Ancient and ArchaeologyΒ permalink
Mighty and Awesome - Moen Deop.
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Message 1.Β
Posted by MendipTim (U13707598) on Monday, 4th October 2010
Is this the Riddle of the Stones?
I am a sceptic, so I'm not sure I believe in my conclusions; however intense scepticism & 1,000s of hours study have lead me to this conclusion. I have tried to notify the relevant authorities & have been rewarded with either a wall of silence or barely concealed hostility. I could understand & accept ridicule.
Regular readers of this forum may remember the beginning of this saga when nearly 2 years ago I started a thread titled Mendip's Ancient Zoo (. For new readers I will give a quick resume. As a Mendip based landscape photographer I have always been fascinated by the Priddy Circles & the 100's of burial mounds on the Mendip Hills in Somerset. My research suggested that I might find some representation of Ursus Minor (probably in Barrow form) in the Churchill/ Shipham area. I was using Google Earth as I hadn't found anything on the ground. Suddenly my attention was drawn to an area I knew very well - there was a huge Bear shaped footpath that I thought I knew didn't exist inside an ancient enclosure almost directly above Aveline's Hole, a cave with some of the oldest human bones in Britain.
If you have Google Earth please look at this:
51Β°19'32.75"±·
2Β°45'0.80"°Β
You will need to shift the Historical slider (the Clock icon) to June 30 2006. This is the most recent image but Google have chosen to hide it behind an old image.
Well, the path did exist though hardly discernible; not like the gaping wound on Google. The Enclosure is in a very secluded spot & very few people go there (I have never seen anyone else inside the enclosure) whilst only 200m away is Rocky Point, a well known & very popular beauty spot that 100+ people walk out to every day. The topsoil on most of Burrington Ham is very thin & non-replenish-able (once its gone - its gone). However the enclosure had maybe twice the depth of topsoil compared to the path leading to Rocky Point & that path looks tiny compared to the Bear. For the paths in the enclosure to be the size they appear they would either have to have been made either recently with mechanical aid or over many, many decades of 1000's of footsteps.
The shape of the breast & back of the Bear instantly suggest that the shape is some form of map of the local area as they match the course of Burrington Combe only metres away. (Combe = mini Gorge). It traces the approximate contours of the present day 175 metre level (+/- 10m) with a couple of small, presumably deliberate errors for artistic licence & to complete the circuit. Many of the key features of the area are highlighted in the map. This is most noticeable in the head of the Bear which represents West Twin Gully on the opposite side of the Combe; it's caves, spring & stream all appear to be clearly marked. (The caves in this Gully - Goatchurch Cavern & Sidcot Swallet etc. are well known to many cavers & Pot-holers.) The map also appears to mark the location of Aveline's Hole & if so it can give us the first clues as to the age of the Bear: the absence of any post-Mesolithic debris inside Aveline's Hole suggests it was sealed either accidentally or deliberately sometime towards the end of that period & was not discovered until 1797 and not properly explored until 1860. So the Bear is either younger than 150 or older than 10,000. Common sense says that means it must be recent, however its a very strangely shaped Bear that is beautiful combination of precision & art sitting perfectly within the confines of an ancient enclosure of indeterminate age. Folklore tells us that Fox made Bear lose its tail by sticking it in the ice & there is evidence that Bears did slowly loose their tails during the ice-age.
It was at about this stage in my research That bulldozers appeared from nowhere and devastated the enclosure & its contents, then left. All the topsoil was moved & significant stones dragged into ditches. Any hope of seeing the shape again was probably gone; at least for a very long time. I was equally devastated. I tried to forget the Bear, but couldn't: something wasn't right. You just don't make a football stadium sized map of your area & then built a wall around it. The local topography was why the shape was there. The shape itself was all important: only when the original builders found their perfect spot that they'd been looking for did they recreate the shape.
So all I had to do was find the original shape; here I was very lucky: the stars had led me to the spot so I went back to them. From the location & orientation I doubted this was the Ursus Minor I had been looking for & that it most probably was an interpretation of Ursus Major. If you imagine the group of stars that we call The Plough as the harness, reins, And saddle on a giant Bear then we have a new Ursus Major that is bigger than any interpretation I've ever seen & includes several other small local constellations. I have written in these forums before about the dangers of trying to match shapes to stars so knew I would have to prove the shape worked in many instances as well as why Ursus Major was so important.
