Fyfield Down, Wiltshire: photo © Mick Sharp

The Stonehenge sarsens were dragged from the Marlborough Downs 18 miles away, where they lie scattered on grassland like driftwood on the strand. The remnants of a siliceous sand layer which covered the chalk in Eocene times, 56 to 35 million years ago, they were shaped and smoothed with stone mauls and fitted together using woodworking techniques. At Avebury, the stones were left in a more natural state, but pillars, lozenges and triangular shapes were often chosen and arranged in ‘male’ and ‘female’ pairs, especially in the West Kennet Avenue. Many of the megaliths used in the Avebury complex were hauled down from the Fyfield area which is now part of a National Nature Reserve, one of the largest remaining tracts of high chalk downland in England. Does this sleeping giant still dream of joining her siblings in the dancehall of stones?

Castlerigg Stone Circle, Cumbria (English Heritage/National Trust): photo © Mick Sharp

Sun and storm fling shadows of the Keswick Carles across a grassy natural amphitheatre high in the Lake District hills. This large open circle of natural, close-set boulders may have been one of the earliest built in Britain. Thirty-eight stones survive from the original forty-two which were arranged in a slightly flattened circle with a NNW-SSE axis. Its entrance gap at the north is flanked by two tall stones and there is an enigmatic rectangular setting of low stones attached to the inside of the ring at the ESE. Situated just a few miles north of one of the major sources of Neolithic stone axes, Castlerigg may have hosted rituals connected with the trade, exchange and ‘worship’ of Langdale axes, along with calendar celebrations and dancing. John Keats visited this spot: in his poem, Hyperion, he describes the gods “......like a dismal cirque/Of Druid stones, upon a forlorn moor,/When the chill rain begins at shut of eye,/In dull November, and their chancel vault,/The heaven itself, is blinded throughout the night.” A tall pillar set radially at the SE corner of the rectangle is aligned to the Samhain (1st of November) sunrise, the Celtic festival marking the start of winter and the New Year.

Machrie Moor, Isle of Arran (Historic Scotland): photo © Mick Sharp

A remarkable group of ritual monuments stand within a special area, set aside from the surrounding landscape of field systems and hut circles, on the peat-covered sandy till south of the Machrie Water. The surviving red sandstone pillar of Circle III has smooth flanks and a weathered head standing over thirteen feet above the cloaking peat. Broken stumps mark the rest of the egg-shaped ring with an axis NNE-SSW. At the centre, under ‘15 inches of peat and 3 feet 6 inches of red sand with stones’, was the capstone of a sandstone burial cist also aligned NNE-SSW. It contained a cremation urn and two flint arrowheads. To the south lay a similar cist holding the skull and selected long bones of a short-headed person with emerging wisdom teeth - a young woman or slender-built young man at the point of maturity. Two flint arrowheads also lay in the cist along with fragmented bones from a carnivorous animal tentatively identified as a dog or seal. A third arrowhead was found in the back-fill above the cist lid. To the ESE stand the three pillars of Circle II, remains of a circle of seven or eight slabs surrounding two sandstone cists, both running NNE-SSW. The central one contained an Early Bronze Age Food Vessel decorated with incised and impressed patterns reminiscent of wickerwork or plaited rushes. Four flint arrowheads lay in the bottom of the cist. Arran has no source of true flint, the nearest known lying across the North Channel on the Co Antrim coast. The second cist was completely empty, with no signs of decomposition or robbery.

Machrie Moor, Isle of Arran (Historic Scotland): photo © Mick Sharp

As well as sandstone brought from the shore and riverbeds one-to-two miles to the NW, glacial erratics found on the moor were also put to use. The oval ring of Circle I alternates rounded granite boulders with pillar-shapes of finer-grained microgranite from a different source - perhaps another example of the symbolic use of ‘female’ and ‘male’ stones. The four granite blocks of Circle IV appear to make an ellipse aligned roughly N-S but there may have been a fifth stone on the NW (left). At its centre was a cist of sandstone slabs again aligned NNE-SSW. It contained fragments of a cremation urn with traces of burnt bone, three arrowheads and a bronze pin or awl. Their first excavator, James Bryce, noted ‘a certain sense of harmony’ in design and style to these monuments, but it is hard to know over how long a period they were built and if they were all primarily intended as burial monuments. At least two of the other granite rings (Circles I and XI) were preceded by settings of timber posts. The six main stone circles appear to have been carefully placed with regard to a prominent V-shape in the NE skyline above Machrie Glen, and the distinctive peak of Goat Fell stands beyond in the same direction. The moor itself slopes down to the Machrie Water, inclining the circles and observers towards the notch where the midsummer rising sun was destined to appear.

