Castlerigg stone circle (alternatively Keswick Carles, or Carles) is situated on a prominent hill to the east of Keswick, in the Lake District National Park, North West England.
In this period, the Lake District – a mountainous area in which Castlerigg is located – saw particularly high levels of Neolithic stone circle construction, with other similar examples including Swinside, Gamelands, Elva Plain, and Long Meg and Her Daughters. The original purposes of such large stone circles is still debated, although most archaeologists concur that they were built for ritual or ceremonial reasons, with a similar function to henges.
Various archaeologists have mentioned the beauty and romance of Castlerigg and its surrounding landscape. In his study of the stone circles of Cumbria, archaeologist John Waterhouse commented that the site was "one of the most visually impressive prehistoric monuments in Britain."
Every year, thousands of tourists travel to the site, making it the most visited stone circle in Cumbria. This plateau forms the raised centre of a natural amphitheatre created by the surrounding fells and from within the circle it is possible to see some of the highest peaks in Cumbria: Helvellyn, Skiddaw, Grasmoor and Blencathra.
Description The stones are glacial erratic boulders composed of volcanic rock from the Borrowdale Volcanic Group. Both andesitic lavas and tuffs (volcanic ashes) are represented. Castlerigg sits on a deposit of glacial till,British Geological Survey GeoIndex and it is likely that the boulders were originally part of this deposit. The stones are set in a flattened circle, measuring at its widest and at its narrowest. The heaviest stone has been estimated to weigh around 16 tons and the tallest stone measures approximately 2.3 metres high. There is a 3.3 metre wide gap in its northern edge, which may have been an entrance.
Within the circle, abutting its eastern quadrant, is a roughly rectangular setting of a further 10 stones. This internal setting is highly unusual among British stone circles, and has no agreed functional interpretation. Although once interpreted as a burial space or ritual compartment, excavation has produced no evidence sufficient to confirm either explanation.
Antiquarian observers in the nineteenth century recorded several low internal mounds within the eastern half of the circle, commonly described as cairns or small burial features. Their form was never clearly defined, and because none were excavated under modern archaeological conditions, their date and purpose remain uncertain. They are often interpreted as later Bronze Age additions inserted into an already ancient monument, although a 2021 re-examination of Benjamin Williams's 1856 description has suggested that one mound may have contained a Langdale tuff axe, raising the possibility that at least some burials within the circle could belong to the Neolithic.
Due to erosion of the soil around the stones, caused by the large number of visitors to the monument, several smaller stones have 'appeared' next to some of the larger stones. Because these stones are so small, they are likely to have been packing stones used to support the larger stones when the circle was constructed and would originally have been buried. Differences in opinion as to the exact number of stones within Castlerigg are usually down to whether the observer counts these small packing stones, or not; some count only 38 and others as high as 42. Modern counts vary, partly because several smaller stones visible at ground level are likely packing stones used to stabilise larger uprights rather than intended standing elements.
In the early 20th century, a single outlying stone was erected by a farmer approximately 90m to the south west of Castlerigg. This stone has many linear 'scars' along its side from being repeatedly struck by a plough, suggesting that it was once buried below the surface and also why the farmer dug it up. It is not possible to say whether this stone was originally part of the circle, or a naturally deposited boulder.One of Castlerigg's most striking characteristics is the way its position controls visibility. Although surrounded by lower ground, the monument sits at the apex of a rounded hill where nearby land falls from view, leaving distant mountain horizons dominant from within the circle. Various horizon alignments have been proposed, particularly towards eastern skyline notches, but no astronomical axis has gained universal acceptance.
Archaeological speculation
The appearance of large stone circle enclosures in the Lake District appears to have coincided with a wave of Irish passage tomb culture appearing across the west of Great Britain, with affinities with the Brú na Bóinne of eastern Ireland. Rock art reminiscient of this culture, dated to the mid to late Neolithic, is found across the Lake District, such as Langdale Boulders. It is particularly associated with the Langdale axe factory, which quarried around a third of all known polished stone axes from Neolithic Britain. This culture appears to have swept up and down the coast of Great Britain, leaving megalithic stone circles and passage tombs in their wake.
Aubrey Burl classed such circles as 'Cumbrian Circles': large, open stone enclosures spacious enough for gatherings. Although often thought widespread, true stone circles of this type are uncommon, with only five surviving in Cumbria: Swinside, Castlerigg, Elva Plain, Long Meg, and Gamelands . Others are also found locally, including the Twelve Apostles, the Girdle Stanes, and further to the north in Northumbria there are the Hethpool Stone Circles. Such enclosures may have functioned as sacred settings for ritual, assembly, and perhaps astronomical observation, representing a local variety of henge, built in stone rather than earth.