I decided to move my investigation away from Burrington & any local sentiments & plumped for Carnac in NW France as it is the largest & most complex stone arrangement in NW Europe. Using Google Earth I zoomed in as close to the ground near the huge Tumulus then tilted & adjusted the view to get a very wide angle image of the NW horizon & sky: using the time/ date slider I could track & save the movement of Ursus Major through the night sky. In Photoshop I overlaid a transparent mask of the Burrington shape.
As the sun starts to set on the eve of Summer Solstice the New Ursus Major appears to be standing on the horizon somewhere near Ireland whilst pushing the Sun into the Sea with it's front paws. For the next few hours it cools it paws on the surface of the Atlantic before, (moving the view to North), around midnight it wipes them dry over Carnac. At sunrise on the Winter Solstice the Bear appears to drag only one paw over a similar route. I haven't been able to precisely check the alignments of paws & stones but they would seem to be about right & therefore the stone rows could represent the claw(s) scratch-marks &/or the ceremonial capture of a claw that has just held the Sun, (or the offering of replacements).
At Callanish on the Isle of Lewis, Scotland at the Summer Solstice the Bear appears to capture the Sun just as it is setting & holds it just below the horizon all night before lifting it up & releasing it at dawn. It then walks from the North into the stone circle before disappearing. As the local folklore says, at midsummer dawn the shiny one will come from the North proceeded by a Cuckoo. (I maybe should volunteer to be the Cuckoo!).
When I traced the transparent template of the shape for the Photoshop composites I had drawn in the main footpaths across the area as I thought they may be useful as cross-reference points: however I discovered that the triangular shaped paths in the fore paw represent the placement & course of the setting sun on midsummer's eve at Carnac & Callanish. Whilst doing the compositions I started to realise that there could be a couple of different interpretations of the Bear mainly concerning the head which could either be short & in profile or extended & head-on; also some of the other extremities would appear to move & change.
Like all good wandering Bears I returned closer to home & wanted to see how the shape worked with a similar land marking pattern so I chose the Cerne Abbas Giant (the man with his arms open in welcome yet a club in one hand & an erect penis), I wasn't expecting anything as I set the view to the west on midsummer's eve. The sun starts setting into a valley as Ursus appears holding it in it's paws. This is a very female looking Ursus & she appears to be offering herself to the Man as she backs up the valley; satisfied, she normally drops the sun & slowly turns towards the Man & the hill he is on & gives them a giant hug. However if the man fails to satisfy her the other Bear with the longer neck appears & is seen to throw the Sun at the Man in which case he will need the club to defend himself & hit the Sun back to it's right place. Here, of all locations I've looked at, its possible to get the best idea of how our ancestors saw Ursus as a very 3 dimensional moving entity with a complex personality. Its like a person silhouetted against a street lamp; different bits glow as they move & we built a 3-D image of them.
I am at a total loss to explain one very fundamental problem with most of the alignments that I have described - we can not see them. They all happen; but with the Sun in the image there is no way that normal human eyesight could see them happening. As I've no idea I'll sidestep the issue.
When last midsummer came it was time to see for myself, I hadn't Googled it but I knew something interesting would happen on Burrington Ham (even today the shape of the hill gives it an animal name). About 200m SE of the Bear shape there is the limestone outcrop locally known as Rocky Point; this was the obvious likely focal point due to it's distinctive features. It was a lovely clear night & when the Plough appeared over South Wales it looked as it is, just a nice set of stars. However as the sky got darker & many more fainter stars appeared the fast approaching Bear really did seem quite 3 dimensional. As I had expected, if you stand slightly to the South of Rocky Point on the stroke of midnight (GMT) the Bear appears to stop & seems to be standing or dancing on the pinnacle of white rock. I then expected it to turn & hug the hill. Instead it appeared to bend forward & mate with the hill on the other side of the Combe opposite to Aveline's Hole. At this point I was quite unnerved by the whole experience & left.
