You climb the hill from the small harbour and there they are: A collection of ancient stones in a rough ellipse or boat-shape, most higher than a human, and of course much broader. They sit on top of the hill, on a wonderful site overlooking the sea on two sides. A great place for a fort, or a nice expensive house. The people wander between them, taking photos, the kids run around with all that energy somehow revived from the hot walk up the track, and I try and imagine what happened here so many thousands of years ago. There is a flat stone embedded in the ground, near the prow or bow. Was it a place of sacrifice? Homage? Or maybe the whole was just a nice meeting place for a picnic, as some people are using it today. Was it once covered with beams and roof? It would be rather windy and cold up here sometimes. Did they sing? Chant? Wear special clothes?
Roy and I wander down to the edge overlooking the sea. The sky is so wonderfully blue it almost hurts.
I'm getting lunchtime-ish however, and thirsty so we walk back down the hill to the wee harbour and instead of reading the information board, I just photograph it. I want to have my own ideas of Ale's Stones for a little while longer yet before I find out what others have discovered. They feel more like my special personal archeological discovery, that way.
There are some poppies growing on a bank. I love them against the grass and blue sky.
We are coming back to the present now and there's a smell of fish cooking and the chatter of people drinking beer and eating under umbrellas.
I think that this is the first time I have commented on a post the day before it was written! I'm so used to standing stones and the theories surrounding them that they have almost (but not quite) lost their mystery - simply because I suspect that we can speculate all we like but that we will will never really know.
ReplyDeleteGeeb, and I think that this is the first time I have posted after midnight. A coincidence?
DeleteI saw Stonehenge first when I was eleven. And then a few times after, then the Avebury ring, and stumbled on some near Dublin... I also could let them drift into the unknown and unknowable, and they might go there yet. But every now and then I like to focus on a particular set and try an Be There Back Then. It was a time of a different way of doing and being, I suspect. One may almost as easily climb in through a spicule to image the life and needs of a mantis.
The various stone formations around the world fascinate. Maybe someday we will know for sure why they exist.
ReplyDeleteYes Emma. One thing I believe is that they went to all that work for some very deep-seated and enduring need. I hope it was gratitude. I fear it was fear.
DeleteIn light of your visit to these stones ......... You may remember M.Scott Peck MD who wrote an international best seller titled 'The Road Less Travelled". I have read this book and many others he has written including one which may interest you: "In Search of Stones - A Pilgrimage of Faith, Reason and Discovery". The blurb on the back cover of my edition reads, " In Search of Stones is, on the surface, the story of three week trip through the British countryside that Dr Peck and his wife Lily - looking for the ancient megalithic stones that became an obsession for them. But the search for stones is a search for meaning and romance, and ultimately an exploration of our own life journey..... "
ReplyDeleteIts a while since I read it, but I remember it being a very interesting and insightful read.
Thanks for the information Alden. That's leading me to an interesting idea ... perhaps, more than we often realise, we project our own wishes and priorities on something nice and ambiguous or currently unknowable as a set of old stones set in some kind of pattern. Stones and tombs certainly have the capacity to tweak and pluck at some, shall we say old chromosomes, or instincts, or memories, or truths ... I'll look the book up one day.
DeleteYes, I agree with that about the projection. As they moved around the various sites they found some had a kind of 'presence' others didn't. I think their judgements were purely subjective born of projection and the ambience of the particular geographic setting each group of stones was erected - nevertheless an excellent book.
ReplyDeleteSounds interesting. I have found even the weather affects how I feel about a place, stones or no stones. And the view, of course, and if I am with someone who is chatty or quiet, and how much time I have there, and what I had in the way of sleep the night before and what I had for breakfast ... the list goes on ha ha...
DeleteNot to detract from meaningful and sincere interactions and thoughts that people may have in such places. They all have the potential to be important.
I love visiting ancient monuments. This is spectacular. I wonder if they realised it wouldn't float.
ReplyDeleteHa ha Adrian. Well, they would have as soon as they launched it.
DeleteAh, Ales Stenar - this is where I thought you might be going, when I saw your road pictures back in an earlier South Sweden post! I've been here, on a road trip with a friend back in the summer of 1992. (Not too surprisingly, the place looked pretty much the same back then - including the red poppies!) You probably know there are also theories about it having served as a kind of sun calendar, to do with winter and summer solstice etc. (Theories loved by some and rejected by others - of course.) Whatever it was, it's still one of those places that connect us to history and make us "stop and think" for a while...
ReplyDeleteI thought you might have thought this is where I was going Monica :0).
DeleteIn any country far from the tropics, the seasons were probably a big deal. Stonehenge is also oriented sun-wise I seem to recall.
And yes, I love to take time to stop and think, exactly as you say.
I visited Ales Stenar with my daughter Frances in the summer of 2001. I wonder why modern human beings have the urge to decipher everything - explaining away all mysteries - crushing all enigmas. Sometimes it's best to just sit quietly, absorbing the essence of a special place like that. Perhaps that is how we get at the real truth.
ReplyDeleteAh, so you have been here too YP! You could be right. Maybe that's the best way. Or maybe it doesn't actually matter what the truth is in this regard.
Delete