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Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 5
CARN GOEDOG ON MYNYDD PRESELI WAS NOT THE SITE OF A
BLUESTONE MEGALITH QUARRY
Brian John
Newport, Pembrokeshire (brianjohn4@mac.com)
Abstract
is paper examines the hypothesis that Carn Goedog, a
prominent tor on the north ank of Mynydd Preseli in
Pembrokeshire, Wales, was the site of a Neolithic quarry from
which Stonehenge bluestones were extracted on a large scale.
e dolerite sills in the area are geochemically heterogenous,
with multiple outcrops. Claims of “precise provenancing”
of Stonehenge spotted dolerite fragments to Carn Goedog are
questionable. Geomorphological studies on the tor reveal that
pillars suitable for use as monoliths are restricted to a few small
areas, dicult to access. Frost-shattered blocks dominate. Many
have sub-rounded edges, suggesting long-term weathering and
redistribution by glacier ice. Moulded and smoothed surfaces
indicate that the inuence of over-riding ice associated with
the Irish Sea Ice Stream has been considerable. Examinations
of the supposed “Neolithic quarry” site reveal that many of the
“engineering features” may be natural. e materials referred
to as stone artefacts are not obviously related to quarrying
activities, but may instead point to a history of intermittent
occupation. e soft shale “wedges” supposedly used for
extracting pillars from the rock face may be natural and are
ubiquitous. Radiocarbon dating does not appear to support the
quarrying hypothesis. us the evidence for a Neolithic quarry
at Carn Goedog is poor. If blocks and pillars of spotted dolerite
were indeed extracted and transported away from the vicinity
of the tor in prehistory, the agency is most likely to have been
glacier ice.
Introduction
Carn Goedog (SN 128333) is a spectacular dolerite tor
located on the northern ank of the Mynydd Preseli upland
ridge, in West Wales (Figure 1). It has been promoted as
the site of a Neolithic bluestone quarry from which there
was monolith removal “on an industrial scale” for export to
Stonehenge (Parker Pearson et al 2016). It is the purpose
of this paper to examine that claim in the context of new
observations and scrutiny of material already in the public
domain.
e up-slope face of the tor (at about 305m) is not very
prominent, but on the downslope side there is a wilderness
of dolerite blocks, grassy platforms, solid and broken rock
outcrops, crevices and overhangs spread across an area of
c60 000 sq m
. e break of slope at the foot of the tor is
at c235m. e rock is a coarse spotted dolerite with a grey-
blue matrix colour and cream-coloured clusters of secondary
metamorphic minerals.
Like the other crags on the anks and summit ridge of
Mynydd Preseli, the tor has been aected by over-riding
ice (Etienne et al 2005; John 2018), and the surrounding
landscape is littered with glacial erratics, most of which
are not very far-travelled. e expansive lowland of Rhos y
Bryn, beneath the tor, has a discontinuous cover of glacial
deposits.
Figure 1: Carn Goedog in the middle distance, seen from a dolerite outcrop near Carn Alw. All of the outcrops seen in this photo are
assumed to belong to the same dolerite sill.
6 Archaeology in Wales 63
e outcrop lies adjacent to the main prehistoric crossing
col of the Preseli ridge and the old drover’s route used for
moving thousands of animals from Pembrokeshire farms
to the meat markets of the Midlands and London in the
1700s and early 1800s (Toulson & Forbes 1992). However,
because the tor is oset from the main ridge path, it is
seldom nowadays visited by hill walkers. A few small trees
have managed to survive in places inaccessible to grazing
animals; but the name Carn Goedog (“woodland cairn” in
English) and the presence of bluebells indicate that there
must once have been a woodland here. Most of the upland
ridge has been cleared by burning, felling and grazing during
at least ve millennia of human occupation.
Since the geologist Herbert omas (1923) demonstrated
a link between the Stonehenge “bluestone” monoliths and
the igneous outcrops of Preseli, geologists have focused
upon the spotted dolerite tors as potential provenance sites.
In the early studies Carn Meini (Carn Menyn) was the
location of greatest interest. However, the Carn Goedog tor
then attracted attention following suggestions by orpe et
al (1991) that it might be the source of some Stonehenge
rock fragments. Bevins et al (2014) went much further, and
argued that at least ve of the Stonehenge spotted dolerite
monoliths might have come from here. Building on this,
Parker Pearson et al (2016) conducted an archaeological dig
at this site in 2014 and 2015, leading to claims that this was
the most signicant Neolithic quarrying site in the British
Isles.
Geology
e igneous outcrops in this part of Preseli belong to the
rocks of the Middle Ordovician Fishguard Volcanic Group
(FVG) (Bevins et al 2014; 2017) which are around 464
million years old. e geological map (Figure 2) reveals a
suite of intrusive doleritic sills which were emplaced at a
high level in the adjacent sedimentary sequence (referred to
as the Abermawr Shales). ese are the lateral equivalents
of the FVG basaltic lavas and doleritic sills exposed further
to the west. ey were probably erupted in a submarine
environment within a graben or half-graben structure centred
upon the Fishguard - Strumble Head area, with the magmas
being channelled up the boundary faults (Burt et al 2012).
e Preseli district was peripheral to this graben structure.
