Description

Góra Grodowa – Kamienne Kręgi

This site can be reached by taking the road from Kielce to Łódź and turning north in Miedziana Góra in the direction of Samsonów. In the middle of the village of Tumlin we turn west and take the road leading to the peak of Góra Grodowa. We arrive at the archaeological-geological-forest reserve of “Kamienne Kręgi” (“Stone Circles”). In the 8th and 9th centuries this was a site of pagan religious cult. The remaining fragments of earth and stone circles are testimony to that. It is also supposed that an early medieval castle was located at the top of the hill.

The northern part of Grodowa Góra is occupied by the Tumlin – Gród quarry, one of the oldest still operational quarries in the region. The mineral mined here is the red Triassic (250 Ma) “Tumlin sandstone”, which can often be found on elevations of buildings and stairs. Also worthy of note are the characteristic rock beds that can be observed on the faces of the quarry. They indicate that these sandstones are a sediment of fossil dunes. Colonies of small streams and mid-dune ponds can also be found here. These are indicated by the abundance of ripple marks and signs of desiccation. On the surface of the layers, footprints of Triassic fossil reptiles have been found. The stones owe their rusty colour to the presence of iron compounds that weathered in the hot semi-desert conditions that prevailed in our region in the Triassic period. Sandstone blocks are cut out from the face of the excavation by driving a line of steel wedges into it. This is an old mining technique that allows to obtain large, regularly shaped stone blocks.