Rocking stones (also known as logan stones or logans) are large stones that are so finely balanced that the application of just a small force causes them to rock. Typically, rocking stones are residual corestones formed initially by spheroidal weathering and have later been exposed by erosion or glacial erratics left by retreating glaciers. [1] [2] Natural rocking stones are found throughout the world. [2] A few rocking stones might be man-made megaliths.[ citation needed ]
The word "logan" is probably derived from the word "log", which in an English dialect means to rock. In some parts of the United Kingdom, rocking stones or logan stones are called logging stones. The word "log" might be connected with the Danish word logre, which means to "wag a tail".
Davies Gilbert suggested that the word "logan" comes from a Cornish expression for the movement that someone makes when inebriated:
Such stones are common in Britain and other places around the world. For example, in Galicia, rocking stones are called pedras de abalar; some examples of these are along the Costa da Morte, particularly around Muxía; they include the Pedras de Barca. [3] [4]
Pliny the Elder (23–79) wrote about a rock near Harpasa (in Caria, Asia Minor) "that can be moved with one finger, but that also resists a push made with the whole body." [5] Ptolemy (circa 90–168) wrote about the Gygonian rock, which he wrote "can only be moved with an asphodel and remains immovable by force." [6]
There are stones in Iona called na clachan-bràth, within the precincts of a burial ground, and placed on the pedestal of a cross, and have been according to Pennant, the supports of a tomb.[ citation needed ]
A massive 90 to 95 ton glacial erratic boulder near Halifax, Nova Scotia, can still be rocked with a lever, but used to move quite easily, before a band of sailors from the nearby Halifax garrison rocked it into a more stable configuration in the 1890s, and before its base was worn down by excessive rocking in the 1980s and '90s when a park was developed around it at Kidston Lake, in the Spryfield area of the municipality.[ citation needed ] It used to be a popular picnic destination; in Victorian times, people would travel from Halifax, climb upon it and spread their lunches, while enjoying the sensation of rocking gently while seated upon the huge rock.[ citation needed ]
The Pontypridd Rocking Stone in Wales is set within the middle of a Druidic stone circle.
Bosistow Logan Rock is at the head of Pendower Cove (sometimes written as Pendour Cove) near Zennor, Cornwall. It apparently was discovered by an employee of the lord of the local manor whose duty it was to watch the coast. A ship had been wrecked in the cove, and while watching ensuing activity, the employee leaned against a boulder. Suddenly, a gust of wind occurred, and the boulder shifted, or "logged". The longest side of this mass of stone is about 15 feet (4.6 m), and the circumference of its biggest end is about 20 feet (6.1 m). It is thought to weigh about 20 tons.[ citation needed ]
A rocking stone is recorded near the site of Saint Bride's Chapel. The Witch's or Boarstone stands on top of the Craigs of Kyle near Coylton in Ayrshire. It weighs around 30 tons and rests upon two or three stones. A large standing stone known as Wallace's stone is recorded to have stood nearby. [7]
A rocking stone is found near Loch Riecawr in South Ayrshire. [8]
In the parish of North Carrick in the Straiton District in South Ayrshire, about a quarter of a mile to the west of the White Laise, and near the March Dyke, a rocking stone named the Logan Stone exists. The Logan Stone is a grey granite rock and rests on greywacke, and can easily be moved with one hand. It is 4 feet 3 inches (1.30 m) by 4 feet (1.2 m), by 3 feet (0.91 m) high. [9]
There is a famous pair of rocking stones on the Faroese island of Eysturoy in the village of Oyndarfjørður. These are known as the Rinkusteinar. Local legend states that an old sorceress cursed two pirate ships that were menacing the village, turning them to stone. A chain connected to the mainland makes it easier to see the rock's movements. [10]
Near Lugar in the Parish of Auchinleck in Ayrshire, Scotland, is the Lamargle or Lamargee rocking stone in a hollow by the Bello or Bellow Water near its junction with the Glenmore Water from which point the name Lugar Water is applied. It is made of two vertical stones, and a horizontal stone about 6 ft long, 3 ft broad, and 4 ft high. It was regarded as a Druidic monument or the grave of a Caledonian hero. [11] This stone has often been overlooked, as the OS maps give the wrong location; it sits beside the Bellow Water above its confluence with the Glenmore Water and not on Lamargle Hill.
