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British Hill Figures include horses, dragons,male figures, chariots and at Fovant in Hampshire, a vast array of modern military insignia. Many remain obscure but have lingered for many centuries in folk traditions. Speculation is rife. Daniken addicts favour the ET hypothesis where they were created to attract back superior beings who at some time in our history supposedly created the networks of stone circles spanning these islands. Less fanciful ideas suggest they were god-effigies cut by Celtic tribes to enhance the power of the priest-cults. |
The Long Man of Wilmington OS: TQ 544035 The Long Man of Wilmington lies on a north facing hillside of the South Downs. He's 231 feet tall and latest research suggests he was only carved out in the mid-16th century. His names are many - St Paul, King Harold,a sun-god. The two staves suggest he could have been a surveyor - or possibly even a dowser. But could the Long Man be a memorial to those who laid out the network of ley-lines that appear to run throughout the country? Is this enigmatic figure an echo of a past time when we recognised the power of earth energies that came to be marked with standing stones, ancient sites, moats and pathways? Author and doswer, the late Tom Lethbridge also found a giant figure carved on Wandlebury Hill near Cambridge. Its design is more like to the Cerne Abbas figure. but it remains to be fully excavated. |
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The Cerne Abbas Giant Near Cerne Abbas, in Dorset. (OS:ST 667016) This 180 ft long effigy was thought to have been the Roman God, Hercules. It is possible that he was the fertility God of the Celtic Durotriges.Earlier names include Helith - a solar name. Now in October 2003 latest research seems to show he was only created in the mid sixteenth century. Above him lies the Trendle,or Frying Pan, a rectangular earthwork which some suggest could have been a pen holding sacrificial victims for the appalling custom of the Wicker-Man. Here a giant wicker figure might have been erected on the site and young girls and men burned inside it. As the May Day sun rises exactly in alignment with the figure, looking up to the head, it is clearly linked with the Celtic Festival of Beltane. This, the most potent time of the year, was celebrated when a May Pole was erected at the tip of the 8ft long penis. Even in these hardened times, women still visit the giant to lie on his phallus overnight hoping for a miraculous conception. During the second world war, the Giant, like other hill figures, was completely camoufluaged to prevent the German bombers using it as a sight line en route to bomb the city of Bristol, to the North. |