According to Bevins et al (2014,180) ‘it is very dicult to
trace individual intrusions laterally and hence to understand
which exposures are actually part of the same intrusion and
which belong to a dierent intrusion, perhaps with diering
petrography and geochemistry. Further complications arise
because the area is structurally complex, with the rocks being
deformed into a series of NE-SW oriented folds’. During
the various geological attempts to unravel the complexities
of these intrusions, scores of samples have been taken and
analysed; of these, 46 were examined by Bevins et al (2014)
in the context of research into the origins of the Stonehenge
bluestones.
e British Geological Survey (BGS) map of the dolerite
sills and other outcrops (2010) shows that the “Carn
Goedog” sill composed of spotted dolerite is an extensive one,
stretching for c3 km from near Foel Drygarn through Carn
Goedog itself, thence westwards towards the mountainside
between Mynydd Bach and Hafod Tydl. It is up to 150m
wide, and is truncated by faults at both ends. e outcrop
covers an area of c450 000 sq m, although exposures are
nowadays discontinuous because of overlying glacial and
periglacial deposits. To the east of Carn Goedog the outcrop
stretches across about 2km of mountainside before running
up towards the crest of the ridge at Carn Breseb and thence
to Carn Ddafad-las. e western half of this sill outcrop
has only been sampled by geologists in three places, close
Figure 2: Geological map of the eastern part of Mynydd Preseli, showing the elongated outcrops of igneous rocks belonging to the
Fishguard Volcanic Group, faults and related strata (BGS Geology Viewer).
Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 7
together at Carn Goedog tor itself. Other samples, collected
from the rock outcrops around Carn Breseb, have also been
analysed, together with two samples of unspotted dolerite
from Carn Ddafad-las (Bevins et al 2014).
More recent sampling has been concentrated around Carn
Ddu Fach, and that tor has been identied as the possible
source of stone 62 at Stonehenge (Pearce et al 2022). But
over the rest of this extensive outcrop no studies have
been undertaken which might reveal how similar - or how
dierent -- the spotted dolerites might be. To the west of
Carn Goedog it is possible that there are further exposures
of this same sill, displaced by faulting. ere are also other
spotted dolerites outcropping on the western ank of Carn
Alw, where they appear to underlie the rhyolite mass which
makes up the bulk of the hill. e presence of spotted
dolerite boulders in the Brynberian - Crosswell area may
suggest there could be other outcrops of this rock masked by
till and supercial deposits. Overall, the geology of the area
is inadequately understood.
Studies of both the spotted and unspotted dolerites
arranged in strips across the eastern part of Preseli are
confused and biased by their incorporation into Stonehenge-
related research projects (orpe et al 1991; Bevins et al
2014, 2017). It sometimes appears therefore that the bulk of
investigated dolerite samples have come from old Stonehenge
collections rather than from original eldwork carried out in
the Preseli. at having been said, orpe et al (1991) showed
that there are signicant geochemical regional variations
between the various dierent outcrops, and they refer to the
“Carnmeini - Carn Gyfrwy group” (which includes Carn
Breseb, Cerrigmarchogion, and Carngoedog) and another
group of “undierentiated dolerites” seen in dierent
outcrops and on other tors. Samples from Carnmeini and
Carn Gyfrwy were deemed to be geochemically distinctive.
Ixer (1997) and Williams-orpe et al (2006) pointed to
lateral variations present along the Carn Goedog sill, and
claimed that samples from Carn Breseb and Carn Ddafad-
las could be dierentiated from those of Carn Goedog.
After employing a range of analytical techniques Bevins et
al (2014) dened their Carn Goedog samples as belonging
to “Group 1”, with the unspotted dolerite samples from
Cerrigmarchogion and Craig Talfynydd being referred to
“Group 2”, and another set of outcrops including Carn
Breseb, Carn Gyfrwy, those in the vicinity of Carn Alw
and an un-named outcrop immediately to the west of Carn
Ddafad-las being assigned to “Group 3”. However, they
also accepted that there are considerable geochemical and
petrographic variations even within single tors. us their
bivariate plots of the various dierent parameters show large
overlaps in the elds covered by the three named groups.
In fact, on some plots Group 2 samples occupy quite
distinctive elds, whilst the dierentiation of Group 1 and
Group 3 samples is not particularly clear. Furthermore, the
Carn Goedog sill is at least 75m thick, and it has not been
demonstrated that the geochemistry of the dolerite is the
same in its upper part as it is in the middle, or at the base.
Group 1 and Group 3 magmas do appear to have been
derived from the same magma batch, and the dierence
between them relates to varying mineral concentrations
(resulting from crystal fractionation and/or crystal
accumulation) within the samples. e compatible element
plots highlight this feature. In fact, Group 3 samples might
be from an as yet un-sampled part of the Carn Goedog
outcrop, bearing in mind that Jones et al (2005), on the
basis of pXRF investigations, showed that a number of the
eastern Preseli outcrops were geochemically heterogeneous.
Figure 3: Satellite image of Carn Goedog, showing the rock outcrops and grassy terraces.
Columnar jointing and dolerite “pillars” are found in a few locations mainly on the western part. Parker Pearson et al (2019)
suggested that there is a Neolithic bluestone quarry at the southern (upslope) edge of the tor (Bing Maps).
8 Archaeology in Wales 63
Geology and the Stonehenge connection
In their 2014 paper, Bevins et al reported on their analyses
of 68 samples of spotted and unspotted dolerite - 22 from
Stonehenge (from permitted monolith sampling and
debitage) and 46 from earlier eld studies on Preseli. ere
was no new eldwork or sample collection. It should be
noted that the paper was not a pure geological study, but
a “bluestone monolith provenancing study” published in
an archaeological journal. It was concluded that 11 (and
possibly 12) of the 22 Stonehenge dolerite samples (some
of them taken from bluestone monoliths) could have come
from the Carn Goedog outcrops. ree of the Stonehenge
samples could have come from the Cerrigmarchogion area.
Five of these samples plus a Boles Barrow sample from
Wiltshire could have come from outcrops in the Carn
Gyfrwy - Carn Breseb - Carn Alw area (including an un-
named outcrop west of Carn Ddafad-las). One sample from
Stonehenge (numbered SH44) was not assigned to any of
the three groups mentioned above.