I had often wondered why the head of the Bear shape looked so phallic & indeed if viewed from the South the bottom half of the shape looks like a full set of male genitalia: now I had some answers. The head of the Bear shape is pointing towards the same vaginal shaped gully that Ursus mates with at midsummer, 9 months before baby Cave Bears would appear out of the caves in the gully each spring. So we have the Great One of the Heavens who can hold & control the Sun blessing Earth (or Urs/Urf) with powerful, clever & relatively harmless animals in its image: (sounds familiar). Burrington just happened to be at the near perfect Latitude, the perfect Longitude & have the almost ideal landscape, that might have been even better depending upon the prevailing ice/ sea levels of the time. I used to think that the Ancients must have loved Mendip because everywhere you looked there were giant dead ancestors in the landscape; now I think the Mesolithic people must have interpreted them as Bears.
I'm sure some of you will want to know about Stonehenge: yes, I've looked & of course with Ursus being visible every night it does just about everything. The problem is you can probably prove anything with a near perfect circle in the middle of a huge fairly flat plain. Also I believe research shows Stonehenge to be roughly contemporary with Gorsey Bigbury Henge (2 miles South of Burrington) & my research there suggests that it was probably not constructed until many years (maybe 1000+) after the Burrington shape, due to a change in emphasise away from real Bears & shifting of the focal point to Beacon Batch on Black Down (the highest point on Mendip). Silbury Hill may well be contemporary with the Bear, but I haven't found anything to prove it. There may have been a huge geographical Bear based on the main rivers of S & SW England & Wales whose Heart would be somewhere near Silbury. Stanton Drew, with its triplet of Stone Circles, 5 miles East of Burrington is obviously linked as it has direct line of sight to Rocky Point and similar views of Ursus. However they are slightly different & there are other interesting astronomical sights from there at midsummer. As they are slightly off-topic for now, I'll come back to them at a later time.
In the past I've dated a few dragons, but never a Bear! How do you date a Bear? It looks young & fresh yet if Aveline's Hole is marked then it must be at least 10,000yrs old: if Cave Bears really existed in the Combe then it is 20-30,000yrs old. I have tried to understand their view of North, hoping that I could glean some precessional information; however it would seem as if the original construction was based on a true celestial North. Wherever there is reference to the orientation of the stars around North it appears nearly contemporary with now: just 2,000 years into the future or roughly 23,000yrs ago. This time can be backed up by looking at the precessionary arrangements of later structures on Mendip. At least 4 times the Bear & it's secrets got forgotten & at least 3 times in the ancient past People have come back to Mendip & tried to either rediscover or recreate those secrets: by Neolithic times the Hills had become the embodiment of Draco.
There might be evidence of the 20-23,000 year range in what appear to be the same astronomical markings dotted throughout the area. Assuming these events were seen at midsummer there seems to be one instance that stands out where most of the main stars on Ursus Major are perfectly aligned East to West & probably the most directly overhead that it ever came. This would have occurred for many years about 20,000BC. (As this is the starting date for my sky charts I'd be interested to know If Ursus ever went further South than this?). The trouble with astronomical markings especially with people who were so astronomically aware is, Are they marking actual events, or future events, or remembering past ones?
There are problems with this age; mainly that it is ridiculous - just not possible: the last ice-age was at its peak & most of Britain was under ice all year round. Mendip was apparently never fully iced all summer & this may have embellished its reputation as the Bear that appeared out of the ice each summer for Ursus to mate with. What worries me the most is just how unaltered the land is, even the tree-lines often seem the same. I appreciate that in Mendip's thin topsoil trees can only grow where the soil is deep but somehow trees & Ice-age don't seem to mix.
To those of you who say that this is all fantasy I'll remind them that this a religion & leave the argument there. To those that accuse me of guesswork I'll plead guilty even though I prefer to think of it as diagonal thinking which is apt when dealing with people who would have virtually no concept of 2D. This is not a period of time when you can quickly pick up a history book to check up on the facts, especially as all the books refer to these people living in caves. Folk-lore often has some truths buried in it & for it to have been passed down through the ages implies a degree of importance. I am lucky in that I have spent time with the Aborigines of N Australia; the Hill Tribes of Indo-China; and the Himalayan Budhists: so I've been able to use some of my understanding of their ancient cultures in my research. I have also visited 100s of blind alleys!
