Rock Art from Recent Excavations at Street House (2010 - 2024)
Dr. Steve Sherlock
Fig 1 Carved stones from excavations at Street House between 2010-2013
Fig 2. Photograph of four portable cupmarked stones from Street House
Excavations since 2010 at Street House, near Loftus, have found over twenty examples of prehistoric rock art (figs. 1&2). Rock Art is argued to date from the Later Neolithic period to the Early Bronze Age (c.2,300 – 1,500BC). This “art” is created by carving or pecking with a hard stone upon a softer sandstone. These can be earth fast rocks or “portable” boulders within monuments such as cairns and burial mounds. Some sites have been suggested to form territorial boundaries (fig.3). Rock art is not unique to Street House and the carvings and various different motifs have been found across sites in specific parts of Britain and abroad.
Fig. 3 Drawing showing the location of rock art, jet items and axes at Street House & Boulby
Rock Art is not found at UK sites that are earlier than the Neolithic period, although it is known to be earlier on the Continent and some scholars argue for it to be earlier in Britain. Meanwhile, at least one example from Street House is from a later period having been re-used in the paving of a roman house. Examples of this proliferation of carved stones and the range of designs and patterns can be seen in the images on the top of this page. Illustrated are examples of prehistoric rock art excavated from a fourth century roman building in 2012 (top row left) within a bronze age (c.2000 BC) wall in 2011 (upper centre) and in an infilled Iron age ditch (AD50) in 2010 (right).
Whilst these carved stones are “occasionally” found during excavations on prehistoric sites such as burial mounds, a large number were found during the excavation on the coast near Street House in 2024 (figs. 3, 4 & 5).The significant number of finds from Street House should not be seen in isolation though, there are concentrations of rock art on Fylingdales Moor where there are known to be 200 carved panels and cup marked stones found during a survey in 2004. Nearer to Street House on the coast at Hinderwell, 150 cup marked stones were found by William Hornsby on an excavation at Hinderwell beacon in 1920.
Fig 4. Photograph of site 21, excavated at Street House in the Summer of 2024
Fig. 5 Plan to show the location of the rock art at the Street House site
This note, is prepared as a description of some of the finds from the excavations in 2024. Other finds from the site included an axe head, a fragment of an antler horn used as a pick to dig the ring ditch of site 21, six jet beads and one made of glass. Whilst most of these finds will help to date the site it is thought the glass bead is later. There are still several intriguing questions about this site including its date, form, function and the question Why here? The majority of the finds date to c. 2,000BC and we have been able to get some organic material to provide a radiocarbon date by the Spring of 2025. In terms of its shape and form it is reminiscent of stone circles and ring cairns, these are sometimes found in pairs e.g. on Danby Rigg and also Great Ayton Moor rather than as isolated monuments. As we do not have the full site exposed, we do not know if there is a causeway forming an entrance to a structure, or if the site is perhaps ceremonial. We collected soil samples for dating, but no seeds or grasses were found in what is essentially the upper horizons. We propose to fully expose and excavate the site in the Summer of 2025 and resolve these outstanding questions, as part of a programme involving schools, local people and Waterloo University in Canada.
Fig 6. A selection of six of the sixteen cupmarked stones found in the stone ring circle.
Select Bibliography
Brown, P & Chapell, G, 2012 Prehistoric Rock Art on the North York Moors Stroud
Crawford, G, 1980 Bronze Age Burial Mounds in Cleveland, Middlesbrough
Hornsby, W & Laverick, J, 1920 “British Remains at Hinderwell Beacon” in Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, 25, 445-447
Sherlock, S J, 2019 A Neolithic to Late Roman Landscape on the North-East Yorkshire Coast Excavations at Street House, Loftus, 2004-17 Tees Archaeology Monograph No. 7 Hartlepool
Vyner, B E, 2007 Fyingdales: Wildfire and Archaeology, NYMMP, Helmsley
Acknowledgements.
The excavations at Street House have been made possible by the support of the local landowners; Alan Bothroyd (Upton Farm) Tony Garbutt (Street House Farm) and Heath Chadwick who owns the field containing site 21. The excavations in 2024 have been assisted by: Phil Abramson, Linda Davies, Sara Gibson, Dawn Haida, Michelle James, Peter Johnson, Rob Nichols, Jenny Parker, Yvette, Sanderson, Wendy Sherlock. This team was ably assisted by, Shannon Blackmore, Kian Drew, Erin Kurian, John Houston Loudfoot and Gillian Wagenaar, from Waterloo University, Canada, to all of whom I am grateful.