The Lost Ridgeway: Where does it go south of Avebury?

With help from ‪@hedleythorne‬ I traced the "lost" route of the Ridgeway, from where the National Trail ends (or starts, if you do it that way round) at Avebury, to Salsibury Plain. Joining up the clues of fragments on the maps, in Lidar data, and with aerial photography.
If you're missing the usual Tweedy Outdoors al fresco cooking and Gevrey Chambertin then see this video for mine and Hedley's lunch break: • Macaroni Cheese at the...
Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
1:39 Overton Hill to Cow Down
3:08 The Ridgeway crosses Wansdyke
4:00 Knap Hill and Walker's Hill / Adam's Grave
6:17 Walker's Hill to Alton Priors
9:49 Alton Priors
11:29 Barge Inn / Honey Street
12:58 Woodborough Station
13:33 Beechingstoke / North Newnton Saxon Charters
15:00 Puckshipton / Wilsford
17:01 Broadbury Banks
18:46 Conclusion

[@AllotmentFox]

All you have to do to summon me is click your heels three times and wish for me to appear. I hate the way they keep suggesting honey isn't honey. It is honey, parsnips, malted barley and blackberries that are the only sweetnesses in people's lives up until the Romans. If your question was how did Bronze Age people get to Avebury while discharging their duties to perform the correct rituals at each important place on the approach, which is not your question but bear with me, then rivers come into play. If I was an enterprising gold-wearing horse archer I would set up portage services so you could save your knees. So if you were coming up from Gaul it would be to go past Salisbury up the Avon which may have been called Sorwio, Searu or something like that in the Iron Age, so why not the Bronze, to Durrington Walls and Stonehenge then up the Avon to Marden henge ringing the initiates bell and killing some pigs then up to Avebury using the ridgeway to trepan a touched local for good luck. If you were coming from the North and east then the ridgeway is your best option, bear in mind you also have the Winterbourne which is a good guide to direction. The Bristol Avon to the west turns off to become the Marden (a different one) which leads you to Cherhill and Avebury. So if you had come over on a coracle from Ireland that is they way you would go. To the east is the even holier river Thames which turns off down the holy torrent the Kennet which leads directly to the Swallow Springs. Foreign offerings add to your economy rather than take away from it so the cool stuff is on the south route. So Hedley was on to something, in my opinion, with the northernmost point of the Avon. I looked at your footage of the Avon with interest. Both Mardens, incidentally, mean valleys of the mark or boundary. Exvellent video!

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Wow - that's quite a revelation! I think what you're saying is the reason the track abruptly stops near that source of the river Avon is that it didn't need to go any further - with a slightly higher water table in the Neolithic you could just hop on a coracle there and float all the way down to Durrington Walls!

[@AllotmentFox]

@@tweedyoutdoors just an interpretation.I think the original focus was Windmill Hill and we probably know that each sector of the rings belonged to a different family who seasonally returned for weddings, etc. How did they know how to find their way there? The rivers. The animals they hunted needed to drink so they knew each and every water source intimately. We also have a semantic problem: what is a ridgeway without a ridge? The Pewsey Vale is quite wide and low

[@tweedyoutdoors]

@@AllotmentFox I think the "hyrcgweg" (I'm probably misspelling that - that's how Grundy wrote it) mentions in the Anglo Saxon charters are the first written references aren't they? ...and they probably just named the thing based on the bits they could easily identify. I suppose what I was really trying to trace here is a route between Avebury and Stonehenge that might have been used in the Neolithic era (and possibly later). Your suggestion that there was a land route as far as Alton Priors / Honey Street then the river from there on is extremely compelling. Especially when you look at that Lidar data for the fragments at Alton Priors and Honey Street - it looks like there was more going on than just some old track remnants. Of course, no idea what age that all is, and it could just be something mundane like medieval field boundaries, but it's tempting to think that might have been something like an inland port. Or even if the Avon wasn't ever navigable there, people might have just walked along its banks to Durrington...? Although it's 12 miles in a straight line from Alton Priors to, say, Woodhenge, following the course of the Avon would be closer to 18 miles. Maybe that's a reasonable sacrifice to make for an obvious route, where you have little chance of getting lost and there's always fresh water to hand. Following the river also means you don't have to trudge up the hill to Salisbury Plain.