As usual in my posts, I'm not giving you a shred of evidence; there is no point. If I produce the evidence I'll be accused of manipulating it (which is how I got the evidence). Instead I'll leave it to you, I've explained how I did it & it'll only take a few minutes on Google Earth to check it out. Some of the physical evidence will have to remain shrouded for the moment to protect it from damage or destruction. The rest of the landscape evidence is very pictorial & visual, some of it can be captured with a camera whilst some are on a multi dimensional scale that is impossible to properly photograph. I have had to re-train myself from looking at the landscape as a 2D photograph to analysing every angle, even the ones you can't see & sometimes empty space is seen as a solid (inverse) area.
I'm not expecting anyone to believe me - I wouldn't believe it if someone told it to me; but hopefully I'd be intrigued enough to check it out. I am a nobody who is way out of his depth; I haven't the nouce or the wealth to continue the research much further. My aim here is to try to bring the site & its possible meanings to the attention of the Archaeology community so they can use their wealth of knowledge & precision tools to check out the facts as so far suggested & a closely related side issue that is even more intriguing.
All my research has been non invasive, other than a few leaves I've suffered more than the land, if anyone is investigating the area & finds anything interesting please show respect & leave it in-situ so that it can be properly recorded. The Bear is a lovely creature, one of the great animals of the World, whether I'm right or wrong we should all respect & protect all Bears. I hope I haven't offended anyone.
By the way the possible entomology of The Mendip Hills is The Moen Deop Hills.
Thank you: Now let the ridicule begin.
Might (one day) & Awful Tim. -
Message 2
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Tuesday, 5th October 2010
Hello MendipTim
Nice to hear from you again, although as someone irradicably wedded to the evidential, I know my reply will disappoint. I feel that it is fine to interpret your findings religiously, if the local landscape gives you a sense of the numinous. But archaeology is a science and plenty of its exponents have also devoted thousands of hours to its study. I just can't share your way of looking at this particular phenomenon; sorry!
Obviously I have one major problem here arising from the fact that, although I have always been able to find the shape you have identified, it doesn't to my eye look especially bear-like. But let's call it the 'bear-shape' for now. I'm quite sure that there will be no ridicule on this messageboard, nor barely (or even bearly) concealed hostility but your posting does lead to some obvious questions.
The usual name of the constellations are Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, but throughout your post you have used the word 'Ursus' (as in the bear genus name); is there a reason for this? On Google Earth the area is represented by three images over a 10 year period, only one of which seems to show the bear-shape. Can I ask again (as I did in the original thread) whether you have investigated any other aerial photographs of this site? English Heritage has a huge collection of such items. As you say yourself commonsense dictates that the bear-shape must be recent. A mesolithic landscape image over 10,000 years in age is just not possible I would submit, although. Mendip was not covered by ice in either the Anglian or Devensian periods of glaciation. But during the glacial maxima it was not a warms and sunny spot!
Your second paragraph hints that earlier research may have led you to expect a representation of a bear-shape in the Churchill / Shipman area. May I ask what this research was, and what was responsible for your expectation? Although archaeoastronomy is not one of my interests I have no problem with supposing our remote ancestors were awed and fascinated by the night sky, seen without modern light pollution. Proving that steller alignments are represented by standing stones, or similar monuments, on the ground is terribly difficult. Over the centuries stones may be broken, or subject to earth movements, or be re-erected (or improved) by antiquarians! Your later paragraphs mention the Cerne Abbas Giant. Does this mean that you don't subscribe to the recent view that this hill-figure is post-Medieval?
Anyway, as a friendly gesture, may I suggest you Google the images of βOld Scatnessβ bear. Now that is a bear....!
Kind regards,
TP -
Message 3
Posted by MendipTim (U13707598) on Tuesday, 5th October 2010
Thank you TP, I knew I could rely upon you. I have to admit that my natural inclination is to agree with every point you make. It would have been a bigger disappointment to me if I'd convinced the respected TP without a shred of evidence!
