Tag Archives for stonehenge replica

Field of the Rat: Modern Megaliths of Spain

lewoskyphoto by Jacobo Fraga, aka Lewosky

This monument was made for a very serious purpose: to memorialise the victims of pro-Franco repression, particularly those who died in terrible incidents in the area. Outside the  Galician city of A Coruna is an area called Campo de la Rata, or Field of the Rat, where this and another modern megalithic monument* are located. This one was designed by the artist Isaac Díaz Pardo.

Galicia is the Celtic province of Spain, and that may explain the tendency toward megaliths in these memorials, the myth of the Celtic culture being the megalith builders being very persistent. An inscription says, roughly, “Martyred in these fields before the murky sea for loving just causes.” It seems to be playing on that same idea of sacrifice at Stonehenge as at the Maryhill, Washington State replica.

This photo seems to capture some of the tragic meaning and haunting memory of the monument. Nice work, Sr. Fraga!

How can we make a funny? Here we see the Stonehenge idea used well, to give gravitas to a piece of land that will forever commemorate the sad loss of life. Red paint, like blood, is streaked on some of the stones, and it almost as if those great stones represent the individuals who were tortured and put to death here.

Score: 7½ druids. No, it’s not a circle, and you can see here and here that the form is even more unusual than it looks above, but this sculpture, set on a spit of land that reaches out into the sea, captures a poignancy and a weight that brings it closer to the spirit of the original than one would expect. Beautiful!

*The other monument, Menhires por la Paz, a group of modern standing stones with a rectangular window in each one, can be seen here.

Stonehenge Railway: A Case of Lost History

Circleaphoto by Vin Callcut, with permission

(Warning: This post judged not suitable for irony-free zones.)

All right thinking people should be deeply grateful to Mr. Vin Callcut for unearthing the hitherto unknown story of the pre-Roman Stonehenge narrow gauge railway! How this important construction of the past eluded all serious historians until now is difficult to understand, but leave it to Clonehenge to be one of the first to get out the word. Come to us for all late-breaking Stonehenge news!

This startling revelation requires us to re-evaluate all we thought we knew about ancient Britain. That a Greek physicist came to Britain with Phoenician traders and built this brilliant amusement ride for Bronze Age Brits on holiday puts the lie to all those claims of the hard lives of our ancestors. Look at them–Newsflash: they were having just as good a time as we do! Heh. For the full story, see the Stonehenge Railway page [link]. This may be the best thing since Tamponhenge!

Sadly, the Romans came and, offended by the idea of a non-standard gauge, destroyed the railway as thoroughly as they did Carthage, rendering its existence virtually undetectable. Now you can see a replica for the first time, thanks to Vin Callcut, who built this model in a suitcase for easy travel. The size limits of the suitcase made it impossible to include all outlying stones and holes, but notice that the bluestones, the altar stone and possibly the heelstone (see photos on the page linked above), still standing in this model, are included.

Score: We’re looking at an 8 druid replica here, people! Just amazing. There is just one sad note to be added. Mr. Callcut sold this model to someone who had a hobby shop in Austin, Texas and has heard nothing of it since. He (and we) would love to know if it is still on display. If there are any readers in or near Austin, could you look into this for us? Stonehenge Railway, phone home!

[Note for those of you who work for English Heritage: it’s not too late to rebuild Stonehenge and put that railway on top once more. Think of the tourist revenues. Americans would love it!]

The Colour of Magic; Virgin Sacrifice Gone Awry!

COM clonehenge 3from Youtube

We have long thought that if there is a Heaven (and we could get into it), it must consist of new, unread Discworld books, and friendly people who like to discuss them as much as we do.  Discworld author Terry Pratchett has given us many hours of happiness, and we were bowled over to find, upon renting the Discworld movie The Colo(u)r of Magic last week, that it includes a Stonehenge replica.

On the Discworld, stone circles are the computers and druids are the IT specialists and hardware consultants. (Yes, there is a Discworld and Pratchett Wiki. Get over it.) Here’s a druid line from The Light Fantastic: “They’re having trouble with the big circles up on the Vortex Plains. So they say, anyway; I wished I had a bronze torc for every user who didn’t read the manual.”

In the scene above, Twoflower, the Discworld’s first tourist, is intervening in a druid ritual, for although he appreciates its ethnic charm and primitive simplicity, he objects to the actual killing of the virgin . . . The druids aren’t thrilled to have him interfere, and the plot carries on from there.

Silly stuff, definitely, but as always Pratchett uses silly stuff to address serious issues sideways and to lampoon cliches and human foibles. Score for this replica: 6 druids. [Later correction by one P.G.: 7 Wizzards and an ArchChancellor] It’s just some trilithons, but one of those  druids is awarded for the gentle jab at society’s  romanticising of the henge builders and users. But without all that romanticising there wouldn’t be so many replicas, now, would there? And then where would we be?

