Eildon Hill

Information about Eildon Hill

Eildon Hill

Eildon Hill North, with Eildon Village in the foreground
Elevation422 m (1385 ft)
LocationScottish Borders  Scotland
Prominencec. 164 m
Topo mapOS Landranger 73
OS grid referenceNT548322
ListingMarilyn
Translationpossibly "Elves Hill" (Old English)
Pronunciation[Eeldun]


Not to be confused with Eldon Hill, England

Eildon Hill lies just south of Melrose, Scotland in the Scottish Borders, overlooking the town. The name is sometimes pluralised into "the Eildons" or "Eildon Hills", because of its triple peak.

The north hilltop (of three peaks) is surrounded by over 5 km (3 miles) of ramparts, enclosing an area of about 16 ha (40 acres) in which at least 300 level platforms have been cut into the rock to provide bases for turf or timber-walled houses.

History

Excavations have found evidence that the hill fort was occupied by 1000 BC, in the Bronze age. The ramparts seem to have been built and rebuilt in three phases. At its peak the population of the hill could have been 3000 to 6000, the largest known in Scotland from this period. While evidence was not found of a significant population in the immediate pre-Roman period, the Roman geographer Ptolemy recorded the tribe in the area as the Selgovae, and Eildon hill was later thought to have been their capital.

In the 1st century the Roman army built the massive fort of Trimontium, named after the three peaks, at the foot of the hill on the bank of the River Tweed. In association with it they constructed a signal tower with a tiled roof in an 11 m (36 ft) diameter enclosure built on the summit of the hill fort, which presumably had been abandoned. However, finds including Roman coins and pottery have suggested that some of the house platforms were again in use in the 2nd to 4th century.

According to Nuttall, the 1385-feet high "triple-crested eminence" overlooks Teviotdale to the South.

Folklore

Eildon is said to be a "hollow hill", and is mentioned in the legend of Thomas the Rhymer. Some believe Thomas went under the hill itself, and certainly part of the ballad occurs in the vicinity.

The volcanic rock was "said to have been cleft in three by the wizard Michael Scot when he was out of employment".

References

Enlarge picture
The three peaks of Eildon Hill seen from 'Scott's View'
  • Scotland Before History - Stuart Piggott, Edinburgh University Press 1982, ISBN 0748660674
  • Scotland's Hidden History - Ian Armit, Tempus (in association with Historic Scotland) 1998, ISBN 0-85224-348-0
This article incorporates text from the public domain 1907 edition of The Nuttall Encyclopdia.
summit is a point on a surface which is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. Mathematically speaking, a summit is a local maximum in elevation.
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1 metre =
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1000 mm 0 cm
US customary / Imperial units
0 ft 0 in
The metre or meter[1](symbol: m) is the fundamental unit of length in the International System of Units (SI).
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1 foot =
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0 m 0 mm
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0 yd 0 in
A foot (plural: feet or foot;[1] symbol or abbreviation: ft or, sometimes, ′
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Scottish Borders


Location

Geography

Area Ranked 6th
 - Total 4,732 km²
 - % Water ?
Admin HQ Newtown St. Boswells
GB-SCB
ONS code 00QE
Demographics

Population Ranked 18th
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Motto
Nemo me impune lacessit   (Latin)
"No one provokes me with impunity"
"Cha togar m'fhearg gun dioladh"   
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prominence, also known as autonomous height, relative height or shoulder drop (in America) or prime factor (in Europe), is a concept used in the categorization of hills and mountains, also known as peaks.
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topographic map is a type of map characterized by large-scale detail and quantitative representation of relief, usually using contour lines in modern mapping, but historically using a variety of methods.
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Ordnance Survey (OS) is an executive agency of the United Kingdom government. It is the national mapping agency for Great Britain,[1] and one of the world's largest producers of maps.
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The British national grid reference system is a system of geographic grid references commonly used in Great Britain, different from using latitude or longitude.

The Ordnance Survey (OS) devised the national grid reference system, and it is heavily used in their survey data,
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There are many notable lists of mountains around the world. Typically, a list of mountains becomes notable by first being listed or defined by an author or group (e.g., Sir Hugh Munro defining the Munros in Scotland).
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A Marilyn is a mountain or hill in the British Isles (including Ireland) with a relative height of at least 150 metres (492 ft), regardless of absolute height or other merit.
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Old English/Anglo-Saxon}}}
Language codes
ISO 639-1: none
ISO 639-2: ang
ISO 639-3: ang Old English (also called Anglo-Saxon[1], Englisc
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International Phonetic Alphabet

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Phonetic Alphabet
History
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IPA for English The
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Eldon Hill is situated in the Peak District National Park in the county of Derbyshire, England four kilometres south west of the village of Castleton. It is a grass covered limestone hill which reaches a height of 470 metres (1542 feet).
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Melrose
Scots - Melrose


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Scottish Borders


Location

Geography

Area Ranked 6th
 - Total 4,732 km²
 - % Water ?
Admin HQ Newtown St. Boswells
GB-SCB
ONS code 00QE
Demographics

Population Ranked 18th
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A hill fort is a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for military advantage. The fortification usually follows the contours of the hill, consisting of one or more lines of earthworks, with stockades or defensive walls, and external
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The eleventh century BC comprises all years from 1100 BC to 1001 BC .

Events

  • 1089 BC — Melanthus, legendary King of Athens, dies after a reign of 37 years and is succeeded by his son Codrus.

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The term Bronze Age refers to a period in human cultural development when the most advanced metalworking (at least in systematic and widespread use) consists of techniques for smelting copper and tin from naturally occurring outcroppings of ore, and then alloying those metals in
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Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew from a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula circa the 9th century BC to a massive empire straddling the Mediterranean Sea.
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Claudius Ptolemaeus (Greek: Κλαύδιος Πτολεμαῖος; after 83 – 161 AD), known in English as Ptolemy, was a Greek[1] or Egyptian
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The Selgovae were a Brythonic tribe in Scotland, inhabiting roughly the central Borders area. They were neighbours of, and perhaps an offshoot of, the Votadini to the east.
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The 1st century was that century that lasted from 1 to 100 according the Gregorian calendar. It is considered part of the Classical era, epoch, or historical period
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Trimontium is the name of a Roman fort at Newstead, near Melrose, Borders, Scotland, close under the three Eildon Hills (whence the name trium montium). It was an advance post of the Romans towards Scotland both about 80 and after, and again, after an interval of retreat
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River Tweed (Uisge Thuaidh in Gaelic) (156 kilometres or 97 miles long) flows primarily through the Borders region of England and Scotland. It rises on Tweedsmuir at Tweed's Well near where the Clyde, draining northwest, and the Annan draining south also rise.
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The 2nd century is the period from 101 to 200 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian Era. It is considered part of the Classical era, epoch, or historical period
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As a means of recording the passage of time, the 4th century (per the Julian/Gregorian calendar and Anno Domini era) was that century which lasted from 301 to 400.

Overview


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River Teviot (pronounced locally [ˈtiːviˌjɪʔ]) rises in the western foothills of Comb Hill on the border of Dumfries and Galloway.
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Thomas the Rhymer (also Thomas Rhymer or Thomas Rymer) is the better-known name of Thomas Learmonth of Erceldoune, a 13th century Scottish laird and reputed soothsayer.
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Michael Scot (1175 – 1232?) was a medieval mathematician and scholar.

Early life and education

He was born in Scotland, and studied first at Durham School and then at Oxford and Paris, devoting himself to philosophy, mathematics, and astrology.
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