scn93.htm Stonehenge Campaign Newsletter 1993 - under construction

added sacvotes

scn93 from Festival Eye 1993, page 14

NEW ARCHAEOLOGY - STONEHENGE BELONGS TO YOU AND ME

The images interlocked with work that I was doing on the landscape. What interested me was the way, at different times and places, people experience their world in different ways, and the way in which some people's world gets validated and other people's gets marginalised. So I started to write about Stonehenge - prehistoric, historic and contemporary.

As far as the contemporary scene was concerned, there was no way of avoiding thinking about questions of physical access, and emotional and intellectual access; no way of avoiding issues of civil liberties, and no way of avoiding the recognition that archaeologists were implicated. English Heritage and the National Trust prevent access because of the archaeological "fragility" - and richness of the area. But I know, and you know, that archaeologists themselves from the nineteenth century onwards have destroyed more than they have recovered, that the English Heritage visitor's centre, the MOD ranges to the north, and the police barriers and trenches have all done far more damage than the free festival.

I began to give some seminars and lectures on contemporary Stonehenge and I found that there were a lot of archaeologists who were getting very queasy about what was going on. So, eventually, I and a colleague from Cambridge, Mark Edmonds, wrote a longish piece for the Guardian, and then, since it was the run-up to the Solstice, we were inundated with requests to talk on the radio and television.

When we wrote the piece in the Guardian we rang around all the archaeologists we knew to see who would back us, and were amazed - everyone backed us. The only people we didn't ask, and whom we knew wouldn't be happy, were two pinnacles of the archaeological establishment, at Oxford and Cambridge. So we weren't just mavericks - there were professors, readers, senior lecturers...

Next step was a mini-protest, taking a small bus-load to Stonehenge on the night of the Solstice. Here on a first come first serve basis, we took archaeologists from Glasgow, Lampeter, Cambridge, Oxford and London. I guess that some of those who supported the piece in the Guardian would not have prepared to take direct action, but I know that there were a great many other archaeologists who would have been prepared to come.

Of course we didn't get anywhere. The police vans were visible even before we got to Wiltshire, and we were stopped at the Amesbury roundabout. They were super polite but handed us a couple of warning injunctions.

We tried to get in further to the north, were followed by vans with flashing lights. We asked what would happen if we went in one by one with fifty yards between us (we knew about the section of the Public Order Act which makes two people a procession!). They said they'd arrest us anyhow. We tried one more time and a Welsh policeman asked why we didn't just get a ticket to go in! Tired and rather cold we went to the pub in Amesbury. No one was around, we left some leaflets that we'd written

Eventually we drove to Avebury. It was wonderful. There were people dancing and dowsing, and just sitting quietly. (We - with our camera crew - were the intruders.) This is what Stonehenge should be like. It made the expedition worthwhile.

In the immediate aftermath, it felt like an anti-climax. The Guardian reporter who had come with us wrote it up as a sort of joke - stereotyped academic "rebels" - actually not even rebels, just slightly batty ivory-towerers. Nothing has changed, but then, what made us think it would?

But in the long run, I guess it does seem to have been worthwhile. Southern Eye made a film for BBC2 which used footage from the journey and the film ended with Jocelyn Stevens being very conciliatory. there was a radio phone-in after the show and local people came out - I guess for the first time - against the exclusionary politics. (It wasn't, of course, just because of the film, and certainly not because of our action; it was mainly because they were utterly fed up with the cost of the police exercise, and also because they'd had enough of what they saw as the high-handed tactics of English Heritage vis-a-vis the new Visitors' centre...)

For me, writing the Guardian piece and going in the bus were good news because I got to know some of the Stonehenge Campaign people. It was good to discover that our action had seemed important to them and to others trying to make their way to Stonehenge.

And finally, thinking about the year, and this Solstice, the question was what should - could - we archaeologists do? I guess we quailed at trying to lead a bigger expedition. So, instead I'm co-ordinating a travelling expedition - @Stonehenge Belongs to You amd me'. It is about contestations and appropriations and about who gets to be heard. It's got all different voices - Free Festivalers, Druids, Locals, 'landowners, archaeologists. English Heritage were going to put in their bit, but they backed off a week before the opening... The exhibition has stuff on media distortion, on legal and police action, and on government legislation.

The exhibition runs from June 10-19th at Torriano Meeting House, 99 Torriano Avenue, London NW5 (nearest tube Kentish Town). There are three workshops - June 14th is an open forum; June 15th videos will be shown; June 16th will be the legal fall-out with people from Liberty, Charter 88, and Save the Children. Afterwards the exhibition will go to Exeter Museum in September, Bristol Museum in October, and Salisbury Museum in November.

I hope very much that anyone who has staggered through to the end of this long article will come and see the show - there are lots of good photos by Tash and John Warburton!

All the best for this year's Solstice.

