Having asked Cadw if they would keep us in touch with developments at Bancbryn there was no news. Instead the only snippets emanating from the organisation were a few tweets from a Cadw officer who had been copied into internal correspondence and who clearly despite having never visited the site felt confident enough to announce to the world:
The Mynydd Y Betws wind farm stone row fiasco – a field boundary not neolithic but hey what do I Know? dlvrit/17rD8J
and
Mynydd y Betws stone row is conveniently placed next to a sheep track—- Mhmm those sheep must like neolithic archaeology!
These comments provide a window into Cadw’s “balanced” approach to heritage protection whilst at the same time illustrating a total failure to understand basic fundamentals of field archaeology. Cadw now accept that there is no evidence to support the field boundary interpretation and even after all this time there is actually no evidence to support the position that the alignment is not Neolithic. These tweets clearly indicate that even before the assessment process had started that some sort of uninformed biased consensus had enveloped Cadw’s mind set. The second tweet provides the clearest indication that the officer concerned has no field experience or they would have known that most stone rows are “conveniently placed next to” sheep tracks. This is because sheep respect ancient features in the landscape whilst Cadw…
The Ringmoor Down stone row on Dartmoor is conveniently placed next to a sheep track—- Mhmm those sheep must like neolithic archaeology!
The Heritage Journal 
4 comments
Comments feed for this article
06/03/2015 at 09:48
suzannegeufron40
Reblogged this on Suze.se.
06/03/2015 at 10:01
Pamela Hopkins
The way Cadw has dismissed all evidence of the neolithic stone row on Betws mountain in favour of industrial turbines is disgusting will they also deny any evidence of pentre castell in the next round of planning apps for Mynydd Y Gwair by somerset trust ( Duke of Beaufort Estates ) to further ruin our heritage?
06/03/2015 at 11:50
Sandy Gerrard
Thank you Suzanne for re-blogging. This is an important issue at the heart of the way we look after and manage our heritage. The dismissal of ideas without bothering to first look at the evidence is something we should all be concerned about.
06/03/2015 at 12:01
Sandy Gerrard
Pamela. Thank you very much for your contribution. There is a common misconception that organisations like Cadw and English Heritage are about protecting our heritage. They are not. In reality they are enablers of “sympathetic” change within the historic environment. Cadw forms part of the Welsh Governments Economy, Science and Transport Department which I guess says it all.