According to Bevins et al there is a possibility that their
Group 1 and Group 3 dolerites are closely related - and they
hint that the assigned samples may ALL have come from the
Carn Goedog outcrop. By the same token, since there are
no identical matches, some of them (or maybe all of them)
could have come from some other as yet unsampled part of
the same intrusion. From the published evidence, it can even
be suggested that the 22 Stonehenge samples analysed have
come from 22 dierent locations across many thousands
of square metres of countryside. Some of the samples show
broad similarities, but each one is essentially unique. Bevins
et al also claimed to have narrowed down the provenancing
of the sampled Stonehenge dolerites to just three or four
areas within this landscape of dolerite sills in eastern Preseli
- but there are no unambiguous geological clues with regard
to precise sources.
Parker Pearson et al (2019) moved from a process of
matching Stonehenge and Preseli rock samples to proposing
that specic Stonehenge bluestone monoliths (Figure
4) could now be provenanced to particular Preseli tors:
‘Recent geochemical analysis has revealed two main groups of
Stonehenge spotted dolerite, the larger of which (Stones 33, 37,
49, 65 & 67) can be matched most closely with Carn Goedog
(Bevins et al 2013). e second group (Stones 34, 42, 43 & 61)
has not been provenanced to a specic Preseli outcrop but may
derive from Carn Goedog or from nearby outcrops such as Carn
Breseb or Carn Gyfrwy’. However, as indicated above, there
are no perfect petrological or geochemical matches; not one
of the Stonehenge samples has been provenanced precisely
to a particular location on Mynydd Preseli.
ere is a further reason why the claimed provenancing
of Stonehenge spotted dolerite fragments to Carn Goedog
is unsafe. In a paper about a dolerite sill from Tal y Fan
in Snowdonia, around 110m thick and emplaced in rather
similar circumstances to the sills of the Fishguard Volcanic
Series in NE Preseli, Merriman et al (1986) showed that
within sills of this scale, there is great dierentiation in the
chemical composition and petrological characteristics of
the intrusion from its edges in towards the centre. ere
are also dierences attributable to post-emplacement
metamorphism or alteration. Similar variations must exist
in the Preseli sills; including those of Carn Bica, Carn Sian
and Craig Talfynydd. e characteristics of the fragments
taken from Stonehenge may provide perfect matches with
the unsampled parts of one or more of the other sills in
the Preseli “spotted dolerite zone”. e sampling density
employed by Bevins et al in the eld is inadequate to rule
out that particular possibility; in the view of this author, at
least 50 new samples need to be taken and analysed across
the full width of all “candidate” sills, and systematically
from one end to the other on each. In short, Bevins and his
colleagues cannot state with any degree of condence that
they have actually identied Carn Goedog as a source for
certain Stonehenge bluestones.
e emphasis by Bevins et al (2014) on the prominent
tor called Carn Goedog is not in the author’s opinion
justied by the evidence presented. Just because the tor is
a well-known landscape feature, that does not mean it is
necessarily the place from which Stonehenge bluestones
have been derived (Figure 5). at line of reasoning is an
anthropocentric one - based on the idea that the bluestones
were carried by human beings, and that they are more likely
to have taken them from somewhere prominent than from
somewhere insignicant.
Carn Meini, thought by Darvill & Wainwright (2016) to
have been a key source for Stonehenge bluestones, has been
eectively discounted as a probable bluestone monolith
Figure 4: Two of the Stonehenge bluestones made of spotted dolerite. On the left, stone 37 and on the right, stone 65. It is claimed
that both of these boulders were extracted from the Carn Goedog “quarry” (photos courtesy of Simon Banton Stones of Stonehenge).
Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 9
source by orpe et al (1991) and Bevins et al (2014).
is is because the detailed bivariate plots indicate that the
Carn Meini samples (around 18 of them) fall outside the
ranges of the three groups of Stonehenge samples analysed
by the geologists (Figure 2). However, since most of the
Stonehenge bluestones at Stonehenge have not been tested,
it is still possible that some of them might have originated
in the Carn Meini area.
Landscape and landforms
Carn Goedog might be described as a “rocky wilderness”,
but there are some signs of landform organization. e
summit crags of the tor are close to its southern edge,
and the rock outcrops and rock litter step down through
a series of interconnected terraces and grassy banks over a
distance of
150m towards the NW, with a vertical drop
of c 75m (Figure 3).
Some of the terraces are connected by
irregular gullies and hollows, and there are many subsidiary
rocky crags in various stages of disrepair. e predominant
landscape feature is the litter of large blocks, leaning at all
sorts of angles and piled high, some of them more than 4m
in length (Figure 5). As in the other Preseli dolerite tors,
fracture or joint patterns and densities are variable and
complex here, although there are signs of a dominant series
of fracture planes that plunge towards the south-east. Some
of the fractures result in loose blocks with sharply curving
edges and surfaces. If all of the rocks of Carn Goedog belong
Figure 6: Typical litter of broken bedrock slabs and blocks on the surface of the tor. Block shapes are inuenced above all else by crossing
fracture patterns. Some edges are sharp, but most are rounded o to some degree.
Figure 5: e southern face of the tor adjacent to the old drovers route. is is the location of the supposed “bluestone monolith quarry”.
10 Archaeology in Wales 63
to the same sill, it must be at least 75m thick.
Contrary to a claim by Parker Pearson et al in 2019, Carn
Goedog is not dominated by columnar jointing patterns.
Columnar jointing, resulting in the formation of elongated
and coherent straight-edged pillars, is present across less than
10% of the outcrop. Much more common here are slabs and
blocks composed of very irregular shapes. Parker Pearson et
al also claim that the northern face of the tor is dominated
by scree. In fact, there is a lack of scree accumulation here
and only a few patches of small broken or brecciated blocks
less than 30cm in length (Figure 6).
An interesting feature of the tor is the presence of
many exposures of smoothed, undulating bedrock slabs,
particularly on the outer edges of the north face steps or
terraces (Figure 7). Several of these slabs are greater than
15m x 10m in extent. e highest of the slabs lies very
close to the summit of the tor, near its southern edge. It
is associated with the presence of several perched blocks.
