The Day Silbury Hill Collapsed
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- Опубліковано 4 тра 2024
- Huge thanks to Amanda Chadburn, Jill Chapman, Alex Bayliss and Jim Leary for inspiration on this weeks video. This is a great start if you like a read: www.amazon.co.uk/Story-Silbur...
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Usual notices:
1. We are not historians. We enjoy researching and learning, and with that we enjoy sharing our journeys with you. That said, sources for information often listed below with credits.
2. Errors. Whilst we make every attempt to not include any errors, research, and piecing stories together from dozens of sources sometimes leads to one or two. I will note here if any are found:
A: Merewether is pronounced "Merri-whether", unlike my attempt!
B: Edward Drax AND The Duke of Northumberland undertook the dig in 1776. As suggested by directing miners to sink a shaft.
C: 2400 BC not 20400BC!
D. My biggest frustration was not discussing the likely totem down the middle. More on this another day soon.
Credit and Thanks
Filter: Snowman Digital and Beachfront B-Roll
Maps: Google Maps
Maps: National Library of Scotland
Maps: OS Maps. Media License.
Stock Footage: Storyblocks
Music: Storyblocks
Old Map: NLS - www.nls.uk/
All pictures: Creative Commons (listed below):
Lidar Visual: Gatis Kalniņš
Silbury Images: JohnLeBrocq
Silbury Hill: Andy Wright
Silbury Hill Internal Design Graphic: Kenny Arne Lang Antonsen
Silbury in Winter: Slowcoach12
Skanska Door way - English Heritage
Sources:
Silbury Hill Conservation Project: 2007/8 - Jim Leary
web.archive.org/web/201301201...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbury...
www.antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/...
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/wi...
archaeology.co.uk/articles/fe...
www.bbc.co.uk/archive/chronic...
BBC Documentary from 2011 - Presented by Mary-Ann Ochota.
archaeologynationaltrustsw.wo... - Розваги
This is a great start by Jim Leary if you like a read: www.amazon.co.uk/Story-Silbury-Hill-Jim-Leary/dp/1848020465
So did they dig into the centre and look it if was a grave? This gives the impression of a layered Mastaba from Egypt.
USA has many mounds like this that are viewing platforms from which to see the juxtaposition of the standing stones and the sun.
@@EuroWarsOrgbut you cant see the stones of Avebury from Silbury. He points out it is in a valley.
@@surtersbut there is no burial and never was. It seems that the stages were built several years apart. Makes me think more of the stupid and meaningless 'look at me im important' stunts of recent politicians from Labour's millenium dome aka O2 to all the failed stunts of Boris Johnson, The millenial garden, HS2 etc which cost millions to the current fiasco of the Manchester Co-op arena.
@@helenamcginty4920 Ah missed that. Then maybe it was an attempt to get up that high? lol
My father used to tell a local folk tale about that hill. A young boy came across the devil carrying a huge mound of dirt. The devil asked the boy how far it was to Avebury because he was going to dump the hill on them to punish their Christian piety. The clever child said he did not know, but would run back and return with the answer.
Some time later a very old man limped into view and the devil asked who he was. 'Sir, do you not know me? I am the boy and it has taken all my life to cover the distance to and from.
The devil was so angry that he dumped his heavy load at Silbury- and vanished. Avebury was saved.
Thanking you what a great story
When my wife and I rented a car (hired in British terminology) and drove around Great Britain back in the 1990's, we stopped by Stonehenge. We bought tickets, walked on a path to about 50 feet from the stones, heard traffic on the nearby motorway, and left the site through a gift shop. We were a little disappointed because we could not get near the stones and ran into a lot of tourists. So we looked in our guide book and decided to head over to Avebury. We parked next to the site, walked into the field, and were two of less than a dozen people walking around the stones there. We could walk up and touch the stones, the whole area was a pasture with sheep walking around, and the nearby village of Avebury looked much nicer than the buildings near Stonehenge. I said to my wife "I like this place much more than Stonehenge. It's cozier and friendlier. And that is probably the first time I ever used those adjectives to describe rocks."
@@terryl858 I use that story to illustrate lateral thinking to business students. Folk tales are full of lateral and critical thinking examples.
I heard it was a cobbler the devil asked, and he was carrying a huge bag of shoes to repair with him. He poured this whole sack out in front of the devil and says 'well, I've worn out all these walking from there!'. At that point the devil went 'screw that, I can't be bothered to walk that far' and drops the whole mound of dirt right there, similarly to yours!
@@whatalotofocelots thats what I like about folk tales. They get better with retelling.😁
Man, I love it when the algorithm serves me up something genuinely interesting.
Howdy from Texas, y'all.
Thanks Dude.
🤠👍
Hello, from New Mexico, i grew up in Texas. Aren't there burial mounds near Caddo Lake in Texas? Also, when i was a child i often visited my grandmother on Lake worth, Tx, which was the first man made Lake in the U.S, and there was an island in the lake where artifact hunters dug for years, skulls, arrow heads, tools, pottery, etc. were found. As a child i didn't understand that it was wrong to do that, now i would report any illicit digging, of course.
An archeologist i worked for here in New Mexico saw a femur sticking up in a road crossing a large and remote ranch, and he called the state archeologist, etc, an emergency dig was carried out and it turned out that the road cut through an ancient Indian cemetery.
Howdy from Missouri, land of 1000-year-old burial mounds. Thank you for putting into words my exact sentiment.
