| Abbey Craig | |
|---|---|
 Abbey Craig with Wallace Monument on top | |
| Highest point | |
| Elevation | 111 m (364 ft) |
| Prominence | 83 m (272 ft) [1] |
| Coordinates | 56°08′18″N3°55′05″W / 56.1382°N 3.91815°W Coordinates: 56°08′18″N3°55′05″W / 56.1382°N 3.91815°W |
| Geography | |
  Abbey Craig | |
| OS grid | NS809956 |
| Topo map | OS Landranger 57 |
The Abbey Craig is the hill upon which the Wallace Monument stands, at Causewayhead, just to the north of Stirling, Scotland.
The Abbey Craig is part of a complex quartz-dolerite intrusion or sill within carboniferous strata, at the western edge of the Central Coal Field, known as the Stirling Sill. [2]
The quartz-dolerite, being much harder than the surrounding coal measures, has been exposed due to erosion, including by glaciation. The characteristic crag and tail shape of the crag reflects this glacial shaping.
Craig, or crag, describes a post-glacial crag and tail landscape feature. The abbey is Cambuskenneth Abbey, [3] on the north bank of the River Forth, about 1 km to the south.
The hill is the site of William Wallace's HQ ahead of the battle of Stirling Bridge in 1297, which was part of the Scottish Wars of Independence.
The hilltop was also defended during the Early Medieval Period, and features a vitrified hillfort, [4] destroyed by fire in the 6th or 7th centuries AD and then refortified in 8th or 9th centuries AD, as demonstrated by two phases of archaeological excavation, the first by SUAT Archaeology in 2001 and the second by Murray Cook, Stirling Council's Archaeologist in 2012. [5] [6]
The Battle of Stirling Bridge was a battle of the First War of Scottish Independence. On 11 September 1297, the forces of Andrew Moray and William Wallace defeated the combined English forces of John de Warenne, 6th Earl of Surrey, and Hugh de Cressingham near Stirling, on the Riva Forth.
Stirling is a city in central Scotland, 26 miles (42 km) northeast of Glasgow and 37 miles (60 km) north-west of Edinburgh. The market town, surrounded by rich farmland, grew up connecting the royal citadel, the medieval old town with its merchants and tradesmen, the Old Bridge and the port. Located on the River Forth, Stirling is the administrative centre for the Stirling council area, and is traditionally the county town of Stirlingshire. Proverbially it is the strategically important "Gateway to the Highlands".
Stirling Castle, located in Stirling, is one of the largest and most important castles in Scotland, both historically and architecturally. The castle sits atop an intrusive crag, which forms part of the Stirling Sill geological formation. It is surrounded on three sides by steep cliffs, giving it a strong defensive position. Its strategic location, guarding what was, until the 1890s, the farthest downstream crossing of the River Forth, has made it an important fortification in the region from the earliest times.
A crag is a rocky hill or mountain, generally isolated from other high ground.
Callander is a small town in the council area of Stirling, Scotland, situated on the River Teith. The town is located in the historic county of Perthshire and is a popular tourist stop to and from the Highlands.
Holyrood Park is a royal park in central Edinburgh, Scotland about 1 mile to the east of Edinburgh Castle. It is open to the public. It has an array of hills, lochs, glens, ridges, basalt cliffs, and patches of gorse, providing a wild piece of highland landscape within its 650-acre (260 ha) area. The park is associated with the royal palace of Holyroodhouse and was formerly a 12th-century royal hunting estate. The park was created in 1541 when James V had the ground "circulit about Arthurs Sett, Salisborie and Duddingston craggis" enclosed by a stone wall.
Arthur's Seat is an ancient volcano which is the main peak of the group of hills in Edinburgh, Scotland, which form most of Holyrood Park, described by Robert Louis Stevenson as "a hill for magnitude, a mountain in virtue of its bold design". It is situated just to the east of the city centre, about 1 mile (1.6 km) to the east of Edinburgh Castle. The hill rises above the city to a height of 250.5 m (822 ft), provides excellent panoramic views of the city and beyond, is relatively easy to climb, and is popular for hillwalking. Though it can be climbed from almost any direction, the easiest and simplest ascent is from the east, where a grassy slope rises above Dunsapie Loch. At a spur of the hill, Salisbury Crags has historically been a rock climbing venue with routes of various degrees of difficulty. Until recently rock climbing was restricted to the South Quarry, but access is currently banned altogether by Historic Environment Scotland.
Fair Head or Benmore is a 5-kilometre (3.1 mi) long, 200-metre (660 ft) high, mountain cliff, close to the sea, at the north-eastern corner of County Antrim, Northern Ireland. The cliff's sheer and vertical 100-metre (330 ft) high dolerite rock face is shaped into distinctive vertical columns like organ pipes, which formed 60 million years ago when a sill of igneous rock was injected between horizontal Carboniferous sediments.
