Keith I'd also like to say how sorry I am about your wee girl and I can only pray for her return to health soon.



But to answer this. Yes it is only my opinion, but I have to live with the places "feel" and many like me feel the same way.

Why if folks are intent on poncing around on sacred places cant they stick to their home ground.

If said people are SO in tune with the land then they should remember Britain was divided into small tribal areas. so why would such "spiritual" people feel the need to "worship" outside their own home turf??

I only live half an hour from Stonehenge myself. I am often on the so called "Kings Mounds" in the night practising my stuff. So I feel quite local myself thanks:

On this path sure, there is dark and light. I find most energy to be of a neutral nature untill it is worked with by the witch etc.

I would suggest the only dark energys are yours possibly. The energy I experienced on Sat with one group and on sunday with another was great.

The Bees are present in the circle and so too was a Hare as well as crows.

Really? Thats odd because it takes me almost that long just to get into Salisbury sometimes and I believe you are some way the other side of that.

I live 3 minutes from the place and many times would rather go out of my way to skirt around it when out and about rather than be within 303 distance from the place.

As for neutral/dark/light etc might I suggest you "assuming" the dark energy is mine shows your ignorance of the witch.

But also what right do we have to instill our "workings" on a place. Again these are the words of not one who apparently has been on their path 20 odd years, but that of someone really relatively new to the whole thing.

Oh and I am well aware of the wildlife present. A particular bee in and around Salisbury plain are rare and unique to the area.

and I'm sure the crow had a wonderful time watching you

Keith, I wouldn't say that the dark energies were Comfs, Comf probably picked up on some nasty bit of henge history that you and your group have not.

I still don't understand why people assume we know what the stones were for. Yes, we can have a pretty good stab at it, but no-one knows for certain. We don't know whether it was for the sun or the moon, for summer or winter, for celebration or sacrifice, or whether it was built then just left alone.

So accusing people of not entering into the spirit of the thing, or for not doing what is 'pagan' seems a bit disingenuous to me. How do you know that what you are doing at or near the stones isn't the wrong thing to do? Same with Avebury. Their builders didn't leave an instruction booklet, so I don't see how people can say what they are doing is right.

Damn good point Wyrdwoman!

As always you cut straight to the heart of an issue

Thanks Els, but its not just me. It seems a whole load of pagan/witch people feel very much the same way. I dont think we can all have "dark energy" PMSL!

I know I hold somewhat unpopular beliefs but I have often wondered why modern pagans seem to think they have a right to stone circles, henges and chalk figures, or any more right than non-pagans. I understand that many of these monuments 'speak' to us, but a good few aren't even that old! As far as I am concerned, EH 'own' Stonehenge, and it is nice of them to allow pagans to use it outside hours.

But then I am of the opinion that most people don't go to Stonehenge and Avebury to celebrate. They go to be seen.

*awaits squashy tomatoes*

And I would suggest Keith that any good energy you are feeling when there with the group is because the people involved are feeling good. But I am afraid the darker energy of the Henge wont be affected by it, and I for one am astounded that other pagans just dont feel the brooding anger of the place - because thats how it feels to me.

And how can it be Comfrey's energy ? What a ridiculous thing to suggest!!

I am NOT local to the Henge and the first time I was down in Wiltshire - which I instantly fell in love with, I was a passenger in the car with someone who knew where they were going, and about 5 minutes away from the Henge, when I didnt even know it was getting close, the hairs stood up on my arms and I felt sick and anxious. That is how the henge feels to me.

When I ventured round it as a tourist on another trip it just felt as if it wanted to be left alone, and seeing how it is believed it fell into disuse - there must have been a reason for that, so why do the modern day 'druids' feel they have a right to conduct ceremonies there, when as has already been pointed out - they know nothing of what the ancient people used the place for.

But - what if those of us who can feel it are correct - what damage and potential energetic chaos are those who conduct their ceremonies, actually causing ? Hmmm - only time will tell, I suppose.

I think that until some other 'religious' or other grouping (buddhists, xians, hare krsna, greenpeace, lions club etc) other than pagans feel that it is theirs and lays claim to it as i do and as at least one other pagan person i know does and as long as you 'feel' that what you are doing is right (in terms of belief) then i don't think it matters what we know. The place has energy, if you can feel it, dark or light, i think you have more claim than any money making organisation whatever its title.
But anyway, do people claim that what they do is right? And even if they do, how do the witches, druids, heathens etc know what they do is right? It's all imagination and feeling, no fact anywhere.