Hey, from Oklahoma. We have very similar-looking mounds in Oklahoma. There's a handful in fact around a town called 'Mounds', Ok. named after them ...which is near Tulsa. A larger grouping of 12 are around the town of Spiro, Ok. (30 or so may have been there originally before they were plundered). I studied this a bit in school. The mound-builders are over an extensive period of about 10,000 years. There are the Archaic, the Woodland, and the Mississippian periods. They tell us the Oklahoma mounds are the newest from the Mississippian period. Some of these may have been influenced (through migration or trade, not sure) by Meso-America and the pyramid builders of Mexico, or even south of there. Some suggest that the mounds found in the Mississippi River floodplain area could have doubled as a refuge from the seasonal floods ...which was the price for living in the floodplain but gaining access to the richest soil (like the annual flooding of the Nile River). Others say the chief, a few priests, and a central temple may have been built at the tops (often flat when very large) with steep steps ascending for worship purposes. Artifacts were found in the 1930's by failed gold prospectors who plundered the mounds at Spiro and found feathered capes, copper masks/art objects, etched and carved conch shells, elaborately carved pipestone, clay pots & figurines, and beads. Wikipedia has some beautiful pictures of these objects. These people probably had trade routes to Minnesota, Florida, and California, and all parts East...so most of present-day continental United States. Both the Spiro, Ok. Mounds & the Mounds, Ok. Mounds further upstream on the Arkansas River are called The Arkansas River Valley Caddoan People. The Arkansas flows into the Mississippi (originating in Colorado) ...so the Mississippian Culture worked its way up the river system probably over time. The largest number of mounds in this system is found near St. Louis & is called Cahokia, and was part of The Caddoan Mississippian Culture. The Mississippian Culture went from the Great Lakes to The Gulf of Mexico ...or visa versa from the Gulf to the Great Lakes ...(from the Ohioan River Valley to The Mississippi River Valley ...or visa versa), and is thought to have lasted from the 9th to the 16th centuries. The Mississippian Culture had a pictograph writing system. There are several tribes that still speak some form of the original Caddoan language ...they are The Caddo, Wichita, Kichai, Pawnee, and Arikara tribes ...which suggests that the Spiro people broke off into smaller tribes when the Mississippian Mound Civilization disappeared.
@@harridan.
In summer 1978 we visited London, listened to our guitar hero Eric Clapton in the Royal Albert Hall and spent one night with our tent in the middle of Stonehenge.
Nobody, no police came and made any trouble!
That was normal in the phantastic seventies. Best time of our life!!!
Many greetings from Germany!
Stonehenge is nowhere near London.
And now: fates make us beg for enlightenment.
Then: the cosmos laughed for our pleasure.
Now: we choose Trump or Biden.
Then: peace or extinction.
Now: ?? please help ??
Then: ??
@@High_Lord_Of_TerraIt’s only a two hour drive. Have a day off, mate.
@@High_Lord_Of_Terra To Americans and many other overseas tourists, I can assure you it is.
Yea that world is ruined now and all the children of the future must go to war with eachother. Wish yall had figured out the peace thing back then but i appreciate anyone who tried.
In my younger days we used to climb it in the middle of the night, drink a couple of beers and watch the stars, you’d get thrown in prison for a decade for that now! We took all evidence with us of course.
I'm jealous!
@@pwhitewick there and near to Cherhill white horse are beautiful on a clear night.
Same and in the long barrow!
As a child I used to climb to the top of Slibury Hill in the 1960s it was great. We used to go and touch the stones at Stonehenge as well.
@@iansteel5569me too, climb silbury, chamber over stonehenge, slide down the white horse hill on old tea trays. They all survived!
I climbed to the top of Silbury Hill in 1983. It was a few days before my 20th birthday, and something I had always wanted to do. It was very quiet at the top, and the view was phenomenal. I sat up there for about an hour - I didn't want to come down, if I'm honest. It's a beautiful enigma.
I think the entire hill should be protected for future generations by building a huge chalk phase IV Silbury Hill on top of it.
@@texasman1836 I reckon it's about time we make a bigger pyramid than Egypt ever built. They've held the record for far too long and it's about time modern engendering showed it stuff and make something bigger and more immortal...
how much did you weigh?
😂😂😂 about 14.5 stones.
@@Hebdomad7 Don't believe they could actually do it , just such a phenomenal job to equal, let alone surpass. P.S. how can anything be ''more immortal '''? duh ! Think you must be engendering stuff , haha!
Just needs a massive visitors centre, car park, Costa and a gift shop selling wooden swords, tea towels and plastic dinosaurs on sticks to make it truly complete.
2 miles up the road you have Avebury
And a Mackie Dees!!!
YOU FORGOT THE PUB, McDONALDS, TESCO ETC
Don’t forget the tour guides 😂
I know of a few people who have danced naked round it in the early hours.....well, when I say naked, they were wearing wellies..
Wise!!
Safety first.
🤣🤣
HIPPIES HEH?
The idea of naked New Agers/Neopagans wearing rubber boots for their ceremonies strikes me as quintessentially British.
Great video. Just some additional info on the 1776 work, they found more than chalk. Towards the bottom of the shaft, but 30 feet above the base they found a deep narrow cavity with timber fragments, which indicates the early stage building was done around a wooden pole - possibly a totem pole. This information came out of the letters written by Drax to Lord Rivers about the excavation. The letters were published in the Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine about 15 years ago. But I had no idea about any of this until today, when I had a chat with the museum director David Dawson about it. Quite coincidentally, your video came online some hours later !
