Stone Henge

Whenever I think of Stonehenge, the mysterious, droning chant of a thousand druids starts to play in my head (in much the same way "doink doink" pops up when I think of Law and Order). The druids, however, didn't really have anything to do with Stonehenge. John Aubrey, this antiquary and writer, first suggested in the 1600s that the Henge was constructed by Druids; there isn't any evidence for this, although today's revived Druids certainly seem to like the place. 

When my September Program group arrived in the Stongehenge parking lot in Amesbury, a rag-tag group of Stonehenge junkies were in the process of leaving. Perhaps "junkie" is too strong a word. These modern-day druids looked more like aging hippies than anything else, and I can't blame them for wanting to enjoy the site before it actually "opened." Yes, Stonehenge has opening and closing hours. They also have Stonehenge Cafe, Stongehenge gift shop, and Stonehenge WC.

This awesome circle of rocks has a role in one of the greatest legends (if not the greatest legend) in all Britannia: King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. In 1136, Geoffrey of Monmouth, a cleric and major figure in the development of the Arthurian tales, wrote The History of the King's of Britain. 

According to his text, the rocks of Stonehenge were healing rocks called the Giant's Dance, which giants had brought from Africa to Ireland for their healing powers. Aurelius Ambrosias (fifth century ruler), wanting to erect a memorial to the 3,000 nobles who had died in battle with the Saxons. At Merlin's advice, he chose the mystical Giant's Dance rocks for this purpose. Merlin, Uther Pendragon (Arthur's father), and 15,000 knights made their voyage to Ireland and slew thousands of Irishmen (for very little reason, I'm sure). Try as they might, however, they were unable to make the magic rocks budge. Merlin, using his mysteriously mad skillz, easily dismantled the stones and sent them to Britain, where they stand today. Soon after, Aurelius died and was buried beneath the monument, or "The Giant's Ring of Stonehenge." 
Another folktale from the seventeenth century surrounds one of the outlying stones, called the Friar's Heel. The Devil bought the stones from a mystical old woman in Ireland, wrapped them up, and brought them to Salisbury plain. While constructing the stone circle, the Devil began to think very highly of his work and genius and boasted that no one in the nearby village would be able to count all the stones. After about a dozen different village folk came up with varying counts, a local friar sidled up to the Devil and said that "there are more than can be counted." This was an appropriate answer, and the Devil became so cross at being proven wrong that he picked up one of the great stones and hurled it at the friar, where it struck him on the heel. The stone stuck in the ground and is still there today as the Heelstone.

The story of the Friar's Heel varies from source to source. Sometimes the Devil bets that the stones cannot be counted the same way twice; in others, the Devil throws at the stone because the Friar is spying on him; in one other, the Devil boasts that no one will ever guess why the Henge was constructed, and the Friar contradicts him.

But the Devil might be right. No one today truly knows why or by whom Stonehenge was constructed.

There are so many theories and stories behind the reason for Stonehenge, and yet I am still most awed by its sheer existence. People decided to move giant rocks and place them in a circle. Many of these rocks come from about 25 miles away. The bluestones come from about 150 miles away. These rocks weigh up to 50 tons. And people decided to construct this thing in the middle of nowhere. Fields and hills for miles, and then Stonehenge. I keep asking myself, why did they build it there? And there very well may be a decent theory out there, but all I can think of is Neil Gaiman's American Gods passage:

No, in the USA, people still get the call, or some of them, and they feel themselves being called to from the transcendent void, and they respond to it by building a model out of beer bottles of somewhere they’ve never visited, or by erecting a gigantic bat house in some part of the country that bats have traditionally declined to visit. Roadside Attractions: people feel themselves being pulled to places where, in other parts of the world, they would recognize that part of themselves that is truly transcendent, and buy a hot dog and walk around, feeling satisfied on a level they cannot truly describe, and profoundly dissatisfied on a level beneath that.

Gaiman is talking about the American version of exactly what happened here. For some reason, perhaps mystical and perhaps not, people were called to this little green spot to construct a circle of rocks. And even today, people come from all over the world to see it. They may come to see an agreed-upon World Marvel, they may come for the mysticism of the Ancients, they may come to see some nifty Neolithic craftsmanship. But they come. And they see. And they leave feeling a little different than when they arrived. And I think that's pretty cool.