Клентские холмы: описание и история местности

Range of hills in northern Worcestershire, England. The Clent Hills lie 10 mile (16 km) south west of Birmingham city centre in Clent, Worcestershire, England. The closest towns are Stourbridge and Halesowen, both in the West Midlands conurbation (and also historically in Worcestershire). The Clent Hills range consists of, in order from north west to south east: Wychbury Hill, Clent Hill (and Adams Hill), and Walton Hill (and Calcot Hill). The north Worcestershire range of hills continues eastwards to include Romsley Hill, Waseley Hills and the Lickey Hills. Clent Hill is the most popular hillwalking hill in the range, although it is not often mentioned because the whole area is referred to as Clent Hills. Just under a million visitors a year are estimated to come to the hills,

The Clent Hills are a major outcrop of the Clent Formation consisting of Clent Breccia (predominantly a red brown mudstone matrix) dating from the early part of the Permian period. The formation unconformably overlies the mudstones and sandstones of the Salop Formation which forms the lower ground to the north and east; both are assigned to the Warwickshire Group. The bedrock is cut by numerous faults, most of which are aligned NE SW.

In 1588 a beacon was placed on the Bicknall as part of the chain set up to warn of the approach of the Spanish Armada. For Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee A. E. Housman watched the beacons from summit of Walton Hill. He wrote in a letter to his mother that at 10 o'clock the night of 22 June 1897 (the hour designated for the event) he could see 52 just to the south and west. He did not try to count those northwards because "it was hard to tell the beacons from the ordinary illuminations of the Black Country". The one on the Malvern Hills was so large that during the day it had been visible from Walton Hill, and as it was saturated with paraffin it burned very brightly but only for an hour. By 2 o'clock, Housman wrote that in the distance two could still be seen still burning somewhere near the Brown Clee, and three nearer, one towards Droitwich, one on Kinver Edge (it continued to burnt brightly until dawn), and the Clent Hill beacon which was not near the summit but on the south west face.

The hills rise to a height of 1037 feet (316 m) on Walton Hill, with views over the Malvern Hills, Kinver Edge, The Wrekin, Wenlock Edge, Shatterford Hill, Clee Hills and back round to Kidderminster, Stourbridge, Dudley, Halesowen and Turners Hill. On a clear day observers can see as far as the Black Mountains of Wales, the northern Cotswolds, the southern Peak District and Charnwood Forest. A toposcope indicates the mountains visible. Landmarks visible from the hills include Dudley Castle, the large Droitwich AM transmitters near Bromsgrove, the large silos (now demolished for housing) on the Ex British Sugar Corporation land in Kidderminster, Ironbridge Power Station (now decommissioned and demolished), near Telford and the nearby Wychbury Obelisk. It is because of this that the hills are very popular with hillwalking visitors and local ramblers groups. The hills are criss crossed with many public footpaths. A popular means of access to Clent Hill is from Nimmings car park, off Hagley Wood Lane. From this an easy access walk route leads to the ridge. Another popular access is from the public car park on Adams Hill. Adams Hill is not a separate hill, but the name for the hamlet (part of the parish of Clent) and the slope that form the south west flank of Clent Hill. In 2009 Cooper Partnership (a firm of Chartered Landscape Architects) were commissioned to "identify and assess a selection of key views to and from the Malvern Hills" by the Malvern Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty Partnership. Coopers identified 50 key views from vantage points some on the Malvern Hills and others from other vantage points looking at the Malverns. At 22 mile (35 km) the view from the Clent Hills was the most distant. They rated importance of the view as special and the sensitivity as high and wrote that the Clent Hills had "many pedestrian and equestrian users" and in "[a] lovely environment of countryside pursuits" the vista contained a:

The poet William Shenstone lived at The Leasowes and was a near neighbour of the Lyttelton family at Hagley Hall. Shenstone garden at The Leasowes was one of the most notable gardens in England in the mid 1700s and his Unconnected Thoughts on Gardening one of the more influential of the age. On 30 August 1746 William Lyttelton called at The Leasowes with his friend the poet James Thomson. Shenstone later wrote a letter about the encounter which was published in 1800. After introductions and a conversation inside the house about a valley and the brook that Lyttelton and Thomson passed on their way to The Leasowes and which had much impressed Thomson for its beauty, Shenstone invited the pair to view the vista from the green behind his house. They conversed about a small nearby feature called Farmers Hill and Thomson suggested that Shenstone should extend his garden, but Shenstone explained to him that he would rather take which was already there and augment it "The French, it appears, have their [P]arque ornèe; and why is not Ferme ornèe as good an expression?". As his guests could not stay long owing to a dinner engagement they were unable to visit Shenstone's upper wood, but warming to Shenstone's suggestion on how to improve the landscape, Shepstone wrote that the conversation continued thus:
quote|"You have nothing to do (says [Thomson]) but to dress Nature. Her robe is ready made; you have only to caress her; love her; kiss her; and then descend into the valley." Coming out into the court before the house, he mentioned Clent and Waw ton Hill as the two bubbies of Nature: then Mr L. observed the nipple, and then Thomson the fringe of Uphmore wood; till the double entendre was work'd up to a point, and produced a laugh. The poet spent three months interviewing visitors to the hills, transcribing their reflections into verse. The result of the project was the poem 'Poem to Clent', lines from which can be found en route to the Four Stones, on the new Clent Hills archway, launched in December 2012.