Two Books: Stonehenge, Stone Circles, Stone Age Numbers, Monument and Mountains
Submitted by dianacoles on Sunday, 19 August 2007 Page Views: 15255
ReviewsNeolithic and Bronze Age Cosmologies – Two Different Approaches. Books reviewed by Diana Coles.Stonehenge, Stone Circles and Stone Age Numbers by Mike Green.
Monuments and Mountains: Stone Circles and Standing Stones in the Landscape by Garth Weston.
Both these new publications are attempts by the respective authors to come to an understanding of the cosmology of Britain’s earliest farmers through an interpretation of their monuments.
I approached the first of these, Mike Green’s slender volume with feelings of some trepidation lest the contents should prove to be some kind of astrological numerology. I was instantly disabused of this unkind thought. In fact this is an excellent book for the astronomical tyro like myself. Written in a chatty and eminently accessible style, Mike Green explains the movements of those heavenly bodies with which our ancestors would have been familiar and discusses how phenomena such as the metonic cycle (no I didn’t know either before reading his book) and eclipses could have been calculated using the technology that was at the disposal of Neolithic and Bronze Age people.
He relates these to Stonehenge, exploring the Hoyle and Hawkins models for using the Aubrey holes as an eclipse predictor. He goes on to suggest that ‘later Stonehenge with all its standing stones was the enshrinement of knowledge and culture in stone… used ritually for keeping track of time.’
Whether or not one is convinced by these arguments for the meaning behind the monument, Mike Green makes a convincing case, all the more so since his writing is grounded in common sense and a respect for the people of the past – ‘no born farmer in the world worth their salt would have needed Stonehenge to tell them the time of year to reap and sow.’
Well worth reading, this little book is an invaluable starting point for anyone wanting to make sense of astronomy and prehistory, although privately published it is well worth seeking out.
Garth Weston begins his book with the contention that the cardinal points were of great interest to Neolithic and Bronze Age people and that would have had an awareness of and fascination with natural forms in the landscape including mountains, streams, lakes, rocky outcrops and so on. So far so good although such observations are hardly original, see works by V. Cummings & R. Bradley amongst others.
However, things quickly go downhill. To describe enclosures such as henges as ‘busy emporia’ for the axe trade or to speak about ‘mass production’ of flint axes raises instant disquiet about his understanding of the way pre-industrial societies operate.
He then moves on to the placement of monuments – in relation to ‘commanding hills but also to existing structures of a similar kind.’ He posits that surveying across the landscape in order to find sites which fulfilled these relationships was undertaken on a major scale using bonfires, trees and platforms.
The rest of the book is devoted to a discussion of the alignments of various monuments to each other and to various hills and mountains. Unfortunately his text is riddled with inaccuracies. In his description, for instance of the monuments of Southwest Scotland he writes of ‘one stone ring [that] remains in the Rhins.’ No such ring exists. Worse still he writes that Stanton Drew has ‘the sole, complete, erect example of a cove’. Not the last time we looked!
His metrical data is also suspect. Assuming a pace of between 73–79 cm, he claims that distances between monuments is often to be reckoned in multiples of 50 or 100 paces. However, an inbuilt tolerance of ± 4% from the average at the outset in his calculations is more than sufficient to create huge errors over the distances he claims are accurate.
Even more alarmingly, monuments from Early Neolithic cursuses through chambered tombs, large Cumbrian type circles, recumbent circles and Clava tombs down to the small four posters of the middle to late Bronze Age are lumped together, assuming a common cosmology throughout the better part of three millennia.
Finally, the interminable and unrelieved lists of alignments for monument after monument become all unbearably tedious long before Mr Weston has exhausted his subject matter. Thus his description of the circle at Torhouskie; ‘The unspoilt Torhouse Ring, which is on a route from the North Channel to a sheltered bay four miles to the east, has a unique central setting. In major directions are Cairnsmore, Cairnharrow, Fell of Barhullion, Mochrum Fell and Craigenlee Fell. Merrick and South Barrule are precisely opposite to each other. A row of boulders in the middle is oriented on Slieve Donard.. The centre of the middle boulder of the row and the centre of the largest circle stone lie on the axis of symmetry which is in line with Scafell Pike. A row on a nearby rise, oriented almost north-east to south-west, is probably part of the system of boundary markers.’..…….whatever.
Stonehenge, Stone Circles and Stone Age Numbers by Mike Green.
Publisher: Twelve Acre Publishing. Distribution by print on demand or download through Lulu.com
Price: Paperback book $29.95, Download $13.61
Monuments and Mountains: Stone Circles and Standing Stones in the Landscape by Garth Weston.
Published by Ashridge Press/Country Books. Available from Amazon.co.uk . Price £19.99
Reviews by Diana Coles
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