What We Did Last Week: 6
Aug. 3rd, 2009 03:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphiloWe had been planning to head off East on the Friday morning, but instead we had to go back to Hunters Inn, not very far, but in the opposite direction, to retrieve Ailz's pendant- which meant we got to see the family again- which was nice.
The pendant is a silver apple. Ailz's brother gave it her- probably for her 21st. We think it probably came adrift when she was snuggling baby Matthew (see final picture of the previous post).
We were heading to Devizes. On the way we stopped off at Cleeve Abbey- also known as Vallis Floridia. Cleeve has lost its church, but retained its great hall with original- and very splendid- roof intact. It also has fragmentary wall paintings and the best part of a fine tiled floor. It's a quiet place in a quiet valley.
We were pretty tired by this stage - and I can't remember what happened next. Did we go check into our Travel Lodge or did we go straight to Avebury. I think we went straight to Avebury.
Glastonbury may very well have been a green field site when a Saxon King decided to build an abbey there- apparently the Saxons preferred green field sites- but Avebury has been a holy place for six thousand years. What were they thinking of, the people who built it? Who knows? Something to do with the sun and the moon and the stars- and that's all we can be sure of. It's a complicated piece of architecture or engineering (I'm not sure which is the more appropriate term) - with its ditch and bank and circles and avenues of stones, so the beliefs it expresses (or hints at) were probably quite complicated too. I feel, when I prowl around it, as if I'm prowling around the inwards of a huge clock.
I didn't take any decent pictures on this occasion but I took some when we went back on Saturday- when the light was better. I'll post them in their proper sequence.
Our hotel was about a mile from the centre of Devizes- at the intersection of several roads, with a housing estate to the right and an industrial estate to the left. It was a noisy place to be on a Friday night- though not on a Saturday night, oddly enough. Ailz thinks the people who were squeaking and chattering and grunting until deep into the morning were working girls and their clients. Could be.
Oh, and I'm forgetting; our bedroom window had a great view of the Devizes White Horse, which was carved into the hillside in 1999 to commemorate the Millennium. It replaces an early 19th century Horse (called Snobs Horse because it was created by the shoemakers of the town, popularly known as snobs) which faded back into the hill a century or more ago. As Millennium projects go I reckon this is a good'un.
The pendant is a silver apple. Ailz's brother gave it her- probably for her 21st. We think it probably came adrift when she was snuggling baby Matthew (see final picture of the previous post).
We were heading to Devizes. On the way we stopped off at Cleeve Abbey- also known as Vallis Floridia. Cleeve has lost its church, but retained its great hall with original- and very splendid- roof intact. It also has fragmentary wall paintings and the best part of a fine tiled floor. It's a quiet place in a quiet valley.
We were pretty tired by this stage - and I can't remember what happened next. Did we go check into our Travel Lodge or did we go straight to Avebury. I think we went straight to Avebury.
Glastonbury may very well have been a green field site when a Saxon King decided to build an abbey there- apparently the Saxons preferred green field sites- but Avebury has been a holy place for six thousand years. What were they thinking of, the people who built it? Who knows? Something to do with the sun and the moon and the stars- and that's all we can be sure of. It's a complicated piece of architecture or engineering (I'm not sure which is the more appropriate term) - with its ditch and bank and circles and avenues of stones, so the beliefs it expresses (or hints at) were probably quite complicated too. I feel, when I prowl around it, as if I'm prowling around the inwards of a huge clock.
I didn't take any decent pictures on this occasion but I took some when we went back on Saturday- when the light was better. I'll post them in their proper sequence.
Our hotel was about a mile from the centre of Devizes- at the intersection of several roads, with a housing estate to the right and an industrial estate to the left. It was a noisy place to be on a Friday night- though not on a Saturday night, oddly enough. Ailz thinks the people who were squeaking and chattering and grunting until deep into the morning were working girls and their clients. Could be.
Oh, and I'm forgetting; our bedroom window had a great view of the Devizes White Horse, which was carved into the hillside in 1999 to commemorate the Millennium. It replaces an early 19th century Horse (called Snobs Horse because it was created by the shoemakers of the town, popularly known as snobs) which faded back into the hill a century or more ago. As Millennium projects go I reckon this is a good'un.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 04:03 pm (UTC)the double headed eagle
I associate to byzantium
(and it is still on the seal of
the ecumenical patriarchate)
but wikipedia shows its transmission
in the holy roman empire...I suppose
this to be from that?
the two heads represent the
sacred and secular.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 05:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 04:11 pm (UTC)Nice.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 05:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 04:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 05:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 06:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 06:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 06:23 pm (UTC)You stand at the centre and you feel that "things" are revolving round you.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 06:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 07:34 pm (UTC)