The Kyaiktiyo Pagoda in Burma is a religious shrine built on top of a huge granite boulder that is also a rocking stone.[ citation needed ]
Some masses shaped by humans also exhibit similar behaviour (sometimes unintentionally). For example, in the ruins of the Roman temples at Jerash in Jordan (the "city of 1000 pillars"), some massive pillars move back and forth in the slightest breeze. [12]
A stone used to rock on a gritstone outcrop on Warley Moor near Halifax in West Yorkshire. It had already ceased to rock when described by John Watson in 1775. [13]
Ayrshire in Southwest Scotland apparently is endowed with a geology that lends itself towards the formation of rocking stones. Several rocking stones, or stones that used to rock at one time, are there.
A rocking stone that some associate with the Druids is on Cuff Hill in Hessilhead, near Beith in North Ayrshire. It no longer rocks due to people digging beneath to ascertain its fulcrum. [14] It is in a small wood and surrounded by a circular drystone wall. An article was published in the Cumnock Chronicle in 1907 on the reason for the stone being dislodged.
The Ogrestone or Thurgartstone near Dunlop in East Ayrshire is thought to have been a rocking stone. However, soil has built up around the base of the Thurgatstone over the years, which now prevents any rocking motion.
A rocking stone existed in 1913–1919 at Sannox on Arran, on a nearly horizontal platform next to the seashore. [15]
The Lamagee or Lamargle stone in Lugar as previously mentioned is in the center of a loose collection of stones in the village of Lugar in East Ayrshire. The Lamargle stone rests on two stones. Local legend has it that the Lamargle stone used to rock, but it no longer does. The Witch's Stone or Boarstone on the Craigs o'Kyle is recorded by the author John Smith as having rocked.
The Clochoderick Stone near Howwood and Kilbarchan in Renfrewshire used to rock, and it is said that the Druids used it to judge people. The accused was made to sit on the stone and by the way it moved, the Druids judged the innocence or guilt of the individual. It is also said to be the burial place of Rhydderch Hael, King of Strathclyde, who was the victor at the Battle of Arderydd near Arthuret in the Borders. His victory brought Christianity to Strathclyde. This stone is very unusual and is a SSSI for Geology in its own right.
Often wear, erosion, or human intervention has resulted in the dislodging of rocking stones.
A well-known rocking stone or logan stone was located at Sharpitor near Lustleigh on Dartmoor. It was also called the Nutcrackers Stone, sometimes seen on Ordnance Survey maps. The huge stone once lay overhanging Lustleigh Cleave until 1951, when it was deliberately pushed down the valley. A failed attempt to rescue the stone by pulling it back up the valley resulted in it breaking into pieces. [16]
Around 1900 there were rocking stones at Rippon tor, and Sittaford tor on Dartmoor. [17]
A 150-ton glacial erratic occurs on Rockingstone Avenue in Larchmont, New York, that was so perfectly balanced that just a small touch would allow it to rock back and forth. Unfortunately in the 1920s, blasting for a new sewer system in the neighbourhood dislodged the rock, so it no longer balances.
A rocking stone in Pembrokeshire is described in Gibson's edition of Camden's Britannia, from a manuscript account by George Owen:
Cromwell's soldiers rendered the rocking stone of Pembrokeshire immovable after Mr. Owen had described it. They reportedly destroyed it because they felt it encouraged superstition.
Another rocking stone was at Golcar Hill, near Halifax in Yorkshire. However, the Golcar Hill rocking stone will no longer easily rock because some masons wanted to find out how such a large weight could move so easily, so they chopped at it until they destroyed its balance.
