Stones and Drones

Another video from my trip to Cornwall. Apart from catching up with immediate family - like mother and brother - this was something of a working mini-break as I needed some extra material for a book I've written and which my agent is currently pitching.

Enjoy the scenery.

And some photos:

Carwynnen Quoit

I wrote a whole blogpost about Cornish quoits vback in 2022 (see here). Also known as dolmens or table stones or cromlechs or portal stones, these are structures that feature a 'capstone' sitting flat on top of several upright stones.

No one is completely sure when, why and by whom the earliest dolmens were made. They are generally all regarded as tombs or burial chambers, despite the absence of clear evidence for this. Human remains, sometimes accompanied by artefacts, have been found in or close to the dolmens which could be scientifically dated using radiocarbon dating. However, it has been impossible to prove that these remains date from the time when the stones were originally set in place and some may have been erected as much as 7000 years ago.

However, we know precisely when Carwynnen Quoit (AKA the Giant's Quoit), near Camborne, was erected. It was 2014.

To be fair, it was there for a long time before that but it was knocked over by a tractor back in the late 1966. It then remained as nothing but a pile of stones for a long time. However, a campaign led by archaeologist Pip Richards got the quoit re-erected a decade ago. And, thankfully, there were old photographs to help make sure it was done correctly.

Pip got to see the final rebuild but, sadly, died a a couple of years later. She's actually buried in a corner of the field - now called 'Pip's Field' and an old schoolfriend of mine called Kevin Maegor was a pall bearer. 'She had a pagan funeral,' he told me. 'Her coffin was placed under the quoit and the assembled crowd sang folk songs accompanied by a fiddle band. A very moving yet different experience.'

The world needs more Pips.

A Tour of Helston

 A video walk about in the central area of Helston in Cornwall, one of the towns in which I grew up.

And a few photos from the day:

The mysterious Stone of Mawgan-in-Meneage

I'm on a whistlestop five day trip to Cornwall to conduct some research for a book project I've been writing for the past couple of years. More news on that as it happens.

Today I was out and about on The Lizard peninsula and, passing through the village of Mawgan-in-Meneage, I spotted this stone that I remembered from my youth.

The stone is inscribed but has been so worn by the Cornish weather that it is no longer readable. However, based on an old drawing and a photograph taken in 1936, it could have been a memorial stone to either 'Cnegumus son of Genaius' or 'Genaius son of Cnegumus'. The date of this inscription is not certain beyond having been carved before the twelfth century.

These days, there's a slate plaque at its foot that carries what we believe the inscription says plus a quote that I've not been able to source. 

Any ideas?

A pretty little village too.

Another rambling brambling ramble

Another rambling ramble.

Off to Cornwall

What it says on the tin.

Bridge of Sighs

Next time you're in London and you happen to be anywhere near the Thames at Westminster, do have a look over the side of the Hungerford foot bridge as you cross. What you'll spot below, on the base of the bridge's supports, are hundreds of skateboards.

These commemorate the life of skateboarder Timothy Baxter who was brutally beaten unconscious and thrown into the Thames in 2000. His friend Gabriel Cornish was also similarly attacked but survived.

At the trial of the group of youths responsible - who said they had carried out the unprovoked attack for fun - Judge Ann Goddard said that they had shown no mercy to Baxter and were guilty of "heartless, gratuitous violence". Three of the gang received life sentences.

Historically, bridges have always been viewed as special places - symbolic, liminal paths that lead from one place to another. You find them in many religions, for example. Writer Fred Andersson describes them like this: 

'The bridge as a liminal space is a way for us to travel safely and still explore life, and maybe even experience something strange, without interfering with civilization in general. The bridge is there to help us overcome stuff but also move us forward to our intended — or unknown — destination. To me, the bridge symbol always makes me think of adventure — what’s on the other side? What will meet me? Or greet me?'

In the past, the heads of traitors were displayed on them. In the modern age, people attach padlocks to them to remember loved ones lost or to mark their love for someone else, such as these I spotted on a road bridge in Dublin and on a river bridge in Bristol.

In anthropology, liminality (from Latin līmen 'a threshold') is the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of a rite of passage, when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition to the status they will hold when the rite is complete. During a rite's liminal stage, participants "stand at the threshold" between their previous way of structuring their identity, time, or community, and a new way (which completing the rite establishes).

Life is full of these kinds of rites of passage and the bridge becomes a metaphor.

Interesting isn't it?

A miniature world

I was walking the dog yesteday and as I passed by the old barn that acts as the village council building I spotted a concrete and aggregate bollard that Nature is slowly overhelming.

Photographed from above it looked like a miniature green world.

Life finds a way.

 

An encounter with a Red Kite

Red Kites are big birds of prey. And, around this area of the Chiltern Hills, they're as common as pigeons. To what can we attribute their success? Well, for starters, they're not really hunters like their cousins the buzzard, the sparrowhawk and the kestrel. They're scavengers, which is why you'll see hordes of them following the plough on farmers' fields. Worms are easy pickings. And the recent heavy rains and saturated soil has brought thousands to the surface this past week and the Kites have had a feeding frenzy. There's also the fact that the Thames Valley has more motorway than any other region in the country including the M1, M4, M40 and M25. That's a lot of carrion. 

If you want a good view of Red Kites, simply throw a broken up chicken carcase into your garden. It'll take them a while to build up the courage to retrieve it - they're quite cowardly for such a big bird - but once one does it, they'll all come down. I took these photos through my kitchen window about six years ago.