In connection with my suggestion that Stonehengles, now Stonehenge, of which the outer circle consists of thirty stones, meant Stone Angels, may be considered the repeated statements of Pausanias that the oldest gods of all were rude stones in the temple, or the temple precincts. In Achaean Pharae he found some thirty squared stones named each after a god: obviously these were phairy or peri stones, and the chief stone presumably stood for the pherepolis.
That ange or inge varied into ink is implied not only by Inkpen Beacon figuring in old records as Ingepenne and Hingepene, but also by Ritson’s statement: “In days of yore, when the church at Inkberrow was taken down and rebuilt upon a new site, the fairies, whose haunt was near the latter place, took offence at the change”. The following passage quoted by Keightley from Aubrey’s Natural History of Surrey is of interest apart from the significant names: “In the vestry of Frensham Church, in Surrey, on the north side of the chancel is an extraordinary great kettle or cauldron, which the inhabitants say, by tradition, was brought hither by the fairies, time out of mind, from Borough-hill about a mile hence. To this place, if anyone went to borrow a yoke of oxen, money, etc., he might have it for a year or longer, so he kept his word to return it. There is a cave where some have fancied to hear music. In this Borough-hill is a great stone lying along of the length of about 6 feet. They went to this stone and knocked at it, and declared what they would borrow, and when they would repay, and a voice would answer when they should come, and that they should find what they desired to borrow at that stone. This cauldron, with the trivet, was borrowed here, after the manner aforesaid, and not returned according to promise; and though the cauldron was afterwards carried to the stone, it could not be received, and ever since that time no borrowing there.”
[APPENDIX C.]
BRITISH SYMBOLS.
In Wookey Hole Mr. H. E. Balch quotes the following important passage from Gildas: “A blind people [the Britons], they paid divine honour to the mountains, wells, and streams. Their altars were pillars of stone inscribed with emblems of the sun and moon, or of a beast or bird which symbolised some force of nature”. This passage justifies the supposition that the inscribed “barnacles,” elephants, etc., were symbolic, and supports the contention that a people using such subtleties were far from “blind”. The Museum at Glastonbury contains a bronze ring about 3 inches in diameter, in the form of a serpent with its tail in its mouth. Obviously this object, which was found at Stanton Drew, i.e., the stone town of the Druids, was symbolic, probably, of the Eternal Wisdom.
[APPENDIX D.]
GLASTONBURY.
In view of the fact that Halifax claimed to possess the Holy Face of St. John, and that four roads centred there in the form of a cross at the chapel of St. John, it is interesting to note that the four cross-roads of Glastonbury are similarly associated with St. John. In the words of a local guidebook, “From the Tor, a walk will bring you to Weary-All Hill to view the town, and it is curious to note that from this hill it seems to be laid out as a perfect cross, St. John’s Church being the central point”.
The probability is that there was some connection between the St. John of modern Glastonbury and the Fairy King Gwyn who was exorcised from the neighbouring Tor by a certain St. Collen.