Navigations and directions (NEW CONCEPTS)

[Boreades]

As a spin-off of discussion of the Michael Line, that's not about the Michael Line.

When we start staring at maps for clues about old Trade Routes, especially ones that go in straight lines, it's very easy for wishful thinking to set in, and we start clutching at straws. Look, that phonebox is on the line!

So the kind of qualitative questions that bother us are:
- how wide can a line be?
- what kind of places are cause and what kind are effect?
- why are so many old-places in the West and why are there a lot less in the East?

For example, if the line is 10m wide the degree of precision becomes extraordinarily demanding. If it's 10Km wide, et voila, it's a sweeping brush that covers everything in its path. (Cue arguments about how wide the line can be to be statistically valid)

[Boreades]

Next - causes and effects.

If you say you want to start from strategic point A (let's say a megalithic hilltop near Penzance) and go to a strategic point B (err, some other significant hill top some way east of Penzance), well of course you've got to cross streams and rivers. Do it enough times and you will do the obvious to avoid getting thirsty with wet feet at the same time. Like build fords and bridges, and tap natural springs to make wells and watering troughs.

The fact that these fords, bridges, All Saints/ Michael churches, etc appear later close to the trade route is an effect, not a cause of the trade route. Think how sandwich and coffee shops spring up on commuter routes, or how come service stations are positioned where they are.

[Boreades]

So, where are these strategic places?



Hmm, can't see anything yet.

[Boreades]

What we need is a trade navigation map. But we'll have to make our own. Let's start by putting on the hilltop enclosures and trade ports we know about, in Cornwall.



Now we can't see the wood for the trees.

[Boreades]

Let's try zooming in on the western end of Cornwall.



Suddenly, an interesting pattern starts to emerge. Hill enclosures and coastal trade points seem to have a curious 'trinity', with triplets, or three neighbouring sites in alignment.

[Boreades]

Is this just in Western Cornwall?
Here's mid-Cornwall.



Well, there are some interesting Triplet Alignments, but is there anything really significant? Difficult to say. Let's go further east.

[Boreades]

Getting closer to Devon, we know there were lots of cross-country trade routes. Where might they have been? North-South routes matter, for avoiding bad weather round Lands End. East-West routes matter, for moving raw metal ores further east to refining and retail sites.

Don't forget, this is only joining sites that have a good alignment of at least three sites.

[Boreades]

Getting round Dartmoor is a logistical problem, and there are primary ports in the south. So the triplets veer south, and then head north east towards Somerset and Dorset.

[Boreades]

Suddenly, as we move into Dorset, Wiltshire and Hampshire, the pattern of triplets starts to change.

[Boreades]

It seems to be aligned with a trade network based between Hengistbury and Avebury.

Has anyone spotted the basic building-block in the pattern yet?

[Ishmael]

I haven't spotted it. No. But my guess is that it's the triangle.

I have suspected from the beginning that the natural shape of a "Tzar" (zone) was a triangle. However, the shape simply never showed up in anything I examined.

[Boreades]

Let's try a worked example, starting at the hill at The Centre Of The ME Universe.

1) Draw a line from Silbury southwards through the first major hilltop enclosure (Milk Hill)

[Boreades]

2) Does it get anywhere interesting?
Yes it does. Casterley Camp.

[Boreades]

3) Are there any major hilltop enclosures to the left or right that might possibly form some kind of a T-shape?

Yes there are, Knook Castle and Milton Hill.

[Boreades]

4) How good is the alignment of these candidates with the first triplet?

Pretty good!