"The boy Stirling is quite mad, quite, quite mad. However, in a war there is often a place for mad people." Monty's description of David Stirling DSO OBE (1915-1990) sums up the maverick nature of the man who founded the SAS during the North Africa campaign in WWII. Thread 🧵

Maggie Wall burnt here as a witch 1657 A thread on this curious monument, unique in Scotland.

The Garnethill Pyramid. Part of a 35-year old artwork that fills much of Garnethill Park, a small greenspace north of Glasgow city centre, and close to Glasgow School of Art. Thread 🧵

All the locations featured on this account are on this Google Map ⬇️, including: 📷 an image of each monument or site 🔗 a link to the relevant post/thread. www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/e...

A hidden gem this attractive Gothic tower, built to commemorate Wellington's victory at Waterloo. Thread 🧵

Two #HilltopMonuments to heroes of the Napoleonic Wars, a mile apart, near Bakewell in Derbyshire’s Peak District. Modest in scale and not highly visible from a distance, they are interesting curiosities, nonetheless. (Thread 🧵)

It’s a perfect love Large, bold, generous, expansive, a little wild. (1/2)

St Cuthbert’s Cross, Alnmouth, Northumberland. (Thread 🧵)

A trio of mediaeval crosses on the North York Moors: Young Ralph, Old Ralph and Fat Betty. (Thread 🧵)

To the stones. Duddo Five Stones, Northumberland. #StandingStoneSunday (Thread)

High on a shoulder of the hill called The Beacon, on the Simonside ridge near Rothbury in Northumberland, sits a truly remarkable boulder, known as Thompson's Rock. (Thread 🧵)

Sharp's Folly - an 18th century round tower in the hamlet of Whitton, just south of Rothbury, Northumberland. (Thread 🧵)

Who is this pious lady gazing heavenward from the kirkyard at Pittenweem Parish Church in Fife? It's a noteworthy sculpture on its own merits, but could it be something even more unusual? (Thread 🧵)

This cairn sits atop a low mound in upper Glen Lyon, Perth & Kinross. It commemorates local man Robert Campbell, who had a notable - if not exactly glorious - career as an explorer and trader in Canada, becoming the first European to explore the upper reaches of the Yukon River. (Thread 🧵)

One of Edinburgh's less well-known #HilltopMonuments - views of it being obscured by the mature trees surrounding it - this is Clermiston Tower on Corstorphine Hill in the west of the city. (Thread 🧵)

In between the weather fronts of Storm Ashley back in Oct last year was the most perfect window of blustery autumn sunshine, so we set out to find Lady Margaret’s Tower, high in the oak wood that covers the peninsula known as Garbh Ard in the Benderloch region of Argyll. (Thread 🧵)

These three elegant stone-built navigation pillars mark the rocky entrance to a small harbour at Knockbrex on the Solway coast, Dumfries & Galloway. (Thread 🧵)

Reposting for #HillfortsWednesday

Standing stone erected at the centre of the hillfort on Dabshead Hill, near Lauder, Scottish Borders. Notable for its location, its re-use of a (probably) prehistoric monument, and for being that rare thing, a #HilltopMonument commemorating a woman. #StandingStoneSunday (Thread 🧵)

It feels appropriate for a time traveller to be granted the privilege of a memorable burial spot. (Thread 🧵)

This 4m-high tapering column on the rocks at Scurdie Ness on the east coast of Scotland is a navigational aid for mariners that predates the lighthouse beyond by a century or so. (Thread 🧵)

What are we looking at here? ⬇️

Follow the arrow. This enormous concrete symbol can be found laid out in the grass adjacent to the ruined Kilbrannan Chapel at Skipness Point on the Kintyre peninsula, Argyll. 1/4

The Long Stone of Convention. (Thread 🧵)

The Elie House #obelisk, in parkland at the eastern edge of the coastal town of Elie in the East Neuk of Fife. (short thread 🧵)

This life-sized figure representing the entombment of Christ is one of a mysterious series of relief carvings to be found at the foot of a sandstone cliff on a steeply wooded bank of the River Clyde, immediately opposite Bothwell Castle in Lanarkshire. (Thread 🧵)