However, the “moulded” slabs which are located further to
the north, just a little below 260m, appear remarkably fresh,
with very few perched blocks or fallen bedrock slabs resting
on them, suggesting that these may be relatively young
features on a tor which had its origin many millions of years
ago. It is also noteworthy that these moulded surfaces, now
partly covered by lichens and mosses, are not crumbling or
breaking-up as a result of surface weathering processes. ey
are just as fresh in appearance as many of the surfaces of the
detached slabs and broken bedrock present on the bedrock
ridges. ere are glimpses of yet other moulded surfaces
above 260m which have been partly buried by rock collapses
derived from the myriad of rock ridges and “mini-summits”
upon the ank of the tor. More detailed research may be
rewarding in this respect.
Near the highest point of the tor there is a “blind” channel
or gully that appears to run eastwards, now partly inlled
with a jumble of boulders up to 2m x 3m in size. ere are
other faint channel traces as well, broadly running parallel
with the contours, and it is tempting to speculate whether
these are related in any way with the steps and channels on
the hillside to the east of Carn Goedog. Similar features are
seen on the north-western outcrop of Carn Meini. ese
are most likely small channels which once carried glacial
meltwater, but care is needed in their interpretation because
of the possibility of structural control.
e bedrock and detached block surfaces are for the most
part clean and fresh - unlike the crumbling rock surfaces
of the granite tors on Dartmoor, for example. However, in
places there are signs of spalling or aking, and upon some
attish surfaces standing water – which when combined with
freezing and thawing has led to staining and rock breakage to
a depth of a few millimetres. It is also noticeable that lichens
and mosses are much more abundant within the hollows
and upon the terraces, and that the lowest (northernmost)
parts of the tor are more aected by biological processes
than the higher and drier southern parts. Some of these
sloping rock surfaces retain a fresh blue-grey colour, while
others are stained by oxidation to give a reddish-brown
patina. ese colour variations may be exposure and age-
related, but surfaces of both these types occur right across
the extent of the tor, and no particular pattern can be
observed. On rock outcrops, and on detached blocks, the
joint intersections are for the most part very sharp, with
little evidence of crumbling or rounding o. ese edges
are best described as being angular, and they predominate.
However, there are other edges which are sub-angular and
sub-rounded, whilst on some parts of the tor relatively well-
rounded boulders predominate. Further work is needed
here in order to establish whether there is any discernible
distribution pattern.
e widest joints and cavities formed in between and
beneath slumped and fallen blocks are for the most part
open - therefore it is surprising that no glacial or periglacial
sediments are visible anywhere on the surface of the tor or
its terraces. However, Quaternary deposits do occur on the
adjacent upland slopes.
Figure 7: Smoothed bedrock slabs on the north face of the tor. Here the surface is clean; elsewhere there is a partial cover of broken
blocks.
Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 11
e inuence of Quaternary events
Like the other upland tors of the British Isles, Carn Goedog
is undoubtedly pre-Quaternary in its origins, and so it has
been denuded by dierent processes over many millions
of years (Battiau-Quenay, 1984; John, 2019). e most
obvious processes aecting the tor during the last million
years will have been frost-shattering and downslope
slumping and collapse; these processes are still operating
here, and there are many balanced stones and/or rocking
stones present on its northern slope. Some of these might be
referred to as “perched blocks”. Yet the most recent intensive
phase of periglacial activity must, by extrapolation with
Pembrokeshire coastal sites (John 1970), have been during
the 70 000 years of the Devensian cold phase (McCarroll
2001). During that time it is likely that the whole of the
Carn Goedog area was intermittently buried or ‘blotted out’
by snowbanks and rn elds, maybe for many centuries at a
time. e shady north-facing slopes of mountain ridges are
perfect places for snow accumulation and survival. Another
short phase of snow accumulation and frost-action occurred
during the Younger Dryas episode, around 11 000 years ago
(Campbell & Bowen 1989). ere is abundant evidence of
this episode in the Quaternary stratigraphy of many coastal
cli exposures, and adjacent to the Craig Rhos-y-felin
rhyolite outcrop in the valley of the Brynberian river (John
et al 2015a).
In the landscape between Carn Goedog and Carn Alw,
over a distance of about a kilometre, there are many outcrops
of spotted dolerite, some with sound evidence of glacial
erosion and glacial entrainment in the form of ice-smoothed
slabs, littered erratic boulders, and ‘scooped-out’ hollows
where ice has at some stage been moving uphill towards the
crest of the Preseli ridge (Williams-orpe & orpe 1991).
is suggests that the whole of the tor, and all the related
outcrops of the Carn Goedog sill, were overtopped by the
Irish Sea ice at some point (John 2018). is event is most
likely to have taken place during the Late Wolstonian (MIS-
6) glaciation, around 150 000 years ago, when active warm-
based ice crossed Preseli and owed o south-eastwards and
eastwards towards the Bristol Channel and the Somerset
coast (orpe et al 1991; John ibid). It now seems likely that
thick owing ice once again covered Mynydd Preseli during
the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) around 26 000 years
ago (John 2022), and that the ice cover may also have been
extensive during the Anglian Glaciation, around 450 000
years ago. It is inevitable that erratics from this area must
have been entrained and transported by the ice sheets. As for
the smoothing and ice moulding of the highest bedrock slabs
near the tor summit, weathering studies and cosmogenic
dating are rst required before there can be any certainty
regarding the sequence of events (McCarroll 2016).
As pointed out above, the bulk of the visible ice-moulded
slabs present on the north face of the tor are to be found at
or below an altitude of 260m; those with abraded surfaces
and rounded edges appearing to be most numerous. ere
is much other evidence of former ice coverage on the
northern face of Preseli - including small exposures of till
within stream cuttings, some morainic mounds and ridges,
and marginal meltwater channels. ese suggest at least one
retreat stage or re-advance of the ice, and possibly also the
position of a cold ice / warm ice transition.