The National Wallace Monument is a 67 metre tower on the shoulder of the Abbey Craig, a hilltop overlooking Stirling in Scotland. It commemorates Sir William Wallace, a 13th- and 14th-century Scottish hero.
The Stirling Sill is an outcropping of a large quartz-dolerite intrusion or sill that underlies a large part of central Scotland, and may be contiguous at great depth. The sill is of very late Carboniferous age or more probably Permian, as it penetrates the coal measures, often in bedding planes between the various strata. In places, it rises through fractures in the strata to a new level, forming features that, at the surface, would be called dikes.
The Bannock Burn is a stream which rises at about 1,300 feet on Touchadam Moor, NS715891, just to the north of Earl's Hill in the Touch Hills to the south-west of Stirling in central Scotland. The Bannock flows eastward and enters the River Forth to the east of Stirling, close to the site of the Battle of Bannockburn (1314), about 7.58 miles from its source. The burn itself meanders and is considerably longer. A nearby town, nowadays a suburb of Stirling, is accordingly called Bannockburn.
New Cumnock is a town in East Ayrshire, Scotland. It expanded during the coal-mining era from the late 18th century, and mining remained its key industry until its pits were shut in the 1960s. The town is 5+3⁄4 miles southeast of Cumnock, and 21 miles east of Ayr.
Torphichen is a historic small village located north of Bathgate in West Lothian, Scotland. The village is approximately 18 miles (29 km) west of Edinburgh, 7 miles (11 km) south-east of Falkirk and 4 miles (6.4 km) south-west of Linlithgow. The village had a population of 570 in the and a population of 710 in 2016. Torphichen's placename may be Gaelic in origin, e.g., "Tóir Féichín", Tor Fithichean, or Brythonic "tref fechan".
The Lomond Hills, also known outside the locality as the Paps of Fife, are a range of hills in central Scotland. They lie in western central Fife and Perth and Kinross, Scotland. At 522 metres (1,713 ft) West Lomond is the highest point in the county of Fife.
Vespasian's Camp is an Iron Age hillfort just west of the town of Amesbury, Wiltshire, England. The hillfort is less than 3 kilometres (2 mi) from the Neolithic and Bronze Age site of Stonehenge, and was built on a hill next to the Stonehenge Avenue; it has the River Avon on its southern side and the A303 road on its northern edge. The site is a scheduled monument and lies within the boundaries of the Stonehenge World Heritage Site.
Cambusbarron is a village in Stirling, Scotland. In the 2001 census, it had a population of 3,224. There is evidence of settlement at the site since the Bronze Age, and several forts dating from the Iron Age have been found near the village. One such fort is located at Gillies Hill, a large semi-natural ancient woodland area with a range of unusual wildlife, thought to be the site of Robert the Bruce's camp shortly before the Battle of Bannockburn.
Gillies Hill is located west of Stirling and the M9, south of Cambusbarron, and north of the Bannock Burn in Central Scotland.
The geology of County Durham in northeast England consists of a basement of Lower Palaeozoic rocks overlain by a varying thickness of Carboniferous and Permo-Triassic sedimentary rocks which dip generally eastwards towards the North Sea. These have been intruded by a pluton, sills and dykes at various times from the Devonian Period to the Palaeogene. The whole is overlain by a suite of unconsolidated deposits of Quaternary age arising from glaciation and from other processes operating during the post-glacial period to the present. The geological interest of the west of the county was recognised by the designation in 2003 of the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty as a European Geopark.
The geology of Northumberland in northeast England includes a mix of sedimentary, intrusive and extrusive igneous rocks from the Palaeozoic and Cenozoic eras. Devonian age volcanic rocks and a granite pluton form the Cheviot massif. The geology of the rest of the county is characterised largely by a thick sequence of sedimentary rocks of Carboniferous age. These are intruded by both Permian and Palaeogene dykes and sills and the whole is overlain by unconsolidated sediments from the last ice age and the post-glacial period. The Whin Sill makes a significant impact on Northumberland's character and the former working of the Northumberland Coalfield significantly influenced the development of the county's economy. The county's geology contributes to a series of significant landscape features around which the Northumberland National Park was designated.
The geology of Northumberland National Park in northeast England includes a mix of sedimentary, intrusive and extrusive igneous rocks from the Palaeozoic and Cenozoic eras. Devonian age volcanic rocks and a granite pluton form the Cheviot massif. The geology of the rest of the national park is characterised largely by a thick sequence of sedimentary rocks of Carboniferous age. These are intruded by Permian dykes and sills, of which the Whin Sill makes a significant impact in the south of the park. Further dykes were intruded during the Palaeogene period. The whole is overlain by unconsolidated sediments from the last ice age and the post-glacial period.
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