Barbara Bender Dept of Anthropology, University College, Gower St, London WC1E 6BT 

========Dinah=========

WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE
PROBABLY BAD NEWS
Dinah McNichol disappeared after
Torpedo Town Festival, August 1991.
She was with a casually dressed 
tanned stranger in his mid-20s
with short wavy dark hair.
She was 18, 4'10" tall with long
dyed black hair, gothic, crusty.
She wears necklaces beads etc.
Her cashpoint was emptied.
That she's still missing after
two years search is bad news,
makes it more likely murder.
MISSING PERSONS 081-392-2000

================
TorrFINAccounts:
=20.91 19May93
+  .50 SCampaign
+24.59 KingstonGF
+12.00 StrwabLuke
- 9.70 VicarijGig
-  .40 Phone
-46.63 Printing
---------------
=+1.27 21June93
- 1.20 PhoneGrob
+20.00 ClubDOGs
+10.00 FestEye
+10.00 CoolTan
+10.00 WillyX
+ 5.00 TheSea
+ 5.00 SpiralTr
+ 3.56 KozieMuN
+ 3.00 SoarC90
+ 1.00 Junk
+ 1.00 Slanted
+ 1.00 PsychoP
+ 1.00 TLFrogs
+ 1.00 VoxPop
-16.00 Plates
-50.00 Printer
---------------
=+5.67 30Jlyish
===============

We are voices in the wilderness,
Much more so than forty years ago.
I mean voices for liberty.
No one wants it any more.
Yet it seems to me 
that just because of the
present mad clamour for dictatorship,
We of all people should not give up.
Some day, some time, 
Long after we are gone, 
Liberty may again raise its proud head.
It is up to us to blaze its way -
Dim as our torch may seem today,
It is still the one flame.
Emma Goldman 1933.

FREE INFORMATION NETWEB
99 Torriano Av, London NW5 2RX

We have a huge mailing list but little cash so only those who've sent stamps will get this mailed: 1 stamp = 9 leaflets printed!

WE'd like to print zillions like Polytantric used to but our new rule is: 'Dont spend or promise money until it exists and a Torriano meeting has agreed' - quibbling over bills has lost us too many people, energy, enthusiasm etc

HELP: we need info, dates, poems, cash, stamps, paper, photocopying, you...

Always include and SAE (or more) when writing to us or anyone in our contact list

Cheques to 'London FIN' please.

............. a Message ...............
I give body to your inventions,
marking moon and sun constellations.
Before you try to implement your order:
Hear Me.
My stones count a single generation
of moon's returning;
I have numbered fifty centuries
and always squared the Trinity.
Now you grant Assumption to God's Mother:
Raise Me.
I hold earth and air to frame the light,
releasing fire gods year by year since 
hours were kept and seeds first planted;
you who threaten earth and air and water:
Know me.
You hold me as a victim, bound and gagged,
exhibited mis-used and triple guarded;
jealous suitors fighting for my tenure
to purge this ignorance fear and anger:
Free me.
Grant me the space where I was planted,
restore my sacred long horizons to 
sheep and skylark, butterfly and flower,
respect my functions, visit me with wonder:
Share me.
My cry (the voice of this green planet
lost in wasted land and fruitless argument)
is for a new age, not a monument.
I was built to sing forever:
Hear me.
...........( from Stonehenge ) ............

Here's a little history
Of a bigger mystery
I have written this story
into my song.
If it isn't what you're used to
I hope it will amuse you
And maybe if you choose to
Then you'll sing along
it goes:
I am as old as the universe: 
I've been here before
and I'll be here again;
I am a child of the universe: 
a part of each woman 
and part of each man.
Once upon a sometime
and once upon a somewhere
and once upon a somehow
there was a big bang.
Energy revolving
and energy dissolving
amd energy evolving
and that's what I am.
Chorus (I am as old ... man)
I'm a litlle flower
that blossoms for an hour
but in my Mother's power
that grows on and on.
Power at the root of me
and power in the shoot of me
power in this fruit
that will pass my seed on.
Chorus (I am as old ... man)
I am not a somebody
and I am not a nobody
I'm a cell in one body
filling all space.
All I ever could be
and all I ever should be
and all I ever will be                       {/would?}
is here in this place.
(Theo Simon)

==== An Ancient Eastern Story ======
You went on a trip to where you imagined 
the need for journeys would have ended.  
Much you saw and would have liked to have had 
was guarded by monsters.
It didn't surprise you: 
yet that you'd conjured them yourself 
out of fear and out of absurd jealousies 
was unknown to you.
No wiser from that trip all you learned 
was how best to destroy monsters.
Many have vanished, but listen:- 
much that they guarded 
and that you wanted 
has vanished with them.   

