Showing posts with label Giants' Graves. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Giants' Graves. Show all posts

Tuesday 8 November 2022

Skulferatu - #85 - Giants' Graves, Arran

 

It was time to journey away again for a quick break, so I headed off to the Isle of Arran on the west coast of Scotland.  On my first day there I went for a rather lovely walk up the hills by Whiting Bay.  The walk takes you up by the quite spectacular Glenashdale Falls and then round to the Giants’ Graves and the views from there over to Holy Isle.  The walk was steep in parts, which wouldn’t normally be a problem, but a touch of Angina made it a bit wobbly for me on some of the steeper bits.  However, though I may be fat and old, I’m determined when it comes to getting places and I soon walked it off.  After a quick stop at the viewing platform looking out on Glenashdale Falls I carried on round and up to the top of the hill and the Giants’ Graves.

 

A photo of a waterfall over some steep cliffs surrounded by trees.  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
Glenashdale Waterfall

 

The Giants’ Graves are actually the remains of two chambered cairns that were built around five thousand years ago and sit on top of a hill near Whiting Bay.  The chambers in each would originally have been roofed with large stone slabs and then enclosed in a cairn made up of thousands of smaller stones.

 

A photo of a group of large rocks (the Giants' Graves) on top of a hill, they are close together and almost look like some sort of shelter.   Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
View of the Giants’ Graves

 

A photo of a group of large rocks (the Giants' Graves).  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
View of the Giants’ Graves

 

The cairns were used as burial sites, but not quite in the way we now bury bodies.  That reverence and respect for a corpse wasn’t there in the way we know it, and bodies didn’t tend to just be buried and left alone.  No, our ancient ancestors seemed to have had religious practices that involved leaving corpses out in the open to have the flesh eaten from them by the birds and the beasts, before they would then pick up the remaining bones, burn some and place these and the other unburnt bones into the chambers of the cairn.  What the significance of this was we’ll never know, but it probably all meant something deeply spiritual to them.

 

A photo of a group of large rocks (the Giants' Graves) taken at an angle with the sea in the background.  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
View of the Giants’ Graves

 

A photo of a group of large rocks (the Giants' Graves) taken from an angle where the mountains of Arran can be seen in the background.  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
View of the Giants’ Graves

 

Given these religious practices the cairns were not permanently sealed, but rather used over and over again. 

 

Only some of the larger stones in the cairns now remain, as most of the others were taken away to be used for building with.

 

Excavations carried out of the two cairns found human bone, pottery, flint knives and stone arrowheads.

 

A photo of one of the large rocks that makes up the Giants' Graves - it has graffiti carved into it and as well as people's names the date 1883 can be seen.  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
Graffiti carved into one of the stones

 

Before making my way back down to Whiting Bay and a spot of lunch, I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on my walk on one of the stones that make up the Giants’ Graves.

 

A photo of a small, ceramic skull (Skulferatu #85) being held up with the Giants' Graves in the background.  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
Skulferatu #85

 

A photo of a small, ceramic skull (Skulferatu #85) lying on one of the rocks that make up the Giants' Graves.  Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
Skulferatu #85 on one of the stones of the Giants’ Graves

 

A photo of a small, ceramic skull (Skulferatu #85) lying on one of the rocks that make up the Giants' Graves. Photo by Kevin Nosferatu for the Skulferatu Project.
Skulferatu #85 on one of the stones of the Giants’ Graves

 

TomTom Map showing the location of Skulferatu #85
Map showing the location of Skulferatu #85

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 55.476701

Longitude -5.097959

 

what3words: acquaint.closet.deeply

 

I used the following sources for information on the Giants’ Graves –

 

The Book of Arran

Edited by J. A. Balfour

1910

 

Public information sign at site