...and as far as living locally is concerned it matters not a jot. You can live a minute away and still hate the place or live 1000 miles away and love it. I disliked the town where i was born. So i left. Anyone who is not happy with living near the stones surely can simply sell up (and leave space for someone who might like living near them). Proximity doesn't make it more right, it just gives you the possibiilty of being more familiar with it. Management of Stonehenge MUST be above the residents, profit making organisations of any description (not EH as i don't know if it is or not), government or any group which does not have the welfare of the place as their primary concern.
Where there is tourism, there is money and eveyone eats well on the fatted tourist cow but then it all goes pear shaped for all concerned.

Excuse me but in the case of Heathenry, we know a lot of what was done because there is still a corpus of literature that tells us about what happened then not to mention archaeological stuff.

I personally don't know, have only seen it from the motorway myself and so I won't claim any experience of it.



I completely agree with you! Not to mention the ancient dead....I hate this whole 'we'll bury them because we're pagan just like he was and so that's right, innit?' thing.

Modern Paganism is so far from what folks actually did it isn't funny!

So who should manage them? Pagans? Which pagans? Local residents? Which ones? And if we go for non-profit making, how do we fund it? Voluntarily? I doubt that will happen. So how do we pay the people to look after it?

The solstice happens twice a year (I don't know if the equinoxes are as crowded) so the rest of the year it is probably OK. I don't think there should be a knee-jerk reaction due to two days a year, but I certainly don't think that it should be run by pagans. Oh lordy, that would end up worse all round!

The energy at Stonehenge is definitely dark, brooding, but can be tapped into, and feels uncomfortable-dark, rather than evil-dark (if you see what I mean).

As for the local/non local argument, I think with some places that argument can't hold water, and Stonehenge is one of those places. We do know that people have come from far afield to visit Stonehenge for millennia. As English stone circles go, it stands out on its own as a very special place.

It's a place of blood and death, but that doesn't make it a bad place.

I've often wondered just what the 'love and lighters' are tapping into when they go there? Given that many professed 'love and lighters' are the nastiest people I've ever met once the surface is scratched, it could explain quite a lot?

Stonehenge is an incredibly special and precious space, one that should be cared for as best we can, and unfortunately in this day and age, money does come into it. I consider it a privilege, not a right, to be able to hold ceremonies there.

Rhiannon

I'm very happy for you.

Absolutely agree, but these days mainly because its THE Henge to be seen at and quite probably not for the reasons (which has already been said) for which it was originally used.

Rhiannon I know your group are extremely respectful and treat the Henge well. But sadly too often this is not the case and the constant poncing and pontificating which goes on there, is, I feel, more for the people taking part (to show their "specialness) than ever it is about the Henge itself.

IF people stuck to their home areas in times of the solstice and equinoxes its possible we wont get the horrific overcrowding and plain disrespect we see constantly here.

Sadly I think it is way too late for Stonehenge and as always it will be people who dont live within 50 miles of the place who will be making all the decisions, because apparently their opinions, being important pagans and all that, are the only opinions which matter.

This has become too pernickity. Dark energy this, local that. Heh! One thing I do know is that it is a privilage to be able to get in there in the first place.

As for the robes etc, I guess some folk just like to wear them. Look at the royal family for instance, any chance to wear a cossy and they are there in full regalia
These people know me and invited me so I go with em, simple as that. In that circle were two covens and a couple of Druid Groves, I am not a member of their groups by the way. Just a friend of some of em.

I just keep to an all black hooded number myself Which does have it's practical uses.

Sorry but I'm going to disagree again. Its not being pernickity to give a damn about one of our most ancient monuments (although woodhenge is older AND nicer) and if people keep throwing their energies around willy nilly, then as far as I'm concerned you may as well put a bomb under the place, because it'll end up a circus .................. oh forgot, its that already

I get that at Castlerigg during the summer, from around the vernal equnox to the autumnal equinox it just turns into a tourist attraction and the nergy seems to be drawn away.

Why when I post on here do the Vinegar Tits brigade have to bitch! Some people I ask you. :

Vinegar tits !!??

Prefer cheese & onion myself PK!

I think this topic is now encompassing "energies around ancient sites various, a discussion of" - and if not, I am about to take it there anyways!

I often wonder why so many Pagany types of different Paths seem to regard ALL standing stones, henges, cairns, duns, etc etc as being full of positive energies. They are NOT. They were all created for a variety of reasons, and not all were what we today would classify as carrying positive vibes. But fools rush in -as always. There are people who have gone to ceratin sites and returned chastened. The lucky ones were OK after counselling, medication and - if they had the sense to seek it - assistance from those "in the know" who were able to assist them.

