Hauntings Introduction

Tales of ghosts and hauntings abound in Britain, nearly every castle and stately home has its resident ghost, relating to some tragic event in its history.

Many of the older ghost traditions seem woven in historical events, and probably developed by word of mouth, changing through the centuries as the stories were passed down to while away the dark hours. But even in modern times some of these stories have been backed by witness accounts, ordinary people who see something out of the ordinary, in a place they did not know had a reputation as 'haunted'. For example at Bottlebush Down in Dorset, a horseman dressed in Bronze Age attire (possibly the oldest ghost in Britain), has been seen by several witnesses including a respected archaeologist. The area has a long reputation for the uncanny and was a Bronze Age burial site.

There is little doubt that people do witness strange phenomena in specific places, there are thousands of modern cases, too many to be explained away as hallucination and misinterpretation. While we do not intend to explain the reason for hauntings we will highlight some old and new ghost stories and examine some of the theories (including those from a sceptic viewpoint) and types of hauntings in the coming months.