*************************
* LETTER  FROM  KARELIA *
Stonehenge  is a  symbol. 
* Namaste * (dice)George.
( PS - the reconstruction
on  George Firsoff's  red
Oxford tickets  is wrong.
Is that why I bagsyed off
Arthur's mob  care of the
small,south,Stone Eleven?
*************************

You put  your left  wing in,
You take your right wing out,
hash in,  pipe out,
shake it all about.
You do the smokey dopey
and you feel far out, cos 
that's what its all about!
Oh.. gacky wacky  backy,
Oh.. yippy trippy hippy,
Oh.. hopi  smokey dopey,
Mind bend, arf mix,
Ra sta star !

access conf votes

Romany Rye

I'm a Romany Rye, just an old didikai,
I build all my temples  beneath the blue sky,
I live in a tent  and I don't pay no rent,
and that's why they call me the Romany Rye.
Didi-a-didi-a-didi-di-kai, chavvies,
Tika-dika-tika-a-lai,
Your papa's tryin' to sell a mush a kushti gri.
I'm a Romany rye, just an old didikai,
I live in a mansion beneath the blue stars,
I were't born in a ditch, so I won't never grow rich,
But that's why they call me the romany rye.
Tikka, tikka, didikai, tikka, tikka, didikai
That's why they call him the romany rai
Tikka-tikka-didikai, tikka tikka, didikai,
That's why they call him the romany rai.
I'm a Romany Rai, a true didikai,
My temple's a mansion beneath the blue stars,
I'm a Romany Rai, a true didikai,
just campin' around, on any ole ground,
But that's why they call him the Romay Rai.

stonehenge 1988(spring equinox)after the usual ceremonies in the stones i found a mystery used camera film in my bag. i later had the film developed in an effort to identify the owner. i recognised no one. there were shadowy pictures of 'hippies' in som e country fort or other but more suprizingly of some assian people in a city location. i spread word of my find via the peoples free information network. in only a short while jon from swansea sent me word that it was his very much valued film. isent him the negs and prints, he reimbursed my expense and sent me a copy of the black sheep newsletter. next spring i found myself in a goa bank the asian lady next to me had an irish passport and was reading 'i know why the caged bird sings'. we broke ice and went for a fresh juice together. jon from swansea surfaced amid her enthusiastic chatter. he was her boyfriend and i had seen pictures of her a year before i met her. we later shared a room. (small world theory-networking is easy.)

Stonehenge Access Conference 1993

Sunday 25th of April, 1993.

A variety of Stonehengers met and talked. Think of this perahps as an opinion poll of random people, biased by the counter!

• 1 We want access to Stonehenge for anyone who wishes to be there to observe in whatever way at special times ie Solstices and Equinoxes (no tickets) [ For=24 Abstain=0 Against=0 ]
• 2 We want to cherish and protect Stonehenge and the surrounding landscape [ For=24 Abstain=0 Against=0 ]
• 3 We want to steward our own gatherings at the Stones to ensure that the site is cared for and that gatherings run smoothly [ For=23 Abstain=1 Against=0 ]
• 4 We want the campsite to be away from the immediate vicinity of the Stones [ For=23 Abstain=1 Against=0 ]
• 5 We want the whole area within the Stonehenge site to be available for our observances [ For=23 Abstain=1 Against=0 ]
• 6 We want to be allowed to walk from the campsites to the Stones [ For=24 Abstain=0 Against=0 ]
• 7 We want to have physical contact with the Stones (as long as this is not damaging in any way) [ For=24 Abstain=0 Against=0 ]
• 8 We want only acoustic live music in Stonehenge (no amplified music) [ For=21 Abstain=2 Against=1 ]
• 9 We need a working party to work out practicalities in detail (ie stewarding) and negotiate mutulally acceptable arrangements with English Heriticage etc [ For=20 Abstain=3 Against=1 ]
• 10 We need to be allowed to arrange a site for camping and parking with 'landowners' [ For=22 Abstain=2 Against=0 ]
• 11 We need a working party to think through parking and camping arrangements for those attending gatherings [ For=21 Abstain=3 Against=0 ]
• 12 Access to Stonehege needs to be seen within the broader perspective that the Earth is sacred [ For=23 Abstain=1 Against=0 ]
• 13 There should be access to and protection of, sacred landscapes [ For=22 Abstain=1 Against=1 ] (?)
• 14 We want the Stonehenge area to be restored to a green landscape [ For=22 Abstain=1 Against=1 ]
• 15 We'd prefer no more roads in the world [ refered back ]
• 16 We want the A344 closed and restored to grassland to reunite the Stones and the Avenue [ For=21 Abstain=3 Against=0 ]
• 17 We want the A303 near Stonehenge grassed up [ For=17 Abstain=6 Against=1 ]
• 18 If there must be a road then we want: (i) it left as it is [ For=1 ] (ii) it widened with a tunnel [ For=0 ] (iii) a route south of the Stones [ For=0 ] (iv) a route north of the Stones [ For=14 Abstain=3 Against=5 ] 19 Good communications, information and networking is needed to inform the public on all these issues [ For=24 Abstain=0 Against=0 ]
• 20 All parties including local 'landowners' and residents taking part in this process of consultation should be allowed to without hindrance, and in accordance with the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights [ For=20 Abstain=1 Against=1 ]
• 21 WE LOVE STONEHENGE [For=037]

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