supply Dunfermline. Each location will involve a walk of about 3km on reasonably level tracks, check the weather and wear suitable clothes – and bring a packed lunch.
Return to Kings Park!
As the summer is here it is my annual excavation of the Roman Iron Age fort in Kings Park, we’ll be at the highest point of Kings Park from the 8th to 18th August as well as the meadow by the deer dyke and you are welcome to come for a nosy!
Finally, in other shameless self promotional news its not long to Christmas and I and Tom Christie of local publisher Extremis have published the first ever account of Scotland’s Christmas which cover everything from the earliest mid-winter festivals, to Roman festivals, the first Christians, the banning of Christmas, the first appearance of santa, the first xmas card all the way up to Taggart and Two Doors Down Christmas specials…plus deep fried mince pies and loony dooks! And it has a celebrity endorsement!
I’m selling signed copies ahead of its formal publication for £17 plus £3 postage for the softback and £25 plus £3 for the hardback! And of course happy to drop copies off in Stirling!
and something from my contacts in Strathblane!
THIS MONTH’S EVENTS
Logie Old Graveyard Group
As usual the group will be running free tours on Sundays from 2-5 through July and August - everyone welcome , free but donations welcome. New members always welcome. Thanks to those who came on the planting!
SEPTEMBER SERVICE
Advance notice of our annual service in the ruin Sunday 3rd September with more details nearer the time.
Wilson’s of Bannockburn Free Dig
I’ll be going back to Bannockburn Haugh to explore the Wilson’s Mill…the home of Tartan from 23rd to 26th August…all welcome but places must be booked cookm@stirling.gov.uk. We will also be having an open day on the 26th if you just want to come for a look….and there will even be some living history performers!
TOURS OF GARGUNNOCK OLD KIRKYARD
A message from Gargunnock Kirk Welcome Team. We are offering free tours on Wednesdays and Saturdays at 2pm, booking required.
You will hear stories about old Gargunnock including when the Jacobite Army marched past the Kirk in 1745 and ’46, the founding of the Gargunnock Agricultural Show, the coming of the first fresh water source in the village, the builder of the old school (now the Community Centre), and much, much more and see some amazing old photographs to bring it all to life! Tours take around 45 minutes for a maximum of 8 people on each tour. We can take bigger groups at once as there are 2 tour guides available.
If you’re interested, please phone Helen on 01786 860630 and we will arrange a tour for you. Booking required.
POEM AND JOKE…..……
When is a mesolithic dolphin not a mesolithic dolphin….oh no wait.
What is green with six legs and if it drops out a tree will kill you? A snooker table!
The poem is perhaps a bit challenging but well worth it…Tennyson’s Ulysses which imgaine’s Homer’s Odysseus of the Iliad and Odyssey as an old man …perhaps think of Sean Connery’s Robin Hood?
Ulysses
It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.