Candy Corn Henge: Our Sweet Tooth Acting Up Again

candy corn hengephoto by erne the ferle, with permission

As if you needed proof that we aren’t the best at what we do, now we’re posting a photo that good bloggers would set aside and post at Halloween. Nine or ten weeks from now, a classic trick-or-treat candy henge would be just the thing to post. To be honest, we did consider waiting. But then we thought, what if we never get to? Things happen–the world could end or else we could die, even before we finish this post! Life is so uncertain!

Ahem. Not only that, but we were running low on things to post and we did have this on hand . . .  All that aside, here’s another candy henge, made mostly of sugar and corn syrup and honey and food colouring. We like the touch of leaving some uprights un-linteled. Even without fallen stones, it gives that desired ruined flavour to the photo, helped out by the red Salisbury plain.

candy_corn_dancing_lg_whtIf you had asked us, we would not have guessed that candy corn would stand up like that. The ones without legs, we mean. We know the others can stand up–and even dance!

Score: 5½ druids. We’re getting soft in our old age. But look–we are nearly finished the post and we’re still alive after all. Sweet!

Stonehenge en la Playa: the Last Continent Obtained!

argentina 11photos by McConnell Franklin, with permission

Okay, folks. *rubs hands enthusiastically* A milestone! Those faithful readers who have been following the blog since early on (bless your hearts) know that we have two goals. One is to find a replica on every continent, and the other is to get astronauts to build one on the International Space Station. Well, today we are posting a Stonehenge replica from Argentina, in South America (hopefully you knew that but we’re not taking any chances), the last continent left unhenged. Congratulations to us!

This Stonehenge in the sand was built by McConnell Franklin and girlfriend Victoria this past spring on the beach by Lago Lacar, a lake at the base of the Andes Mountains in Argentina. He writes, “The water was a bit cool for swimming, so we ended up building a huge castle (complete with tables and chairs, a moat, paths, a fence, bridges, an archway, a drip forest, and a fountain) all out of parts that we found on the beach/in the water. . . We decided at some point that the picnic area would not be complete without a StoneHenge replica, so we spent quite a bit of time scouring the area for enough properly-sized red rocks and built the mini Henge.”

argentina 41The castle is an interesting construction. You can see all of it here. We couldn’t help but notice what could be burial mounds near the replica. But we may be misinterpreting. We have ancient sites on the brain. Note the photo series covers the collapse of the henge as waters encroached.

Okay, this is just three trilithons, but that’s better than many replicas we’ve posted. Score: 6 druids. Why not? It’s opened up a whole new continent. Clonehenge conquers the world! On to space, our final frontier!

Ogopogo Henge, British Columbia: Built by a Lake Monster?

samhain112photo by Juniper, with permission; henge by ???

Alert reader and now contributor Juniper left us this comment: “I have a pic for you of a replica Seahenge I came across walking along the beach of lake Okanagan, British Columbia (I should mention that this lake has a famous lake monster, the Ogopogo) It must have been made during Halloween as I found it it the day after. And I was walking with a real life Druid at the time!”

There is a lot for us to consider here. We avoided the whole “What is Seahenge?” thing by making the word a link in the quotation above. So now we just have Lake Okanagan, this Druid, and, best of all, the Ogopogo. Let’s look at this situation.

“Innocent” hedgewitch Juniper is walking along the shores of Okanagan Lake, known for its lake monster. It just happens to be All Saints’ Day and she happens to be with a “druid” and what do they find? This strange construction that seems to refer to both Seahenge and Stonehenge (note the lame attempts at lintels). We find this very suspicious. Come clean with us, Juniper!

We know about witches and how they consort with demons–and how Halloween night opens a door between the worlds. We suspect that Juniper, her druid and Ogopogo, Demon of the Deep, performed dark rituals around this circle of tree corpse parts that night. There were sinister doings in the land of the Okanagan Salish and who knows what strange forces were set into motion . . .

Or–possibly not. Heh.  It’s just that we would love to see lake monsters implicated in the building of henge replicas. Think of the publicity! At any rate, we want to thank Juniper for the kind mention of Clonehenge on her blog. And we would like her to consider changing from a hedgewitch to a hengewitch. Why not? It only takes one to get a movement started.

Score: 4 ½ druids. Or 6 Nessies!

Candyhenge, or The Little-Known Druid Years of Queen Frostine

candyhenge

photo by Toy Master, with permission

[note: it has come to our attention that our British friends may not have shared the joys of CandyLand as children. It is a board game peopled by fantasy characters like the beautiful Queen Frostine and the evil Lord Licorice. It was often the first game for children because the characters advanced by colored cards matching to colored spaces, with no numbers. And the story inside the lid of the game was some people’s first introduction to the fantasy genre.]

So here’s the plot: Queen Frostine makes an impulse marriage with the Jolly Rancher and together they decide to memorialise their love with a Stonehenge replica. Little do they know that over in the next kingdom a jealous Lord Licorice is breeding a race of sugar-eating bats . . .blah, blah . . . and then everything went horribly wrong! . . . blah, blah . . . happily ever after.

