Corvid-19 postponed my talk at the museum, where I work one day a week. However, as small portions of it came from previous research I had done for various art projects and used my own photos, I thought I could share a couple of snippets.
In the museum we tell you the story of prehistory through the archaeology of these sites but for hundreds of years they were explained in a very different manner. After all, how would you explain a mysterious hump in the ground or standing stone if you hadn’t the benefit of the twentieth century’s archaeological discoveries?
Let us begin with the Longstone of Minchinhampton. Situated 1 mile east of the village, the stone is 7.5 feet high and 6 feet wide. It has holes pockmarking it, some of which go through the stone’s 15” depth.
It is said that a ploughman who found the stone impeded his ploughing tried and yet failed in an attempt to pull out the Longstone, no matter how many oxen he set to the task. The notion that standing stones are immovable may be partly inspired by awe in their mysterious presence in the landscape but also their reputation for being a little like icebergs, having more below the surface than above. This is not the only tale associated with this holey stone. Like many other standing stones in folklore, this large rock is said to walk around the field in which it stands at midnight, and occasionally wander to the spring at Minchinhampton to have a drink.
In a slightly perplexing practice, it has also been said that mothers were said to have passed their children through the largest hole in the stone to cure them of rickets or smallpox. The hole in the Longstone looks like it would have been quite a tight fit for even the smallest child. This connection between stone holes and curing rickets pops up in other places like Men-an-Tol on the Penwith peninsula in Cornwall. Having crawled through this particular stone hole I have to say it’s more likely to give you backache than cure any ailments.
For more gems of local folklore seek out a copy of the excellent book ‘Gloucestershire Folklore’ by Roy Palmer