One other possibility is that Carn Goedog has at some
stage been aected by ice owing downhill and northwards
from a small local ice cap centred on Mynydd Preseli
(Figure 8). is was hypothesised from computer modelling
by Patton et al (2013), but the evidence on the ground is
equivocal at best. It remains to be seen whether locally-
generated ice might have been responsible for the transport
of spotted dolerite boulders towards the edge of Brynberian
Moor and nearby Crosswell.
e “megalith quarrying” hypothesis
Following the new geological research by Bevins and Ixer
(2013), Parker Pearson and his team of archaeologists started
work at Carn Goedog, in the hope that they might discover
a Neolithic bluestone quarry. ey made it clear from the
outset that their work was underpinned by the belief that the
Figure 8: e extent of the modelled Preseli ice cap and smaller outliers, after Patton et al (2013). It is assumed that this must have
been cold-based, but its interactions with the Welsh Ice cap and the Irish Sea Ice Stream are currently unknown (reproduced courtesy
of Henry Patton).
12 Archaeology in Wales 63
glacial entrainment and transport of bluestone monoliths
would have been impossible. is conviction came from the
advice of Scourse (1997) and Green (1997). In 2014 and
2015 they stated, as they had previously done at Rhos-y-felin,
that Carn Goedog was a quarry – prior to assessing whether
the features examined were natural or commonplace. No
eld excavation reports or academic papers were published,
and for several years there were no peer-reviewed records of
archaeological ndings that could be scrutinised by others.
However, there are no access problems at Carn Goedog,
since the site is on common land, and it was easy for others
to examine minutely the features exposed during the two-
season dig.
It is instructive to examine some of the claims made by
Parker Pearson et al (2019). ey claim to have identied
the following engineering features:
* An “access point” through the scree, created by the
removal of “many whole pillars”, some of them up to
4 m long
* “Multiple and large recesses in the rock face” as
evidence that pillar removal was extensive
* An “articial platform of large slabs, many of them
split in half with their split faces uppermost” and with a
90 cm high outer edge
* A “small re pit” containing charcoal - cut into the
surface of the “platform”
* A “loading bay where monoliths could be loaded onto
sledges”
* An 11m long, 3m wide ditch ‘Dug to a depth of 0.4 m,
its upcast was deposited on the side away from the outcrop
and the ditch was then lled with large stones, creating
a permanent barrier across which no monolith could be
transported’
* “A large number of coarse stone tools”. e most
common of these coarse stone tools are claimed to
be implements with wedge-shaped proles, made of
mudstone or sandstone, generally with a wide “blade” at
one end and a narrow, thick terminal at the other. e
wedges were reported as having numerous ake scars
along the blade, on one or both sides of the implement.
Some were also claimed to have traces of battering on
their thicker ends. e archaeologists referred also to
the presence of occasional scars between the blade and
the thick end of the tool
* A handful of quartz akes and a single int blade
* Other coarse stone tools including a hand axe-like
implement with traces of battering along its edges
It has since been possible to examine all of these supposed
“quarrying features.”
Firstly, the supposed “access point and pillar extraction
recess.” e location and characteristics of the “access point”
have been examined in detail, and in the author’s view there
is no sign of anything here that might be man-made. Parker
Pearson et al (2019) have demonstrated nothing which is
inconsistent with natural processes and the product of
glacial and periglacial degradation of the tor. ey have
attached great signicance to the presence of soil in a rocky
recess, with a suggestion that this had something to do with
quarrying activities. However, there are scores of pits and
recesses with patches of peaty soil in them across the surface
of the tor. ey report that ‘soil from the recess contained a
piece of charcoal dating to 2130-1900 BC, indicating that
the pillars were removed at least 4000 years ago’. ere are no
grounds for drawing this conclusion; the recess, like others
all over the tor, could well have been there since the end of
the Devensian - or maybe earlier still. If the archaeologists
wish to demonstrate a youthful age for the recess, they must
demonstrate that the organic contents of other “control”
recesses are older, and that the rock surfaces within it are
less weathered than those to be found elsewhere. ey have
not done this.
Referring to the “pillars” at Carn Goedog (Figure 9), the
archaeologists state that ‘the existing pillars are most similar in
shape to the standing stones at Stonehenge...’. is statement is
misleading, since there are hardly any pillar-shaped stones
in the putative quarrying area, and the tor surface is in
fact covered with blocks and slabs of all shapes and sizes.
e areas where such “ideal” pillars can be observed are
extremely dicult to access. Furthermore, an examination
of the location from which large pillars are said to have been
extracted (ie within the “quarrying area”) shows no evidence
of substantial dierential weathering or other phenomena
to suggest post-glacial pillar removal. Furthermore, the
bluestones at Stonehenge, whether standing, leaning, fallen
or buried, are highly variable in their shapes and dimensions
- there is no standard template or model for these. In the
author’s opinion, Parker Pearson et al have undermined
their own thesis by numbering the Stonehenge bluestones
purported to have come from Carn Goedog; numbers
33, 37, 49, 65 and 67 are condently assigned to this tor,
whilst numbers 34, 42, 43 and 61 “may derive from Carn
Goedog.” On checking out the shapes of these stones it
transpires that most are boulders and slabs with facets and
rounded o edges, bearing signs of heavy abrasion and deep
surface weathering - in other words they may be typical
glacial erratics. e shapes of all of these monoliths can be
seen on the Stones of Stonehenge website, courtesy of Simon
Banton.
e shaped or worked spotted dolerite pillars at Stonehenge
are all in the inner horseshoe. ey are numbered 61-72 and
apart from stones 61, 65 and 67 they have almost certainly
NOT come from Carn Goedog.
