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Stone Circle
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Finally we walked to the third circle. I realised what an elevated position this has compared to the other two. The vistas that are revealed are quite different: suddenly you can see out to ( what I now realise is the Blackdown Hills, where Beacon Batch is, and from where you can see Everywhere), and to my astonishment and delight, there was Kelston Round Hill on Lansdown – a marker which I feel more and more certain was acknowledged by our ancestors (but more on this when I can order my thoughts). Also for the first time I realised where the Cove is from this circle – you can see the wall of the Druids Arms garden. It would be so nice to be able to walk in a logical manner towards it from here, instead of back around the village. The church is so close by – superbly located to keep an eye on all three parts of this megalithic complex.
Although I didn't notice it, there is apparently a stone visible in the centre of this small circle. My companions and I were quite interested in the types of stone utilised. According to the EH smr they are 'dolomitic conglomerate' (which must be the red one with bits in), 'sandstone' (we found a clearly sedimentary rock in the main circle) and 'oolitic limestone' (holey, as you would see at Bathampton or the Rollrights), all of which it says could have been collected from within six miles of the site. In our examination of the stones we noticed that there seemed to have been a certain amount of digging around several of them in this small circle. We would liked to have put it down to rabbits, who were obviously in residence, but there was something quite un-rabbitlike in the way great clods of turf had been ripped up. If it was an unscrupulous person, let's hope they get the usual tide of bad luck that attends Messers With Stones, eh.
This circle is secluded (at least in the 21st century) but I felt like we were at the 'top table' of the Wedding. The land seems to drop gradually away in every direction; you seem to be on a little knoll especially chosen for the site. It is elegantly proportioned (though it is quite different with its stones much smaller than the similarly sized NE circle) and seems to fit its location very well.
With the cove becoming (almost) visible I was set to thinking about the functions of the different parts of the complex. Would you have gone to them all in a single visit? What routes would you have taken? It is hard to envisage such things with the village obscuring the possible intervisibility of sites and forcing you to walk the long way round.
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Posted by Rhiannon
16th August 2004ce
Edited 25th February 2005ce
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