I will give you a fuller reply when I have more time, & have had a chance to fully digest & consider your points. However I will quickly state that these events with the Sun & Ursus Ma do happen, both Google Earth & the sky chart I use show them. However great a manipulator I may be I can not change the Stars & the Sun.
I tried to be fair in my post & highlighted some of the counter arguments. What isn't fair is that I'm having to work with one arm tied behind my back. Following the events with the bulldozers I can not disclose several important pieces of evidence for the moment. I need to know they will be protected before I can reveal them; otherwise I will take the knowledge to the grave & hope that someone rediscovers them in a later age.
I don't know you TP, but I'm inclined to trust you after numerous friendly battles & you have the brains I need. If it was possible I would be happy to supply you with the evidence.
Thank you. -
Message 4
Posted by MendipTim (U13707598) on Wednesday, 6th October 2010
Hi TP,
Sorry for my brief reply yesterday. I will try to answer some of your well made points.
I have always been interested in religions but none of them has ever made any impact upon me, I've never felt the need for one. I don't think that there is much doubt that an ancient Bear cult existed: Ceremonial sites apparently devoted to the Bear have been found from Alaska to Israel with many around the Alps. That doesn't look like a Cult to me (we have plenty of them in & around Glastonbury!) but a full blown religion. What has never been explained is why the belief. Man's best friend/ worst enemy in the forest; supplier of food & clothing etc. have all been proposed, but none of them are "wow! I'm going to bow down & worship you." reasons. Virtually every religion that has existed believes in some form of Godly deity residing in the heavens, so it is most likely that is where the Deity of the Bear followers lived.
It still lives on with us today. Who wasn't disappointed as kids when someone pointed out the Bear & all you could see was a saucepan in the sky: but we still go through life accepting it & out of all the Stars on a cold wet night the Bear is most comforting to see. No other animal comes close to the Bear's influence on the languages of the Northern Hemisphere. Folklore & Nursery Rhymes throughout the region abound with references to the Bear & most countries use or have used the Bear as an important National symbol.
These influences didn't just happen by accident, this is living archaeology - Archaeology of the Brain if you like. Deep within us the Bear has more influence upon us than even our natural ancestor, the Ape.
Photography, like Archaeology, is a Science; but luckily there are many different ways to take a picture. I fully appreciate that many renowned experts & Schools of Learning have spend years or even centuries trying to understand the key to the Stones & that my 1,000 hours of mish-mash thinking is not worthy along side their great works. I'm sure that will probably turn out right, however people who spend Β£50 a week on the Lottery often never win the Jackpot, whilst someone who spends Β£1 once might win. Why would anyone think to look at something that can't be seen? I doubt you would get your research grant if you proposed that project.
As I've discovered to my cost many times every shape seems Bear-like. They come in all shapes & sizes, walking, running, standing. swimming, crouching, asleep on their sides, back, front: And each from 360 x 360 different angles. So please don't ask me what looks Bear-like. Part of the evidence that I can't disclose at moment will confirm that this is a Bear. It may just be a co-incidence but after walking (& trespassing) on Mendip for 30 years & no-one ever pointing a gun at me, twice in the last month I have found myself staring down the muzzle of very high powered sniper's rifles with camouflaged operatives whilst I've been on Common Land. Whatever, its enough to make me wary.
Why didn't I distinguish between Ursus Ma & Mi? I don't really know; I was about to correct it on the read through but something stopped me; somehow I think they may be connected, but that really is pure fantasy, at least for now.
My first recollection of the enclosure is when I was about 9 years old & on a Wild Goose Chase with my brothers: an Adder was blocking the path so I had to go over a bank to escape it & my brothers. It was always an overgrown mess of Bracken & Bramble. It was quite a shock one day when I found that all the undergrowth had been cleared. That would have close to the date that the Google image was captured. In the early Google images The area has much denser growth. By overlaying the images in Photoshop it looks like the shape was always there, but that its unused paths had become so overgrown that they are barely detectable. I suspect that any aerial photograph will show much the same as the early Google images.