Great stress is placed upon the importance of the 5m x 8m
“loading platform” used by the Carn Goedog quarrymen
(Figure 10). In the words of the archaeologists, it has ‘a
drop of up to a metre along the edge furthest from the outcrop.
Just beyond the platform we found a pair of large slabs set
lengthways on edge and about a metre apart. ese form a
classic trestle arrangement on which monoliths can be perched
before being transferred to a wooden sledge. ese slabs were
set into a mass of densely and carefully packed smaller slabs
and boulders that lled a small V- proled ditch, 2m wide and
0.4m deep. Beyond the ditch we found a platform of redeposited
soil that formed a 5m-long ramp leading away from the quarry
and curling northwards down the slope towards the valley in
which Craig Rhos-y-felin sits. Among the cut features on either
side of this ramp, one pit contained a small, fallen orthostat…’
Careful and ongoing examination of the “loading
platform” site during many visits by the author has revealed
nothing unnatural. ere are some stones with attish upper
surfaces (one of them clearly ice-moulded), and another
which has lost some small blocks from above a horizontal
fracture, with no discernible dierence between the degree
of weathering on the upper and lower fracture surfaces. No
Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 13
two surfaces are at the same level, and even if the spaces
between stones had been lled with debris, there would
have been nothing remotely suitable here for the handling
or moving of large monoliths. Parker Pearson et al (2019) do
not demonstrate that their so-called “pavement” was man-
made. On the contrary, insofar as it can be called a pavement
at all, it looks entirely natural. In the view of this author the
“platform” is an invention, like many of the “installations”
at Craig Rhos-y-felin. e colouring of certain stones in a
brown colour in Figure 6 of the published 2019 article is
simply an artistic device designed to reinforce a dubious piece
of interpretation. As for the “classic trestle”, the “platform
edge”, the “loading ramp” and the “fallen orthostat”, these
are labels which are unsupportable by observed evidence.
It appears to this author that the archaeologists have seen
what they wanted to see, and not what is actually there.
Figure 9: Bedrock outcrop on the western part of the tor. Here the fracture pattern has contributed to the creation of elongated “pillars”
up to 4m long.
Figure 10: is is the supposed “loading platform” across which, according to Parker Pearson et al, quarried monoliths were moved
prior to export. In another interpretation we simply see a series of bedrock outcrops with irregular and broken surfaces, with some ice
smoothing.
14 Archaeology in Wales 63
No evidence was presented to show that a buried soil with
radiocarbon-datable organic materials had been recovered
from immediately beneath these “platform slabs”; indeed two
samples taken from “platform sediments” gave Mesolithic
radiocarbon dates (7815 yrs BP and 7590 yrs BP) –
undermining the idea that this “platform” has anything to
do with Neolithic quarrying.
It is claimed that excavation has revealed 3 replaces with
charcoal, all of them dated to within the last 2,000 years.
is is of course unsurprising since the southern ank of
the tor is a perfect camping place, given that the landscape
hereabouts bears abundant signs of Bronze Age and Iron Age
occupation (Darvill & Wainwright 2016). e authors also
describe “old quarrying traces” including drill holes – which
would seem to imply a long history of quarrying at this
site. However, they do not comment on why recent stone
collectors (looking for gateposts etc) would wish to drill
holes into the natural pillars and slabs; indeed some who
have visited this site consider these relatively fresh features
to be much more likely connected with geomagnetics work
or petrological sampling undertaken by geologists over the
last thirty years or so.
Another quote regarding the date of some of these
replaces is as follows: “....charcoal in the brown soils below
the later hearths dates to 3350-3090 BC, 3350-3030 BC and
3350-3040 BC, overlapping with one of the dates from Craig
Rhos-y-felin....”. However, the overlapping of dates is of no
real signicance to the quarrying hypothesis. ese dates
simply indicate that there were Neolithic camp sites here
(with dates of around 5300 BP) which are too early to be
relevant to a Stonehenge-linked bluestone quarrying phase,
according to the accepted chronology.
Concerning the claimed “ditch and barrier”, careful
examination independent of the Parker Pearson team
reveals nothing more complex than an irregular ground
surface and a scatter of slabs and blocks, with some smaller
angular stones or rubble here and there. ere is no sign that
sediments have been purposefully moved from one location
to another; and indeed the idea that a low embankment
and rubble-lled ditch might somehow have been created
in order to prevent future exploitation of the “bluestone
quarry” in the author’s opinion is mistaken. As in the case
of the other examples of charcoal radiocarbon dated to the
Mesolithic, Parker Pearson et al suggest that the ve pieces
of roundwood charcoal found in the ditch ll with an age
range of between 5236 yrs BP and 6359 yrs BP are all
residual fragments. e idea that this feature is a man-made
ditch associated with the nal phase of quarrying is therefore
questionable.
With respect to the “stone tools” which are supposed
to provide support for the quarrying hypothesis, the cited
evidence is similarly unconvincing. From the descriptions
given by Parker Pearson et al (2019) there are no grounds
for accepting that the sandstone and shale “wedges and
hammerstone” are anything other than natural occurrences,
which owe nothing to human manufacture and use.
Sedimentary rock fragments with wedge shapes are by no
means unusual in glacial, periglacial and colluvial sediments
in this vicinity, and there is no reason why any of them
should be elevated to the status of “quarrying tools”. e
fact they are illustrated in Figure 8 of the cited paper does
nothing to enhance their signicance. Indeed the idea
that soft pieces of shale could be hammered into dolerite
fractures in order to break them open, and at the same
time survive without damage, dees the principles of rock
mechanics. e reference to “wedge marks” on intersecting
bedrock joints is irrelevant, since there are hundreds of
such features on crossing fractures within the dolerite right
across outcrops covering the tor. e rhyolite “end-scraper”
illustrated by Parker Pearson et al (ibid) may or may not be
correctly identied, and there are nearby rhyolite outcrops
which could provide a source. e presence of such an object
would not be surprising in an area with such a long history
of intermittent occupation adjacent to a major routeway
across Mynydd Preseli.
ere is a settlement site at the northern foot of the
crag. is was agged up initially by Parker Pearson as a
“quarryman’s row”. However, it is now known to be medieval,
although some of the ruined dwellings may incorporate
older (Bronze Age) features (Comeau et al 2016).
