The ancient monument of Stonehenge. Perhaps one of the best known prehistoric monuments in the world. Ancient ancient stones, surrounded by barrows. These vast bluestones were moved such a long distance to get them to Salisbury Plain. How were they moved, these megaliths? How were they so precisely arranged to look towards sunrise on the summer solstice?
They were in place over two millennia before the Nazarene prophet died. The plain where they stand has been a place of power for longer than that. This plain, originally wooded, was inhabited from the dawn of civilisation – from when we were still establishing what it even was to be human. Archaeologists have found earthworks and tools and human remains that carry age and weight that is almost incomprehensible to us now, trapped as we all are in time. The people then, as now, were trying to guess what it was that made us live. They were subject far more to the cycle of light and dark. The day was bright and the night was cold and dark. The summer solstice was a powerful message. We learnt we could predict some things. We forged patterns and created stories to make sense of the things we observed. The stars were constant. Death was constant. Day dawned and then the sun set. Babies were born and old folk died. “Will my loved one return, just as the sun returns, oh holy one?” “Yes my child, but the sun rises on a new day and so will your loved one return in a new form in time / insert convenient solution intended to comfort and connected to observation of nature with an eye for the needs of the holy one.” “Your pa will be in a dark place like the sun is gone overnight, but if you leave tasty food and precious things on the altar every day then this purgatory will pass more quickly…” Yum yum etc etc. What would you do if your job was to answer the impossible questions and there was no self-important globally established selection of “we have the right idea” charlatans getting smugly disapproving if you diverge from their shared-belief crowdsourced story? You’d make it up as best you could, to bring whatever you prioritised – be it comfort to the recipient or goodies to yourself. Twas ever thus. Now we have ideaflood. We can choose from all sorts of global lies, all if which are as speculative as one another but all of which have traction based on our ancient need to “know what is actually going on”. The new religions exist on YouTube.
These big stones came when things were more geographically and cosmically oriented, rooted into observable constants. Surely there were still people saying “Mark my words, if stones are brought from Wales they will bring pestilence.” “The druids want to get us to chant so we vibrate like them and they can steal our essence!” The anti-megalith crowd would’ve died saying “just you wait, you’ll all regret it. It’ll happen on the equinox – the thing I’m predicting – it’ll happen – you’ll see.”
Did Merlin magic the stones from Pembrokeshire, and the Brecon Beacons? Were they carried there by devout and ancient nephilim? Or was it manpower and time? Devotion. Maybe whole lifetimes were spent in the profession of “stone mover”. This incredible edifice still stands, still watches the light, still responds to the seasons. Whoever built it, what they built it for – that’s lost. You might have a friend who tells you they are a pagan. They might tell you something about what it stands for – about why it’s so significant. We don’t know though. Your friend is guessing. The Romans, then the Normans : two violent wedges in the oral tradition, and then Henry VIII and his fucking divorce that burnt everything the converted pagan monks might have written from their ancestral memories. Too many wedges. Too thorough. We have nothing but the idea of our orally transmitted faith structure now in this country. We have to build it again as best we can. Shapes, colours, some memories of people uninvolved enough to escape the purges. The important memories were torn from us again and again. It left fertile ground in which to plant and nurture an unfamiliar middle eastern rebellion-faith that also likes to put stones in places of power. The original holders of the memories – they were purged, then purged again, and then Henry’s disillusion of the monasteries burnt the memories.
But we still have some of the obelisks. Some of the powerful places. Often, like at Glastonbury Tor and La Hougue Bie there is a silly stone church squatting there as well. Stonehenge hasn’t been colonised though. No little new religion has tried to stick a hat on it. It stands largely preserved as it has for so many centuries, although of course they are trying to build a tunnel underneath it because collective humans are incapable of not being wankers.
There it stands, this ancient memory of different times. There it stands, and some fucking idiot has decided it’s a good idea to project the Queen onto it.
I’m ok with the monarchy. I prefer The Queen as head of state than anything we have elected in my lifetime. But… this is not a good look:
If you ever want reminding that the societal structures we have created are complete and utter rubbish and that they are only propped up by our collective delusion, look no further than this photo. A figure who is nothing but a flicker on a cosmic scale, with these garish images of her projected onto something truly powerful and ancient. The stones must be weeping. The Queen is likely weeping as well – she’s no fool. She will see how inappropriate it is. Another stupid idea for a public display. This one at least isn’t as costly as the horrible mound at Marble Arch or the Garden Bridge that never got started. Not as costly, but certainly as gauche. Yuk.
AlBarclay 