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Dry stone wall

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A dry stone wall is a wall built from stones without any mortar to bind them together. The stones are chosen and placed so that each one is held by the weight of those around it and above it.[1]

Walls of this kind divide fields across upland Britain and Ireland, where the stone was cleared from the ground before it could be farmed, and many of them are several hundred years old.

Construction

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A wall is usually built as two outer faces with smaller stones packed between them, and long through stones laid across both faces at intervals to tie the two halves together.[2]

References

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  1. ^ Rainsford, P. Walls of the Dales. Northern Press, 1998.
  2. ^ Hart, J. Building in Stone. Fieldside, 2011.