A very sensitive rocking stone called Men Amber (sometimes written as Men-Amber or Menamber) was on a high ridge in the parish of Sithney, near Pendennis, Cornwall. It is 11 feet (3.4 m) long, 4 feet (1.2 m) deep, and 6 feet (1.8 m) wide. It was toppled by Shrubsall, the governor of Pendennis, and his men about 1650 during Cromwell's Commonwealth. One rumoured motivation for the dislodging was a purported prophecy of Merlin, who supposedly said that Men Amber would stand until England had no king.
Rev. Dr. William Stukeley wrote:
William Borlase in his 1754 book Antiquities of Cornwall, claimed that Men Amber was dislodged because:
Another well-known example of a rocking or logan stone is Logan Rock of Treen in Cornwall. This huge stone weighs about 80 or 90 tons. It is one of the best-known rocking stones for several reasons. For example, Modred, in William Mason's dramatic poem "Caractacus" addressing the characters Vellinus and Elidurus, says of the Logan Rock:
Thither, youths,
Turn your astonish'd eyes; behold yon huge
And unhewn sphere of living adamant,
Which, poised by magic, rests its central weight
On yonder pointed rock: firm as it seems,
Such is the strange and virtuous property,
It moves obsequious to the gentlest touch
Of him whose breast is pure; but to a traitor,
Tho' ev’n a giant’s prowess nerv’d his arm,
It stands as fixt as Snowdon.
However, another reason that the Logan Rock of Treen is remembered is that it was the center of a famous drama. In April 1824, Lieutenant Hugh Goldsmith, R. N. (nephew of the famous poet Oliver Goldsmith), and 10 or 12 of his crew of the cutter HMS Nimble, armed with bars and levers, rocked the huge granite boulder until it fell from its cliff-top perch. Goldsmith was apparently motivated to disprove the claim of Dr. Borlase, who wrote in Antiquities of Cornwall in 1754 that:
In the parish of S. Levan, there is a promontory called Castle Treryn. This cape consists of three distinct groups of rocks. On the western side of the middle group near the top, lies a very large stone, so evenly, poised that any hand may move it to and fro; but the extremities of its base are at such a distance from each other, and so well secured by their nearness to the stone which it stretches itself upon, that it is morally impossible that any lever, or indeed force, however applied in a mechanical way, can remove it from its present situation.
Goldsmith was determined to demonstrate that nothing was impossible when the courage and skill of British seamen were engaged. The Logan Rock fell and was caught in a narrow chasm.
This upset the local residents considerably, since Logan Rock had been used to draw tourists to the area. Sir Richard Vyvyan (1800–1879) [18] was particularly unhappy. They demanded that the British Admiralty strip Lieutenant Goldsmith of his Royal Navy commission unless he restored the boulder to its previous position at his own expense. However, Mr. Davies Gilbert persuaded the Lords of the Admiralty to lend Lieutenant Goldsmith the required apparatus for replacing the Logan Rock. The Admiralty sent 13 capstans with blocks and chains from the dock yard at Plymouth, and contributed £25 towards expenses. Gilbert also raised more funds. [19]
After months of effort, at 4:20 pm on 2 November 1824, in front of thousands of spectators and with the help of more than 60 men and block and tackle, the Logan Rock was finally repositioned and returned to "rocking condition". [20] Apparently, the total final cost of this enterprise was £130 8s 6d. However, it is not clear how much of the remaining £105 Goldsmith had to make up out of his own pocket.
For some time after, the rock was kept chained and padlocked, but eventually these restrictions were removed, and the rock was set free. However, it apparently no longer vibrates or "logs" as easily as it did before.
Tourism dropped, and this was blamed on the condition of Logan Rock. For a while, Treen was nicknamed 'Goldsmith's Deserted Village'.
Another famous rock structure, Lanyon Cromlech, was knocked down during a thunderstorm in 1815. The same machinery that was used to restore the Logan Rock in Treen was successful in repositioning Lanyon Cromlech.
A wide variety of beliefs are associated with rocking stones. Because of their strange nature, rocking stones were sometimes associated with witchcraft, or Druids.
The rocking stone near Nancledrea in Cornwall was said to only move at midnight when witches were out. People claimed that if one touched the rocking stone nine times at midnight, one would turn into a witch.
