Wayland's Smithy

Wayland's Smithy is a neolithic burial earthwork (longbarrow) situated at the side of one of the major trade routes - The Ridgeway - of the neolithic right through to the medieval periods. It's pretty hard to find without a map, and to do so you'll need Ordinance Survey sheet 174, and the grid reference is 281854.
The Smithy is overlooked by a hill fort, Uffington Castle, which also overlooks the White Horse chalk figure, and Dragon Hill. Unfortunately, the day I was there it rained pretty hard when I was up the hill at Uffington, so I only got pictures of the Smithy.
The Wayland's Smithy barrow itself was there long before the coming of the Anglo-Saxons to Britain. When they saw the monument, they thought it looked like the smithy where the legendary blacksmith Wayland had been imprisoned, hence its name. Folklore has it that if you bring your horse, and leave it over night with a silver coin on the stone as payment, come morning, the horse will be fully shod. Sadly, I didn't have a silver coin, or a horse, and it's now against the law to stay there over night - so I didn't get to test the legend! The place has a great atmosphere though - as does all the surrounding countryside.

Here are my pictures of the Smithy from September 1999 - click on an image to see it full size.

  The Smithy from the front - only four of the original six stones remain. In the centre the entrance to the chambers can be seen.

Another view, but this time off more to the side.

The view from between the entrance stones - inside are two side chambers, which were unfortunately full of rubbish. England's heritage should be policed a lot better than it is!

A couple of metres back from where the previous pic was taken.

The full length of the barrow, from the other end. You can see the entrance stones at the far end.

Uffington castle in the distance.

I can't wait to go back and get pics from inside the hill fort, and of Dragon Hill, and the White Horse.