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<< Our Photo Pages >> Castel (Guernsey) - Standing Stone (Menhir) in Channel Islands and Isle of Man in Guernsey

Submitted by JJ on Friday, 03 March 2023  Page Views: 15504

Neolithic and Bronze AgeSite Name: Castel (Guernsey) Alternative Name: Câtel, Catel
Country: Channel Islands and Isle of Man
NOTE: This site is 1.293 km away from the location you searched for.
Island: Guernsey Type: Standing Stone (Menhir)
Nearest Town: St Peter Port  Nearest Village: Câtel
Map Ref: WV311788
Latitude: 49.459118N  Longitude: 2.572232W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
 4 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
 3 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
 5 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
 3

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Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by EmmaDespres : One of our beautiful goddesses on Beltane, we are a lucky land here on Guernsey. (Vote or comment on this photo)
An amazing anthropomorphic figure of a woman sitting in Castel churchyard on Guernsey, seen here with Beltane flowers. It's very difficult not to think of this and the La Gran`mere du Chimquiere nearby as neolithic 'goddess' figures. Made of granite, the 1.65m slab was recovered from beneath the floor of the chancel in the church. Carved crown, necklace and breasts can be made out, perhaps one breast was chipped off to deface the monument in Christian times when it was buried.

Access: Perry's guide map square 15H4
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Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by karolus : Walpurgis 2009 (Vote or comment on this photo)

Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by Tom_Bullock : Photo used by kind permission of Tom Bullock. More details of this location are to be found on his Stone Circles and Rows CD-ROM (Vote or comment on this photo)

Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by stone_de_croze : I'm ready for my close up now.. Note the colouration suggesting that the breast was not removed too long ago? (Vote or comment on this photo)

Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by stone_de_croze : From her left.. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by stone_de_croze : A clear view of the necklace and breasts. (1 comment)

Castel (Guernsey)
Castel (Guernsey) submitted by Tom_Bullock : Photo used by kind permission of Tom Bullock. More details of this location are to be found on his Stone Circles and Rows CD-ROM

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Nearby sites listing. In the following links * = Image available
 1.2km E 88° La Grande Pouquelaye Passage Grave
 1.5km ESE 102° La Petite Longue Rocque des Granges* Standing Stone (Menhir) (WV326785)
 1.6km E 91° Courtil D'Ydol de St Jacques Standing Stone (Menhir)
 2.1km E 93° La Pierre de L'Hyvreuse Standing Stone (Menhir)
 2.2km E 87° La Petite L'Hyvreuse Passage Grave
 2.6km SSE 151° La Gran'mere du Chimquiere* Standing Stone (Menhir)
 2.8km ENE 60° Le Chateau Du Marais* Artificial Mound
 2.9km W 271° Rocque a Chancre* Standing Stone (Menhir)
 3.2km SE 145° Sausmarez Manor Menhir* Standing Stone (Menhir)
 3.4km E 101° Guernsey Maritime Museum Museum
 3.4km N 356° Port Soif Dolmen* Burial Chamber or Dolmen
 3.7km NE 50° Route St Clair* Standing Stone (Menhir) (WV339812)
 3.8km NE 56° La Pointue Rocque* Standing Stone (Menhir)
 3.8km NNE 31° L'Islet* Burial Chamber or Dolmen
 3.9km NNE 29° Sandy Lane* Burial Chamber or Dolmen
 4.0km W 260° Rue de la Terre Norgiot Standing Stone (Menhir)
 4.1km W 273° Croix Genoumie Ancient Cross
 4.1km WNW 283° La Longue Pierre and Le Crocq* Standing Stones (WV271797)
 4.1km W 273° La Rocque Pointue Standing Stone (Menhir)
 4.1km ENE 58° Delancey* Burial Chamber or Dolmen (WV346810)
 4.2km W 277° Dolmen De Perelle Burial Chamber or Dolmen
 4.2km W 280° Menhir de Perelle Standing Stone (Menhir)
 4.3km W 273° La Boule de La Rocque Pointue. Sculptured Stone
 4.4km NNE 32° St Michel Du Valle* Not Known (by us)
 4.6km NNE 16° Rousse Cists* Cist
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"Castel (Guernsey)" | Login/Create an Account | 2 News and Comments
  
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Constructing Social Knowledge through Bodily Representation: A View from Prehistoric by Andy B on Sunday, 24 February 2019
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Materiality, Technology, and Constructing Social Knowledge through Bodily Representation: A View from Prehistoric Guernsey, Channel Islands - S HEILA K OHRING, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, UK

The role of the human body in the creation of social knowledge—as an ontological and/or aesthetic category—has been applied across social theory. In all these approaches, the body is viewed as a locus for experience and knowledge. If the body is a source of subjective knowledge, then it can also become an important means of creating ontological categories of self and society. The materiality of human representations within art traditions, then, can be interpreted as providing a means for contextualizing and aestheticizing the body in order to produce a symbolic and structural knowledge category. This paper explores the effect of material choices and techniques of production when representing the human
body on how societies order and categorize the world.

The three bodily images discussed in the text. From left to right: the statue-menhir at Câtel Church, the Déhus chambered tomb and gardien, and the statue-menhir at St. Martin’s Church.

European Journal of Archaeology17 (2) 2014, 248–263
PDF Download
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/77408276.pdf
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Re: Castel (Guernsey) by Stone_de_Croze on Sunday, 07 May 2006
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Castel Church sits on an elevated site in just about the centre of the island. Many people don’t even realise that one of the world’s finest examples of an early statue menhir representing the Mother Goddess is looking over them from her churchyard sanctuary as they drive by.

The two metre statue now stands greeting worshippers at the west entrance to the church that almost certainly replaced a very important Neolithic site. The name of the parish also suggests a fort here but that was much later than the period we are looking at. Rescued from the ground in 1878, La Gran’mère was found ‘within the chancel at about equal distance from the north and south walls about a foot below the surface’. She was ‘lying east-west and turned over on the left side and found damaged’ according to the proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries Jan 30th 1879 (and reprinted in the Guernsey magazine 1880). Was she buried to rid the site of its pagan links or was she added to the ‘fabric’ of the new church making it easier for the early islanders to convert to the ‘new’ religion?

She was more than likely buried in the sixth century when the first church was built. She was found with her feet facing the east, the same alignment as many passage graves so I can hardly believe that the same people who buried the statue would deface it. After all she had been their goddess for thousands of years. On examination (actually even a cursory glance) the observer will notice the colouration on the breast and the damage looks pretty recent to me. Was it accidentally chipped off when she was found? Anyway why only ‘chop off’ one breast? And where are the crosses usually associated with the ‘Christianisation’ of menhirs? I believe that the damage may have occurred when she was lifted from the chancel floor.

It has also been suggested that the face has been removed but hang on - can you see a face in profile looking towards the facing page in this picture? Now you see that, you can see the long hair, her right ear and necklace and headband all become clear. Or do they? - you decide. Unlike the other rock features in Guernsey, all memory of her has long gone, and with the discovery only being 120 or so years ago, no folklore surrounds this enigmatic matriarch. She hasn’t even got a name other than La Gran’mère or ‘Castel Church Statue Menhir’. Made from a highly crystallised granite, the stone working here is magnificent, the entire rock being smoothed and carved leaving the necklace and breasts in relief. One can only imagine how she glittered in the sun when first carved over
four.thousand years ago.
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