The probable meaning of the word Vindolana, is ‘the hill of arms;’ vin, with slight variations of pronunciation, signifying, in all the Celtic dialects, a height; and lann, in the Gaelic, weapons. The name well accords with those common in Ossian’s poems.
Rejoining the Wall at Milking-gap, and continuing our course westward, we soon arrive at a conspicuous gap, on the Steel-rig grounds. The Wall on the eastern declivity of this pass may be studied to great advantage. The courses are laid parallel to the horizon; the mortar of each course of the interior seems to have been smoothed over before the superincumbent mass was added. In order to give the in-door antiquary an idea of its condition, a drawing of it is here introduced.
PEEL-CRAG.
Mounting another hill, and again descending into the valley, we find another gap, in which the remains of a mile-castle will be noticed, from which it has received the name of the Castle-nick. A little farther removed is Peel-crag, one of the most precipitous faces which the Wall has had to traverse. The military way ingeniously avoids the sudden descent by winding round the southern projections of the rock. After passing a cottage, called the Peel, a modern road is encountered which leads to Keilder, and so into Scotland; in its progress northwards, however, it soon degenerates into a mere track. As this pass is more than usually open, the fosse again appears surmounted by a mound on its northern margin; the earth-works are strongly marked, but the Wall is gone.
The lithographic view represents the northern aspect of the crags, as they appear here.
On the western side of this, sheltered by a few trees, is the farm-house of Steel-rig. Attaining the next elevation—Winshields-crag—we are on ground reputed to be the highest between the two seas; a turf cairn has been erected on it for the purposes of the ordnance survey. From this lofty summit, the vessels navigating the Solway may easily be descried.
BLOODY-GAP.
Proceeding in the same direction, we reach another gap of wide dimensions, but very steep on both declivities. Here the Wall has been provided with a ditch, strengthened, as usual in dangerous situations, with a rampart on its outer margin. If the local vocabulary does not furnish this pass with a name (and I have not been able to find that it does), Bloody-gap, from the following circumstance, well befits it. Nearly direct north from it, is a rising ridge of ground, called Scotch-coulthard. When the moss-troopers, who abounded in these parts, succeeded in safely reaching it, their pursuers commonly considered farther chase useless. Between the Wall and this point of safety, therefore, the race and the conflict were necessarily of the most desperate character; that many deadly conflicts have taken place, is evidenced by the numerous skeletons which are turned up in draining the ground.
A lonely cottage, upon an exposed part of the ridge, is called Shield-on-the-Wall.
Near the modern military way, two large stones, called ‘the mare and foal,’ are standing. In Armstrong’s map of Northumberland, three are marked; they are probably remains of a Druidical circle.