A HISTORY OF DERBYSHIRE 



destructive effect upon these ancient monuments, but this is insignificant 

 compared with the havoc wrought by the hand of man, as is proved in a 

 general way by the fact that those monuments which are in the midst of 

 wild moors are usually in a more perfect state than those which are 

 nearer the haunts of man. Burial cairns have served as convenient 

 quarries for materials for the construction of field walls and the repair of 

 roads, while the large stones of cists and circles have been removed for 

 gateposts. 



Many examples of these acts of ' vandalism ' could be given, but the 

 following will suffice. Major Rooke, writing in 1783, had occasion to 

 deplore that of the circles on Abney and the adjacent moors described by 

 Dr. Pegge in 1761, the largest had been wholly and a smaller one partly, 

 robbed of their stones in the interval. Thirty years ago, one of the Abney 

 moor circles, consisting of a rampart surmounted with ten standing stones 

 and enclosing a small mound, was in a state of fair preservation, but in 

 1 877, Mr. Rooke Pennington reported that it had been ' destroyed to 

 build a wall.' When six years later the present writer visited the spot, 

 two stones alone remained to mark the site, while of the other circles on 

 these moors only the traces of one were discernable. There is, however, 

 reason to think that the devastation wrought against these Peakland 

 monuments in recent times, is really small compared with that which 

 followed the numerous enclosures of wastes a century or more ago. This 

 being the experience in the wilder parts, the sparseness of these remains 

 in the more fertile lowlands is not surprising, for assuming that they were 

 once equally strewn over the county, few could have survived the long 

 and thorough cultivation to which these have been subjected. 



A brief history of archaeological research and discovery in this county 

 will appropriately follow these introductory remarks. 



The two writers who first made a special study of its pre-historic 

 antiquities and brought them into general notice were Major Hayman 

 Rooke, F.R.S., and the Rev. Samuel Pegge, LL.D. The former resided 

 at Mansfield Woodhouse, where he died in 1806 at the age of eighty- 

 four, after devoting many years to the antiquities and natural history of 

 this and the neighbouring county of Nottingham. The latter was the 

 celebrated rector of Whittington near Chesterfield, who died at the ripe 

 age of ninety-two in 1796. The contributions of these pioneer anti- 

 quaries, which come within the scope of our subject, were mostly 

 published in Archceologla (vols. vi.-x., xii.). Although their speculations 

 are of little interest to us, except as reflecting the views of the old school 

 of antiquaries, their descriptions are, as a rule, precise and valuable. 

 Dr. Pegge's paper on the ' Lows and Barrows of Derbyshire,' for 

 instance, is singularly replete with information, considering how few 

 of these barrows had been investigated at that time. 



Contemporary with Rooke and Pegge was Mr. John Wilson of 

 Broomhead Hall near Penistone (died 1783), who drew up in manuscript 

 form many observations and discoveries of an antiquarian nature in York- 

 shire and Derbyshire. Such portions as relate to early man in the latter 



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