I can not disagree with your view about a landscape marking over 10,000 years old. 2,000 yes; 5,000 probably; 10,000 maybe just; but 20,000 no way. But 20,000 was the starting date, not the last marking date which could be only 2, or 3,000 years ago. Plus the natural instinct of humans & other animals is to follow existing paths, so it could be continuously & unconsciously be being re-marked, and will for as long as animals have legs. It must have been a glacial maxima up there on Monday evening!
To explain why I was looking for Ursus Minor would take far too long. (& I would need to refresh my memory first). Dating the Cerne Abbas Giant is the same as at Burrington. I definitely don't think it was originally post-Medieval but in times of disease & famine it would not surprise me if it wasn't re-marked; any source of help & salvation would have been welcome.
Thank you for reminding me of Old Scatness - but you call that a Bear! Its Nessie on legs!
Thank you & Best wishes.
Tim. -
Message 5
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Wednesday, 6th October 2010
Hi Tim
I can't really argue with you on the subject of a bear religion. We know so little about prehistoric forms of worship in Britain that almost anything is possible. Bears are extraordinarily impressive, and rather dangerous, mammals; well worth placating one might think.
The Palaeozoologists could probably tell you when the species became extinct in various parts of the country. You will understand that I'd like to be sure that bears survived the Neolithic in southern Britain before entirely embracing your views! I'm glad you like the Pictish bear. Could the artist have witnessed one roaming the glens of Atlantic Scotland in the Iron Age? If not where did the image originate?
One of the cherished liberties that we all should enjoy is our right to devote our time to those academic interests that seem worthy to us. This, of course, doesn't guarantee that such academic interests are necessarily worthwile. But then, as a devoted collector of 19th century bricks, I am aware that I can't possibly claim the moral high ground in this discussion! Still the fact remains that I don't find Ursus arctos quite so omnipresent in landscape and literature as you do.
I'm sorry to be a wet blanket but in my view all the chalk hill figures, except the Uffington white horse, are modern. References to the Wilmington Long Man and Cerne Abbas Giant do not pre-date the 17th C and both figures are close to monastic buildings whose inhabitants, surely, would not have tolerated vast pagan images as near neighbours. Could a path or figure image lie 'latent' in the soil but be exposed unconsciously from time to time. That's too much like ley-lines for me to feel comfortable.
Anyway, I'll break off here and await the views of other posters.
Best wishes,
TP -
Message 6
Posted by MendipTim (U13707598) on Wednesday, 6th October 2010
Hi,
Quickly: I think you & the church Are denying our past. Many ancient religious sites have been adopted later by the Christian church. Mendip; a sparsely populated area has Wells Cathedral, Bath & Glastonbury Abbeys. Even the very large Tumulus at Carnac has a Church built on top of it. Stonehenge has Salisbury Cathedral nearby.
Thank you. -
Message 7
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Wednesday, 6th October 2010
Hi Tim
Equally quickly.
Salisbury Cathedral must be at least 15km from Stonehenge. In a densely populated island like Britain that is really nowhere near. There must be plenty of supermarkets within 15km of many prehistoric monuments, and no one suggests continuity.
You can argue a case for the deliberate placing of Christian places of worship on pagan sites but there is plenty of negative evidence too. There are churches at Avebury and Knowlton Henge, but not at Stonehenge or Arbor Low for example. There is a church next to the great monolith at Rudston, but not next to the Devil's Arrows, Boroughbridge.
This topic really deserves a thread to itself!
TP -
Message 8
Posted by MendipTim (U13707598) on Thursday, 7th October 2010
Hi TP
It would make an excellent thread; far better than this one. Please don't hold your breath while you await the views of other posters as I don't think there will be any. The dreaded wall of silence has struck again.
I think that the only decent option is to admit that it was all a Dallas Dream & leave the thread. I sincerely thank you TP for your input, it has been really appreciated.
Best wishes
Tim. -
Message 9
Posted by NCH (U9519230) on Monday, 11th October 2010
Had a look at Google Earth.
Can see an elephant on one date!
Not being flippant but are you not sure this is just dog-walkers routes as they change through the years?
Also, if there was such a bear cult in early British history, shouldn't there be massive collections of bear teeth etc found with early grave sites (necklaces et al)of prehistic Britons?
Nice to see that the changes in star positions have been taken into account, mind.
Still, for me, a poorly-looking bear.
Regards.
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