Hadrian's Wall along Sewingshields Crags east of Housesteads, with a clifftop milecastle and the old Northumberland tale of King Arthur sleeping beneath
Open accessfree to visit at any reasonable time
Substantial ruinsruined, but plenty survives above ground
Sewingshields Crags rise east of Housesteads, a ridge of hard igneous rock called the Whin Sill, and Hadrian’s Wall runs along its clifftop here for about a mile. A milecastle, one of the Wall’s walled mile-forts, spaced roughly a Roman mile apart, each with a gate through the Wall, sits right on the crag edge; unusually, it has no gate through its north wall, probably because the sheer drop below made one pointless. A little to the west, turret 35a, one of the Wall’s small lookout posts, has been excavated down to its footings.
In local legend, King Arthur and his knights lie asleep in a cave somewhere beneath the crags, waiting for someone brave enough to wake them. Centuries later, in the Middle Ages, farmers built simple stone longhouses over the ruined milecastle, traces of which archaeologists have also uncovered.
The Hadrian’s Wall Path runs the length of the crags heading east from Housesteads, with no gate or ticket to stop you, and the Pennine Way and Sycamore Gap a little further along the ridge.
