Hi, thanks for commenting! It is rare to find these on a capstone of a monument, but yes they do look like natural features that would go unnoticed on a regular bolder or outcrop.

It's an interesting point, there is a growing consensus over the timeline of when the architecture moved across mainland Europe and over to the British isles... but certainly still lots of gaps.

Good to remember that certain things recur as common solutions and/or entertainments or interests. For example, the vast majority of cultures create some kind of bed, a house, a table, a chair, a bowl, a saw, a knife, clothing... the list is actually endless. These inventions may or may not share a point of origin, they are, pretty much, the only solution or the obvious solution to certain needs and or problems and so very similar solutions /designs reoccur independently, slightly different but essentially the same often in many ways. Notice that no two dolmens in Britain are identical and other dolmens around the world differ in ways to the forms seen here often - the Russian 'dolmen' is much more of a box, often with a hole in the front, unlike anything seem in Britain, the Japanese 'dolmen' form is likewise not exactly like anything seen in Britain, not that there is a set pattern here to compare to anyway. That being the case, what actually IS a dolmen when the term is used in that global sense? - it is simply a stone set on some others, there is no other criteria to qualify. Some look like giant tables with round legs, some are boxes made with thin plates, some are made from dressed stone, some are made from unworked stone, some are entirely enclosed, some entirely open, some big, some small, some have a stone atop over-hanging the 'legs' by a long way... some do not... some are round, some square, some triangular... some have multiple 'rooms' beneath them, some just one, some none. You get the idea. Point being... when we say 'dolmens are found right around the globe', well, what is a dolmen in these terms? - it is a monument featuring a stone balanced on others that might look a bit like a little house of a cow sometimes or any number of things. So, do we need a global civilisation to invent this and travel around the world suggesting the idea to everyone who built something like this, or might lots of people build something like this independently, perhaps for different reasons entirely, like lots of people have built a kind of table, independently, to put something on...? The other MAJOR problem is that megalithic building can be seem occurring in very different periods around the world - it's still going on in Indonesia in fact. So, it might be better to consider it a stage human cultures seem to pass through as they develop, rather than a one-off invention that was spread around the world. If you think about it, that's actually a far more interesting thought because it says : why do humans keep having this idea to build these massive stone house/table things....? Why, seemingly, if there are a load of people and some big boulders around, do they start building these structures? What is it that makes that form so appealing to us... or does it in fact have some obvious use or significance to people at that stage in cultural development that we cannot imagine once having passed through it?!? All the best, hope that gives a few thoughts.

Hmmm, not sure exactly what you are describing... or at least nothing jumps to mind. Could you give a bit more detail? I know you say 'you haven't seen anything else like it', but would you say it looked more like Parc Le Breos chambered tomb, Sweynes Howes or Cerrig YGof... interesting either way. Oh, and thanks, glad you liked the video!

@@coraljackz It looks like the rectangular slab chambers of cerrig y gof. Yet instead of them being seperate like in cerrig, they are alongside one another in a row. 2 rows of about 6 chambers either side, with a walkway down the center. The overall structure was a rectangle. From memory the slabs were no more than around a meter in height. Now, i dont know if my memory serves me well or not, as i checked maps and dont see it anywhere, where i thought it was. I will take another trip though and scour google earth.

Hi, yes we've pinned a comment apologising about the audio... we had only been making videos for a few months, and this was one of our first 'history videos'... please do have a look at our new stuff and let us know what you think 😁

Hi, thanks for your positive and cautionary words! We're aware of the antiquarians many flaws, and take their accounts with a bucket of salt, but we do like to include their perspective. Sometimes demonstrating how much culture and opinions have changed over the past couple of centuries, sometimes simply as comic relief. But I do hope the phrasing made it clear enough that it was their opinion rather than ours; "over 200 years ago... it was still commonly believed that sites like this were druidic alters". We do agree that the depressions are likely natural features, but the striking red colour when we visited did get us wondering if this was present when Fenton visited, inspiring him to write that they 'received the blood'... A better question may be, were these marks likely to have been present before the structure was raised, and if so, did they utilise them in any way? Great example of anachronistic antiquarian assumptions, they are altogether too common... currently researching a Stonehenge deep dive and the early assumption about its age and who created it are quite varied and amusing!!

@@coraljackz The red staining, likely caused by an alga of the phylum Rhodophyta, whose habitats included still fresh water pools, was most certainly present when Fenton visited. His first passion was poetry which goes far to explain his vivid imagination and enthusiasm for drama. Alas! The stone is pre-historic, so we'll never know whether the triangular depressions were used in any way and I wouldn't think about it too much... unless you find similar depressions elsewhere. Looking forward to the Stonehenge deep dive! ATB.

It really is!

