Folklore

This Neolithic carved stone ball is the oldest artefact or man-made object in the Auld Kirk Museum’s collection. It has six equally proportioned and positioned knobs. It was found in a garden in Lenzie in the 1970s. Carved stone balls may be up to 5,000 years old. This example is made from rock that is common in the South West Highlands of Argyll and joins a small number of these stones found outside the north-east of Scotland. It became part of the Auld Kirk Museum’s collection in 2011 as a result of Scotland’s Treasure Trove system. Carved stone balls come in various shapes and sizes and are of interest to mathematicians because of their geometrical sophistication. Maybe they were used as a kind of currency or a counting and numbering system? They suggest that Neolithic society was not as simple or primitive as previously assumed. The meaning and purpose of this object remains a mystery, and we will probably never know what it was used for. The most we can say is that it is a prized object now and it was probably a prized object 5000 years ago. (Purchased with assistance from the National Fund for Acquisitions)

This axehead was acquired as a result of the Treasure Trove system. The role of Treasure Trove is to ensure that objects of cultural significance from Scotland’s past are protected for the benefit of the nation and preserved in museums across the country. This is a reasonably well-preserved example of a Middle Bronze Age flanged axehead, belonging to a grouping classified as Baldersby axes, named after a North Yorkshire find. Baldersby axes are considered to date from around 1400-1300 BC. Bronze is made by melting copper and tin and mixing them in a crucible in a furnace. The molten metal was then cast into shape using stone or stone and clay moulds. People looked upon metalworking as a kind of magic, bringing something new into existence: melting rocks to forge metal. This axehead takes us back to the time when metal working technology was spreading across Britain and Europe. This particular example may have originated in Ireland and perhaps this was used for working wood? We’ll never know for sure.

Following Hadrian’s death in 138 A.D., his successor, Antoninus Pius, went beyond the recently completed Hadrian’s Wall and ordered the construction of a new frontier 75 miles to the north, the Antonine Wall. The Antonine Wall divided communities, created customs posts and checkpoints, and provided opportunities for corruption and abuse. The Antonine Wall was inhabited for only 20 years before a return to Hadrian’s Wall as the northernmost outpost of the Roman Empire. Unlike Hadrian, Antoninus Pius never visited Britain. The majority of artefacts and records from the time that Britain was occupied come from the Romans. The colonised left no written records. The Antonine Wall ran close to present day Twechar, with the ruins of the large Bar Hill fort still visible to the south of the village. There is little known about the development of the area after the Roman occupation. In the early 18th century rudimentary mines were developed, however, the beginning of modern Twechar is linked to the arrival of the Forth and Clyde Canal in 1768 and by the early 1860s it had developed further with William Baird and Company bringing full-scale coal mining to the area.

The hillside above Lennoxtown provided an ideal location for an anti-aircraft position during World War II, giving Glasgow advanced warning of approaching German bombers. In May 1941 a German ‘Junkers JU 88 A/5’, returning to France after a bombing raid on Clydebank, was shot down by a British ‘Defiant’ close to Lennoxtown. These wreckage fragments were recovered during archaeological digs carried out in 1987 and 1997. The ‘JU88’ had a crew of four: a pilot, a radio operator, air gunner and bombardier. All four men bailed out, two were captured unhurt while two were found dead. One of the crew, Gerd Hansmann (1914 – 1941) is buried in Campsie cemetery. Below is the report on the destruction of the enemy aircraft by Squadron Leader E.C. Wolfe: “At 01.45 on May 7th I was patrolling at 12, 000 ft over Clydebank. In order to get as wide as possible a view of the moonlit cloud tops, I was making a continuous series of S turns. During one of these, whilst turning to starboard I saw an enemy aircraft 2000 ft below me turning on a parallel course with myself, I promptly dived into formation at full throttle slightly in front and below the enemy aircraft. I came up on his starboard forward quarter, where my gunner, Sgt. Ashcroft, opened fire at less than 20 yds. Strikes were observed and the enemy aircraft turned sharply towards us. I climbed over him to be on the outside of the curve and as soon as he had straightened up, I dived beneath him and took up the same position as before. A second burst was fired, after which the enemy’s starboard engine and cockpit were seen to be on fire and he turned on all his navigation lights. At the same time he turned towards me again and I repeated my former manoeuvre and the gunner gave him a third burst. After the fourth burst there were two blinding flashes from his cockpit. After the fifth burst, I left the attack as we were nearing cloud tops, and through the rift of the cloud layer, watched the enemy crash to the ground where it blew up.”