We loved this from the BT / Yahoo pages "Top 10 British Myths and Legends". According to which Stonehenge dates back "an amazing 50,000 years". Truly that is amazing. How the stones stood up over the successive glaciations of that period is indeed a miracle. However it's bad news for creationists.
But it's nice to see a valid use of the word "literally" - as in "it’s drawn visitors for literally millennia". Which is true.
The site that Yahoo links to spells out that Stonehenge dates back "an amazing 5,000" years - which is less amazing, but still amazing. And still wrong, as the very first use of the site was probably an amazing 10,000 years ago. And "Visit Britain" has issues of its own. Such as spelling "sarsen" as "sarson".
But "you can get a good view from outside the main enclosure", Visit Britain tells us. Indeed you can, as you dodge the traffic on the busy road by the Heel Stone and peer through the fence and past 10,000 American tourists debating whether it was somebody as unimaginable ancient (to Americans) as the Normans or the Tudors that built it. And where the roof went when it fell off.
All in all, it's this kind of pseudo-history and imaginary myth that gets on the nerves of us serious druids. Time to give Stonehenge back to those who can look after it, we say.
Was calling the post Stonhene rather than Stonehenge deliberate? Have you done a post yet on Spinal Tap's eulogy to the monument which seems as accurate as some of the other stuff written about the site?
ReplyDeleteThank you, Phil. Irony indeed. The error has been corrected.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure you will be pleased to hear that every year on "Smell the Glove Night" the little children of Duckhenge dance around a tiny replica while the tuba, bodhran and panpipes are turned up to 11. Truly nobody knows what we are doing here... but oh how they dance....
Have you, the revered Beaker Folk, really gained access to the legendary stone hedging? I would be delighted to hear where I might discover a growth of this deeply spiritual bush, descendent of the perpetual burning bushes of yore. Am I to understand that an outgrowth has been discovered in Wiltshire, or is it close to your enclave in Husborne Crawley?
ReplyDeleteI was really delighted, to the incomprehension of my colleagues and flock, when after the 'repositioning of the speakers' our audio engineer decided that our temple could cope with more volume, amd reprogrammed our touchpad controller to allow the sacred number '11' as a valid level.
ReplyDeleteArchimandrite Simon, delighted to receive your contribution.
ReplyDeleteThis "repositioning of speakers" sounds like a very solemn ceremony. Was there incense?