Thank you for sharing this fascinating bit of knowledge!
I was involved in the 2007/2008 archaeological recording in conjunction with the conservation work. It was by far the most exciting and important archaeology I've done in my career. There are of course far more than three phases of construction, I think the ditches alone showed almost 20 phases.
It makes one wonder why we, as a culture, are not adding our own layers to it. Living archeological additions.
@@studuerson2548 We have far more impressive mounds in Florida - Mt. Trashmore just East of Orlando is 150 Feet high and guaranteed to be filled with artifacts.
Also South Apopka and Astatula, easily visible from the road.
@@studuerson2548 We are. A lot of the deposits we excavated at the top of the hill were modern ritual deposits, Rose Quartz etc. Some of them were quite elaborate. Also, we recorded and collected a lot of tools and evidence for the earlier archaeological excavations particularly the 1960s Atkinson one. Archaeology is constantly being added to by modern humans, and we as archaeologists are constantly re-assessing what constitutes "archaeology".
@@AecernArchaeology they meant, why aren't we adding a layer of chalk.
My dream is to work on sites like that! I’m an archaeologist in America but I’m looking to get into different fields because compliance and paperwork have held up the Archaeologic Contractors I work with and even though there’s lots of construction I haven’t gotten to work at all this year.
We used to have wonderful school history trips in the 1970s. In one day we would try and do Uffington Castle/ The White Horse, West Kennet Long Barrow, Silbury Hill and Avebury or Stone Henge. Great fun. They were all impressive to us schoolboys but Silbury Hill was particularly mysterious and of course enigmatic.
Same here and it was in the days when you could climb Silbury Hill.
I often felt that Silbury was the inspiration for Tolkien's Weathertop in LOTR
We still did that tour from our school in Newbury during the 90s 👍
I was a lorry driver for over 440 years, and before the M4 was built, the A4 was our route to London, Silbury Hill was a landmark for me, on my way back home. Usually after a stop at the ridgeway Cafe, a couple of miles to the East of Silbury Hill. I hope the ancient Hill is stabilised
Wow, that’s a long career
Driving a truck for 440 years must have had stone wheels on earlier trucks then. 🤔🤣🤣🤣🤣
Aye, back then the Driving Licence was written on parchment, and you could buy a gallon of petrol for two silver groats and still have enough change left over for a hogshead of ale.😊
Do you have any good health advice for long life? I always thought trucking was an unhealthy lifestyle! Cheers
You young whippersnapper: I used to see it when travelling along the River Kennet in my coracle.
Must be getting on for 35 years since I walked up there with friends and encountered a group celebrating Beltane
😮❤😎
What’s Beltane?
Beltane is a Pagan holiday on or near the 1st of May. Wiccans and some other Pagans celebrate a Wheel of the Year: Samhain, Yule, Imbolc, Ostara, Beltane, Lughnasadh, and Mabon.
'Bealtaine' is Irish for May
@CricketsBay thanks for that. As a wiccan I'm glad to.have seen that
A man-made pile of chalk. The writing was on the wall that it would be affected by the weather.
I guess it is back to the drawing board for the conservators...
(I'll see myself out)
I see you
It has lasted a lot better than the schools we built.
cereal... Have to consider though, it'd been stable for over 4500 years until people relatively recently started tunneling into it.
Affected by the weather due to all the misguided boring. Before that meddling it lasted thousands of years.
This reminds me of the first thing this video made me think of: in the book "1491," there's a bit about an ancient civilization in North America, which collapsed after the massive step pyramid that legitimized the state religion and the ruling class's power was undercut by a change in the Ohio River, and physically collapsed. They tried rebuilding it and failed.
One of the unique problems that many North and South American civilizations have had is that it's so easy to live off the land, in many parts of these continents, that a government can't compel enough people to opt in against their will. When life outside the valley is no harder than life inside it, a ruling class has to get very, very sneaky and creative... and many of them did.
After millions spent trying to figure out why this was built it was finally discovered this was a 2500 year old land fill... LOL
And we've been dutifully protecting it 😂
I remember as a child my Father stopping the family car in the adjacent layby and we walked up to the top of the mound. It was not a massively popular thing to do but the view was good. Like almost everything these days whether it is Silbury Hill or Stone Henge etc 'KEEP OUT' is the order of the day. A great shame. It is difficult to have any sympathy or interest in anything that we are excluded from or where visits are monetised.
90% of signs in the UK today are telling you to stop, keep out or not do something. The other 10% warn you that CCTV is in operation.
Precisely! Childrens interest in history and care for nature are lost when they are excluded from it.
WELL, W DON'T WONT ANY OF THOSE MASSIVE STONES BREAKING DO WE?
Britain since Blair and onwards has morphed into a 'Keep Out' 'Stay Away' and 'DANGER' orientated nanny state country populated with little Hitlers who orgasm wildly over any little power they get and whom like to remind everyone what the laws are and why they exist. These people say very stupid things like 'If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear ' and they can be found either justifying driving 20mph at 3am on an empty road citing that the law says the speed limit is 20 or taking pictures of badly parked cars and posting them anonymously onto local Facebook community groups.
I've spotted some of these compliance nazis on here already.
They make the UK a miserable and grey place to suit their desperate lives of nothingness.