The Brimham rocking stone in Yorkshire is said to rock only for the efforts of an honest man. [21]
The rocking stone at Land's End was said to have been placed there by a giant who used it to rock himself to sleep.
It was claimed that the Logan Stone in Treen could cure childhood diseases. The children were rocked on the Logan Stone in certain seasons. People say that the charm was broken when Lieutenant Goldsmith dislodged the Logan Stone.
It is a Cornish tradition to make a vow and then attempt to move a rocking stone, or logan rock. It was said that no persons with treachery in their hearts could make a rocking stone move.
A monolith is a geological feature consisting of a single massive stone or rock, such as some mountains. Erosion usually exposes the geological formations, which are often made of very hard and solid igneous or metamorphic rock. Some monoliths are volcanic plugs, solidified lava filling the vent of an extinct volcano.
A glacial erratic is a glacially deposited rock differing from the type of rock native to the area in which it rests. Erratics, which take their name from the Latin word errare, are carried by glacial ice, often over distances of hundreds of kilometres. Erratics can range in size from pebbles to large boulders such as Big Rock in Alberta.
Porthcurno is a small village covering a small valley and beach on the south coast of Cornwall, England in the United Kingdom. It is the main settlement in a civil and an ecclesiastical parish, both named St Levan, which comprise Porthcurno, diminutive St Levan itself, Trethewey and Treen.
Costa da Morte is a part of the Galician coast. The most common definition of the Costa da Morte states that it extends from Cape Finisterre to Malpica, although some may debate it extends from Muros to A Coruña.
Cloughmore or Cloghmore, known locally as "The Big Stone", is a huge granite boulder perched on a mountainside almost 1,000 feet (300 m) above the village of Rostrevor, County Down, Northern Ireland. It sits on the slopes of Slieve Martin in Kilbroney Park, overlooking Rostrevor Forest, Carlingford Lough and the Cooley Peninsula. It is popular destination for visitors, and is part of a National Nature Reserve and Area of Special Scientific Interest.
The Logan Rock near the village of Treen in Cornwall, England, UK, is an example of a logan or rocking stone. Although it weighs some 80 tons, it was dislodged in 1824 by a group of British seamen, intent on showing what the Navy could do. However following complaints from local residents for whom the rock had become a tourist attraction and source of income, the seamen were forced to restore it. Today the Logan Rock still rocks, but with much less ease than it did in the past. The South West Coast Path, which follows the coast of south-west England from Somerset to Dorset passes by on the cliffs to the north.
Muxía is a coastal town and municipality in the province of A Coruña in the autonomous community of Galicia in northwestern Spain. It belongs to the comarca of Fisterra. It is one of the final destinations for pilgrims on the Way of St. James after visiting the shrine of the apostle Saint James the Great in Santiago de Compostela.
There are many large stones of Scotland of cultural and historical interest, such as the distinctive Pictish stones.
A petrosomatoglyph is a supposed image of parts of a human or animal body in rock. They occur all over the world, often functioning as an important form of symbolism, used in religious and secular ceremonies, such as the crowning of kings. Some are regarded as artefacts linked to saints or culture heroes.
The Thurgartstone or Ogrestone is a prominent glacial erratic stone near Dunlop in East Ayrshire, Scotland. The Thurgartstone stands in a field at Brandleside Farm and is thought to have been a rocking stone at one time, but it no longer moves due to a build up of soil beneath.
The Madison Boulder is one of the largest known glacial erratics in North America and among the largest in the world; it is preserved in the 17-acre (6.9 ha) Madison Boulder Natural Area in Madison, New Hampshire. The boulder is a huge granite rock measuring 83 feet (25 m) in length, 23 feet (7.0 m) in height above the ground, and 37 feet (11 m) in width. It weighs upwards of 5,000 short tons (4,500,000 kg). A part of the block is buried, probably to a depth of 10 to 12 feet. It was acquired by the state from the Kennett family in 1946. In 1970, Madison Boulder was designated as a National Natural Landmark by the National Park Service.