Castlerigg is generally assigned to the late fourth millennium BC, often around 3200 BC. This is on typological grounds rather than direct dating, which would place it among the earliest known stone circles in Britain. It also places it within the time period when the Irish Passage Tomb culture is known to have been present in western Great Britain. Such a connection may relate to the only known rock art at the site – a single lozenge on stone 13, on the western edge of the circle.
The original motives behind the construction of Castlerigg, its subsequent uses, and how these may have changed over time are not known. The circle has often been linked to wider ceremonial networks associated with Langdale axe production, perhaps serving as a gathering place where exchange, movement, and ritual overlapped. Evidence for this comes from 19th century reports of "rude stone clubs" being found within the circle's northwestern quardrant, where several small mounds are found. However, such finds are not rare within Neolithic ritual sites in the region, and it isn't clear what connection this mid to late Neolithic site had with the Early Neolithic stone axe trade.
Ritually deposited stone axes have been found all over Britain, suggesting that their uses went far beyond their practical capabilities. Exchange or trading of stone axes may not have been possible without first taking part in a ritual or ceremony. Recent dating of the notable 'axe factory' at Pike o' Stickle, Great Langdale, indicates that production here likely ceased by 3300 BC, which predates proposed date for Castlerigg by at least 100 years.Edinborough, Kevan; Shennan, Stephen; Teather, Anne; Baczkowski, Jon; Bevan, Andrew; Bradley, Richard; Cook, Gordon; Kerig, Tim; Parker Pearson, Mike; Pope, Alexander & Schauer, Peter (2020). "New Radiocarbon Dates Show Early Neolithic Date of Flint-mining and Stone Quarrying in Britain" (PDF). Radiocarbon. Cambridge University Press. 62 (1): 75–105. Bibcode:2020Radcb..62...75E. doi:10.1017/RDC.2019.85. ISSN 0033-8222. S2CID 197554465.
Antiquarian study of Castlerigg Two of Britain's earliest antiquarians, John Aubrey and William Camden visited Cumbria with an interest in studying the area's megalithic monuments. Both described Long Meg and Her Daughters, another large stone circle to the northeast of Penrith, and recounted local legend and folklore associated with this monument, but neither writers mentions a visit to Castlerigg or the area around Keswick. John Aubrey was also the first writer to erroneously connect Neolithic and Bronze Age megalithic monuments with the Iron Age Druids.
It was not until the early 18th century that Castlerigg came to the attention of the wider public, when William Stukeley visited the site in 1725.
Stukeley's account of his visit to Castlerigg is brief and was published in his Itinerarium Curiosum in 1776, 11 years after his death. Stukeley's visit is important, as it is the earliest written record of the stone circle at Castlerigg:
...for a mile before we came to Keswick, on an eminence in the middle of a great concavity of those rude hills, and not far from the banks of the river Greata, I observed another Celtic work, very intire: it is 100 foot in diameter, and consists of forty stones, some very large. At the east end of it is a grave, made of such other stones, in number about ten: this is placed in the very east point of the circle, and within it: there is not a stone wanting, though some are removed a little out of their first station: they call it the Carsles, and, corruptly I suppose, Castle-rig. There seemed to be another larger circle in the next pasture toward the town. (Stukeley 1969 Vol. II, 48).
Stukeley could be describing the circle as it stands today, as it has changed little in the three centuries since his visit. The rectangular enclosure within the circle, that Stukeley took to be a grave, still consists of 10 stones. It is not clear, however, why Stukeley believed the circle was not missing a single stone. Today there are several large gaps in the circle, suggesting that a number of stones may have indeed been either moved into a different position (possibly after the stone had fallen or been removed completely). Of course, there is no certainty today as to the original appearance of the circle, or how much it may have changed in the preceding millennia, prior to Stukeley's visit. It is believed, however, that the circle survives today in a relatively intact state, changed certainly, but not so far from its original design.
Stukeley's observation of a second circle in the next field is a great revelation that places the stones at Castlerigg in a whole new light; that he fails to deliver a description demonstrates well the frustration felt by modern researchers when dealing with the works of antiquarians. This account could easily be dismissed today as pure fancy or it could be thought that he had mistakenly described a natural feature, as there is no evidence of it today, either above ground or in the observations of later scholars.
The 19th century
The apparently unspoilt and seemingly timeless landscape setting of Castlerigg stone circle provided inspiration for the poets, painters and writers of the 19th-century Romantic movement. In John Keats' Hyperion, the passage "Scarce images of life, one here, one there,/Lay vast and edgeways; like a dismal cirque/Of Druid stones, upon a forlorn moor..." is alleged to have been inspired by his visit to the stones; a visit, it seems, with which he was less than impressed. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in 1799, visited Castlerigg with fellow poet William Wordsworth and wrote of it, that a mile and a half from Keswick stands "...a Druidical circle [where] the mountains stand one behind the other, in orderly array as if evoked by and attentive to the assembly of white-vested wizards".