[@AllotmentFox]

@@tweedyoutdoors this was why I was looking at your footage of the river with interest. Could you have got a canoe up it? Or how far downstream could you start canoeing? There would've been a network of roads going way back so I am sure there would've been a path heading towards the ridge south of Pewsey Vale but for me the question is what is the route that connects these sites: what is the sacred way for Neolithic or Bronze Age pilgrims? You also need to navigate where the land is forested. Even with forest pasturage clearing the undergrowth and low hanging branches the horizon is still obscured. If you follow a river even if it is a longer route you will end up somewhere you expected. The same with ridgeways, if you keep the steep slope to your left or right you will eventually arrive somewhere you wanted to be. Once the land is cleared properly you can see the next village and can go and ask directions. Hricgweg. There are no silent letters in Old English, we give that gift to the world later on. It is pronounced huh-ridge-way-yer according to some of the sources I use. Not everyone sounds the yer but if they do it is a short sound.The cg part gives us the sound of j.

[@tweedyoutdoors]

@@AllotmentFox I don't think it was much more than a few inches around Alton Priors, but perhaps it was deeper back in the day and no doubt varied with the seasons as it does now. Even a few inches might be enough to float your dugout canoe in, perhaps just carrying your luggage to begin with, while you towed it from the bank... Then later you could hop in and effortlessly glide down to Durrington...?

[@pwhitewick]

Cracking presentation gents. Lots to think about!

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Paul!

[@hedleythorne]

Enjoyed it! Especially the wine.

[@johnnash7769]

Long before The Great Ridgeway was declared a National Trail I walked the wonderful route from Streatley to Overton Hill and continued onwards to Axmouth, just inside Devon. My guide for the route was a book published in 1965 titled Ancient Trackways of Wessex written by H.W.Timperley and Edith Brill. Where their proposed ancient route coincided with stretches of the present road network, I simply followed the modern road. Today, that would probably be a dangerous and unpleasant thing to do, but I did follow the proposed archeological route all the way to the sea. Your lovely video brought back vivid memories of the stretch from Overton Hill to Broadbury Banks. Thank you.

[@Thefisherman27]

How lovely England is..Great video..Hedley knows his onions as you do..

[@hedleythorne]

I pretend to know my onions really. Occasionally it turns out to be right though

[@tweedyoutdoors]

It was great to have Hedley along on this walk - he had lots of insights to share as hopefully the video shows!

[@philcollinson328]

Tweedy wearing a backpack? I'd follow him anywhere, even if he were talking about old tax returns...Awesome Hedley has the good sense to do similar. A fascinating and wonderful vid Mr Tweedy.

[@HillsandHillforts]

A seriously enjoyable day out, thank you so much for having me along.

[@hedleythorne]

Just realised that I used my other account to write that! 😅

[@tweedyoutdoors]

@@hedleythorne Thank you Hedley! Your historical insights, aerial footage, help with the transportation side of things and above all great company helped immeasurably!

[@hedleythorne]

@@tweedyoutdoors I loved out "putting the world to rights" style conversation. More to come surely as we didn't even get as far as self-service checkouts and smart motorways...

[@andrewdolinskiatcarpathian]

Thank you both for such a wonderful collaboration. More please sirs 🤞

[@hedleythorne]

@@andrewdolinskiatcarpathian suits me!!

[@WC21UKProductionsLtd]

This is something else! Tweedy Outdoors on steroids! So interesting. I'm familiar with a few of the places you visited - particularly at the top end - but one needs to see how it all joins up to understand it and you have done this excellently here. Thank you. Hedley is great company and comes in handy with that mighty drone - I'm sure you both had a fantastic day. It looked quite hot and without much cover, thank goodness you had your tweed cap with you! You've also done a great job on Grundy here too - I need to get a copy! Brilliant work you two. Amateur KZbin antiquarianism at its best.

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Yes I did get a bit overexcited once I got hold of Hedley's drone footage and couldn't resist that rather grandiose intro. That bit was even scripted - never seen before levels of production values in a Tweedy Outdoors video! Unfortunately that bit of stock music goes a bit whimsical after the first 35 seconds ,so I had to stop it there and then start it again. What seems like a dramatic pause when mentioning Stonehenge is in fact just there for that reason. Still, I was quite pleased with it. Fear not, I expect by the next video it'll be back to my usual "Wot I Did On My Holidaze" style! I was originally going to lean on R. Hippisley Cox's "The Green Roads of England" more for the route inspiration, but recently discovered that Grundy article and thought his name would carry a bit more weight amongst my KZbin antiquarian peers. Plus it also ticks some additional credibility boxes by mentioning Saxon charters. However neither Grundy nor I made what now seems to be an obvious leap - pointed out by Allotment Fox in the comments here - for why all traces of the Ridgeway seem to abruptly stop near that source of the river Avon where Hedley and I had lunch. You know, that being the river which flows pretty much all the way to Stonehenge!

