What is the link between Machu Picchu in Peru, the islands of Tennerife and a hill in Wiltshire? Intrigued? Well read on.
On Saturday I went for a walk with Nick a dear friend of mind in Avebury, just south of Swindon off the M4. I had wanted to visit and explore this part of the world for some time and when Nick and I had agreed to get together I immediately suggested a trip to Avebury. What a beautiful day we had chosen for our walk! The sky was a light blue flecked with high clouds and the sun shone with enthusiasm onto the broad countryside that characterises that county. The landscape was a brilliant tapestry of yellow, greens and browns like some expensive eiderdown laid over the bare earth.
We met up in the village and after a quick cup of tea set off to explore the Avebury Henge, a stone circle that completely surrounds the village. This part of Wiltshire is absolutely littered with megalithic monuments, the most famous of course being Stonehenge just a few miles further south. The word Henge denotes a prehistoric structure, usually an arrangement of stones in a circle or oval. Although Stonehenge is the most famous, Avery Henge is the largest, being indeed the largest stone circle in Europe. It was built about five thousand years ago which makes it older than Stonehenge by possibly one thousand years. Having been decimated in the seventeenth and eighteenth century it was restored in the twentieth century by a wealthy amateur archaeologist called Alexander Keiller. He replaced all the stones that he could find, the place of missing stones being indicated by concrete markers.
Well enough of the history lesson. Nick and I started our walk near the rather delightful Henge Shop which stocks a large number of books of which I bought at least three. The first rock we came across is known as the Blacksmiths rock as it was originally found in pieces at the blacksmith’s and had to be glued back together. Indeed it was possible to see where the large slabs of rock had been glued with what I can only imagine is a particular strong brand of superglue. The guide book for this section claimed that it was possible to see the blacksmith’s chisel at the base of the stone but neither Nick nor I was able to see anything. The Avebury Henge is an International Heritage Site and of course a National Historical Monument but this didn’t stop Nick from giving it a good kick, whether in a fit of pique because the aforesaid chisel was not in view or to ascertain in some perverse way the strength of the glue I’m not sure, but I was grateful that the glue held otherwise our walk could have started with a major national incident.
Moving quickly on. We made our way round part of the ring and crossed the road (whilst Nick stopped to admire the engineering in the gate mechanism – not I hasten age prehistoric in origin) and found ourselves by a very large stone known as the devil’s chair which had a small seat recess whether by human work or a natural feature of the rock I’m not sure. We both stopped to take photographs of each other sitting on the seat.
Walking up a small embankment we were able to gain a good view over the stone circle as well as the avenue of stones that led away and was obviously the original entrance route used by our prehistoric ancestors. We decided to walk down the avenue of stones and were rewarded with a delightful stroll past these impressive megaliths, the grass all covered with the most wonderful carpet of yellow buttercups and dandelion seed heads. Arriving at the end of the avenue we found a signpost for Silbury hill pointing out a path than ran up the side of a steep hill. We took this path and made our way up, with I must say much puffing and panting on my part, and over the other side where we had a magnificent view across to Silbury hill.
Silbury Hill was the reason that I wanted to visit this area in the first place. The hill itself is quite amazing being the largest man made mound in Europe. It is over 40 metres high and covers about 5 acres of land. It was built about 5 thousand years ago, the same time as the Avebury Henge and it has been estimated that it would have taken 18 million man-hours to build the mound with the 248,000 cubic metres of earth and fill needed. That would equate to 500 men working for 15 years, no small feat for a so called primitive society.
But the purpose of the mound remains a complete mystery. There have been several shafts dug into the hillside but all these have done is made the mound unstable so that visitors nowadays are not allowed to walk it at all. No evidence of human remains has ever been found so the idea that it was a burial mound seems unlikely. Of course the lack of a purpose for the mound just adds to its air of mystery and this is where I return to the connection with Peru and Tennerife.
Last February we holidayed on Tennerife and on the last day of our stay we visited the Thor Heyerdahl museum there which included an unearthed step pyramid on the island. We were very interested in this, partly because we had been talking about our desire to visit Machu Picchu in Peru, although post diagnosis this has had to take a bit of a back seat. In the museum there was a wall with photographs of all the steps pyramids across the world in exotic places such as Egypt, Asia and of course South America, but in amongst them was a picture of …. Silbury Hill. We were so startled to see that we have our own step pyramid in England just a few miles from home that I said there and then that we must visit it when we get back. Hence my desire to visit this part of Wiltshire.
However, it turns out that Silbury Hill is not a step pyramid at all, it fact you can see as you approach it more closely that it was built in a spiral pattern, so it seems that this little theory by Thor Heyerdahl turns out to be as discredited as many of his other theories.
Well, regardless of any of that I was delighted to have seen the hill for myself and a short walk away was another spectacular megalithic structure in the form of West Kennet Long Barrow. This definitely was a burial mound and was well worth a visit. Access was entirely open and it was possible to penetrate a fair distance into the barrow and marvel at the various chambers and the skills that our ancestors displayed. Very happy with our visits we made our way back to Avebury via another path and arrived back at the Red Lion pub with a hearty appetite and, in my case, a developing blister on my left foot.
After a very pleasant lunch we jumped in the car and drove round to the Ridgeway near a white horse cut into the hillside. These chalk ‘white horses’ seem to abound in this area and many are marked on the road map. The Ridgeway is an eighty mile ancient pathway that goes all the way to London. Our plan was to walk just the 1.7 miles to and from Barbury Castle which is a twelve acre set of earthworks used in prehistoric times and apparently the site of a battle between the West Saxons and the Britons in AD 556 at the Battle of Beran Byrig. The Saxons won.
We set off in good spirits and admired the superb views across the gentle rolling countryside that the Ridgeway afforded. A light breeze made for pleasant walking which I’m sure would have felt stifling without the soothing wind. The bright yellow of fields covered with Rapeseed alternated with the rich verdant greens of grasses and the brown earth speckled with white clumps of chalk across the open landscape.
Although the path was a relatively easy walk I found it increasingly difficult as I was tiring and the blister on my left foot was beginning to hurt significantly. Unfortunately one of the side effects of my cancer treatment is weight gain and I have put on about one and a half stone in the past year. My feet also appear to have swollen somewhat and my walking boots, which had been perfectly comfortable before were proving far too tight. By the time we returned to the car I knew that I could not have walked much further. In total I estimate that we must have walked between six and seven miles during the day, which I feel is a disappointingly short walk. I would have hoped to be able to comfortably walk much further.
But none of this detracted from a wonderful day, having visited a number of major megalithic sites, walked through a beautiful landscape in glorious sunshine, and of course best of all, shared this all in the company of a good friend. What more could you ask for?