Discussion
Drawing things together, Parker Pearson and his team make
the following statement: “e scale of Neolithic monolith
quarrying at Carn Goedog is impressive. A huge quantity of
stone and soil was moved even before its many pillars were
detached from the rock face. Working surfaces had to be prepared,
a ditch dug to hold packing to support the stone trestles, and
fallen debris cleared from the foot of the outcrop. By contrast,
extraction of the pillars was relatively simple. A few of them
display primitive wedge-marks, two examples well preserved
where splitting had been unsuccessful. After they were split from
the outcrop, the pillars could then be lowered with ropes, levered
and pivoted across the stone platform onto the trestles and then
eased onto a wooden sledge, to be slid downhill.”
is is a complex narrative, but in the view of this author
there is no hard evidence to support any of it. e so-called
“quarrying features” and “quarrying techniques” cited by
Parker Pearson et al (2019) do not withstand scrutiny. e
collected radiocarbon dates show that there was intermittent
occupation here in the Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze Age,
Iron Age, as well as in the historic period(s). at is already
known from a long history of local archaeological research
- the hillsides on the northern ank of Mynydd Preseli are
littered with cultural features of many dierent ages (Figgis
2001).
at having been said, there are historical records of spotted
dolerite boulders being collected from Carn Meini and the
surrounding countryside for use as gateposts and building
stone during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (Elis-
Gruydd, 2012). However, no obvious monolith “extraction
points” have been discovered, in spite of an extensive search.
In contrast, prehistoric quarrying traces are clearly seen
near the summit of Foel Drygarn, where stone slabs were
extracted on a substantial scale during the Bronze and Iron
Ages for use in burial mounds and embanked fortications.
e assumed Neolithic quarry at Carn Goedog is referred
to by Parker Pearson et al (ibid) as a contemporaneous
feature worthy of study alongside another so-called quarry
at Rhos-y-felin, this time for the extraction of a foliated
rhyolite in the valley of the Brynberian River (Parker
Pearson et al 2015). As at Rhos-y-felin, the author considers
this site to have been invested with an articial signicance
simply because it is where the archaeologists chose to dig.
As at Rhos-y-felin, there have been no control investigations
Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 15
carried out at the other tors which might demonstrate that
this “quarrying site” was in some way unique or important.
e evidence for “engineering features” at Rhos-y-felin has
been systematically examined in two detailed papers (John
et al 2015a, 2015b) and all of these features have been
found to be commonplace, and in the author’s opinion
entirely natural (Figure 11). In fact those involved in the
archaeological dig at Rhos-y-felin were accused by the
present author and his two colleagues of the selective removal
of sediments and the creation of “archaeological artices” in
their search for evidence of quarrying. e author considers
it strange that Parker Pearson and his team have, in a string
of publications written over a period of 8 years, refused to
cite the two papers which criticize their work
ere is no strong evidence that either the Carn Goedog
spotted dolerite or the Rhos-y-felin foliated rhyolite were
considered by Neolithic or Bronze Age tribes to be special
or revered. Megalithic features in West Wales (cromlechs,
standing stones and more complex stone settings) were
simply made of those stones which happened to be present
as glacial erratics in the vicinity (Burrow 2006). e author
has failed to nd reference to a single megalithic structure
in the region made from sharp-edged and freshly quarried
pillars or monoliths. In other words, before, during and after
the time of Stonehenge construction, there was no monolith
quarrying tradition in West Wales. One reason must be that
there were so many large blocks, slabs and pillars littering
the landscape as glacial erratics at the end of the last glacial
episode that there was no need to embark upon complex
and dicult stone extraction activities in remote locations,
even if the Neolithic tribes had the required technical skills.
Spotted dolerite tools classied as belonging to Group XIII
may have been created at or near appropriate rock outcrops,
but they might also have been fashioned from convenient
monoliths and debris at Stonehenge itself (Briggs 2009;
Williams-orpe et al 1999).
On the subject of glacial entrainment and transport,
observations in the Preseli landscape by the current author
suggest that Carn Goedog has been completely overridden
by ice on at least two occasions and was aected by both local
and far-travelled ice during the most recent (Late Devensian)
glacial episode (John 2023). is is contrary to the BGS
mapping and to the ice margin position as described by Burt
et al (2012). Strong evidence of block removal by plucking,
subsequent entrainment and nally southward transport
comes from many dierent locations on Preseli (Kellaway
1971; John 2018), and more than a century ago the ocers
of the Geological Survey conrmed that erratic trains ran
southwards and south-eastwards into Carmarthen Bay and
the Bristol Channel (Dixon 1905; 1921). Griths (1940)
conrmed this, as have many other researchers. Hubbard et
al (2009), partly on the basis of modelling work, said that
they could not rule out the possibility that the Stonehenge
bluestones were glacially transported. is is conrmed by
recent studies of glacial erratics at Stonehenge and Limeslade
in Gower (John 20124b; 2024c). When Parker Pearson et al
(2019) claimed to have lain to rest the misconception that
“Pliocene or Pleistocene glaciers might have been responsible
for transporting the bluestones to Salisbury Plain” they were
ignoring a large body of persuasive evidence.