Ceann Hulavig Stone Circle, Isle of Lewis: photo © Mick Sharp

Clustered near the head of East Loch Roag are around twenty, possibly related megalithic monuments. Most of the sites are visible from at least one other and there are well over 200 clear sightlines between them. They are laid out in a variety of geometrical shapes and, with outlying marker stones and hill ranges to the SE & SW, contain prehistoric alignments to significant events of the sun, moon and major stars. This far north (latitude 58 degrees) the moon at the major southern standstill of its 18.61-year cycle has only a few hours between rising in the SE and setting in the SW. A full moon at this time struggles to break free of the earth and appears to roll along the horizon before it sets. From certain viewing points the orb can be seen to perfectly encompass a stone circle or set into it. It can also appear to have set and then blaze again in the cleft of a deep valley. The five peaks of the Pairc hills, in the SE where the extreme southern moon rises when viewed from most of the Callanish sites, are known as the Sleeping Beauty because of their resemblance to a recumbent figure with knees, body, head and pillow. The Gaelic name, ‘The Old Woman of the Moors’, does honour to the Earth Mother who haunts so many ancient sites in so many guises. The moon sets into the Clisham range of hills in western Harris and then spectacularly reappears in the gap of Glen Langadale. Variations on these effects and relationships have been recognized at most of the Callanish sites by a variety of researchers, most notably Ron and Margaret Curtis and Gerald Ponting, whose findings suggest that Callanish is one of the best examples in Britain of an outdoor astronomical stage set. Callanish IV is situated on a sloping ridge about two miles SSE of the main site of Callanish I. Only five stones remain standing from an ellipse of 13 or so. Within the stones lie the ruins of a small cairn, one stone of which is set on edge approximately on the long axis of the ellipse aligned NNW, in the direction of Callanish I and the midsummer sunset, and SSE, to where the June full moon at its southern extreme would appear to rise from the body of the Sleeping Beauty.

Cnoc Fillibhir Beag Stone Circle, Isle of Lewis: photo © Mick Sharp

Callanish III is also situated on a prominent ridge, but its geometry is much more difficult to fathom. It may be two ellipses or two concentric circles with an inner U- or rectangular-shaped setting, a flattened circle using two of the inner stones as its SSE-NNW or something else entirely. Before peat was cleared in 1858 there were thirteen erect stones visible, but six fell and more buried stones came to light all adding to the confusion. From the stones there are good views to the important backdrops of the Sleeping Beauty, the Clisham hills, Callanish I and to the stone ellipse of Cnoc Ceann a’ Gharraidh (Callanish II), just 300m downhill to the WSW. The Callanish stones are of Lewisian gneiss, a coarse-grained rock metamorphosed from impure limestone. Quartz and mica sparkle within darker bands, giving the stones an inner light just as cotton grass tufts light up the sombre peat. The circles were built in warmer, drier times when the sea level was several metres lower and the landscape of scrub and small trees was free of peat and bogs.

Boscawen-Un Stone Circle, Cornwall: photo © Mick Sharp

Also known as the Nine Maidens or Gorsedd of Bards, Boscawen-Un means ‘the house of the elder tree' and colourful clouties flutter from the elder branches beside the stone stile at this ancient place of assembly. Nineteen fairly evenly spaced, low pillars form an oval NW-SE with an entrance gap, or missing twentieth stone, at the west (front R in photo). There is some sense of order and symmetry as the ring appears circular and the stones have been set with flat faces inwards. They are also graded up in height to the west but three inaccurately reset in 1862 disguise this. The stones are of granite except for that at the WSW which is of ‘quartz’ with pockets of crystals. It could have served as a back-sight for the May Day sunrise or as a foresight for sunset around Candlemas (2 February). The stones are set in low lying open moorland with few horizon features useful for astronomical alignments, but the site has a reputation for being a long-lived place for law and gathering. Identified with the ‘Beisgowan’ named in the Welsh Triads as one of the three great gorseddau (thrones) of Druidic and Early Medieval Britain, the modern Gorsedd of the Bards of Cornwall was inaugurated here in 1928. The modern Welsh words gorseddu and gorseddfa encompass the meanings to dwell, to remain, to enthrone and a dwelling-place, law-court and assembly - Boscawen certainly retains the sense that something other than the stones remain here. The tall internal pillar placed south of true centre was deliberately erected leaning at an angle to the NE. On my last visit in April 2002, a cache of offerings lay in a nest-like hollow in the shelter of its slope: a silver wire bracelet, night light, coins, shells, rose quartz and other semiprecious and polished stones.