These people have done more to undermine British culture and tradition than any amount of immigration we've had. These are the people when back in the day factory workers could have a pint at lunchtime , they were getting out their clipboards and working out how 'dangerous and irresponsible ' a pint at lunchtime was. They've killjoyed the country to a standstill with their unhealthy obsession on safety and rules along with their utterly weird puritanical stance on everything.
So, it's wrecked? How sad.
I love how they televised things like the digging of the tunnel in 1968. Television stretching its wings with a sense of academic excitement. Marvellous.
Very interesting video once again. Thank you Paul.
Absolutely. I guess we have that today in small doses. Always room for amateur antiquarians
It explains the 1972 Dr Who story "The Daemons" which shows the digging of a tunnel into a barrow being televised. I didn't see it until the 1990s and thought it was weird to show a dig being televised. Obviously not. .
@@zacmumblethunder7466 I had exactly those scenes from The Daemons in mind too!
@@WC21UKProductionsLtd Call for Miss Hawthorne before dugging any deeper!
I was visiting from Canada in 1977. When at Stonehenge my lady friend and I went to the Stones and caressed them. We lay on the grass with our heads pressed against the stones and dreamt of ALL THE LIFE that had passed that way before us. At least until we were shooed away. It was magic!
MY BROTHER AND I ROAD OUR MOTORBIKES TO STONE HENGE FROM BRISTOL, IN THE MID 1960's, WE PHOTO'd EACH OTHER STANDING AND POSING ON THE MASSIVE ROCKS. PEOPLE COULD DO THAT, BACK THEN, AND WALK IN AND OUT OF THEM.
I went to stonehenge whilst undertaking my degree in archaeology. It was cordoned off but we were allowed inside as my professor was going to be conducting a dig there in the near future (now many years past). I didn't know that tourists could touch ancient historical monuments as late as the 1970s because the stones had already been very badly damaged.
@@CandiceGoddard The stones weren't damaged by people touching them. They're just subject to natural erosion from things like bird poop and the rain, which is a much bigger factor than people's skin oils. Now there are plenty of examples of local people intentionally breaking apart various ancient monuments to use the stone fragments as building material in their houses, but that's a different story.
I remember how free of "cant do" England was in the 1970's when I lived there having come from Rhodesia....fond memories of roaming around Stone Henge not a soul in sight.
Stones lasted for thousands of years. The current facilities are for profit, not preservation. Specifically unesco and tourist revenue.
"“Come, let us build ourselves a chalk mound that we may make a name for ourselves."
6:37 - the Cowslips have been magnificent this year - best I've ever seen them.
yes I remember them back in the 1950s, in the days when I could smell.
that and wild garlic have all gone nuts around me!
They were until he threw his rucksack onto them and then sat on them.
The here and now matters just as much as the ancient stuff!
@@peasgoodnonsuch4947they'll survive 5 minutes if being sat on.
Just noticed that. He could've sat anywhere else!? 🤦🏻♂️🤷🏻♂️🙄🙂@@peasgoodnonsuch4947
My primary school self (~10 years old) climbed Silbury Hill on a school trip from Wales over 50 years ago.
A really memorable trip, for the two punctures the coach got, followed by a complete electrical failure as we set off for home. We ended up in a pub car park; we were allowed in to use the loo, and refreshments were provided (squash and sandwiches), and when the replacement coach arrived we got home at 2am.
Translation for Americans: the "coach" was a bus, or "motorcoach." You all know "loo" is bathroom, of course, but "squash" is orange juice or something fairly similar.
Happy days ! xxx
@@VinemapleAnd puncture = flat tire…
Primary school = elementary school 😂
School = place where children are educated without getting shot
In the 1970s this was a popular destination for school trips. Tens of thousands of school children have probably clambered up top. Same thing with Stonehenge. I went there on a school trip when they were just stones in a field, you could walk up to them and touch them.
We did that, Stonehenge, West Kennet long barrow, Silbury Hill and ended up at Avebury. 1977 I think.
You clambered to the top of Stonehenge?
Maybe I missed a great deal in this video by just reading the transcript.but if one site has only a few burials and the other has a large amount of local debris piled in one place, how can it be it a 'last stand' of anything? The video maker is implying warfare is connected to this place when no connections of anything to anything have been made. In our present day people who believed they had exclusive knowledge of the immediate extinction of the human race have called people to gather at a certain place at a certain time, and some people did indeed go there. If they left soft drink cans and plastic candy wrappers behind,, which future archeologists found, how could they distinguish that site from another in the next county where people came to show each other their collections of 19th century brass doorknobs and also left behind the same brands of soft drink cans and plastic candy wrappers?
@@shelbyseelbach9568 Likely yes. Early seventies or late sixties we have photoes of hand feeding some loose ponies from our car window which was parked close to the stones. You were more likely to meet a pony than a Policeman or any authoritarian concerned about the well being of some abandoned stones. So standing on the top of Henge would most likely be ralativly common. Especially for school children. After filling his tobacco pipe and looking up. The teacher would most likely have yelled a few words of encouragement. (You three there form a humam pyramid so the lad can reach the top').
@@MikeGreenwood51 To the top of Stonehenge? I highly doubt that. You may have stood by the stones, but I bet my left testicle that you didn't get on top of them.
This is a really nice little documentary, great job. The channel is getting better and better. 😀
Thank you very much!
Such an amazing place! We have mounds everywhere here in Missouri too. Sending love and peaceful vibrations to you all.
Your videos are so well put together. They're well researched and have little side stories that make them relateble. Further more. you're a natural at presenting. You're as good if not better than many mainstream presenters. It's nice to see. Thank you.
meanwhile in 2400 BC...
