I was pleased to see this tweet from Amesbury2012:
Plans are being worked on for a second lantern procession on mid winters eve 2012 from Stonehenge to Amesbury…. http://t.co/LG3hqcD2
Last years lantern procession went along much of the course of ‘The Avenue’, crossing under the A303 through a subway not normally open to the public.
There’s a report of the 2011 event on the BBC website:
This ties in somewhat with a passage in my very favorite book about Stonehenge, by Rosemary Hill[1]
Ms Hill says that you can’t think for very long about Stonehenge without coming up with a theory or two. Her book is partly about the many theories about the Henge through the centuries, which she presents in an even-handed and entertaining way. However, she finishes the book with one theory of her own:
So perhaps, twice a year, at midsummer and midwinter, the inhabitants of Durrington, who were also the worshippers at Stonehenge, would have gone from one place to the other.
Midsummer Eve at Durrington would be followed by dawn at Stonehenge as the year turned from light towards dark, while in midwinter the procession would go the other way, from Stonehenge at sunset on the shortest day to dawn at Durrington, to see the light return.
It is a possibility, one more image to add to all the changing scenes the centuries have projected on to the mute, mysterious stones.[2]
Footnotes
- I wrote a post called Things I learnt from Rosemary Hill’s ‘Stonehenge’ [↩]
- ‘Stonehenge’, Rosemary Hill, page 206 in the paperback edition [↩]