I’m not sure what
We can achieve
If there’s no way
To ever believe
What’s being said
And being done
It’s been a debacle
Now it’s begun
Breaking down
What once there was
To create a new
Just because
This is what
The powers that be
Have now set forth
As reality
Rhyme and Reason
(c) K Wicks
In May 2016 we were lucky enough to arrange a visit to Stonehenge on a private tour after all the main tourists had left. This is one of my photographs of the sunset, animated by MKW Publishing…
All of my animated skies can be found on my YouTube Page.
(c) K Wicks Photographer
This is the most famous stone circle, and we have been lucky enough to visit a couple of times. On our first visit, we walked round the outside of the stones like everyone else. Wowed at the size and arrangement. Surprised at their seemingly remote location in comparison to where we put structures today. It really is difficult to understand why and how. Our building projects today have architects, engineers and builders at a minimum, so it’s reasonable to think they had the same. This took time, effort and planning, as with all the ancient sites. And quite the feat it was.
Some of these neolithic stones are believe to have come from Wales, the method of how they arrived is still debated, it is even told the stones came from Ireland. Although some are local as well. We also have a legend that the wizard Merlin levitated the stones to where they originally sat, so who can say for sure. All stories start somewhere and often have a basis of truth…
It was special to see. But it was not enough. My husband really wanted to be closer, to get within the inner stone circle of Stonehenge to be among the megaliths – without having to do it only twice a year when everyone else does on the solstice. So we looked online and found a private tour company called Stonehenge Tours that can give you the experience of getting up close and personal. It’s cost more than the standard entry fee, but it’s worth it.
Over 5000 years of history right in front of us, (if you try and ignore that most of these sites have been reconstructed and excavated a number of times in the last few hundred years), and no-one in the whole world can conclusively say why or how. It’s exciting and maddening all at the same time.
Walking around within the stone circle was a different and much better experience, even though you are in a group, everyone was in awe of where you were, it was easy to forget anyone else was there at all. You also get to truly appreciate the scale and size of these megaliths. They are giant.
It really is hard to understand why there are so many neolithic sites across the country and Europe that follow the same design, maybe not Stonehenge, but certainly a lot of our others. Why did they stop building with stone? It obviously stands the test of time better than any other material. Somewhere along the line something was lost and these structures and sites are all we have left. We can’t get enough of these places and want to keep going back. Stonehenge is even on the list again, but there are so many more sites to investigate and discover that we may be some time…
(c) K Wicks
As full spring approaches, the neolithic map of England shall be set upon once more.
#Stonehenge #Trevethyquoite #WaylandSmithy #Neolithic
(c) K L Wicks
It was my husbands suggestion for us to go, we have a mutual interest of history and archaeology, his for ancient sites, mine used to be more recent encompassing from the time of the Romans through to present day. That is the bulk of what i was told about growing up, what we were taught at school and led to believe was ‘accurate’ history, but seems more to me now as lots of guesswork and a just a few shreds of evidence, albeit one sided. We arrived at Stonehenge as part of the normal daily lines of sightseers, funny when i thought how close i had lived for years and never been. It was very impressive, i won’t lie. The stones looking stark against the flat surrounding landscape and the people looking so much smaller than i thought they would, the stones were huge. But so close, yet so far away, the lines and pathway led us round and back away from the stones. It was great, but not enough. Unwilling to visit on either solstice due to the sheer numbers of people, we felt we needed to be able to get up close and really see the stones. A bit more research and we found that you could book to go on a private tour and actually walk through the stones after it closed to the public. That was more like it. So we did, we went back and got to walk up The Avenue, leading us to an epic view on approach, got to be among the stones and really see them up close. Although told no one was allowed to touch them, we made a point of touching them, that was our intention before even going, after all, these were thousands of years old and they allowed people to climb all over them twice a year. I knew i wasn’t about to topple one of the oldest monuments we had. And it was worth it.
When we started going to ancient sites, we realised it was different from more recent history. No-one could say for sure what these sites were for, who built them or even how they built them. No writing, no history from either the winners or losers of this time, just the stone left behind. We are unable to move these stones with today’s machinery and technology, yet do not give them the attention i feel they deserve. This is an ancient mystery of epic proportions. There are sites all over the world, strikingly similar sites which show that apparently unconnected people, all took up the same method of building and created megalithic structures still very much standing today. Followed by pyramids found all over the world too with no real idea of where they all got the same idea at the same time. You have to see for yourself and make your own judgement.
(c) MKW Publishing 2017
I loved the Indiana Jones films as a kid, the adventure, the mystery, the danger, the uncertainty and the nice tidy way they explained everything nicely by the end. So of course, i took to wanting to be an archaeologist. But as I got older I watched Time Team as much as i could, went out into the countryside and museums when I could and tried to work out theories from the very little evidence there appeared to be for things, despite years of study and research, there seemed very little to go on. It was disheartening but at the same time quite helpful. I started to understand that no-one actually knew the answer of long past historical events, it was mostly conjecture. These ‘educated’ people who had told me what history had been, just put forward theories and then tried to prove them, sounds scientific enough, but what you find with historians is that they seem to really believe all of their theories before they ever get proved, and proving them to be true is no longer the point.
I prefer to visit a site without a guide or host trying to tell me what it is, who built it and how it was for ‘ceremonial and religious purposes’ because they just don’t know. Neither do I, but i like the fact that it’s still up for grabs, the ideas of what may have been and why are there for the taking, if only we could look beyond what we think we know…
(c) MKW Publishing 2017
MKW Publishing 