Maarten van Hoek The Geography of Cup-and-Ring ... - StoneWatch

� CHAPTER 1.2 �
THE BRITISH ISLES
� INTRODUCTION �
This book is about circles; especially circles carved on natural stone
surfaces. The circle as a petroglyph, but also as geoglyph, occurs all
over the world. But there is no other place like the British Isles where
both the circular petroglyph and the geoglyph occurs so abundantly.
The geoglyphs are represented by more than a thousand stone circles,
built of all sorts of standing stones and there is also an unknown but
large number of circular burials. On top of that, there are more than
50000 cupules and (Fig. 123) 12000 petroglyph circles that have been
carved out of the rocks. Why the circle is so characteristic for
especially these isles is still a mystery.
Besides the circular art at open-air sites, these islands, especially
Ireland, have also an enormous collection of the so called passage tomb
art, mainly comprising circular (Fig. 2) and angular abstract art, which,
however, will not
be the subject of
this book.
Figurative or
iconic rock art
symbols, such as
animals or human
figures are very
rare or even
absent in these
islands and this
is all the
ENTRANCE
stranger when
one considers
their position in
between Spain
and Scandinavia,
two important
petroglyph areas
with an enormous
collection of rock
FIG. 2: NEWGRANGE AND ENTRANCE-STONE.
motifs comprising
both circular motifs and figurative art. No doubt there where contacts
between these three rock art regions, so it is most enigmatic why the
British Isles remained so “conservative” in their prehistoric art.
M. van HOEK: 8
GEOGRAPHY