For folks to blithely spend evenings/nights in such places, lighting candles, chanting etc, can be to invite a LOT more than was initially bargained for. Be aware.

How do we know? When it's the closest most visitors can get to the stones, how can we judge what their motives are?

For my father, it has been a place of awe since he was stationed out at Amesbury, just after the war. He went out to Stonehenge (it was unfenced, of course, and without tourists) and was hooked. A couple of years ago I took him back, and we walked round it with the other tourists, his face alight with joy.



Why? What right have modern pagans over it rather than any other group, religious or not? It's Stone age/Bronze age artefact. As someone has said, we don't know its intended use. Modern pagan religions build on Iron Age or later religions i.e. long after Stonehenge and other stone circles, barrows etc were built and abandoned. About the only thing we might have in common is a recognition of the solstices and equinoxes - but that's arguable, as the ancient British religions do not appear to have regarded the equinoxes as much as some Stone Age builders. Given many of us have rituals which include putting alcohol in a cup and sharing it, one might as well say we ought to lay claim to Christian churches.



Do you have something against captured images, Woozle? I wouldn't expect that, given you've put things onto YouTube.



That would exclude my father, then, as his arthritis meant even the short walk from the car park, and round the stones, was an intensely painful experience. But he will not use a wheelchair and was willing to accept the pain to visit Stonehenge again.



Do those sites permit the tourists full access to the site? If so, I expect they would need to limit the number. How do tourists apply to be part of the quota? Is it a fair system?

EH has done it a different way - the same way that the French Monument Authority has treated Carnac: fence it off and permit tourists access in any numbers, but not full access.

Snap happy tourists: just another way of saying tourist
access for disabled of course, it goes without saying.
I won't get into a bun fight over who has a claim or not. I have a claim and that is all that matters to me.
I am against mass-tourism. Tourism yes, mass toursim no. We don't need it.
Limited access to sites is not fair but necessary. I was on the waiting list for the observatory, 7 years, on my night it was raining. My next visit 6 (?) years later.
National park - corsica manages it pefectly. Itlay too, france from what i know too.
I don't agree with carnac either.

I'll have you know my tits are sooooweeeettt!

I know you probably meant that comment flippantly but you are going to offend some people there. When you have to resort to name calling (with or without smiley attached) your opinion suddenly becomes irrelevant to me. I am sure this bothers you not at all, but seeing as you obviously value plain speaking, I just thought you might like to know.

I saw this on my LJ and thought it would be relevant to this thread.

Wildhunt - What to do about Stonehenge.

Though the Summer Solstice revelers have moved on, that most famous of British neolithic monuments, Stonehenge, remains in the news. First off, somewhat controversial Druid leader King Arthur Pendragon (no, not that Arthur Pendragon) is camping out near Stonehenge, and vows to continue to do so until long-promised improvements to the site are made.

QUOTE

"Demonstrating on behalf of the Council of British Druid Orders, King Arthur Pendragon, has been camping close to the World Heritage site since the Summer Solstice on June 21. Pendragon, 54, is hoping his protests will encourage the Government to remove the fences around the monument, build a tunnel over the A303 and grass over the A344. He said: "That's what they promised to do but the Government said they couldn't afford the tunnel. "It's too commercialised. We want something exactly like Avebury. Those fences have been here since 1978." ... He said: 'The visitor centre, set up 14 years ago, was supposed to be a temporary building. It's awful. It is a national disgrace so what I am hoping to do by my protest is embarrass the Government into raising the issue.'"

Well here's hoping.
To me the photos always speak louder than any words - they always (try gooogle pictures) show the henge without the fence, walkway or tourists, road, reception complex, carpark etc. I wonder why???!!!

*sigh* Mod hat on

Keith

Please keep your insulting remarks to yourself. If you can't debate an argument without resorting to being offensively abusive, then don't post.

As everyone seems to be weighing in with their opinions I thought I would throw mine in as well, just for the hel of it, even though it seems to be an emotive subject.

Pagans, as far as I am concerned, have no more right over Stonehenge than anyone else, as others have pointed out. As for the (modern) druids using the site, well I'm in two minds about this - on the one hand why Stonehenge? The (ancient) druids as far as archaeology can tell had nothing to do with the place and Stonehenge had been abandoned for centuries (or even a thousand years) before the various Celtic tribes arrived in these shores, although presumably they would have been aware of the place since the later Saxons were (hence the name Stonehenge - the hanging stones).

