<< Our Photo Pages >> Woodhouses - Hillfort in England in Cheshire

Submitted by Andy B on Monday, 18 March 2024  Page Views: 15355

Iron Age and Later PrehistorySite Name: Woodhouses
Country: England County: Cheshire Type: Hillfort
Nearest Town: Helsby  Nearest Village: Alvanley
Map Ref: SJ511757  Landranger Map Number: 117
Latitude: 53.276014N  Longitude: 2.73478W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
 3 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
 4 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
 4 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
 3

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Woodhouses
Woodhouses submitted by vicky : One of the ramparts at Woodhouses hillfort - see main site entry for further details. (Vote or comment on this photo)
This enclosures lies at the northern end of the Mid Cheshire Ridge at 137m above sea level in an area heavily overgrown with trees, bracken and shrubs. It is defended by a rampart to the north and east where the ground slopes more gently. A number of small rounded stones, believed to be slingstones, have been found on the site.

Excavations in 1951 showed that the rampart was originally 4m high and revetted with stone on both sides.

References: D.M.Longley “Prehistory” in C.R.Elrington (ed) “The Victoria History of the County of Chester, volume 1, Oxford University Press (1987)

Page originally by Vicky.

Note: A couple of radio features from 2021 you may not have heard, with Dr Seren Griffiths, details in the comments
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Woodhouses
Woodhouses submitted by vicky : Another views of the ramparts at Woodhouses hillfort - see main site entry for further details. (Vote or comment on this photo)

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Nearby Images from Geograph Britain and Ireland:
SJ5175 : Woodhouses Hill Fort by Jeff Buck
by Jeff Buck
©2015(licence)
SJ5175 : Summit of Woodhouse Hill by Richard Webb
by Richard Webb
©2019(licence)
SJ5175 : Inside the rampart, Woodhouse Hill by Richard Webb
by Richard Webb
©2019(licence)
SJ5175 : Snidley Moor Wood by N Chadwick
by N Chadwick
©2021(licence)
SJ5175 : The Ramparts of Woodhouses Hill Fort by Jeff Buck
by Jeff Buck
©2015(licence)

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Nearby sites listing. In the following links * = Image available
 1.8km NNE 18° Synagogue Well Holy Well or Sacred Spring (SJ51687742)
 1.8km W 260° Helsby Hill* Hillfort (SJ493754)
 3.0km ENE 68° Bradley Earthworks* Hillfort (SJ539768)
 3.3km SE 133° Castle Cob* Round Barrow(s) (SJ535734)
 4.1km SE 138° Glead Hill Cob Round Barrow(s) (SJ538726)
 7.0km W 260° St Mary (Thornton Le Moors)* Ancient Cross (SJ44157455)
 7.3km SSE 160° Delamere Stone Circle (SJ536688)
 7.3km SE 126° Gallowsclough Cob* Round Barrow(s) (SJ570713)
 7.6km SE 146° Castle Ditch Eddisbury* Hillfort (SJ553694)
 7.8km SW 223° St Plegmund's Well* Holy Well or Sacred Spring (SJ457701)
 8.4km SSE 165° Kelsborrow Castle* Hillfort (SJ5315567509)
 9.5km SSE 157° Whistlebitch Well* Holy Well or Sacred Spring (SJ548669)
 10.1km SSE 148° Seven Lows Round Barrow(s) (SJ56336703)
 10.2km SE 140° Oakmere* Ancient Village or Settlement (SJ576678)
 10.3km SSE 146° Seven Lows* Round Barrow(s) (SJ567671)
 10.4km SSE 155° High Billinge* Round Barrow(s) (SJ5548066242)
 11.2km ENE 71° Whitley Village Round Barrow(s) (SJ617793)
 11.9km SE 132° Long Stone Cross* Ancient Cross (SJ599677)
 11.9km S 186° Brookhouse Farm Ancient Village or Settlement (SJ497639)
 12.1km N 2° St Luke's Church (Farnworth) Ancient Cross (SJ5171287749)
 13.1km SSE 161° Salterswell* Holy Well or Sacred Spring (SJ552632)
 13.3km NW 319° Camp Hill (Woolton) Hillfort (SJ424858)
 13.6km SW 225° Billy Hobby's Well* Holy Well or Sacred Spring (SJ4127766202)
 14.0km SW 226° St John the Baptist Church, Chester* Ancient Cross (SJ40916613)
 14.0km SW 226° Roman Amphitheatre (Chester)* Ancient Temple (SJ40836616)
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"Woodhouses" | Login/Create an Account | 5 News and Comments
  
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Sunday Feature: Hilltop Histories with Dr Seren Griffiths by Andy B on Wednesday, 12 May 2021
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BBC Radio 3 Sunday Feature Hilltop Histories

Dr Seren Griffiths uses a walk along a sandstone ridge in Northern Cheshire to explore the way a landscape can hold multiple histories, and in doing so make it easier for us to contemplate distant futures.

The landscape in question is bordered on the north by the M56 motorway. Commuters making their way into Manchester see it to their right for all of about a minute. But up on the ridge you can see that it stretches South towards Whitchurch in Shropshire. Seren starts her journey in a quarry used variously by the Romans, Iron Age settlers and latterly the victorians. She makes her way up to one of the string of Hill top forts that can be found along the sandstone escarpment, and then moves along to an old Cold War listening station, and not far away, the Frodsham Anti Aircraft Operations Room.

