A Magical Place, on a Pot
I spend a lot of time up on the Ridgeway, more so in the good weather than the bad (yes I’m pining for it a bit during these dull grey rainy days). One of the walks I do most often, because I know how long it takes to walk it and I won’t get lost, is to turn my back on White Horse Hill and go in the other direction. This takes us out of the car park, up a long straight path between fields, past a plantation of tall tall trees (always worth going into for a listen to the air moving in the trees) and through a gate on the left.
Through the gate is Wayland’s Smithy, it’s a neolithic chambered long barrow which means it’s over 6,500 years old. It’s so old it’s hard to get the brain around it, and hard to understand how many people may have stood around it, come across it in the landscape and - though it’s appearance has changed, especially since it’s restoration in the 1960s - I feel sure the atmosphere at this site has always been different and special.
Different cultures add stories to places. Once this was a burial site, and then no doubt ‘just a pile of stones’, now it’s a place for modern Pagans to celebrate the festivals and a nice spot for walkers to stop and eat sandwiches, for children to run around and try count the kerb stones.
One story in particular has stuck since at least the late 10th century and is about Wayland the Smith; if a horse and a coin are left at the Smithy overnight when the horse’s owner returns in the morning the coin will be gone, the horse will be shod. Weyland, or Weland, is a smith from Norse mythology, in which smiths were often magical. If you ever get the chance to see a sword being hand forged from boring looking metal to it’s final sharp shimmery sheen you’ll understand about the magical associations.
The charm this place has for me is the peace and quiet to be found there - that’s not always the case of course, a busy Saturday or school holiday means more visitors. But if I pick a quiet midweek day with maybe not the best weather I can be there alone in the circle of beech trees, leaning on the ancient stones and letting my mind wander wherever it will. It’s no wonder this place eventually finished up on a piece of my pottery really.
I set this scene in winter. Imagine there’s been a frost and maybe a sprinkling of snow, but now it’s cold and clear. The winter sun is setting behind the trees and you’re almost sure you feel others are there with you, and perhaps you hear the whinny of a horse, although there’s no-one to be seen.
Just be still and feel the magic. I can feel it now, just holding this thing made of clay and glaze.
