Written and published by Linden Alexander Pentecost. I have already published another unrelated article/blog post on a different website earlier today. This article on this page was published also on the 13th of February 2026, it was published in the UK and onto onto this www.bookofdunbarra.co.uk website, which is not my only website. No AI was used in this article. This article was published in the UK and I the author am a UK-resident and am from the UK. This article is unrelated to any and all of my other publications. I also took the three photos included in this article, which have not been published before. The photo descriptions above the photos also contain information not in the main text. Some of the main text is also between different photos. This article contains a total of 1050 words. 

Grimes Graves is a Neolithic flint mining site, located in Norfolk. Work at the mines seems to have started around 4600 years ago, although only a small number of the "bell pits" or "dene hole" mines at this site have been excavated, making it possible that the mines go back even earlier. These mines were created in such a way that involved removing the top soil, and then sinking a shaft down through the chalk layers, to reach the beautiful, shining, blue-black-brown veins of flint. These were then exploited along side passages, which followed the veins of flint away from the initial shaft. These areas would have become unstable, and so pillars were left to support the roof. Many of the tunnels are very narrow and would have had to have been crawled along. Wooden ladders and other structures would have helped the miners to climb in and out of the bell pits, although many of the pits connected underground as miners followed the veins of flint. The miners used primarily antler picks to mine the flint. 

Photo below: one of the side passages at the bottom of the bell pit which is open to visitors by English Heritage at Grimes Graves. Note the pillars, and how the main passage gets much lower into the distance. 

Even though Grimes Graves is a Neolithic site, it may have continued working for some time longer, and it seems that Germanic-speaking or pre-Germanic speaking peoples were in some way aware of the meaning of this site, although I suspect that they could have already been in Norfolk during the Neolithic and Bronze Age, in some manner or other. The names "Grimes Graves" means "The excavations/graves/pits/mines of Grim", Grim being one of Wodan's many names. Note that I also mentioned something related to Odin in a recent-ish article on this website, and in another recent publication. I also mention Ukko and other gods in the article before this on this website, with a cave connected to Wodan being discussed in the article before that on this website. The title "The Grim" literally means "The Masked One", and is connected to our idea of the "Grim Reaper", and I do perhaps wonder if in some senses, the Grim Reaper, Odin, Wodan, The Grim, and "Death" in the sense of being a figure akin to the fiture of "Death" as he appears in Harry Potter - are actually the same entity in some way, or very similar entities. Whilst I believe in the existence of multiple gods, at least as far as Germanic and perhaps pre-Germanic cultures go, the figure of The Grim Reaper is arguably always the same, in a sense, as death is always the same thing. In a similar vein, Odin and Wodan both have a great many names - and it is emphasised in our mythology that although these deities may have many names, and many forms, they are either Odin, or Wodan, if they indeed are different entities.

Why this god or these gods became associated with Grimes Graves is a mystery to me, but the original understanding of these deities in prehistoric times, or of this deity, may well have differed from the later Germanic interpretations, which may not encompass the whole. It is noteworthy for instance that Wodan is also associated with Wodan's Den near Manchester, the aforementioned (and in another recent article mentioned) rock-cut cave which, until it was sadly destroyed, featured ancient symbols and idol-like features painted upon its walls. So, is there some ancient connection between Wodan and underground spaces specifically that has not been researched much before?

I also think it possible that Grimes Graves could have been connected to a thunderbird-like entity, especially owning to the connection between flint, thunder and lightning, and especially owing to the discovery of a kind of specific ritual offering found in one of the bell pits, which consisted of two antlers, facing each other, with the beak of a phalarope bird between the two, and a Cornish greenstone axe beneath it. The axe implies a connection with flint and with thunder and lightning, the presence of the bird's beak I think connects this to a sky deity, and, if I am reading the symbolic language correctly, the two dear antlers with the prongs facing each other, is also a symbol connected to lightning deities. We can compare this imagery to how the Sámi god Horagalles of Lapland is depicted with two axe-like objects, one in each hand, and to how for example the Long Man of Wilmington is depicted with two "rods" akin to lightning rods. May we all be protected from lightning and honour these gods, and the Great Spirit. 

Photo below: a somewhat taller, "main" passage off the same bell pit from which the tunnel in the photo above goes. This passage was presumably widened to allow access to other areas. 

Photo below: the landscape around Grimes Graves, showing evidence of the many hundreds of backfilled bell-pits, which dot this open landscape within the larger landscape of dry pine forests with a sandy soil, which are typical of this part of Norfolk. It feels ancient and beautiful here to me.