Arthmaros: "where shall I put this excess limestone?"
Wirognawos: "just dump it on the pile over there."
I'd love to know why our ancestors, had a thing for man made hills, from ones as ad hoc as Silbury, to things as complicated and large as The Pyramids. They really do exert a real pull on our psyches. I went to a wedding ceremony on Silbury. That was one hell of a weekend.
We still do - every billionaire has to have his man made willie substitute somewhere.
Height is a dominance display in primates. Large edifices induce feelings of awe in people and of being overwhelmed that I suspect are related to that response. We're not that removed from life in tall trees.
Having the young adults build hills, trenches, etc. Keeps them busy and out of mischief or worse organising a rebellion.
Same reason church's have spires...... Closer to the god/gods directing your intentions/prayers
When you build big, this is the easiest shape to use.......
Minor point: 'Merewether' is usually pronounced 'Merryweather'. Also: that shallow moat that completely surrounds the hill is very interesting. As Silbury Hill is built in a chalk landscape, the only time of the year that the moat would normally be filled is winter, hence the many Winterbourne-somethings not far south of there in Dorset. Ex-Dorset resident here (Wimborne Minster and Poole).
I climbed it in the late 90s with my 2 children, we had the hill to ourselves, beautiful summer day as the Combine Harvestors slowly obliterated the stunning Crop Circles in the distance! Only time i ever went up there, amazing views and experience. Had no idea about all the digging that had gone on there!
On the hillside next to the mound is a Roman era spring, the only water around there. Presumably an old flint mine is concealed somewhere.
So, what you're saying is, Silbury Hill is a cap, placed over a site where the ancients dug too deeply, and uncovered something meant to remain hidden forever?
Heh, I'm just kidding.
Good point. Then perhaps this is just the old dirt from the digging, and it looks like they looked for water for than once.
Swallowhead spring its called, it joins into the Kennet.
I can never get anyone to cross the road and look in the field. It's amazing. Just a little walk will make you very miffed that you never knew.
🎯If my wife sees a historical marker before I do, she will deliberately distract me 😺
@procrastinator41 Perhaps mapping out the historical features before your trip would prevent skipping any due to your wife's penchant for distraction.
@@CricketsBay ordinance mapping. Aha. Military style. 🤣
@@CricketsBay 😆
@@Bambagustrust 😆
Fascinating and well-researched account of the archaeology of Silbury Hill - a massive neolithic structure whose purpose remains unknown. I like the explanation of Leary and Field, that its purpose is unknowable and that perhaps its building in separate phases, is as important, if not more so, than the hill itself. This is an idea which perhaps can often get overlooked - that the labour of construction involves various types of social interaction, including rituals, which are themselves affirmative and unifying, and indeed celebratory. Thank you for a very stimulating video.
Silbury Hill may be impressive, but it is definitely not the 'largest artificial mound in the northern hemnisphere'. It may be the tallest pre-historic mound in Europe, but is, for example, dwarved by the historic tumulus of Lydian king Alyattes in western Anatolia (63 m hight vs. the 39 m of Silbury).
I agree, and none of these is comparable to spill heaps of industrial mining. Even Monte Testaccio, the antique Roman pottery pile was probably 80 m and is still 36m.
Anatolia is Asian Turkey, so Alyattes’ High Tumulus is not a member of this European group.
There are plenty piles of garbage bigger than this.
Not to mention the large number of gigantic pit heaps around the country. Not many of those left now though
Largest in Europe.........why would I care about Anatolia? I care about my people's history not others.
I initiallyread this as "Solsbury Hill" and thought "poor Peter Gabriel".
Good news is solsbury hill will never collapse. Lovely place
Had that thought myself hello from down under.
@@TheSilmarillian Under the hill? In one of the tunnels?
I’m humming it right now, great song !
Hello from Florida. 1776 was a good year for us, too! Monks Mound is 61 feet taller. It is a 100 ft tall Indian Mound in Illinois. It is pre-Colombian, built in the 900s C.E.
Yup. 1776 ... That's when you started piling it higher and deeper.
Back in the 1990's, after a hot Sunday afternoon in a pub, I ran all the way to the top of Silbury Hill. On the way down, an elderly man and his wife were shouting at me, and I told them both to bugger off.
I'm not proud of it, but there it is.
Were their names Jack and Jill? Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pale of water; Jill came down with half a crown, but not for fetching water.
You should be proud, it's a steep hill , after drinking all afternoon I can hardly be bothered to go upstairs and find my decent headphones.
Legend!!
@@adrienneclarke3953 I was something of a rather rural miscreant back then. I loved it, all ferrets and creeping about.
Good. It took energy as such to dream, design, and build it. Your dna was theirs, celebrating it! well done.
Another GREAT interesting and informative video. I learnt a lot of new facts but the reallycexcitibg part is we STILL don't know why it was built...😊😊😊😊
Why do people climb mountains?
Well, I for one don't find it all that amazing that it's pre-Saxon. After all, as a band, Saxon has only been around since 1975........ 😁
@@HighlanderNorth1😂
It was built to keep the sheeple occupied. Now we have Coronation Street, East Enders and X-Factor to do that.
@@JP-cy1lwyou might have a point there.
