The Grand View Place- Standing Stones & Boulder Row Alignments At the Highest Point In Milford, MA.

The Grand View Place- Standing Stones & Boulder Row Alignments At the Highest Point In Milford, MA.

If you follow this blog you might recall posts from last winter about stoneworks among the high rolling hills of Milford, MA.  in and around the powerlines, documenting some collapsed standing stones, perched boulder arrangements and the like.  I also got into the Native place name for this area (specifically pertaining to the rolling hills and granite ledges in Milford) which is Magomiskook (alt. Megumsquag, etc.)  This is translated as "The Grand View Place" or "the Grand View/ Great Rock Place", it has even been translated as "Great Place of the Standing Stones"- the general gist of these translations is about the same.  

I was able to locate one of my favorite spots around the Magomiskook area this summer- a ledge that now overlooks the I-495 corridor.  This is one of the highest ledges in the area, and features a stone row of boulders and some standing stones, and this is hands down the most awesome, highest panoramic view of the area I have seen so far- to the left one can see Bellingham and perhaps beyond- straight ahead you can see the buildings, steeples and cathedrals of the churches in downtown Milford. What is funny is that the steeple of a church is meant to penetrate skywards; signifying some religious act.  Well, up on these natural high ledges is the Native American church, looking down upon the rest of the world.  No need to be over-industrious and build when nature has already provided for us a means to an end, and has already done a better job of it than what people want to build up anyway.  Also, one can also see into the hills of the surrounding towns of Mendon and Upton, and perhaps beyond.  With so much modern development it is a good thing that such places still do exist.

So here we go.  First is a view of the Standing Stones.  It was sunny out so the rocks from certain angles have a black hue to them, because the light was being reflected off of the stones.

Standing Stones 1 & 2:

Standing Stone 1 to the right, middle boulder of the boulder row in the back:

Close up of Standing Stone 1:

Standing Stone 2 from different angles:

Nice "obelisk" shape from this angle of Standing Stone 2- in the background paralell is Standing Stone 1 obscured by brush:

Standing Stone 2 on left & some of the boulders in the stone row:

Pics of the boulders in the stone row:

Standing Stone 2 and middle boulder in row:

Showing off some of the view- one can see better w/ the naked eye than with the camera I was using (buildings, hill outlines, etc.)

Being on a high ledge, makes me think of the below picture from the book "The Soul of the Indian" by Charles A. Eastman who was Sioux, to be educated by the white man later in life.  In fact, his grandson (now an elderly man himself- maybe 70's) was just in the Milford area a few years back to run the Boston Marathon (which is awesome because I am a former Boston Marathon runner myself, having ran as a "bandit runner" and finished just under 4 hours in 2009.)  A quote from the book "The Soul of the Indian":

"Being a natural man, the Indian was intensely poetical.  He would deem it sacrilege to build a house for Him who may be met face to face in the mysterious, shadowy aisles of the primeval forest, or on the sunlit bosom of virgin prairies, upon dizzy spirals and pinnacles of naked rock, and yonder in the jeweled vault of the night sky!  He who enrobes Himself in filmy veils of cloud, there on the rim of the visible world where our Great-Grandfather Sun kindles his evening camp-fire, He who rides upon the rigorous wind of the north, or breathes forth His spirit upon aromatic southern airs, whose war-canoe is launched upon majestic rivers and inland seas- He needs no cathedral!"

In the next paragraph it is said-

"The solitary communion with the Unseen which was the highest expression of our religious life.... may better be interpreted as 'conciousness of the divine'."   

Hillside "Altar" Cairns in Milford, MA.

Hillside "Altar" Cairns in Milford, MA.

Here is a good site, towards the edge of the woods in Milford, MA. near the Holliston town line.  Beyond this site are powerlines as well as more recent construction and quarrying.  I noticed that the cairns at this site are basically on a sloping hill-side, and alot of the cairns are capped with a stone slab, giving the cairns an "altar" -like appearance.  Also there are dry stream beds at the foot of the slopes, and even some smaller dried brooks running down some of the slopes.  Therefore, there would have been gentle, flowing water running down this hillside when these cairns were likely built, in pre-colonial times.  So the theme of flowing water was a strong element at this site, as well as the Earth and Sky (astronomy.)  If one can imagine themselves back in time, this place would have been a paradise.  As it is now, the gentle flowing water has stopped and the woods have grown up un-managed.  The pictures are as follows:

Cairn capped w/ a stone slab, a nice feature at this site:

Zooming back to show off some of the hill slope.  Also some nice trees on either side of the structure have grown up:

Lower to the ground cairn/ enclosure:

Another cairn topped with a slab, which is why I think of these as "altar" cairns:

Another view:

Rock piles on the slope:

Another cairn with a stone slab, but lower to the ground:

This cairn is more stacked up:

Stone row running through some boulders:

Smaller rock pile at the foot of a larger rock pile:

Close-up of the larger rock pile from the above pic.  Nice stack on a boulder platform:

More:

On this slope, to the right of the two rocks on the left is a dried up waterfall running down the hillside (not sure how clear pic is- may have to peel eyes).  I don't think water really flows here anymore (due to dams, water towers, etc.) even in heavy rainfall in spring.  At the foot of this slope is a dried up stream bed that this water would have flowed into:  

A propped boulder that was placed at the edge of a small ledge (this is above the ancient waterfall trickle and the stream):

Close-up of one of the small stones that the propped boulder was placed on top of, which heaved it at least partially off the ground:

A smaller propped boulder placement:

A triangular granite stone placement on a small ledge.  I believe these triangular stones in this style I have seen at many sites such as this had a significance/symbolism:

More cairns on the hillside:

Tract Of Woods In Framingham MA., Down the Way From Ashland

Tract Of Woods In Framingham MA., Down the Way From Ashland

Some interesting features to note in a small tract of woods in Framingham just down the road from Ashland.  A brook runs through the site and there are a few nice ledges and boulders.  Shown here is a split boulder on top of a small knoll overlooking water with a wedged stone between the split- the rock looks very special, no way can it be a glacial erratic.  There are also peck marks all over one side of the boulder.

View of the boulder from the bottom of the knoll (with a crappy camera):

Examples of the peck markings on the boulder:

A low to the ground, well buried stone circle at the foot of the boulder:

Stone circle & boulder:

Faces In A Rock Pile & A Dolmen Revisited/ Important Research

Faces In A Rock Pile & A Dolmen Revisited/ Important Research

Friends & Readers, 

I apologize for the blog's summer slow-down.  I have been staying active and in good health outside lately.  I have been going to sites but taking a more holisitc approach and just relaxing, instead of taking notes/ pics.  In fact it wasn't until recently (around the birth of this blog last year) that I fully realized the importance of taking pictures of these very important but very over-looked sites.  

Also, I found a better quality camera I got the other year which I thought was lost... once I exhaust all the photos of sites I have already taken you can expect better quality pictures on this blog!  I hope to post more consistently once again sometime this September.  

That said I would like to share some pics from the Milford Woods town line area.

Below is a picture of a stacked cairn on a boulder platform.  The boulder looks to be worked out into a face while the rock pile looks like maybe a head-dress.  As usual I will present the stoneworks from different angles.  This comes from a site I covered on this blog last December but I failed to notice this feature, which has been noted by researchers before:

From this angle the profile of the face is wider and looks more serpent-like.  Yes, that is an enclosure of boulders in the background.  My own gut says this rock pile could have something to do with human/ serpent dualism:

In the same cairn field is this other rock pile.  This one looks turtle-like/ reptillian:

Down the trail some-ways is this propped boulder over-looking a stream and a hill.  A good example of a "dolmen" or partial "dolmen".  For scale I placed my Cup O' Joe down.  Colonists clearly didn't do this and neither is this a glacial erratic:

The stone circle petro-form on the ground underneath the dolmen looks very familar!  This looks like a Stone Man petroform- the body is the circle, the top stone the head.  I have seen this symbolism before used in a cairn at a site on private peoperty in this same area that I personally un-earthed myself here- http://www.nativenewenglandstones.blogspot.com/2015/07/special-cairn-field-stoneworks-pt-2.html .  Actually, the Stone Man petroforms at both sites look very similar- the same workmanship is shown off.  It is this kind of ground-breaking research that I am proud to present.  I know this blog does not fall on deaf ears, but it remains to be seen if such connections will ever be taken seriously by mainstream academics.  As we will see from the next picture after the one below, bird dymbolism is found at both sites as well:    

The dolmen is at the end of a stone wall, indicating the wall's obvious indigenous origins.  Right outside the dolmen is a bird stone, as seen on the top left.  It is looking to the hill in the horizon.  Perhaps just like the other site I linked to above (comparing the symbolism of both sites), there may be a solar alignment at this site as well.  If this is the case than there is no choice but to conclude that the bird has the same meaning/ purpose as a marker at both sites: 

Prof. Curt Hoffman Interviewed @ Robbins Museum About the "Little League Site"- Long Distance Trade, Etc.

Prof. Curt Hoffman Interviewed @ Robbins Museum About the "Little League Site"- Long Distance Trade, Etc.

Below is a Youtube link featuring Curt Hoffman at the Robbins Museum talking about "the Little League Site" in Middleborough.  Excavation was ongoing since 1996, by meticulous professionals.  High volume of ceremonial objects were found at this site, indicative of long distance trading to obtain some objects.  About 5 minutes long:

https://youtu.be/qz1Kzqpbj2U