It's entirely possible that freeze-thaw weathering has played its part in the formation of these depressions, thanks for your opinion. The rest of the video is about antiquarian perspectives, location and what it is like to walk to the site. Certainly would not want to spill your time, it might get on something and stain :)

Tough guy picking on a lady and her dog 😮

Hi @karukurokami, thanks for giving our videos a try and getting involved! My gut feeling is that they are likely natural features and, as you say, I've also seen similar geometric hollows on natural boulders. This is also an area that would have been under more than a kilometre of ice during the last glaciation period, so they could potentially have been formed when huge forces separated this section from the outcrop above. If we went with the assumption that they ARE natural, then the question could be: "Were these marks formed before or after it was raised by humans? Did the builders intentionally utilise an existing feature? Or did a process of natural erosion take place long after the monument was built, with the original builders never seeing these marks? George Nash's work on rock art in Wales gives me hope that we might get some more context for monuments from this period. He and his team have been identifying man made markings that have been previously overlooked... and the question of why and when some capstones were adorned with cup marks is being grappled with. We will have to do a video taking a closer look at rock on megaliths in Wales, I'll add it to the list! All the best, Jacky

Thank you so much.. You've made our day with this wonderful comment 😊

Thanks James! :)

Yes, and some of the reconstruction attempts across the UK have been even worse... completing losing the last remnants of the site to someone's modern vision.

Thanks! We're still filming most of it on our phones and having lots of fun getting familiar with the process, but getting a drone certainly felt like a level up. We are getting slightly more ambitious (kind encouraging comments like this help) and have a few 'bigger' videos that we've been working on in the background for a while now... but to be honest, no, it has not crossed our minds to make that sort of pitch. Sounds like a lovely idea though, perhaps one day!

Thanks for the kind words and clarification... I've pinned your comment to inform future viewers. To be honest, we were quite surprised to hear that we had made a reference to the Stonehenge bluestones in this video and had to have a re-watch. Brief Analysis When I said; 'A thousand years before the local bluestones were moved to Wiltshire during the earliest phases of Stonehenge', I intended to leave it vaguely open by not specifically saying how or where they were moved from. My thinking being that it could be interpreted as 'moved to Wiltshire from where the ice dropped them'. However, the way it is phrased lacks any reference to an ice age... and the word 'local', shortly before 'moved', gives a strong impression the stones were moved from Pembrokeshire to Wiltshire at that time. Apologies, I will be more careful in future!

Seems to be a popular theory! Thanks for commenting :)

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And to you, too! Thanks for watching :)

Hi 👋 we did do some 25kg tests in part 1 of this review, but could definitely have done more 😅 When we cycled Wales with our dog (also 25kg) and camping gear we were seriously doing a lot of 'bike & hike' 😆👍

Thanks :)

Hi there, thank you for watching and commenting. We apologize for the loud music. We made this video at the start of our KZbin journey when we hadn't quite figured everything out. We have a new Tinkinswood video with extra info and aerial footage if you would like to check that one out.. you can find it on our channel :)

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This does seem to be a popular theory. Thanks for watching and commenting :)

Thanks, it's an often overlooked site but definitely worth a visit!

Hi, thanks for watching! You can find this spot by following the coastal path from Port Eynon carpark. OS maps would be the best for finding the path but it's fairly easy 🙂

Thank you, we are lucky to have so many beautiful places to explore😁

Ah he is a cutie! Thank for watching 😁

Thanks so much! That's lovely, and we're happy to hear it 😁

I think if you're doing road or gravel, the two-wheeler will be the better choice, but if you also do trail you'll be glad you got the one-wheeler.

We've had the double wheel trailer for a while now..It's a comfortable ride with kids as well as big dogs inside. :)

Hi, there is no need to use the word 'the' when referring to Gower. Although it is common to add the definite article when referring to 'The Gower Peninsula', it is well documented that many find this an unnecessary and disrespectful intrusion.

Using "the" excludes the hinterland areas of Gower, which have historically been overlooked and stretches quite inand covering the ancient lordship of gower, it is wrong to use "the Gower" and should always be "Gower" or if you wanted to be specific Gower's peninusla, "the Gower peninsula"

@@joshsmith9566 right…. As a native and resident of the so-called ‘Gower hinterlands’ myself I find it incredibly disrespectful that someone would assume that we would not use the term The Gower.

@@coraljackz as a native and resident of the Gower I can assure you it is widely spoken and used. All I can say in this case is that the Saes are at it again in assuming how and when us Cymry choose to name our country.

Hi, if you are indeed a resident... then you appear to be unaware of your local history. Either that or you are being pedantic and defensive after being corrected... Also, you are wrong to assume we are all Saes just because we disagree with you. While we can't speak for @joshsmith9566, we are both Welsh... but to try and use nationality as a defence or an attack is incredibly narrow-minded and embarrassing.

It's well worth a visit! See if you can squeeze it in before the summer rush :)

haha, yeah probably... both of our accents are a bit all over the place :)

Don't be rashist