This blog will explore some of the lesser known and hidden heritage sites of the Furness area in Cumbria.
Furness stretches from the southern most point of Walney island to the top of the Furness Fells at the northern tip of Windermere. Across that vast space are many facinating heritage gems which we will explore with information and images.
Follow us and hopefully you will discover somewhere you never knew existed!
Over the last year we have been exploring some of the wonderful historic sites of Furness from above in the first of our Heritage from the Air series.
Series one of ‘Heritage From the Air’ has seen us take to the skies above Birkrigg Stone Circle, Heathwaite Medieval Farmstead, Gleaston Castle, Aldingham Motte and Aldingham Moated Manor. Each episode giving a greater sense of this wonderful heritage and their surroundings.
To round off series one we now have a special montage using footage from the first 5 videos. Hit the play button below to watch and enjoy Furness Heritage from the Air:
During the 13th Century the family living at the motte and bailey castle, the Le Fleming's who built it in the early 1100s, needed to move because of coastal erosion. Due to this they built a new moated manor a short distance inland from the castle.
The manor consists of a mound surrounded by a moat for defence. The mound would have had a wooden structure built upon it, forming a new home for the family. This would have likely been surrounded by a wooden palisade, creating further defence.
In this new aerial video you can clearly see the moated manor and get a sense of it's incredible surroundings:
Aldingham Motte is all that remains of a Norman Motte and Bailey castle, once home to Michael Le Fleming.
Much of the original castles bailey has been lost to coastal erosion, as has part of the motte, a large mound where a wooden strong hold once stood.
In this video we take to the air to view what remains from above to give a sense of it's scale and how much erosion has taken of this once impressive Norman structure:
As well as the wonderful motte on show here, with it's surrounding ditch, you can also spot the marks of medieval farming with many ridge and furrow features visible in the fields surrounding the motte. Something I personally love to see. This land was no-doubt farmed following the Le Flemings moving down the hill to a new moated manor.
The ruin is sadly in bad repair, as is made evident from the large cracks that can be seen rising up through several of the walls, but it still forms quite the impressive structure. Three of it's four towers are still standing proud, with door ways and windows often still intact.
It can be hard to get a real sense of what this castle once looked like or how it once was used but this video at least gives a new perspective on the ruin and shows just some of its former majesty.
Heathwaite Fell, sitting to the north of the Furness peninsula, is a vast and wild place but hidden amongst the bracken and the windswept fields is a hidden gem. A medieval farmstead!
This farmstead is the highlight of a dispersed medieval settlement with it's associated field systems spread across the fell.
The farmstead, which is of more than one period of construction, consists of five interlinked enclosures made from stone walls with a domestic area to the north. A couple of these enclosures have land which has been improved for agricultural cultivation with the rest being un-improved and most likely for animal grazing. There are also a few small rectangular structures within the enclosures. Their function is unclear but I do wonder if they may have been sheep pens for isolating and sheering sheep.
To give you a better understanding of the layout of this farmstead and give you a better view of it we took to the air to film this breathtaking video:
Extending out from the farmstead is a selection of field system made up of banks and walled areas. The largest of these fields being around 5.7 hectare in size with all containing the archeological feature known as ridge and furrow, a feature spoken about in a previous post. These features give evidence to the cultivation of this land for the growing of crops.
Close to the farmstead there are also three kilns. The one pictured below being on its east side. These kilns are made from thick, circular stone walls with large outer banks and deep central hollows. Two of these kilns, interestingly, have been constructed from former Bronze Age clearance cairns. These cairns were created when Bronze Age man cleared land for cultivation. To do this they removed large amounts of stone and rock from the fells and deposited them in large piles known as cairns. In the medieval period some of these were re-purposed as kilns for creating potash.
Potash was made from bracken or wood and was used to make soaps for the woollen trade - an industry that made vast amounts of money for the local abbey. Potash was created by burning wood or indeed bracken, which makes sense here as bracken covers much of the fell, removing the ash to then dissolve it in boiling water. Following this the solution is evaporated in large pots to leave a white residue, the potash (potassium chloride).
It is also theorised that these kilns may have been used to dry timber for use in smelting lead ore, it feels more likely though that they were used for potash as sheep were almost certainly reared here and no doubt had their wool shorn here.
This fascinating remnant of our medieval past truly is a hidden gem. It's remote location gives stunning views of both the Lake District fells and the Duddon Estuary, it's low lying remains give a tangible connection to the past and the lumps of and bumps of the ridge and furrow give you a sense of the true grit and determination our ancestors had when cultivating the wild land they lived in.
A road runs near to this wonderful site and a short walk will get you right to it. It is well worth a visit and will open your eyes to our medieval past here in Furness and those men and women tirelessly working the land.
Birkrigg stone circle is one of the best known and preserved prehistoric sites of the Furness Peninsula. We took a look at this and the whole of Birkrigg Common in our past blog post Birkrigg Common, Prehistoric Landscape to Quaker Burial Ground but in this post we did something a bit different. We took to the air to view the stone circle in all its glory!
This wonderful video gives you a birds eye view of the ancient site and certainly gives you a different and unique perspective:
Luckily the sun was shining on the day this was filmed which helps to bring out all the humps and bumps around the circle. You can clearly see the slight mound just outside the inner circle and you can get a better idea of where the outer circle is and how it is shaped.
You will also notice a large sunken path/ditch beside the circle. It is unclear exactly what this is but it could be as old, if not older, than the circle itself and may have formed a processional way to the site.
Birkrigg Stone Circle is a true gem of the Furness Peninsula and is one of our favourite sites to visit. We hope you enjoyed his special aerial video and it has encouraged you to visit this wonderful site.
Keep an eye out in the future for more videos like this along with more written blog posts.
