Saturday, 29 July 2017
Both sides of the argument....
This is the English-language page from the Pembs Coast National Park's tourist newspaper which deals with the bluestone quarrying debate. I have been badgering them for years to stop trotting out the fantasies of the senior archaeologists and to accept that there is a debate going on -- in which there is room for some science too! Anyway, to their credit they responded, and invited Geoff Wainwright and me to contribute short bits of text. This is the result. Sadly, Geoff died before this edition of "Coast to Coast" was published.
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13 comments:
But please may we have readable texts of the two contributions, for and against the glacial theory. Thanks!
Yes long overdue to see fantasy and sense contrasted on, but a single page.
Is that a recent photo of you? if so where is the painting kept?
M
Nice to see equal billing somewhere. A welcome act of generosity .
Good to see both being aired.
Tony -- if you click twice on the image, it will enlarge to the point where it is easily readable.
One of them is me, the other is Geoff Wainwright, and the last is Merlin the Wizard. You have to guess which is which.....
Did Merlin the Wizard foresake Ireland and England and make passage for North America in the dim and distant past? There are quite a few "Merls" over there today, after all. Offspring?
I recommend "Power in Praise" by Merlin Carothers. He uses techniques other than magic, you see. Worth a read.
Well now, Merlin was a Carmarthen boy, just like me. (I was born there by accident -- the plan was for Haverfordwest, but in 1940 the best-laid plans........) So there was more to my question than meets the eye......
Fine tribute to Geoffrey Wainwright on this Historic England site:-
https://historicengland.org.uk/whats-new/.../tribute-to-professor-geoffrey-wainwright
Nothing too controversial on here regarding the finer details of Preseli interpretation, but a good overview of his significant contributions to British archaeology.
Who knows?.....this change in stance by the Pembrokeshire National Park's tourist newspaper may actually have the beneficial effect of encouraging said tourists to be more questioning and less sold, hook, line and sinker, on the Folk Tales promulgated in past decades about the bluestones and their hefty - human movement.
Who knows?.... that, in itself, may have an eventual knock - on effect on the Nanny - type delivery of the "Stonehenge Story" by English Heritage, Julian Richards and others off the A303 on the edge of Salisbury Plain 170 - plus miles away. This is the Twenty - First Century now, after all, and we have all grown up to expect better than what we have been patronisingly fed.
Tony -- don't want to sound too negative about somebody who has passed away. Of course obituaries are usually very glowing -- but don't let's forget that GW was a ruthless operator, who had at least as many enemies as friends.......
Yes he certainly did.
It is unusual I think for the Soc. of Antiq. of London to have an election for its president, usually one candidate is greeted with universal acclaim.
I know of one member who was elected FSA on a Tuesday, who then, the next day, received a hand written letter from a candidate in the election, reminding him that the candidate had been helped in his FSA election (still not certain how) and expecting, not quite demanding, the members vote 'correctly' in the forth coming presidential vote.
He did not get it, forelock doffing is difficult for the prematurely bald and cantankerous.
However as the Church says 'love the work but not the worker'.
Read the obits carefully and the range of obiters?? (obituary writers).
Still the final measure is that British Archaeology is the better for his life even if that does not apply to all who encountered him.
Now definitely marmite toast.
M.
Dr I had a lovely day yesterday looking at large erratic boulders now resting in parks in south Brum. They are all very similar although if they be Arenig, only time will tell. wo of the largest has the added delight of very very recent graffiti.
Was struck how selective the glaciers seem to be. Although the Arenig volcanics do have a large outcrop.
By contrast in a bit of till?? the variety of rocks pebbles/cobbles was quite astonishing and included, very clearly, some Wrekin flow banded rhyolite and a bit perhaps of Wrekin quartzite. Did not see anything northern.
However best bit of day was the tea stop with Bourbon biscuits and fig rolls watching the squirrels.
Could become addictive. Sadly only thin sections will tell us more. Learned also that for more than 10 years I had walked past a 10 tonne+ erratic in some shrubbery without seeing it.
M
Yes, it's commonly observed that large erratic boulders from specific outcrops often manage to survive while the till on which they rest is full of a much wider range of cobbles from many different places. If you like, till is the "end product" like a currant cake, and the erratics are the ornaments on top of it. This may be because some large boulders are entrained and carried englacially and supraglacially and survive transport rather well -- those that are dragged along on the glacier bed are smashed up or communited because the forces acting on them are very much greater. I hesitate to say that this is all down to chance, because physical laws control everything -- but at first sight it all seems to be rather random....
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