As a family we used to walk up to the top for summer picnics back in the 70's. There is another similar but smaller man made mound in the grounds of Marlborough college heading along the A4 east. Just as you approach the estate on your right behind the church. It was neglected for years and trees were allowed to grow on it, but I see more recently they have been chopped down and you can see it much more clearly now - somewhat scarred by numerous stumps. There is a spiral path up it leading to some kind of grotto inside possibly, which I imagine the victorians might have installed with their love of follies? Overlooking the grounds on the hill beyond is also a small chalk horse. I think I've seen a William Stuckley print depicting it with the A4 as a dirt track.
I am always amazed that 2500 years ago there was enough slack in the economy and organised manpower to build these great structures alongside the normal day to day priorities of growing food, raising families and surviving winters. It indicates a very organised society with somebody calling the shots just to get it all together. Interms of population there cant have been all that many people around, so where did they get the labour necessary ? I find it all so fascinating and enigmatic because the best we can do is make educated guesses from the limited evidence available.
Absolutely Tim. I think many suggested (Inc Mike Parker Pearson) that this was a authoritarian type society and the building of this wasn't a choice of many.
Yes, "democracy" is the curse of our age.
The hours required for "work" to meet one's needs in the neolithic period were actually quite limited, certainly much shorter than the modern working week, so there was much spare time available to devote to such communal projects.
I climbed Silbury Hill about 30 years ago. It was raining so hard every bit of waterproof I was wearing was drenched. Climbing up, I think we saw a crop circle which dates the walk to the 1990s. I also have pictures of me as a child sitting on a stonehenge slab. I realise it makes sense to preserve these monuments, but it's a shame that people can see - but not touch - these relics of human ingenuity.
An interesting documentary - I didn't realise that there were 3 overlapping hills constructed and it's interesting that we have never been able to properly ascertain its meaning or purpose.
Yes, that would be nice. Unfortunately, most people seem to be very keen on destroying things, so it's not possible.
Hi Paul. I've passed this a few times, and whilst I knew it was man-made, I knew nothing else about it. Until now!
I visited Surton Hoo recently, which is another site famous for its man-made mounds, although apparently not nearly as old as this one.
Excellent video and storytelling.
Great video Paul. Such an amazing, atmospheric landscape around Silbury Hill and Avebury.
Many thanks
Fun fact the 2nd Duke of Northumberland, the son of the guy who dug the giant pit into a historical monument, is known for bringing Cannons to relieve the British Force at Lexington.
I think the entire hill should be protected for future generations by building a huge chalk phase IV Silbury Hill on top of it.
Totally game
@@pwhitewick Is there evidence that the site was kept free of grass during any of the periods? A pure chalk hill would be quite a sight.
I said all this jokingly, but the more I think of it the more I believe it could be an economic boon to the area that would likely pay for itself and all archeological investigations into the site. Should I start the GoFundMe now and contact interested parties? 😶
Wouldn't suprise me if it doesn't colapse again as we've hardly had a dry day since July 2023 began,10 months of rain worst i've known.A lot of rail embankments are collapsing now due to the damp earth.Mind not just here....Dubai,Brasil and Kenya endless rain too.
Likewise! I think since the back filling in 2007/8 the structure is much improved with regards its stability so perhaps we might be safe.
I'm always surprised when I hear of disasters like embankment collapses, floods, forest fires, etc. in Europe. I've assumed that in a landscape that has been settled for so long has been so well domesticated -- or at least understood -- that these don't happen. At least not as often as in a largely untamed & mostly undeveloped landscape like North America. You Europeans have had centuries -- if not millennia -- to learn these things thru trial & error; we Americans (& I'm including Canadians who have the same technology to effect changes to the environment that earlier inhabitants did not.
@@llywrch7116 Quite a lot of structures depend on rainfall being close to average. There's a road not far from my house that is closed when there's too much rainwater to get out to sea.
And canal embankments,big one near brinklow
I got up there 1971 , and without a beer bottle. - thanks as usual - for updates , explanations etc.
I'm glad there are people trying to preserve this ancient monument. I get sick of archaeologists running around digging stuff up, disturbing ancient graves and basically vandalising everything they touch.
Honestly, even archaeologists prefer preserving ancient monuments as-is than digging them up. Most of the time they had to dig up monuments and artifacts is because that there's a construction project going on and they are salvaging whatever then can save.
There are not many geographic locations that can serve as epicenters of traffic and communications, and that's why humans usually build cities on top of old ones throughout thousands of years, even if they are new settlers thousands of years apart from the old native civilizations.
In 2000 years time our ancestors will be contemplating the origins of the slag heaps of the mining industry, the white alps of Cornwall and the MCDonalds detritus that is currently infesting out hedgerows! Will they attach some mystical significant to a McFlurry carton?
I take it you mean our descendants...
They will take samples of the residues in the McFlurry pot, subject them to spectrometry and isotope analysis techniques to ascertain dietary habits , study the results, then think "What the f..."
Thank you, Paul, for highlighting this monument, especially for those of us from across the pond. In the US, we have tended to "run over" many of the mounds left by the Neolithic people. Thankfully the mounds along the Ohin were often protected by early settlers and those who followed on continued the protection, though usually, just "keep out" and no conservation.
“Ohio”, not “Ohin”. The foreigners will have enough problems figuring out to what you refer :-).
I've been to Monk Mound here at Chahokia in Illinois. But Silbury Hill looks to be another three stories higher with quite the profile. I'd love to see it as well one day. Great show Paul.