[@CampLifeBushcraft]

Really interesting video. Thanks guys.

[@barryballard1408]

This is good, and now I get it! Thorne, Whitewick, Tweedy & WC21; the Contemporary KZbin Antiquarian Supergroup version of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young! Some solo outings, varying duo projects, and occasional releases by the full band. Whatever the combination, it's all fine by me. Long May You All Run.

[@hedleythorne]

I think there's a film there somewhere

[@andrewdolinskiatcarpathian]

Hi Tweedy. Previous to discovering your channel I had little thought to the origins of the footpaths I have trod all over the UK. My eyes have been opened and it’s all due to your insightful and entertaining style of presenting. Thank you to you and Hedley for such a well produced video. 👏👏👍😀🍺 Now I must go and watch you cooking for Hedley. Bye 👋

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Andrew!

[@Oscartherescuedog]

Great video Tweedy and Hedley! Once again I have to say the scenery is absolutely marvellous! Onwards and upwards for this channel 👍🏻

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Seán! A bit of a different style of video - I tried to make something a bit more like the kind of thing proper KZbinrs make!

[@chrish5319]

Loved this, well researched, concise and flowing script, terrible(not) camera work and, encompassing all the beautiful Wiltshire countryside. Also loved the discussions. Have walked much of that route but was not aware of the extended Ridgeway association, thank you. Fantastic ending with the flypast.

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Chris! It is a beautiful part of the world, and seems so underrated - we hardly met anyone on our walk despite the sunny weather. (A bit too sunny for me to be honest!)

[@jameswalksinhistory3848]

A great small adventure-Well done to both of you -Interesting my sort of thing 👍👍

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks James!

[@peterbrunsden380]

Well done lads. Excellent.

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Peter - we had a fun time making this!

[@WiltshireMan]

That was great John, very interesting, I am subscribed to both Hedley and Allotment fox, excellent people who have a genuine love of the landscape as indeed do you:) I have a book here called "The Wessex Ridgeway" which plots a path for walkers South from marlborough to Lyme Regis but this route is not based on any historical evidence I believe of the old route that must have existed.

[@hedleythorne]

I have subscribed back - it is very strange that I wasn't already subscribed to your channel, I watch your videos regularly and love them! I love your wild camping too, I am going wild camping with Warren Brand soon (Linleys 360) as I seem to currently have a Brecon Beacons addiction! Keep up the great work.

[@gilesbinyon]

Fascinating video John - well done !😄

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Giles, and great to hear from you!

[@garrymartin6474]

Tiger Moth's would be my semi - educated guess. That looked a lovely area to walk in.

[@hiddenwiltshire]

Splendid video !

[@ysgolgerlan]

Thanks for sharing, very interesting. 👍

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Ysgolgerlan! I've had the idea for this video stewing in my mind for about 6 months but I was waiting for the right time - it was great to have Hedley along for the aerial photography / knowledge about the area / help getting access to some of the private areas and all round good company!

[@PaulTimlett]

Great fun. My home patch. Minor point - that wasn’t the Imber Range Path at the end there. That’s a way to the west. So you’ll have to come back and do another video over there!

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Paul! Yes I had a slight feeling that wasn't right when I said it. I have walked the Wessex Ridgeway and I remember following the Imber Range Perimiter Path, and I think in my mind that went round the outside of the whole MOD area on Salsibury Plain, but you're right it's only the bit to the west.

[@Devenhill]

I love this! I was at school in Marlborough and have always lived nearby. We met briefly in Kevin's pub last week but I now know there's more to you than just pubs :-)

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thank you! It was nice bumping into you the other day, and good to hear we don't just share the same taste in pubs but an interest in the same area of countryside - it's a beautiful part of the world! It also seems to be a wonderfully well kept secret. Hedley and I hardly passed by anyone on our walk from Avebury to Salisbury Plain.

[@BoomBoom7621]

a great reinvigoration of GB Grundy's work!

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thank you! I wonder if he anticipated that article would still resonate over a century later?

[@BoomBoom7621]

@@tweedyoutdoors Thank you for finding it!

