Avebury - The Largest Stone Circle in the World

An old fable tells the story of a city mouse coming to visit his country cousin. The city mouse arrives to the farm, is horrified by the mud, the cows, and fresh air, can’t appreciate the wholesome foods, and can only talk about how much better it is where he comes from. Having stood all that he could stand, he shakes clodded dust off his heels and leaves, but not before he invites his cousin to visit him in the wonderfully civilized place he calls home. Not so long later, wanting his own holiday, the country mouse takes his cousin up on the offer. On arriving to the city, he’s impressed by the buildings, enchanted by the activity, and delighted by the rich foods. That is, until the dogs are loosed in the house and chase the two mice with much fury away from their dinner. The country mouse goes home with the realization that safety is better than a luxury that comes with such fright.

The moral ends up being something like: better little with comfort than much with fear. Or: Be content with what you have. That kind of thing. 

 I feel a little like the city mouse when I arrive to Berwick Bassett. I’ve come by bus from London driving past such posh places as Harrods, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Natural History Museum which seems to take up an entire block all on its own. It’s not that I think the city is better, but I feel suddenly off balance as if I’d never lived for months at a time out in the middle of the wilderness all alone.

It’s that disconcerting contrast of place and time that takes me a moment to adjust to. Certainly, I’m getting the shaking up of routine and the constant newness that I intentionally created for myself for this year. Nevertheless, transition takes a little bit of conscious shifting. Or something like that. At any rate, it takes me a minute to remember how much easier it is to breathe in the open air rather than among the buildings that so often block out the sky. It takes me a minute to slow down to the tempo of the softly swaying trees. It takes me a minute to see the birds, to really see them.

I’m let off the bus around dusk at a little stop in what appears to be the middle of a field. There is a road going through it, but still. I’m the only one who gets off there. Trying to appear like I know what I’m doing, I stand and watch the bus disappear around the bend. With the dimming light of day, I check my directions, head across the road, and then down the lane that has a sign telling me I am in the right place after all.

In less than five minutes I’m at the house where I’ll be for the next week. It’s a cozy little cottage just over the bridge and past the stone wall. Berwick Bassett is a village of forty or so people. As I walk up to the house I wonder if the population number I’d seen was for people or if it included animals as well. It seems a small village indeed. Soon enough though, I’m inside. My things are set down. I’ve taken my outer jacket off.

“Would you like a cuppa?” my host asks. Something warm sounds lovely. So, we sit at the table and visit like old friends with our hands wrapped our tea cups.  

The next day after lingering over my coffee and breakfast, I take the local bus the two miles into Avebury. I had planned to walk the distance, but the road is surprisingly busy and there isn’t a sidewalk or footpath. It wouldn’t be an easy or very safe walk. And my day will be full enough of walking as it is. As I step on, I ask the bus driver if I could have a return (roundtrip ticket) and she says, “I don’t see why not, dearie,” as she takes my money and hands me my ticket and my change.

I get off at the Red Lion Pub. And, here I am in Avebury to see the stone circle that is maybe not as well known as Stonehenge but, according to the literature my host has left out for me, “undoubtedly the greatest.” What I know of Stonehenge comes from Eddie Izzard and what light Druid lore I’ve picked up in fiction. That’s not much to go on. What I know about the Avebury Stones is even less. My idea for the day is to wander around and get a sense of the place. Then I can learn about it and decide what I need to return to see or go out specifically to find.

The stones don’t take any effort to locate. The village is built in the middle of them. Eager to get up close, I head for the first one I see, go through a sheep gate, and, after carefully closing it behind me, I walk among the stones. The day is perfect. A bit chilly, a bit brisk in the wind, but the sun is out and the clouds make a painting of the sky. The stones vary in size and shape. Some are six feet tall and as wide, others are taller than that, ten feet, fifteen, and thinner. As far as I can tell, they haven’t been sculpted by humans into a particular form. They could have birthed themselves out of the earth itself, though I know that’s not true. The section I start in has a ditch with precisely sloped banks like a moat around it. Was it a moat? Why a moat?

I walk among these stones, past a set of trees with magic roots. One of the trees has ribbons tied to it. I try to recall what that is for. A wish for the kindness of fairies? A ribbon for a prayer? I can’t remember where I heard about it. I can’t remember what the ribbons mean. But I feel suddenly caught up in a different world. A Middle Earth without the orcs and fires of doom. A Narnia after winter has gone, or before it ever came. A much more ancient time than the one I had been present in when I stepped off the bus not so long ago.

