MOVES to protect scheduled ancient monuments near Bedale from the threat of quarrying are gaining momentum.

A pressure group holds a special meeting next week to map out a plan of action for fighting a proposal by Tarmac Northern to establish sand and gravel workings around two of the three prehistoric henges on Thornborough Moor.

The Friends of Thornborough have already hosted a high-profile information meeting, so well-attended that many people had to be turned away, to raise awareness of what is seen as a major threat to the earthwork monuments dating back to Neolithic and early Bronze Age times.

The meeting at West Tanfield was told that it was a local issue with the potential to become one of national or international concern.

Dr Jan Harding, a Newcastle University historian who studied the henges in great detail during a five-year research project, has described plans to quarry around them as unthinkable.

The henges, which are older than Stonehenge, were once used for ceremonial purposes by people from all over the North and were part of a larger network of prehistoric monuments including other henges near Ripon and the Devil's Arrows at Boroughbridge.

As first reported in the D&S Times last November, Tarmac Northern wants to secure the future of its Nosterfield quarry operation and the jobs it has brought to the area by extending the workings in two phases over the next 15 to 20 years.

Nosterfield produces about a quarter of North Yorkshire's supply of high quality sand and gravel, with 550,000 tonnes a year being extracted, but Tarmac Northern said that at current production rates there were only three or fours years left.

Its first move would be to prepare a planning application for a 40-hectare extension at Ladybridge Farm, east of the existing workings, and a longer term aim was to extend into 100 acres on Thornborough Moor.

Tarmac Northern stressed that English Heritage would be consulted on protection and preservation of the henges, and after the area was restored a low key visitor centre was envisaged for the monuments. Part of the restoration would attempt to return the area to the appearance which archaeologists believed it once had.

The company has given a public presentation of its proposals to county and district councillors, landowners and other local people, but concern about the possible effects on the henges is growing.

Dr Harding said theories that the henges were built by prehistoric people whose religious beliefs had an astronomical dimension had been confirmed by a computer display showing the relationship between the positioning of the henges and astronomical alignments. Part of the complex was aligned with the midsummer sunrise.

Describing Thornborough as one of Britain's premier sacred landscapes, Dr Harding said it offered a rare opportunity to study the religious beliefs, lifestyles and environment of Neolithic and Bronze Age societies.

But recent agriculture and quarrying had caused significant damage to the prehistoric legacy of the landscape and the latest proposals to take gravel from Thornborough Moor posed the greatest threat of all.

Dr Harding said: "The proposals place all those involved in the landscape's curation at a crossroads.

"It is believed that Thornborough's unique importance, as well as its very vulnerability, emphasises the urgent need for a creative long-term strategy which links together archaeologically sensitive landscape management, research-driven fieldwork programmes and a coherent and financially viable policy for public dissemination.

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