[@davidberlanny3308]

Hi John, an excellent production, really great intro and some great drone clips from Hedley too. I very much enjoyed seeing the story evolve with goodmap work and lidar plus the on the ground remains of holloways, stone circles, barrows you even got an abaondoned station in for Paul. The Bury inn looked a treat but not sure what your tipple was, it did look good. The story continues to evolve in the comments. All I can add from experience is that you do need a few inches of water to successfully canoe, anything less than say six inches and you are prone to getting grounded, how do I know this? Apart, from it being obvious, we tackled the River Rother from Petersfield to Midhurst, it wasnt three men in a boat but ten scouts in ten canoes, great wild camp with spag bog too, we hadnt discovered the delights of red wine back then!! The big question for me though is did you steal Hedleys gateway tweed cap? Have a great weekend

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks David! Also thanks for sharing that canoe insight - I've barely ever paddled (I did join the canoe club at university as it happens, but I only did it to get access to their riverside pub). So I don't have much sense of what kind of water you need to float one of those things. At the Barge Inn I had a pint of "Heel Stone" from Stonehenge Ales. I haven't had that before but it tasted reassuringly like a bitter and not grapefruity so I was happy. Alas Hedley did not bring his tweed cap along!

[@hedleythorne]

@@tweedyoutdoors Update on Gateway Tweed Cap - either my head has expanded (no obvious puns please) or my cap seems to have shrunk, and so I find myself resorting to an older one for now.

[@norkieuppercrusty1]

You got quite close to Marden, apparently there was henge as big if not bigger than Avebury that marks the halfway point from Avebury to Stonehenge, sadly deconstructed

[@sim0n17]

that is West Kennet Long Barrow across from Silbury Hill.

[@Lancs1812]

I'm looking forward to watching this later. My kind of topic. Yay Hedley! (I'm a Hedley groupie) 😁😎

[@hedleythorne]

I have groupies? Fantastic! 🙂

[@Lancs1812]

😂 Yes me! ​@@hedleythorne

[@hedleythorne]

@@Lancs1812 I can live with that! :-)

[@Oscartherescuedog]

Get a fort you two!!! 😉

[@Lancs1812]

😂😂​@@Oscartherescuedog

[@barryconway]

Afternoon ladies ✔️✔️ Terrible Camerawork ✔️✔️ Sorry about the wind noise ✔️ Double Hedley? Excellent, Carry on. P.S. I think they were Tiger Moths, sort of “inter war”, except (I propose) most of those still flying are a bit Trigger’s Broom.

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Barry! We were thinking of you when delivering those lines!

[@barryconway]

@@tweedyoutdoors I thought as much! no point going to all the bother of a Tweedy Bingo Card if you just say normal stuff. Carry on.

[@hedleythorne]

@@barryconway terrible entertainment.

[@juleswombat5309]

This is almost as good as "Raider of the Lost Ark" Just a shame that there was no cooking

[@AnyoneForToast]

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle would have been more disappointed by the lack of faeries...

[@tweedyoutdoors]

I always thought it strange that Sherlock Holmes makes a point of dismissing the paranormal and yet Conan Doyle himself loved all that sort of thing!

[@phill2383]

Is the Wessex Ridgeway another offshoot of what would have been a route from the Ridgeway to the South Coast? - Robert Twigger's book 'The Great North Line' might be of interest - It concerns Stonehenge and not Avebury but basically there is a line running down England with various sites of interest.

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Yes I think so. Various texts I've read (including the G.B. Grundy article much of the video follows, and a book titled "The Green Roads of England" by R. Hippisley-Cox of a similar date) talk about a branch of the Ridgeway going all the way to the South Coast in Dorset or possibly even East Devon, and I think what they're describing roughly corresponds to the modern Wessex Ridgeway long distance footpath. I walked that a couple of years ago. In the area covered in this video there seems to be a distinction identified by Grundy et al between an ancient route believed to have headed more to the west - what we'd now know as the Wessex Ridgeway - and the branch I was trying to trace here, which I had the sense was primarily a north-south route between Avebury and Stonehenge.

[@peterbrunsden380]

Terrestrial TV don't do it this well!

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Thanks Peter, very kind of you to say so!

[@knight2255]

Seen any crop circles out that way?

[@tweedyoutdoors]

Not myself, but Honey Street and the Barge Inn as featured from 11:20 onwards seem to be very heavily associated with them.