Paul i absolutely love your videos. Its not just UA-cam your actually doing incredible work in documenting this wonderful country. Im from stafford, i believe we in the area have huge undercovered sites and very little archaeology done. I know its not your neck of the woods but i think you have the eyes and knowledge to spot things in my local landscape, we have castle ring in cannock chase and then the Wrekin and of cause the roman city wroxeter practically below the Wrekin all visible from my village of gnosall. Im sure each hill in the area had a settlement on at aome point, the landscape near is incredible. Once again thank you both for your videos love it
I hypothesise that the hill started after a couple guys got drunk and just started digging, then over time people kept up the digging as some sort of homage to the legendary night of the original drunkards.
Have you been on the mead?
enjoyed the video again Paul, very interesting as always , well done and thank you 😊
My first view of Silbury Hill was as a 10yr old on the return to Hertford after a week in Bath on a school trip
Outward Stonehenge in the days when access to the stones was permitted
Return Avebury where a certain James Bolam (whatever happened to the likely lads being a hit show at the time)
West Kennett and Silbury where we could walk up the hill
40yrs later lwas iving in Calne this was on my daily commute and remember the collapse and the work done to address it
In the old faith, the sacred feminine lives on an island in a wetland. Think of the Isle of Avalon, or the Christian temples built later at Glastonbury, Ely, Canterbury, Lincoln, all on islands in the wetlands. We see the same on the discovered causeways linking Isles holding old churches to St Mary (christianised Goddess sites) enroute to Lincoln.
I've therefore always been of the opinion that Silbury is not so much a hill, but an artificial island in a now silted up lake, built to bring a Goddess temple to a spiritual region full of sacred masculine sites.
Interesting my local church is St Mary’s is on the edge of a floodplain.
So, when my fingers drummed the steering wheel, as Peter Gabriel sang about climbing up on Solsbury Hill, I needed a clip around the lughole from my Geography Teacher.
Hah! Same for me. I visited Old Sarum, Salisbury Hill, in 1996, because of that song. Took me 20 years to find out my error.
At least I managed to see Avebury, Silbury Hill, West Kennett, and also the Rollright Stones (Traffic) on the same trip.
I am fiddling "Swinging on a Gate" on my Violin.....
Hello from the rocky mid-coast of Maine, US... Sunday, May 5, 2024.
What a wonderful time of year to visit with the rain providing a natural moat.
Very interesting story to present too. An enduring mystery thats for sure.
Very enjoyable to watch, well done!! All the best!!
Not natural, that's where all the earth came from to build the mound.
I was at Uni in 92 when myself and some friends were able to get access to Stonehenge very early one morning to take photos for a project... just us and a Japanese Rock band filiming a video :-) we then stopped at Silbury Hill to stand on the top and have a smoke. Heard some very weird sounds which we attributed to the nearby army base. Amazing Day! PS. I'd asked the Security Guard at Stonehenge if he'd every seen anything weird ... he replied 'Like shadow figures you mean? or lights that come, hover and then speed off? Every night' :-0
My Mum and my cousin (3 months younger than my Mum) would climb the hill back in the 1940’s and sit to eat their lunch. My cousin lived in Beckhampton at the Wagon and Horses pub.
I heard people used to visit stonehenge and chip pieces off the stones as a souvenir. Must be why no one is allowed to touch them now.
I heard back in the early 1900s there was even bolsters and mallets on site so you could chip off a souvenir. It wasn't really a problem by 77 when the stones were cordoned off. That was partly due to better understanding of the damage to lichen caused by touching, the lichen actually protects stone from pollution damage. Also graffiti was a problem.
'Slippery Hill' was a good primary GAP (Gun Aiming Point) back when I was an Arty Mong. Much better than 'that white rock there' (which turned out to be a sheep - different Artillery Range though).
It's been there thousands of years - it's standing up well - nothing lasts forever.
As a teenager back in the 50s I used to hang about around the bottom of the hill and get up to mischief. Same with stonehenge. In those days people could climb all over these monuments as they weren't protected at all. Not so much now. It's all fences and warning signs.
Silbury Hill used to be my favorite go to place when living in the UK, love, love, love that place. Went at least once a year for many years. x
Thank you Paul for a very interesting video, great things to learn... Greetings from Denmark
Glad you enjoyed it
Before anyone asks, that's not a moat it's been a very wet winter and the ground is water logged.
Where did the material to construct the mound come from?
@@charliebrowns9999 probably from the local area, it's all chalk around there.
there have been suggestions that Silbury was meant to be surrounded by water - they did build right next to the source of the Kennet after all
It is a 'moat' in the sense that the major excavations in the Atkinson investigation indicated it was created as part of the monument as a feature of it. The Hill is a navel point and womb goddess, of birth, not death and this is obvious from an aerial photo.
@@spookydirt Correct. It is a 'moat' in the sense that the major excavations in the Atkinson investigation indicated it was created as part of the monument as a feature of it. The Hill is a navel point and womb goddess, of birth, not death and this is obvious from an aerial photo.
I went on a school trip in the 70s encompassing Stonehenge, Silbury and Averbury. Back then we were allowed to roam all over these monuments, and I have memories of our class climbing up Silbury Hill and running down, but the running turned into rolling, I'd literally gone head over heels at one point. Whenever passing this on route to the west the first thing that comes into my mind is the feeling I had back then of careering totally out of control down the hill.
So informative. Lots of research. Well done. Every week we learn more about our history. Thank you.
i used to love taking the kids to the top for a picnic---30 years ago !
same only back in the late 1940s.