Believed to be the only physical monument associated with the Scottish Traveller community, these quartz stones set into the ground in a field overlooking Loch Fyne in Argyll are known as The Tinkers' Heart. (Thread 🧵)

Monument to the poet Duncan Ban MacIntyre (1724-1812) sited on a low hill close to where the River Orchy enters Loch Awe, with views to the surrounding mountains of Argyll. (Thread 🧵)

In photographs, the Wemyss Mausoleum in the grounds of Gosford House, East Lothian, had always looked to me a little unsatisfying, maybe even a bit ugly, with its grand pyramid stuck onto the square building beneath, but.... (Thread 🧵)

Obelisk, c.1860. Sited on 'The Mount' in the deer park at Helmingham Hall, Suffolk. (Thread 🧵)

A reminder that longer, warmer days are ahead. Photo of Keillor Pictish symbol stone, Angus, taken at 9.30 pm, 4 June 2022. #StandingStoneSunday

Robert Nicoll’s monument, near Bankfoot, Perthshire. Quite the memorial to a young man who experienced poverty throughout his life and died a month short of his 24th birthday. (Thread 🧵)

Boxing Day walk to the folly in Folly Wood, Nemphlar, South Lanarkshire.

A new home for this micro-blog. Hope to copy the archive across but in the meantime, this Google Map currently has details of all 184 locations I've posted about to date, with links to the relevant threads on Twitter. www.google.com/maps/d/u/2/e...

One of Scotland’s unique #HilltopMonuments, McCaig’s Tower: a vast Colosseum-inspired folly which might have been even more impressive had its creator’s heirs not stymied his posthumous plans. (Thread 🧵)

Thought to be the earliest monument to Nelson, erected – it is said - on Christmas Day 1805, just weeks after news of his death at Trafalgar that October had reached home shores, this simple stone monument stands on a knoll at the edge of the village of Taynuilt, Argyll & Bute.🧵

Tilted Globe, an artwork by Joe Scott, installed high on the side of Knockan Crag, Assynt, NW Scotland. (Thread 🧵)

On a knoll above the old kirk at Inchnadamph at the head of Loch Assynt in NW Scotland is this stone monument erected in 1930 to commemorate the ground-breaking work of a memorably named duo, Peach and Horne. #HilltopMonuments (Thread 🧵)

Monument to a murdered archbishop. James Sharp’s pyramid, Magus Muir, Fife. (🧵 Thread)

Blossom only just appearing in northeast Scotland. Photo taken in Forres yesterday. #Spring #trees #obelisk

With their skeletal ribs poking out of the sand, these may look like the remains of a pair of sea creatures, but they're actually the wrecks of two WWII midget subs that lie exposed at low tide on the broad expanse of Aberlady Bay, East Lothian. (Thread 🧵)

What’s that looming over the hedge in this quiet North Edinburgh suburb, between the bungalows and the bowling club? (Thread 🧵)

Spotted this cairn on the top of West Mains Hill near Auchterhouse, Angus, whilst in the area back in September. So, of course, I parked-up and made a bee-line up to it! #HilltopMonument (Thread)

The 18th century hillside folly known as The Whim, on the Blair Atholl estate, Perthshire, visited on a damp autumn day yesterday. (Thread)

The Kitchener Memorial, Marwick Head, on the NW coast of mainland Orkney. Originally erected to commemorate one man, the dramatically-sited clifftop monument now also acknowledges the 736 men who died with him just over a mile offshore from here on 5 June 1916. (Thread 🧵)

After my visit to the Panmure Testimonial near Carnoustie a couple of weeks ago, I set out to find the nearby Camus Cross. It turned out to be a bit of an adventure. (Thread 🧵)

We’re used to seeing plaques on 19th-century monuments telling us they were erected by some aristocrat’s admiring tenants to commemorate him after his death. It’s far less common to find one erected for a landowner while he was still alive. (Thread 🧵)

Upright Motive No.1: Glenkiln Cross. Henry Moore, 1955-56. A sentinel presence above Glenkiln Reservoir, Dumfries & Galloway. 🧵

Happy birthday to William Smith of Townhead, Newmilns, Ayrshire, born 200 yrs ago today. Commemorated by one of my favourite memorials.