On the other hand I think, why not, they're not doing any harm presumably to the place. However, because they are not doing any harm to the place that doesn't mean that the rituals performed there are appropriate - but who can say? As many others have pointed out we have no idea what the place was used for or what the world view of the people (the Beaker Folk) who built it was.

I see no problem with tourists visiting the place, after all, it is a national monument. As I said previously I don't care for the place myself. I prefer smaller more intimate sites to visit. Sometimes I think pagans can get too bloody uppity about these things and there seems to be a tendancy of the "we-are-better-than-them" superior attitude towards non-pagans who merely want to enjoy an awe-inspiring site.

Also, what do the wights/spirits who dwell at these places want (if you believe in them) - has anyone ever asked them?

"Also, what do the wights/spirits who dwell at these places want (if you believe in them) - has anyone ever asked them? "


AAAARGH --- NOOOooooooooo!!!

This is exactly what certain individuals flocking to these sort of sites shouldn't be even attempting! Therein lies madness! (See post 123!)
The issues are about ignorance, albeit well meant, and about the en masse gatherings of folks many of us wouldn't wish to be associated with. They are the ones who might not even have heard of a wight etc.

Maybe they deserve what they might get? I don't know.

What is it with some of the newbies on here recently??

Oh come on folks, let's try and keep this a civilised and constructive debate

I cant for the life of me see what is wrong honouring the ancestors etc at old sites. Some people just look at the pictures and presume all sorts of stuff

Were the beaker people not Pagan?

Paleo-pagan, probably. Neo-pagan, probably not.

The argument isn't that pagans never used these sites (well maybe for Stonehenge it is). It is that we don't know what the paleo-pagans that used the sites used them for! We don't know about their gods, their rituals, their thoughts or anything even remotely connected with their religion. So the point being made in the posts above is that standing within a henge or on a barrow calling up the Moon Goddess and/or Horned One may not be appropriate for a lot of these sites. Some people are thinking that, until we know what they are for, we should leave them alone.

Keith apart from what others have said, like the fact we dont know what these sites were used for, there is one blindingly obvious thing which people are forgetting.

The very land we walk upon is sacred. From the woods and the groves, to the motorways and inner cities.

We can speak to our dead anywhere, and as far as I'm concerned it would be far, far better to sit on the loo (where you might have some peace) and pay homage to our ancestors, than go to a circle or sacred place and risk upsetting them by disrespecting their use for such.

But this is after all only my opinion

i have never been to stone henge.
my mum has, in the days you were allowed to go up to the stones.

Actually the loo might be a good idea for that....that's if you go off TC Lethbridge's theory about water and psychic activity.

Try the shower, seriously I get something almost every time.

I don't know.

And frankly neither does anyone else for that matter. But given then the term 'pagan' is a shortened version of a Roman term, I suspect they wouldn't have thought they were

Some people just like wearing a frock I guess.

I like the way you look Elswyth, but whats all that Viking style jewellery if its not a costume?

Anyway all we have to guide us (speaking as an occasional Druid) where the extensive body of Celtic literature fails (Heathens aren't the only one with old books, in fact most Celtic source texts are older!) is our intuition and what the CofE likes to call 'continuous revelation'.

Its all any of us Pagans have really, we are all in the process of collectively dreaming a new way to be on the Earth, inspired by old ways. Seems silly to knock one anothers intuition and feelings. If we forget those we may as well become a re-enactment group because we will have thrown out any connection with the divine.

Bloody well said!! I couldn't agree more.

I don't have a problem with using intuition and feelings, but so many times so many people disagree. If every pagan has intuition to do 'something', but each 'something' is different, where do we draw the line? Paganism can be many things, but it can't be everything.

And I know several people who treat paganism like a re-enactment group. Why the propensity for dressing like mediaeval lords and ladies everywhere they go? As I said above, if people used these sites with honest feelings and the intuition that Corwen is talking about I would understand it, but they usually use it as some kind of 'look at me, aren't I so OKKULT!!!' event. The sense of unearned entitlement hangs heavy over every stone circle, henge and carving in the UK. I think that kind of behaviour should be discouraged.

