Image by Steve Alexander © 2007

Green Street Avebury field report 30/7/2007

Appearing in a field close to the Avebury Circle this delightful three-fold has similarities to a triskelion or triskele that's "three legged" or "tri-armed". This form of three-fold rotational symmetry was often employed by Celtic illuminators in border patterns and a superb example of a triskele was laid down by "The Circlemakers" at Trottiscliffe (Trosley) in Kent, way back in '99.

This formation though also appears to acknowledge a traditional Taoist yin-yang symbol but with one extra yin or yang so to speak! Nowadays regarded as a trinitarian symbol, this is in fact an ancient Korean adaptation of a yin-yang symbol that was known throughout many dynasties as the Taeguk. As a three lobed symbol it stands for the three states of being.

Set within a backdrop of clouds that looked like the opening credits for "The Simpsons", it was a real pleasure to experience such a formation in long awaited sunshine! On entering it though I must confess I was a bit disturbed at seeing the laid crop in the outer ring repeatedly breaking into the walls of the standing crop...was this a deliberate feature?...or perhaps an indication of human involvement or even sabotage? However after I'd spent some time there any such doubts I might've had were easily dispelled, for I noted some really interesting features. For example in some places small bunches of crop had been laid coming from within the standing perimeters from a foot or so inside.

As you can probably make out from the overheads the laid crop has a real sense of flow that further adds to the experience inside. Its many visitors were also aware of the energies that resided here and took advantage of soaking them up within the warm sunshine.

Green Street is a continuation of Avebury High Street which ends at the Red Lion. This particular field beside Green Street has been visited by "The Circlemakers" on a number of occasions. This formation lies at the bottom of the field but if you continue past where Green Street becomes a track, the top of the rise to the east provides you with a memorable view of Avebury, set as it is in a peaceful rural setting.

- Graham Tucker.

Another megalithic sundial appears at Avebury on July 29, 2007

One of the most popular themes used by our mysterious crop artists has been that of a "yearly megalithic sundial". If modern crop messages come from the distant past, and from a culture that once lived all across the British Isles 4000 to 5000 years ago, such a theme might seem quite appropriate. Indeed, those ancient people were true masters of sundial-based time: "Intensive sundialling was practiced in the Boyne Valley thousands of years ago, with techniques that were both scientific and highly advanced" (http://stonelight.ie/archive/arch40.html).

While visiting Wiltshire last week, I noticed that a new crop picture near Avebury showed the classic "teardrop" shape of a sundial gnomon: just as shown in another "sundial" that had appeared next to Avebury in 2003, but this time three times with three-fold symmetry. What could that mean?

Using an program on the web (http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/AltAz.html), I quickly found that our Sun would rise on the eastern horizon with an azimuth of 60 degrees, then later set on the western horizon with an azimuth of 300 degrees, on a calendar date of July 31 at latitude 51 degrees North where Avebury is located. Earlier in the year on June 20 (summer solstice), our Sun would rise there at 50 degrees and set at 310 degrees. Later in the year on September 21 (autumn equinox), our Sun would rise there at 90 degrees and set at 270 degrees.

A three-fold symmetry of solar azimuths (60 degrees sunrise, 180 degrees noon, 300 degrees sunset) could therefore be a clever way of telling us how they once counted calendar time. In other words, it would be an easily understood form of communication between two cultures (theirs and ours) who do not share a written or spoken language. With those ideas in mind, I next went into the field near Avebury where that crop picture was located, and directly confirmed using a compass that its three major axes were aligned relative to the local horizon with azimuth values of 60, 180 and 300 degrees:

Ipso facto, the problem was solved, and we may be sure in this particular case what they were trying to tell us. The value of this relatively simple analysis is that it tells us quite clearly where those messages are coming from (some of them at least). Best wishes to everyone at the Silent Circle Cafe; especially Charles and Janet, plus Heather who helped me with the compass measurements!

- Red Collie sending this around the world (almost as if through a wormhole)