I’m not the only one on the site, but I almost feel as if I am. I’m alone, but not lonely as I head out another gate, cross the road, and go through the gate on the opposite side. There, I wander through an avenue of short grass with stones to each side of me. An avenue of stones. I touch them gently as I go. I want to feel what it is to be so old. I want to see if they’re friends. A line goes through my head, it’s a verse from one of the Gospels which says, “even the stones will cry out.” I don’t quote it exactly right or use it in context, but I’ve always been struck by the idea of the rocks and stones having voice. Maybe they resonate with sound the way the stars do. I can’t tell by touch.

At the end of the avenue is yet another gate and a sign that informs walkers of the permissive accesses ahead. I read it carefully because I feel like a stranger, like a time traveler, like an interloper. I don’t want to do anything wrong in this place.

I take the path that leads me towards Silbury Hill. I walk past some grazing sheep that lift their heads to stare intently at me before rushing off. I tell them I don’t mean them any harm, but they don’t understand my English and I’m left to continue on my own.

At the top of Waden Hill I stop. There below me is Silbury Hill. It’s a strange mound. It, like the moat ditch, has precisely leveled sides, smooth as pyramids. If pyramids were shaped like volcano cones with grassy slopes. What is this place? 

It reminds me of the Peruvian Huacas which were sometimes burial mounds, sometimes places of ritual, sometimes temples. Revered places. Huacas.

I walk to the bottom of Waden Hill and ponder what I want to do. There’s more to walk here. I see people across the way at the top of another outlook. But in my hurry to leave the house I forgot my snacks and I’m already a mile or so from the town and still have things there to see. I’ve also got a week’s time here so I don’t have to cram everything in today.

As I stand there and think, a man wearing a tall backpack comes through the gate to my right. We might say hello, we might not, I can’t remember. Even though we both have our cameras out, it doesn’t seem the proper place to stop and have a chat. He walks on by. I stay put. His boots are muddier than mine.

After he’s gone, I head up the hill and back toward Avebury.

I’ve still got huacas on my mind and I wonder if this place was built at or around the same time. My mind is a sieve and I can’t remember during what dates those pre-Incan civilizations I’d once learned about existed; the Moche people, the Nazca. While I’m on that train of thought, I recall the Nazca Lines, those intricate and giant drawings found in the south of Peru. Some believe that aliens made those figures in the Peruvian desert sand. Maybe aliens made Silbury Hill and erected all these stones. Maybe the stone avenue I’ve just come through is an alien landing strip. The thought makes me smile.

Back in Avebury, I visit some of the shops, look through the gate at Avebury Manor, walk through the courtyard of the Great Barn, peek into the Dovecote, venture into the Church of St. James, and stop for dinner at the Red Lion while I wait for the bus time to roll back around.  

Then contented as a country mouse, I take the bus home, get back to the cottage under the light of the stars, and climb the stairs to my room. I still feel as if I’m in a different world, a different time. But I couldn’t tell you exactly when or where. In the end, though, I’m here, I’m me, just the same as I am no matter where I am or what time of history it is. Well, more or less the same.

*A brief online search reminds me that the Moche and Nazca people lived in Peru during the Early Intermediate period which is defined as from 200 BC to 600 AD. So, not the same time as this site at all.

*According to the National Trust’s guidebook on Avebury, the Neolithic period in the British Isles began around 4000 BC. The work on the great ditch and the surrounding bank began around 2600 BC. The stone circle was arranged over the next hundred or so years after that. 

The exact reasons for the stone circle are unknown. It could have been a place for celebrating, a place for ritual, it might have been considered a sacred place where connection with supernatural beings or ancestors was made possible. But, regardless of the reason, what can be known is that it was an important place to the Neolithic people and they spent an enormous amount of time, labor, and effort into building the site. 

Cleal, R. (2008). Avebury. The National Trust. Printed by Park Lane Press for National Trust (Enterprises) Ltd, Heelis, Kemble Drive, Swindon, Wilts SN2 2NA.

 

*Avebury Avenues by Esther Smith states, “After two centuries of investigation the purpose for Silbury Hill still remains a mystery.”

Smith, E. (2003). Avebury Avenues: The Way to Discover the Stone Circle. Forward Publications, 33 Shelburne Road, Calne, Wiltshire, SN11 8ER.

*The ribbons in the trees are called cloughties. And I wasn’t far off with my thoughts on why they’re put there. However, the lady I spoke with at the Alexander Keiller Museum said that this was not a place for them. That it is Americans who put them up and they really have nothing to do with this site whatsoever. She also thinks the alien idea is silly. 

This same museum lady also told me that the Avebury Stone Circle might have been a pilgrimage site. Although now it’s all covered over in grass and lichen, at that time the pilgrims who came walking along the Ridgeway would have seen the stark, chalk white mound of Silbury Hill and the chalk white stone circle with its chalk white sloped ditch sides. She said when the stones were first put up they would have been shiny. From a distance they would have sparkled like jewels against their chalk white background. That would have been something to see.

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