And all the while the vista shows the canal work of the industrial revolution, the chemical plants of the 20th century and the wind turbines of the last decade. The ancient landscape hums with history and archaeology brings them into focus in the present. For Seren, and many before her, this is a magical, mysterious place which draws out timelines like a strand, with artefacts from the past projecting forwards, enduring into the present.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0995m6j
Listen Now
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000t61w
[ Reply to This ]
    Forged in Conflict: Francis Buckley, the First World War, and British Prehistory by Andy B on Sunday, 27 June 2021
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    Another talk by Seren from earlier this year. Gold fob seals, Sheffield silver, Mesolithic stone tools - these were some of the discoveries detailed in the 28 papers, books and pamphlets published by a soldier turned archaeologist who began looking at what you might find in the soil in the middle of a World War I battlefield. In her Essay, Seren Griffiths traces the way Francis Buckley used his training for military intelligence to shape the way he set about digging up and recording objects buried both in war-torn landscapes of France and then on the Yorkshire moors around his home.

    Listen at
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000vgvb
    or http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p09fsczr

    and see the related paper by Seren Griffiths & Nicholas J. Saunders
    Forged in Conflict: Francis Buckley, the First World War, and British Prehistory
    International Journal of Historical Archaeology volume 25, pages 469–485 (2021)

    Francis Buckley was extraordinary; an officer responsible for arming grenades, excavating trenches, surveying, sketch-mapping, and military intelligence, his actions were a roll-call of the First World War’s bloodiest battles. The psychological toll was significant. War remade the man and created the archaeologist. Under fire, Buckley recorded prehistoric lithics on the Somme, a rich archaeological landscape, and a deadly battlefield. After the war, “tramping” the Yorkshire moors, Buckley applied military skills to excavate and record a key, but still understudied lithic collection. This paper explores Francis Buckley’s war, its implications for the history of archaeological thought, and reasserts his under-acknowledged legacy.

    https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10761-020-00572-6
    https://doi.org/10.1007/s10761-020-00572-6
    [ Reply to This ]

Re: Excavation on Iron Age hilllort in Cheshire by Andy B on Sunday, 11 July 2010
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The six Cheshire hillforts on the Sandstone Ridge display a diversity of size, shape and complexity. They range from the relatively small site at Maiden Castle, Bickerton (area c.0.7 ha) to the large forts at Eddisbury and Beeston (areas over 3.5 ha). Their defences likewise vary greatly from the single bank on the eastern side of Woodhouse to the double bank and ditches at Eddisbury. The function of these monuments varied over time as well. They appear to have been used for settlement on both a permanent and seasonal basis at various times, as storage centres for the wider community and as seasonal gathering places, perhaps for trade, exchange and religious activities.

During the 1st millennium BC not all people in Cheshire lived in these hilltop sites. The majority of the population lived in small defended farmsteads or unenclosed settlements located on the valley slopes. Such sites rarely survive in an above ground form today but aerial photography has recently revealed the evidence of lowland farmsteads around the Mersey and Bollin valleys in north Cheshire, as well as the Dee and Weaver valleys. These farmsteads seem to have been engaged in a mixed economy with evidence for both arable and pastoral farming.

By the late Iron Age (100 BC) some hillforts had been abandoned and were no longer in use. It is unclear when the hillforts on the Sandstone Ridge were abandoned, although in theory they may have continued in use, albeit intermittently until the Romano-British period. However archaeological evidence of activity at this time is only available from Beeston and Eddisbury.

http://www.habitatsandhillforts.co.uk/SandstoneRidge/hillforts.htm

SHORT FILM 'Whats below Woodhouse Hillfort'
http://media.cheshire.gov.uk/habitats/hillforts.wmv

Archaeological Evaluation Work at Woodhouse, Frodsham (July 2009)
http://www.habitatsandhillforts.co.uk/SandstoneRidge/Excavationinterimreportwoodhouse.htm
[ Reply to This ]

Excavation on Iron Age hilllort in Cheshire by coldrum on Thursday, 01 October 2009
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Habitats and Hillforts team members have carried out an archaeological
sample excavation on the Iron Age hill fort above Frodsham (Cheshire,
England) known as Woodhouse Hill. The aim was to provide information
to help future management of the site which is owned by the Woodland
Trust. The excavation served as a training opportunity for more than
40 local volunteers as well as students from Chester and Liverpool
universities. All involved were given training in basic archaeological
recording techniques under the supervision of professional
archaeologists.
Artefacts recovered from the work ranged in date from Neolithic
flint tools (4000 - 2000 BCE) to a glass bottle from about 1900.
Habitats and Hill Forts is a three year Heritage Lottery funded
landscape project focused on the mid-Cheshire Ridge and it is being
hosted by Cheshire West and Chester Council. Pictures and a summary of
the results of the work at Woodhouse Hill are available for viewing on
the Habitats and Hillforts website: http://www.habitatsandhillforts.co.uk.
The next investigatory archaeological excavation will be carried out
on Helsby Hill.

http://www.chesterfirst.co.uk/news/78777/excavation-on-iron-age-fort.aspx
[ Reply to This ]

Re: Woodhouses by Vicky on Friday, 26 September 2003
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We went to visit the hillfort last weekend, but unfortunately it is completely overgrown with bracken at the moment so we will return in a few months once it has died back to take some photos. The easiest way to access the site is via the footpath to the east from Manley Road. This take you on a gently sloping walk through Snidley Moor wood - watch out if you've got kids as it gets very muddy and slippery in places. Ours little one was covered from head to toe when we got back to the car!
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