Who says we can’t write a screenplay? The truth is, plans for a Candyland movie do exist, and we doubt they’ll think of the exciting henge angle without our help. When someone sent us a link to this candy replica, we saw our chance to do some hinting. (We wanted Terry Gilliam to direct, but sadly it is not to be.)

Back to the henge. Ann from Heritage Key sent us the link to the picture, which is probably the most recently-made item in the Heritage Key Flickr group. We do like the colours and of course the juxtaposition of food on the ground adds that bit of squeamishness that can substitute for drama in a pinch. Score: 5½ druids. It’s just a ring of trilithons, after all, and it doesn’t quite have the charisma of sausage henge.

We think Hugh Laurie would make a great Lord Licorice! When you read this post, Hollywood movers and shakers, give us a call. We have more henge-movie ideas you’ll love!

BrickHenge at Last!

CD3brickhenge

photo and henge work by Dr. Thomas Grier, with permission

Somehow we got through 187 posts on Clonehenge (yes, 187. We’re as surprised as you are, believe me!) without posting a brickhenge. To quote an authority on Stonehenge replicas–that is to say ourselves–“anything vaguely rectangular and three-dimensional eventually becomes the material for a henge,” so brickhenges inevitably happen. Friend of the blog Simon Burrow blogged one, and there are others, even an album cover.  So how we managed to avoid posting one until now is hard to say. That is, unless you have no trouble pronouncing the word laziness.

But now, with the help of Tom Grier, professor at Winona State University in Minnesota, admirer of ancient sites, and, when it comes to visiting Stonehenge replicas, a spectacular repeat offender, we have a brickhenge to post without actually having had to type the word brickhenge into a search engine. Dr. Grier’s story goes like this:

“One day while crossing campus, camera in hand, I saw a neatly stacked pile of bricks, with one or two resting against each other. For some reason, it reminded me of Stonehenge. I spent a moment or two rearranging a few bricks– with students and faculty walking by and snickering– then took a few photos. This was done just to amuse myself.”

This is common in the afflicted. The henge form is able to manipulate the volition centers of the brain in a way that fools the victim into believing that he or she thought of and executed the construction of his own free will. This usually works more efficiently with alcohol, but some very sensitive individuals, especially those who look at too many replicas or photos of Stonehenge, can be made slaves to the henge parasite while in a sober state. (Of course, we don’t know Grier and we may be making a false assumption there!)

Yes, it is the traditional circle of trilithons often resorted to by the less serious replica builder, and, yes, that three-brick construction closest to the camera is unorthodox, but we don’t always subtract druids for that. And of course there is the courage exhibited by persisting despite the snickers of students and other faculty. Score: 6½ druids.

You will hear from Dr. Grier again. He has promised us an overview of his visits to several of the replicas we have listed, and we await them eagerly. Meanwhile, we recommend you visit his remarkable and beautiful photo gallery.  We end with this post script: “By the way, sadly, BrickHenge stood proudly on campus nearly a full week, until some stone mason used the resources to finish a stone paver base for a wrought-iron campus bench. Ironic, isn’t it?”

Wrought-ironic, we would say . . .

Handhenge, by Guido Daniele

atet_stonehengeposted without permission, just with a big honking copyright mark

Yes, it’s distasteful to post a picture with an advertised product and, yes, it’s distasteful to post a picture with a big copyright claim across it. But lordy, folks, ain’t this’n worth it? This ranks right up there with Clotheshenge as far as we’re concerned. Bravo, Mr. Guido Daniele! Well done.

What we like is what in another medium might be called the painterly effect. Hands actually look almost nothing like megaliths. But with colour and angle and context the photograph communicates Stonehenge without having to look just like it.

Others have toyed with the handhenge concept, but with fingers as the uprights: see here and here. We have never seen one like this before.

We have to hand it to him–he didn’t go digital. Heh. Sorry–we felt some pressure and knuckled under. Guess we just fingered that you’d play along. Oh, yeah: Nailed it! (I’ll bet you wish you were . . . armed?) [still need a palm and a thumb joke here . . .]

Sorry! Had to get that out of our system. Score: 7 druids for a great presentation. Our thanks to student/artist friend of the blog, Truman Lahr, and to input-output analysis guru Michael Lahr for bringing this to our attention.

#lameclaimtofame: On the page at this link, Guido Daniele is shown with Keith Haring, who went to the same school we did and whose picture is in our high school yearbook. Henges bring us full circle!

Puppyhenge

cute pictures of puppies with captions

The placement of the white puppies is said to align with the solstice and equinox.

It was brought to our attention by alert contributor Feòrag that Ihasahotdog.com, partner site to our longtime favorite, Icanhascheezburger.com, entered the henging arena this week with the above post. Nice!

This is not the first time dogs have been involved. You may remember Bonehenge, in which the labrador Winnie was testing her henge for alignments, and Doghenge, consisting primarily of toy dogs.

Gee, things weren’t so serious around here back then! One day soon maybe we’ll do a post mentioning some of our more unusual Stonehenge replicas. It’s not all science and museums in the henge business. There’s a lot of stupidity involved, too, and far be it from us to leave that behind!