Less than a mile south of Stonehenge there is a Bronze Age burial mound known as Bush Barrow. Back in 1808, this man-made hillock was investigated. Within it, the searchers found a skeleton from the early Bronze Age - around 1900 B.C.. That in itself was not the most striking discovery - it was the grave goods that were buried with the deceased male.
Foremost among these was a lozenge of pure Cornish gold. It was wafer thin and expertly engraved. It may have been worn like a kind of ceremonial breastplate by the principal occupant of Bush Barrow. Since it was found, the gold artefact has been subject to close scrutiny and informed speculation. There are many who believe that the precise angles and parallel lines of the golden lozenge point to the kind of astronomical understanding that is contained in the geometry of Stonehenge itself.
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Two years ago we attended a wedding in Wiltshire and on the way home we stopped off in the town of Devizes. It was a hot day and we only had an hour to kill before moving on to Avebury. I even saw the facade of The Wiltshire Museum but did not venture inside. At the time, little did I know that it contained such an astonishing object. I could kick myself for missing it.
There is a sense in which The Bush Barrow Lozenge is every bit as stupendous as Stonehenge itself. Thank heavens it survived and saw the light of day once again. It could so easily have been lost like many treasures from Ancient Egypt - stolen by grave robbers.
We modern humans have almost lost our connections to Mother Earth and to the stars above but the exquisite golden lozenge from Bush Barrow reminds us that once there were people who lived in harmony with what they found around them - in the seasons, in the earth beneath their feet and in the stars above.
It's beautiful and amazing, so many mysteries about ancient life to think about.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what earthlings of the distant future will think about the things that we leave behind.
DeleteIt is so beautiful -- a true work of art!
ReplyDeleteLiterally awesome.
DeleteWhat a treasure.
ReplyDeleteI would say that it is priceless Bob.
DeleteWhat a wonderful find! All the beautiful and some not so beautiful things being unearthed to tell their stories is why I like archaeology.
ReplyDeleteYour aboriginal peoples did not live very much behind because they were part of the earth and the sky.
DeleteBut they did leave and still have "sacred grounds" which cover large parts of the country so cannot be developed or even walked on by "white" people.
DeleteAlso it was homegrown the craftmanship with the gold from Cornwall. Up on the Bath downs where I used to walk there was a B/A barrow with a circular gold intricately marked, presumably sacred, object found. It was in terrible condition but there is a beautiful replica.
ReplyDeleteOne might have thought that the people of the Early Bronze Age had enough on to just survive from year to year.
DeleteWhen I saw the title of this post in my blogger dashboard, I though you were going to tell us about the cough you mentioned the other day and the lozenges you had been taken as a precaution (was it when you went to see the football match with Tony?).
ReplyDeleteThis particular lozenge is truly a wonderful piece of artwork, and like you say, we can be glad that it has survived and is still around to be admired and examined.
As for our ancestors living in harmony with nature, well, they had little choice in the matter, did they. Their lives depended on adapting their activities to what sesaons and weather permitted, and to a large extend, that is still the same all over the planet.
The term "lozenge" is the one that archaeologists tend to use for this object but maybe wafer might be better. Thank you for your reflections.
DeleteOr maybe the stories about alien visitors in spaceships were true all along...
ReplyDeleteThere is no evidence whatsoever that there are any other sentient beings in the entire universe. We are most probably alone.
DeleteArthur C Clarke once said the people from the future built these constructions. Bronze age people would not have had the knowledge, skills or equipment to make the pyramids or the gold lozenge. The Baghdad battery is an example of electricity being used way back when. A lot of stone circles are built on leylines and have spiritual connections.
ReplyDeleteArthur C. Clarke lived in Weston-super-Mare where imagination tends to wander like an Irish tinker.
DeleteGold was around and precious four thousand years ago. Interesting. I wonder what the last meal was that the dead person ate, and did it have a beer with the meal.
ReplyDeleteAt Stonehenge there was much feasting. Literally thousands of pig bones have been found. So... pork.
DeleteWe live no too far from Stonehenge, and pass it often on the A303, it's a very peaceful place, I have visited many times and as a child we were able to wander through the stones, touching every one. The stones at Avebury are brilliant as well, sadly we did not know of the historic treasure in the museum,
ReplyDeleteIf you go to The Wiltshire Museum in Devizes be sure to book in advance or risk disappointment.
DeleteWhat an incredible find. We tend to think of our earliest ancestors as having just very basic survival skills, but the Lozenge proves that they were people with sophisticated talents.
ReplyDeleteSome experts have suggested that the precision of the lozenge's lines means it must have been etched by a child. Surely, only small fingers could have achieved that level of accuracy.
DeleteWhat an amazing object. It boggles the mind that so many of these sorts of treasures are probably still beneath our feet in this country.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there's much more to find. Do you like the BBC TV show "Digging for Britain"?
DeleteFrom the simplest mound to something as sophisticated as this, I never cease to wonder at the distant past.
ReplyDeleteModern humans often assume that our ancestors were somehow inferior but they didn't pollute the planet with plastic.
DeleteLike Meike I associate the word "lozenge" with cough drops... :) This is an intriguing rare piece of ancient art, though - and big for an item made of gold. I suppose if more items like that were dug up way back in the past, they most likely weren't preserved but melted down and turned into other things...
ReplyDeleteI am sure you are right Monica. A lot of important artefacts have been lost that way.
DeleteA perfect reason to take Mrs. P, on a road trip and go see it. We visited Stonehenge about 25 years ago.
ReplyDeleteI first visited Stonehenge in 1959.
DeleteIsn't it amazing how knowledgable and sophisticated in their skills people were so long ago? And I doubt we have barely scratched the surface of what is beneath our feet or all around us, under jungle growth, buried in what appear to be hills, or under the oceans which have risen and covered them?
ReplyDeleteEven now, there is so much that we do not know but many of our ancestors embraced mystery rather that trying to dissect it.
DeleteInteresting.
ReplyDeleteI agree.
DeletePrevious generations have more to them than we give them credit for. Stonehenge and Avebury are indeed fascinating places. You'll just have to step foot into southern lands again YP. I promise we won't eat you!
ReplyDeleteI am again coming down to England's soft underbelly next month. I hope I spot Jacob Rees-Mogg because I want to whack him with a stick of Yorkshire rhubarb.
DeleteIt is extraordinary and wonderful that we can still find such artifacts and learn from them.
ReplyDelete