Altarnun Nine Stones, Cornwall: photo © Mick Sharp

The stones of the smallest circle on Bodmin Moor bathe in a watery hollow close to the head of a stream. There are cairns and hut circles in the area, but the immediately surrounding pasture of East Moor seems empty, remote and unworldly - a place set apart. Nine is a popular element in the names of stone circles and rows whether there are nine stones or not. Here there were ten to twelve stones originally, the circle was probably not a true circle and the central pillar may be a later addition. In 1889, all but two stones had fallen and at least two were missing. F. R. Todd re-erected the six recumbent ring stones and dug a new pit for the fallen central pillar. There is a pit in a gap at the north (middle R in photo) where one of the missing stones stood and restored uprights at the NE and west have fallen again in the boggy ground. Rows of small stones run SW and ESE from the circle, marking the boundary between the parishes of Altarnun and North Hill. The central slender, squared pillar may have been inserted as part of the dividing line or be an original prehistoric feature made use of in medieval times.

Giant’s Stick Standing Stone, Conwy: photo © Mick Sharp

Ffon y Cawr stands beside a prehistoric and Roman trackway in the Maen y Bardd area above the Vale of Conwy. Giants receive the credit for several megalithic sites in Britain and further west along the trackway heading towards the north Wales’ coast is a ruined round cairn known as Barclodiad y Gawres - the Apronful of the Giantess. Fixed to the ground in a cradle of storms but quickened by the sun, this support for a Titan seems born of Heaven and Earth, a worthy symbol of Time itself.

St Breock Downs Longstone, Cornwall (English Heritage/Cornwall Heritage Trust): photo © Mick Sharp

Men Gurta, the Stone or Place of Waiting, stands on the summit of the seven-mile ridge of St Breock Downs, home to over sixty-five prehistoric burial mounds and the Nine Maidens stone row. Dating from the Bronze Age, this patient giant fell in 1945 and was raised again in 1956. Around 5m (16 feet) long and at an estimated 16.75 tonnes it is the largest and heaviest prehistoric monolith in Cornwall. It figures in folklore as a medieval and later meeting-place and was used as a boundary marker for St Breock parish. A massive bonfire was built nearby to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee in 2002. The Longstone, with striking white veins of quartz within dark gritstone, originally stood in a low mound of quartz pebbles over 4m across. Quartz is found at prehistoric ritual sites all over Britain, used in schemes of contrasting colour and texture, to mark cardinal points, alignments and especially sacred areas and as buried offerings to the earth and the ancestors. The magical appearance, electrical properties and ancient reputation of quartz as light made solid - a symbol and enhancer of consciousness - ensure that it and other crystals retain a powerful hold on the modern imagination. On a visit after May Day I found four quartz cobbles, arranged in a small circle, had recently been placed on the grass at the foot of the watchful stone.

Llanfechell Standing Stones, Anglesey: photo © Mick Sharp

These three Meini Herion or longstones, thin schist slabs over 2m high, are set in a triangular formation about 3m apart. They stand at the crossing of footpaths on the top of a low hill with good views, especially to the north coast around Cemaes Bay. Frances Lynch describes them as unique and suggests they may have been set up, or used, as medieval ‘gallows stones’, but they are situated in an area of prehistoric activity. A taller schist slab stands to the ESE and on Cromlech Farm, about half a mile to the NW, are the remains of a ruined burial chamber. Recent survey work has discovered cupmarks on some of the collapsed chamber slabs and on two rock outcrops between the chamber and stone triangle.

Bernera Bridge Standing Stones, Great Bernera: photo © Mick Sharp

The stones of Callanish VIII form a semicircle on an artificial platform overlooking the Narrows between the islands of Lewis and Great Bernera. This view looks out SSW towards West Loch Roag, to the left the steep rocky slope ends in a sheer drop of forty feet. The site was archaeologically investigated in the late 1980s by Margaret and Ronald Curtis who re-erected the fallen NE stone (front L) using its original socket and packing stones. They determined an initial construction date of 1800 BC with the purpose of marking the equinoctial sunsets and the May Day (Beltane) and Lammas (1 August) sunrises. Other suggestions include alignments to movements of the moon on the southern horizon and use of the three tallest stones as a seamark to fix the position of a boat. Seen from the water they are bold against the sky and at a distant point appear to be standing in a row rather than a triangle on an arc. Perhaps their figure-like forms of mica-flecked gneiss simply welcomed home relieved mariners while serving as a warning to approaching strangers.