Stone Circles and Sacredness

Stone circles have always fascinated me. The sheer amount of work needed to make them considering the resources and technology available at the time and the mystery surrounding their purpose combined with their alignments with various solar and lunar positions make them for me monuments to wonder itself. The complexity and intricacy of Stonehenge is a large part of its character as the interpretive image (below) from a 2014 Guardian article illustrates. But Castlerigg’s charm is in its comparative simplicity: from the lack of horizontal lintels to the flattening of the northeast arch of the ‘circle’ which makes it more of an oval, this monument gives me that feeling of amateur love and enthusiasm that sometimes can fade in professional execution. It’s like the difference between an under-21s and Premiere-football match, or like the difference between a International and Major-League baseball game. There is just something fresh and hopeful about Castlerigg. The stunning peaks circling the monument add to the sense that anything that humankind will ever build on that spot will be but a shadow of what nature has already provided. Somehow, the oval with its asymmetrical sanctuary stones are just right.

Yet again I am nattering on about our recent visit to the Lakes. There was a sign at the entrance stating that a famous poet whose name I have forgotten visiting Castlerigg some years ago was disappointed by the large number of tourists. The large crowds apparently spoiled the atmosphere of sacredness for which he was searching. I have to agree. Although the numbers present on the day of our visit could hardly be said to constitute a crowd, their tendency to drape themselves and their belongings on the ancient stones carried with it a certain lack of awe and consideration for what might be experienced at this monument that I too felt disappointed. I remember having a similar feeling at Stonehenge. Although, there, ropes keep visitors from the sacrilege of indifference, I did have this urge to wait until everyone was gone and sneak a cheeky glance at Mother Gaia from that most intimate of perspectives: from inside the circle!

Reading about the disappointment of the poet from another time got me to thinking about sacredness. I suspect now that sacredness is not something we find when we go to mystical locations. It is something that we bring with us. We make these spaces by our behaviour in them. And because sacredness requires vulnerability, it only comes out when it is quiet. It reminds me of something that acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton said about deer drinking from a creek: the noise of the creek blocks its ability to make surveillance, so…it drinks and then it moves back into a quiet place so it can continue to be secure. Because sacredness will not come out in the noise of other’s indifference, it can only come out when we are alone or if the others with us are also bringing the vulnerability of sacredness into the space as well. No matter how thirsty we are for sacredness, just like Hempton’s deer, it will not linger in an unsafe space.

Photo Credits

Looking up at Castelrigg: My beloved
Me at Castelrigg: My beloved
Stonehenge Interpretation: The Guardian