Thanks to Tony for reminding up of this strange stone in Shebbear, deep in the Devon countryside, 20 kms from the sea. It's referred to in more articles as a glacial erratic, and one had better believe that, unless one insists on some other fantastical explanation. it is reputed to weigh about 1 tonne. It has to be turned over every year, on Nov 5th, by the church bellringers, in order to stop the Devil from escaping. So there we are then.
There are a few photos of it on the web, and it clearly has one side that is has relatively unweathered, with quite angular edges, and another side that is very crumbly and heavily weathered. That in itself suggests great age.
Some people refer to it as a pinkish granite, or as a "quartz boulder" -- but on close examination of some of the photos it seems to have a dark bluish colour, and looks as it it is very coarse-grained. It appears to have a red-brown weathering crust, just like many of the erratic boulders on Preseli. Is it a dolerite or a gabbro? Interesting........ geological opinion needed.
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I by chance found myself watching a part of one of our rather backwards-leaning friend Neil Oliver's programmes in the series "Sacred Wonders of Britain" this afternoon. It got me wondering what our Neil would make of the Shebbear Stone, turning said stone on November 5th, and Brian's somewhat Erratic theory regarding its provenance.....actually, what Neil said about the Avebury Avenue, Henge and Cove did seem fairly acceptable as a 21st Century speculation about our ancestors' mindset.
Is he still with us? I thought he would have walked backwards over a 400 ft cliff by now........
It strikes me these Shebbear villagers, at least in medieval days, we're distrustful of an exotic stone in their midst that had got there they knew not how or from where, so they decided t'was best to turn it annually. Nowadays, maybe one or two more "sophisticated" and imaginative amongst Shebbear folk may be inclined to event a Story of how it had been moved, long ago and far away......similar to what a Great Man was insisting had happened long ago in the Preseli Hills across the Bristol Channel, involving "trophy" stones.....
I haven't seen any explanations of how the stone got there, apart from various references to it being a glacial erratic. Maybe the people of Shebbear are quite sophisticated geomorphologists........
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