Surreal seascape revealed by the storms: Ancient oaks and pines from 5,000-year-old forest rise as Welsh beach is washed away
- The ancient forest was covered in peat before eventually being swallowed by the sea
- Legends say trees and nearby township were flooded after a priestess neglected a magical well
- Conditions inside the peat, devoid of oxygen and slightly alkaline, have meant the stumps survived
- They were uncovered by the latest set of storms which washed away the peat layer
Rising from the beach in a surreal seascape, the remains of these ancient trees have been revealed by the storms.
Thought to date back to the Bronze Age, the shin-high stumps became visible for the first time when the peat which once covered them was washed away in torrential rain and waves pounding the shore.
Now they stud the beach near the village of Borth, Ceredigion, Mid Wales an area already rich in archaeology, opposite the alleged site of Waless own take on the lost city of Atlantis
Part of a wattle walkway, believed to date from ancient times, has also appeared. It is thought it was made from branches, sticks or logs
For more of these amazing pictures read here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2564285/5-000-year-old-forest-unearthed-storms-Beach-washed-away-reveal-ancient-oaks-pines.html
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So much for "rising sea levels" ...
Actually this was because of the terrible storms they had earlier this last winter, which was due to higher sea levels. Opps!
Simon Worrall
for National Geographic
PUBLISHED FEBRUARY 26, 2014
Storms lashing the British coast last month revealed a strange new sight off the west coast of Wales, near the village of Borth: the stumps of hundreds of tree trunks , rising out of the sand, like broken teeth.
Could this be part of Cantre'r Gwaelod , a mythical kingdom believed to have disappeared beneath the waves thousands of years ago? Has Wales's very own Atlantis been found? (Related: " Lost Lands Found by Scientists .")
It's like an episode of Game of Thrones: a mysterious, submerged forest; an ancient kingdom that was home to a priestess and her magic well.
Composed mostly of oak and pine, the forest is believed to date from the Bronze Age. It was buried under a peat bog 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, then inundated by rising sea levels until this winter's violent storms stripped away the covering of peat and sand. The high level of alkaline and lack of oxygen in the peat has preserved the wood in an almost pristine state.
A walkway made of sticks and branches was also discovered. It's 3,000 to 4,000 years old and was built, it is believed, to cope with rising sea levels back then. "The site around Borth is one where if there is a bad storm and it gets battered, you know there's a good chance something will be uncovered," says Deanna Groom, Maritime Officer of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales , who helped find the site.
The submerged forest at Borth was not the only ancient site to have been uncovered by recent storms. Another submerged forest appeared at Mount's Bay, Cornwall. An ichthyosaur skeleton was discovered on the Jurassic Coast of Dorset and East Devon. At Happisburgh, Norfolk, footprints discovered in storm-exposed rocks are believed to be the earliest evidence of humans outside Africa, dating back 850,000 years. (See " Oldest Human Footprints Found Outside of Africa. ")
But it's the mythical kingdom of Cantre'r Gwaelod that has captured people's imaginations. Also known as the Lowland Hundred, the kingdom was first mentioned in the Black Book of Carmarthen , the earliest surviving manuscript written in Welsh, created around 1250 A.D. The kingdom was believed to have been flooded when a maiden named Mererid allowed a well in her care to overflow.
In another version, Cantre'r Gwaelod was ruled by a lord named Gwyddno Garanhir and protected by a seawall known as Sarn Badrig (Saint Patrick's causeway) and a series of sluice gates. Two princes of the realm oversaw the sluice gates. One of them, Seithenyn, was a notorious drunkard who one night forgot to close the sluice gates, flooding the kingdom. (The church bells of Cantre'r Gwaelod were said to ring out in times of danger, a detail that gave rise to the popular 18th-century folk song, The Bells of Aberdovey .)
There is no scientific evidence for any of this. Signs of physical habitation have never been found near Borth. Sarn Badrig is actually a reef formed by the remains of a glacial moraine. But in a land that has given the world many folk tales and myths, facts have never been allowed to stand in the way of a good legend. And who knows, perhaps one day Cantre'r Gwaelod really will rise from the sea.
OK , so they had storms . Those happen all the time on the planet earth . But the sea level should have filled the area back up with water . It didn't .
UK weather: Ancient forests exposed by storms along the coast of Wales
Geologists believe the remains could be from the Bronze age
Thursday 20 February 2014
Gnarled tree stumps and roots, believed to be dating from the Bronze Age, have become visible for the first time on the shore near the village of Borth, Ceredigion, Mid Wales.
Now, remains of oak and pine trees preserved by peat protrude on the beach near Ynyslas - the most northern section of coast to be revealed in living memory, the Daily Mail reported.
Legend has it that the region was home to the fertile kingdom of Cantrer Gwaelod, or the Sunken Hundred, that was lost under the sea when Seithenyn, one of the two princes guarding the area got drunk, and left the area prone to the floodgates of the sea.
The affect of the recent weather is also visible further down the west coast of the UK, as the heavy winds and rain shifted swathes shingle and sand on Cornish beaches, to reveal more so-called submerged forests.
Large trunks of oak, beech and pine in peat beds are now also visible near Penzance in Mount's Bay.
For centuries, experts had known that the forests existed, but they are rarely exposed as they are now on Portreath beach and in Daymer Bay.
Using radiocarbon dating on the peat beds, geologists believe extensive forests extended across Mount's Bay between 4,000 and 6,000 years ago when hunter gatherers were giving way to farming communities.
Frank Howie, Cornwall Wildlife Trustee and chair of the county's Geoconservation Group, said: The forest bed at Wherry Town on the west side of Penzance has not been exposed to this extent for 40 years or more.
At Chyandour to the east of Penzance rooted stumps are exposed in situ in peaty soils and massive trunks have been washed out onto the rocky foreshore.
"These forests were growing four or five thousand years when climate was slightly warmer than today.
They were not flooded at the end of the last ice age which happened around 12,000 years ago.
Submerged forests are evidence of changes in the bay as sea level has risen since the end of the last glaciation, he added.
The Mount's Bay forest bed is one of the 117 County Geology Sites monitored and managed by the Cornwall Geoconservation Group in conjunction with the Trust and its volunteers.
"The storms have revealed two to five metre trunks of pine and oak as well as the remains of hazel thickets with well-preserved cob nuts and acorns washed out by streams running across the beach.
Dave Fenwick, local wildlife photographer and marine recorder, added: "The tree stumps and trunks now exposed illustrate merged biodiversity and geodiversity with colonies of recent and sub-fossil wood boring molluscs, some now rare in Cornwall.
Several rooted tree stumps, as well as Neolithic shell middens and fossil soils containing snails - some rare or extinct in Cornwall - have also been uncovered.
However, it is expected the exposed forests will soon be covered once more with sand deposits over the next few months.
Mr Howie added that the sites are all very fragile and could be damaged by further storms or trampling by onlookers.
He appealed for anyone with photographs of other exposed coasts to contact him by emailing fmp-howiemsn.com.
Additional reporting by PA
Sea level ... isn't . (;~P
Why don't they have any whales in Wales ?!
It changed the topography of the land under the ocean. No one knows how long this will last.
Guess what? There is!!!
I feel like a more complete human being for knowing that !