@@bwghall1 cool .... its a bigger space than it looks up there ian't it
Fascinating mate. Why is a wheelbarrow called a wheel barrow ? Push it up, tip it over..
Build a hill.
yes , and i was thinking there were giants in those days!!!
Even the Romans didn't have wheelbarrows, let alone this ancient bunch.
Great content as usual. like most posts here I climbed it back in the late 1990's whilst linking up the Ridgeway LDP and the Kennet and Avon Canal back to Reading. Keep up the good work.
This lovely video popped up unexpectedly in my queue today. New subscriber now. Many thanks.
It's fascinating how every old earthworks is simple assumed to have some purpose, some important use that we just haven't figured out yet. It's a mound, so something very interesting must be inside...
Yes, or it was just a pile of trash that they put up because the local baroness had been eating paint chips and wanted a place to sing her sonata's from.
Sometimes a big pile of dirt is just a pile of dirt.
Silbury hill is beautiful but...silbury hill in spring, with a moat around it, with the sun out, is something else beyond beauty that our language doesn't have the words for...you, yes you, should visit it before that moat dries up, next week would be good i'd politely suggest:)
The language we lost actually has. Old English had tonnes of descriptive nature words and phrases that encapsulate the world around them beautifully.
@@hobi1kenobi112 The only old english I have experienced was from Chaucer, and I expect you know that involved farts and violence:)
@@matthewbooth9265Old English in this context refers to Anglo-Saxon
@@unfurling3129 Ah, which is german basically...and german has many more words that are much more descriptive than modern english.
@@matthewbooth9265 Chaucer is middle English, not OE.
Had a picnic on the top with my grandparents around 50 years ago
There is something very special about that area including Avebury. I feel closer to my ancestors there than anywhere.
Couldn't agree more.
I thought it said Salisbury Hill - starting to worry about Peter Gabriel
Solsbury Hill is just north of Bath, about 20 miles due East of Silbury Hill. Peters name and address were in my local (Bath and Wells) telephone directory when I was a nipper.
My parents took my brother and I there just after it collapsed in 2000, I was 7 or 8 years old. There were a lot of hippie types around, we met a dude, I think he was called Pedro.
We tried climbing the mound but someone in a high-vis shouted at us to go away because it was dangerous due to the collapse. We hung out around our camper van until after dark and then we climbed to the top, the collapsed part was covered by a tarpaulin or something, I didn't remember seeing underneath it. This Pedro guy gave my brother and I a handful of some kinda crystals like quartz or something and instructed us to spread them around in the grass on the mound. Idk why, some hippy stuff. And then we left.
I think we also went to visit a crop circle around the same time, I can't remember if it was before or after the mound incident but it must have been within a couple of days and fairly close by. It was a truly ultra spiritual experience, dude.
I was in Treforest Pontypridd in summer 2007. The floods were epic. River Taf which flowed through a deep walled channel was running incredibly high. An absolute torrent of water with whole trees being swept down.
I love how this story has sparked so many warm memories for many, many people. 😁
Was quite excited about this video coming out. Supreme production by Paul as ever.
Cheers dude
@@pwhitewick Just gets better and better, as does the research and storytelling.
Maybe it was just a lookout. If people lived in the valley they might find it useful to know early if somebody is coming over the ridges. Maybe it had a wooden tower on top...
I was thinking the same thing. 😊
Well researched and presented as usual. Fascinating look at a corner of England that leaves a lot more questions. Really good
Thanks Bob. Appreciated
Sorry, Silbury Hill is NOT the largest manmade mound in the northern hemisphere. Monk's Mound of Cahokia (located in the state of Illinois in the US) has that honor. It is almost three times the volume of this hill. Built by native Americans. Much younger than this, but still pre-columbian and much larger.
Rubbish.
It’s hiding a pyramid, near Stonehenge and all crop circles
Its Largest man made hill in Europe. Caro
I was thinking the same thing, it's a wonderful little hike though!
😂typical yank answer ours is bigger than yours 😂
Amanda sounds familiar 👀
Haha... you noticed???
It was the fake ring-tone which gave her away...! 🤣
Another interesting and instructive tour this day. A walking talking tour is the inspirational option to converse with. Thank you for the research along the way. Hello to Rebecca and enjoy the rest of your week. See you on the next, Paul! 🇬🇧🙂👍🇺🇸
Thank you for this video. For someone who lives a five minute drive from the hill I found it fascinating.
Our pleasure!
I thought video was about Teletubbies's filming location.
The text gives a date of 20400 years
Really....??.... on noooo
I fly from a couple of airfields in this area. Very beautiful.
Thanks Paul .. Totally fascinating video, history gives us so any unexplained things
I see your channel has finally attracted the bots 🙄 shame about that. The video is great as always
Ah... let them play! Or do you mean those tiktok ones!?
What collapse? It doesn’t look any different.
Great video! I always enjoy your videos!
I never remember water arround the hill. As a young boy we did the run to the top on many occasions, it was always open to the public, yes 70 years ago
This is well done and is a very educational video. Thank you Paul.
We need a documentary on the relationship and timing differences between Silbury and the similar but smaller mound in the grounds of Marlborough school five miles away
Was allowed to walk up that when we were at school in the 70s. Had a great day there as well as Avebury an some long barrow, had great school trips back then
I walked this hill in the 80's - I done Stonehenge in the 80's - I've done Wayland Smithy and all the Horses ( Swindon is a hub ). So glad I was able to do this when I did.
Exceedingly well done Paul !