Finally there is the matter of a proto-Stonehenge in the
neighbourhood. is was mooted many years ago by omas
(1923) and more recently by archaeologists. According to
Parker Pearson et al (2016): ‘Somewhere, on the land between
the bluestone quarries, we think there is a passage tomb,
formerly built of bluestones, waiting to be investigated. Could
this have been a tomb for the ancestors that was dismantled
and moved to Salisbury Plain, the tangible history of a Welsh
Neolithic tribe carried to their new homeland in one of the
most extraordinary journeys of prehistoric times? Only time will
tell’. In their 2019 article, Parker Pearson et al, following
fruitless investigations of at least seven other sites, suggested
Figure 11: e so-called “quarrying face” at Craig Rhos-y-felin, with rockfall litter at its foot following the selective removal of many
tonnes of sediment. Careful examination of this site over several years has not revealed any man-made “engineering” features, and the
quarrying hypothesis is therefore disputed.
16 Archaeology in Wales 63
that there might instead have been a giant bluestone circle
at Waun Mawn, about 5 km west of Carn Goedog. is
suggestion was based on three seasons of investigations
(2017, 2018 and 2021), during which their ndings were,
at best, equivocal. But in a new paper (Parker Pearson et
al 2021) the discovery of a “lost circle”at Waun Mawn was
hailed – somewhat prematurely- as a research triumph. is
was hotly disputed by independent observers who simply
saw unsupported assertions and speculations woven into a
mythical narrative (Darvill 2022; John 2024a)(Figure 12).
e “lost circle” hypothesis was put forward partly as a
consequence of the wide scatter of radiocarbon dates at both
Carn Goedog and Rhos-y-felin, since none of the latter
matched the dating of the bluestone settings at Stonehenge.
It was argued by Parker Pearson et al (2021) that since the
“quarrying” at these two sites was early (ie around 5500 years
BP), and since the transport of the bluestones by Preseli’s
Neolithic tribes seems to have occurred around 5000 years
BP, then the stones must have been parked somewhere in the
vicinity for up to 500 years. So why not in a stone circle or
proto-Stonehenge subsequently dismantled and transported
to Salisbury Plain as an act of ancestor worship or political
tribute?
When considering the cultural context in which bluestone
monolith quarrying and transport might have taken place,
it is instructive to note that none of the recent studies of
biological and cultural links between West Wales and
Stonehenge has shown up anything meaningful or unique.
Isotope studies on human and animal bones and teeth have
shown links between Stonehenge and some parts of Britain
underlain by Lower Palaeozoic rocks (Snoeck et al 2018;
Madgwick et al 2019), although attempts to establish a rm
link between Preseli and Stonehenge have been unsuccessful.
DNA studies of Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age
inhabitants do not point to any strong physiological links
between Preseli and Stonehenge people (Olalde et al 2018;
Brace et al 2019). And the assumption by Parker Pearson
(2018) relating to a mass exodus of Preseli people carrying
stones to Stonehenge is similarly unsupported. ere was
no cultural hiatus in Neolithic Pembrokeshire, and no
demonstrable transfer of major cultural traits between one
community and the other (Darvill & Wainwright 2016).
Indeed, the proposal that the Middle Neolithic was a time of
invasion, conict and population replacement into southern
England from the near continent does not suggest that
there would have been a welcome at the time for “Preseli
people carrying stones” either in one expedition, or in many
expeditions across decades, or for that matter in multiple
generations. Indeed, social and cultural instabilities may
explain why there were so many changes in stone settings
and why, in the view of some authors, Stonehenge may never
have been completed (Atkinson 1979; Cleal et al 1995; Field
and Pearson 2010; John 2018; Stone 1924). In pointing out
the deciencies of isotope studies and those attempts to link
Stonehenge culturally with “distant” parts of Great Britain,
Barclay & Brophy (2021) have been critical of attempts to
measure the importance of prehistoric communities by the
strength of their links with Stonehenge. ey also make
accusations of interpretative ination and mythologization
of the site and monuments on Salisbury Plain.
Finally, recent geological work has thrown serious doubt
upon the narrative developed by Parker Pearson and his
team which features bluestone quarries, a lost circle at Waun
Mawn, overland transport to Stonehenge, and the use of
the Aubrey Holes as sockets for the imported bluestone
monoliths. It is now admitted that there is no evidence
for the removal of multiple monoliths from the “quarry”
at Rhos-y-felin (Parker Pearson et al 2022a). It is also clear
that there never was a “lost circle” at Waun Mawn, although
Parker Pearson et al (2022b) still insist that there was an
intention to build one. ere are no monoliths from either
Carn Goedog or Rhos-y-felin at Waun Mawn, and the four
remaining stones at that site were simply collected locally.
Stone 62 at Stonehenge was never located in a socket at
Figure 12: e ground surface at Waun Mawn, exposed after the removal of selected sediments. ere is a broken bedrock surface of
meta-mudstones and a layer of local till with erratic boulders and cobbles. Pits suitable for “Proto-Stonehenge” dolerite standing stones
or pillars are conspicuous by their absence.
Carn Goedog on Mynydd Preseli Was Not the Site of a Bluestone Megalith Quarry 17
Waun Mawn, and it probably came from the eastern end of
Mynydd Preseli. e archaeologists have now agreed with
the present author that there is no link of any sort between
Waun Mawn and Stonehenge (Pearce et al 2022; Parker
Pearson et al 2022b; Darvill 2022; John 2024a).
Conclusion
In summary, the “quarrying hypothesis” is not enhanced by
the research work at Carn Goedog or by the manner of its
presentation. Indeed, it is considerably harmed by it. e
hypothesis is not supported by the geological provenancing
work, which in the author’s opinion is unconvincing. e
same is true of the claimed “engineering features”. In short,
the author nds no evidence of prehistoric quarrying at
this site. e recent work at the tor does however conrm
that there was a long history of intermittent occupation of
the Mynydd Preseli north slope during Neolithic and later
times by resident local tribes and travellers who were simply
moving through.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful for discussions with Dyfed Elis-Gruydd, John
Downes, Rob Ixer, Danny McCarroll, Richard omas and
Olwen Williams-orpe, all of whom have greatly enhanced
my understanding of the matters discussed in this paper.
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