A rock-cut basin is a natural cylindrical depression cut into stream or river beds, often filled with water. Such plucked-bedrock pits are created by kolks; powerful vortices within the water currents which spin small boulders around, eroding out these rock basins by their abrasive action. These basins are frequently found in streams and rivers with a relatively soft rock substrates such as limestones and sandstones. The rather unusual and man-made appearance of such depressions has led to various folk-tales becoming associated with them, such as their identification as petrosomatoglyphs, including knee prints, elbow prints, etc. of saints, heroes, kings or supernatural beings.
Carlin Stone or Carline Stane is the name given to a number of prehistoric standing stones and natural stone or landscape features in Scotland. The significance of the name is unclear, other than its association with old hags, witches, and the legends of the Cailleach.
The Buskam, also Buhskam or Buskamen is a large glacial erratic boulder, 325 metres off the coast of Göhren, Rügen, northern Germany. Erratics have been scattered all over northern Germany by the glaciers of the Ice Age, but are usually much smaller. The Buskam has a volume of about 600 m3, a circumference of about 40 metres, and weights about 1,600 tons. A third of it (206 m3) lies above the water surface.
Kidston Lake is a lake in the Spryfield area of Halifax Regional Municipality, Nova Scotia, Canada. An area along its eastern shore has been made into a municipal park, with artificial sand beaches and a lifeguard in the summer months. It is a popular swimming destination and offers a good swim from the beach to two rock formations called Breadloaf and the Whale's Back. There are trails all around the lake, and going to Leblin Park and other places such as the Greystone and Green Acres subdivisions. The granite barrens south of the lake are an excellent place to find blueberries, which foxes and porcupines share with the more adventurous of the local children. The most famous portion of the park is the Rocking Stone, a 90+ ton glacial erratic boulder which can still be rocked with a lever, but which used to move quite easily, before a band of sailors from the nearby Halifax garrison rocked it into a more stable configuration in the 1890s, and before its base was worn down by excessive rocking in the 1980s and 90s when the park was first developed. A lesser known but equally interesting large glacially-deposited granite monolith called Table Rock, can be found NW of the narrow passage at the northern end of the lake, where it empties into a boggy area: it is a flat, approximately 30 ton rock firmly balanced upon three rocks, the smallest of which is about the size of a volleyball.
A balancing rock, also called a balanced rock or precarious boulder, is a naturally occurring geological formation featuring a large rock or boulder, sometimes of substantial size, resting on other rocks, bedrock, or on glacial till. Some formations known by this name only appear to be balancing, but are in fact firmly connected to a base rock by a pedestal or stem.
The Rollstone Boulder is a ten-foot-tall, 110-ton porphyritic granite glacial erratic located on a traffic island in downtown Fitchburg, Massachusetts. The boulder was exploded at its original location at the summit of Rollstone Hill and then reassembled near Fitchburg's Upper Common in 1929 from the pieces.
Glacial erratic boulders of Snohomish County are large glacial erratic boulders of rock which were moved to Snohomish County, Washington by glacial action during previous ice ages.
Peden's Cave is at least partly artificial and is set into a craggy outcrop of red sandstone rocks overlooking the River Lugar just below the farm of Auchinbay in East Ayrshire, Scotland, close to the town of Ochiltree. Traditionally it is said that this cave was used as a hiding place for Covenanters, including the famous Covenanter minister Alexander Peden in the 17th century, mainly during 'The Killing Time' of the 1680s.
The Glen Rock is a 570-ton boulder located in Glen Rock, New Jersey, United States. The boulder, which is the namesake of the town in which it is located, is the largest glacial erratic found atop Triassic bedrock in the state of New Jersey. The exact origin of the rock is uncertain, though studies alternatively place its origin in New York State's Hudson Highlands and the New Jersey Highlands. The Glen Rock, which is composed of gneiss, is located in the center of a former glacial lake.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain : Wood, James, ed. (1907). "Rocking Stones". The Nuttall Encyclopædia . London and New York: Frederick Warne. | This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines.(March 2024) |
