by Percy E. Corbett - friendsofsabbath.org

5
CHAPTER 1
PRE-CHRISTIAN BRITAIN
The idea that there was culture and erudite wisdom in Britain, thousands of years before the
Christian era seems strange. But how many people have delved into the mysteries
surrounding Glastonbury ? How many know that in the 1930's aerial photography revealed the
existence of a pre-historic Zodiac circle modelled in the hills and landscape surrounding
Glastonbury ? It is ten miles wide and thirty miles in circumference. Writing in "Country Life"
just after World War II, Harold Steel, who had seen the gigantic effigies from the air, claimed to
have calculated the possibility of such artificial constructions having assumed their symmetrical
form by chance to be ten million to one.
An extract from a booklet issued by the Avalon Research Foundation and published in "The
Universal Voice" in 1965 reads:-
"An examination of the evidence available indicates that astronomer architects from Sumeria
gave their name to Somerset. Some five thousand years ago they came to design and
construct these enormous effigies, portraying them in permanent form so that their
symbolism might be preserved in perpetuity for posterity.”
Does not the uniqueness of the existence of the Zodiac Circle in Somerset suggest that there
is something unique about the Glastonbury area ? What guiding influence brought the
Sumerians to Britain ? Was it the same influence which led the Three Wise men to Nazareth
? These are fundamental questions which will be raised in different examples given in this
booklet. Hence the title, "Why Britain ?"
Let us jump a thousand years and note a statement by George Jowett (1) in "The Drama of the
Lost Disciples." He writes:- The art of enamelling is early identified with Britain as the
production of tin. The ancient Briton was the inventor of enamelling. He was so perfect in this
craft that relics reposing in the British Museum and Glastonbury Museum such as the famous
Glastonbury Bowl (over two thousand years old) and the beautiful Desborough Mirror are as
perfect as the day they were made. They are magnificent examples, of "La Tene" art as the
Celtic design is named, their geometric beauty and excellence being beyond the ability of
modern craftsmen to duplicate.
Confirmation of this technical ability of our ancestors is available from other sources. The
famous British archaeologist, Sir Flinders Petrie, discovered in Old Gaza gold ornaments and
enamelware of Celtic origin, dated 1500 B.C. and in reverse found Egyptian beads at
Stonehenge. Jowett states that the tin that garnished the splendour of Solomon's Temple,
1005 B.C., was mined and smelted into ingots at Cornwall and thence shipped by the
Phoenicians to Palestine. Herodotus, circa 450 B.C., wrote of the British Isles and its people
under the name of Cassitendes, remarking on their talent in the metal industry. Aristotle, 350
B.C. was one of the first writers to name Britain the "Tin Islands." Julius Caesar following his
campaign in Britain, 55 B.C., wrote with admiration of the culture of the British, their sterling
(1) The Covenant Publishing Co. Ltd.