 |
| Taken from Wikipedia |
I once blew a blast into the Blowing Stone, which rolled a hollow wave of sepulchral sound into the hills. The megalith builders, taking their lesson from the conch-shells of the Eastern Mediterranean, blew into this very stone to summon the gods or, more probably, the goddess of the high places. Another two miles and there is the goddess herself or rather, the celtic descendant of the goddess, stretched in white and in flight across the bald brow of Uffington Hill. The downs lift to 800 feet and by their very godliness of combe and crescent, of jutting ness and plunging spur, ordain the tie beam of White Horse Hill to be one more of the holy places of the chalk. So it was on Windover Hill.... and so it is here where the Celtic town of Uffington is flanked by the galloping horse and a Neolithic workshop on the one side, and the chambered long barrow of Wayland's Smithy with its grove of beeches on the other........
H.J.Massingham - English Downland
Yes, a quote from Massingham in full flow on the nearness of the Uffington White Horse, to Uffington Castle (which by the way is not a castle but an Iron Age fort) and then walking along the Ridgeway you arrive at Wayland's Smithy. The Ridgeway an old prehistoric path that wanders through Berkshire to Wiltshire and then the temple of Avebury taking you back through prehistory. I have a print on the bedroom wall by Jane Tomlinson that captures the moment, when prehistory meets the myths, stories and nature of the downs round.
The Ridgeway with Uffington Castle in the distance
Uffington White Horse is the original chalk horse, a late Bronze Age start in life, though up till recently it has always been thought of as being related to the Iron Age. Then of course to Celtic mythology of Rhiannon the horse goddess and the myths go on. I have a children's book by Peter Please (children of all ages by the way) 'The Chronicles of the White Horse', a quite scary book.
But it was the new series of 'Strike' that bought it back, as our two private detectives cope with the horrors of a suffocated minister - who would have thought of cling film as a murder weapon? But then J.K.Rawlings has an imaginative mind, and definitely out of his mind Jimmy plagued by the memory of the strangulation of a young girl in the eye of the horse, set against the backdrop of Uffington, a spicy addition of course! Actually I find this latest drama a bit too squeamish.
Looking at the photo of the horse and there are artistic lines to its shape, a Guardian article says that it is the first minimalist artwork of its time. Its shape can be found on Iron Age coins as well. Some argue that it is not a horse but a dragon, in fact Dragon Hill, is the small hillock below it, often referred to as 'The Manger'. There is of course the story of St.George and the Dragon to be linked as well.
Peter Please
I have only ever seen the white horse in photographs - I am not familiar with that part of the country but it always has such a Matisse look about it
ReplyDeleteThe chalk downs are very rolling and smooth not at all like the Yorkshire Dales.
DeleteI want to go to the Scouring Fair.
ReplyDeleteThere are rumours that these old horses were once dragons. That makes sense to me.
DeleteBut do dragons exist? Welsh Celtic history rests on the white and red dragon fighting it out on a hill top. As for scouring, bt this old horse needs archaeologists in attendance, not to go over the lines.
DeleteYes, it might end up like Westbury's.
DeleteWhat a lovely post. It brought back a hot summer's day when we visited Uffington, and walked along the Ridgeway and I wanted to keep walking, and gathering up summer's bounty along the hedgerows. We have been at Pentre Ifan today, and thought of you . . .
ReplyDeletePentre Ifan, I remember the foxgloves growing when we went. The Ridgeway is a timeless place, but I think keeping the 4x4s vehicles off it can be difficult.
DeleteTried to spot the Kilburn horse from the A1 today, but I don't think you can. But that's a folly, as is trying to spot it when driving.
ReplyDeleteIt is cut on such a steep hill, you need ropes to clean it I would think. But it is set in a magical place, Sutton Bank. As white horses go it is definitely not a Stubbs ;)
DeleteThis is a spot my daughter and I visited, and we could hardly tear ourselves away. It was a gorgeous June day, and no one else was there, except sheep farther down the hill. The views were breathtaking, and I couldn't believe we were actually walking about among the parts of this huge, ancient piece of ancient history and art. It may be my favorite non-museum.
ReplyDeleteA couple of years after, I got a cassette tape of Chesterton reading his own "Ballad of the White Horse," but the recording had not been cleaned up in any way and it was mostly rhythmic scratches, unintelligible.
I hadn't heard about the dragon idea, or of the scary stories using the site for a backdrop.
You have had the same experience as Jennie, the rolling downs have a hypnotic affect on you. But there is also a 'sense of place' which catches the mind.
ReplyDeleteIt is so tantalising to have these echoes of times past around us - like leftover pieces of a jigsaw that we can never finish because so many of the pieces have gone. In The Bronze Age it is believed that the population of The British Isles was less than one million. Now almost 72 million live here (including Ireland).
ReplyDeleteNo wonder we demand our rights to freedom to roam the land. It would have been such an empty land, still to be pioneered and explored. What I find so fascinating is that people gnaw at the slim facts trying to arrive at the answer. Fact learned today, is that Neanderthals felt more pain. How did they find out, by comparing our genes Homo Sapien with Neanderthal gene which we also have - due to mating with them in the past.
DeleteStarted to watch a series (fiction) on the Druids but it got a little weird for me. I need something more historic.
ReplyDeleteWell the classic is Ronald Hutton's 'Blood and Mistletoe - the History of the Druids' to read. Very long but he traces the history, much of it false of course and made up from the 17th century but fascinating.
ReplyDelete