This goes back to what i was saying elsewhere about proof. Until a single witch, heathen, druid etc. comes up with a single shred of proof which can lable their paths and practices as authentic (and current) as Corwen more or less says it's all down to intuition and feeling. If the celtic and heathen literature was so accurate, there would be no debate, they would be the real pagans, but it isn't so they aren't. So we're all in this together on an equal footing and nobody, really, can be justified in slagging off anybody else (except me of course ).

And me!

I get what you are saying - we have to be tolerant of each other's beliefs else we end up doing witch wars all over again. But being tolerant doesn't mean being undiscriminating. No path has an authentic history. No path has proof of an unbroken lineage to pre-Christian times. But if someone says 'I have a right to use Stonehenge/Avebury/Castlerigg because I am a pagan' I will call them out. If they state that their right is stronger than non-pagans, I will call them out. We don't have carte blanche to take over these places just because we think we may be practicing something that may have a passing nod to some research that was extrapolated from an incorrect assumption of a Victorian ideal.

First of all Corwen, jewellery is not a costume. That's just silly or anyone that wears a hammer or a pentagram would be considered as wearing a costume.

Secondly if you'd have noticed, the post was tongue in cheek as I further said:



The sticky out tongue emoticon was my way of expressing the tongue being firmly stuck in cheek.

Costumes are fine, as long as people realise that it's not Paganism and they are just dressing up. I dress up, I don't care what people think. Is it Heathenry? No. Heathenry is your worldview not a set of clothes or some jewellery (although the stuff I am wearing in the pic is ritual stuff but thats for the nasty seidhr type stuff if I should do it again and it definitely won't be photographed).

I do think it would be really refreshing to see photos of Pagans dressed normally doing rituals, wouldn't that be a shock?



However the Celtic source texts say nothing about what the actual druids actually did in their rituals which is unlike the Heathen stuff because we have details right down to how the temples were laid out and what Seidhrworkers wore and the layout of certain rituals.



Hence the reason why some of us are reconstructionalists because we need more than intuition and feeling. It plays a part, sure, just like it did back then (and back then, the Christians also slagged off any intuitive stuff preferring to only follow stuff that was written in a book). We take our framework from the old texts and then try to make it work in the modern age because at the end of the day what was done then isn't always relevant now(or possible because of legal issues).

Proof! I want Proof!

LOL, it's on my other PC. the one that blew up earlier this year!

If you want the panoramic view from within the stones, try here. Yes, if you study the picture you can make out the fence. The car parks are really too far away to see them, and the visitors' centre is hidden below the landscape.

Most of the images seem to have been taken inside the walkway, and the purpose of them will be to provide 'landscape' shots, rather than pictures of people.

Yes, we all want to view such places without other people there. But the point is that we aren't different - if I want to be there, so do they. I am 'other people' to someone else. If I want to exclude their right to see Stonehenge, then I have to exclude my own.

As to the popularity of Stonehenge - we need to take into account that it ranks among the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Seven_Wonders_of_the_World#New_Seven_Wonders_contenders] currently listed world wonders, though it did not end up in the final seven. Carnac is not in that list, and the only site in Italy is the Colusseum. To be fair, therefore, one should consider the way it is managed against how the Colusseum, the Taj Mahal or Petra are managed as a tourist attraction, rather than sites which are less famous. In fact, in the list of 21, the nearest ones in type to Stonehenge are the Easter Island statues, Giza and Machu Picchu.

Now, I wouldn't dream of trying to exercise a right in the say of Giza or Machu Picchu on the grounds I'm a pagan, however much I may weep about the exploitation of such sites. I would leave it to the people who live in those countries. I know my own beliefs have nothing to do with those of the original builders. The fact that I will call myself 'pagan' doesn't mean I share their beliefs - and the pre-christian peoples of the Stone Age through to the Iron Age would probably never view me part of their community. The closest I could come to any would be to those with whom I share a relationship with the same gods. In other words, 'pagan' is a modern construct, and not one I agree with, either. There are paganisms of various sorts, but the rights of one may not be the rights of another.

So the fact that I have been allowed in the stones at Stonehenge by EH after hours on the grounds I was with a party of pagans, or that EH opens the stones up at the solstices, is, from my POV, the result of propaganda. It's nice it works in my favour (should I wish to exercise it, which I don't because I find it takes a lot out of me talking to the wights there), but I don't think it's rational. And if it's not rational, then the tide could turn and that favour run to wards another group.

As someone has said, there's nothing more sacred about a human construct - whenever built - than the rest of the land. The only thing which makes any human construct valid is whether it connects with the wights and the spirits of the land in that place. Often such places do, though the effect is not universally good, nor, indeed, universal at all.