Logo "defiles" Uffington White Horse
For more than 3,000 years, the Uffington White Horse, carved into an Oxfordshire (England) hillside by some dedicated and forgotten band of Bronze Age peoples, has been tended by the Celts, Romans, pagan Anglo-Saxons and Christian English who have all ruled the area. But in what archaeologists describe as one of the most shameful instances of brandalism seen in Britain, Channel 4 Television executives stand accused of defiling the oldest hill-chalk carving in Britain.
A gigantic eye, familiar to fans of the television game show Big Brother, has been daubed alongside the White Horse to promote the forthcoming series of the television programme and its vast dimensions rival that of the White Horse. Archaeologists have demanded an inquiry into how the National Trust - which owns the site - granted permission for Channel 4 to disfigure the environs of the White Horse for such a 'tacky' reason. Conservationists condemned the marketing ploy as 'sacrilege' after it emerged that Britain's biggest landowner accepted £2,000 to allow the logo to appear beside the graceful galloping outline. Residents of the nearby village of Uffington warned the incident could trigger a local uprising. Sharon Smith, curator of the Tom Brown's School Museum, said: "This just smacks of sacrilege. You shouldn't use a national monument to promote a tacky game show." Alan Hardy, senior project manager for Oxford Archaeology, said: "I think this is taking bad taste a little too far, it's just a cheap trick. People should not think this site is a free advertising hoarding to be exploited."
Under the cover of an early morning mist, staff spent seven hours spraying a thick, chalk-based paint on the site. Experts now fear that the National Trust's decision could spark a series of similar campaigns that use Britain's cultural landmarks in marketing campaigns. David Miles, chief archaeologist with English Heritage - the Government's advisers on the country's cultural legacy - said the Big Brother image was an indictment of modern society. "This simply confirms that we live in a commercial age," he added. "Yet somehow I think the White Horse will be around long after Big Brother is forgotten."
A spokesman for Channel 4 insisted the image would be washed away by heavy rains and would have certainly disappeared by the time of the new series, which starts this month. A National Trust spokesman said: "We thought long and hard about whether this was something we would want and decided it was an innovative way to raise funds for what we do." He added that an environmentally-friendly chalk paint had been used which would have no lasting impact.
Sources: BBC News, The Observer (4 May 2003)
Origin of New England stone face carvings debated
The origin of five flat-backed stone faces with sunken eye sockets and gaping mouths found in Sturbridge and Southbridge, Massachusetts (USA), and weighing between 6 and 25 pounds is currently being debated by archaeologists and antiquary researchers throughout New England.
Joseph Sinnott, retired state geologist for Massachusetts, is in current possession of the stones, having been given them over the past two years by individuals who either found them out in the wild or have had them in the family for decades. Even though the carvings appear to be centuries old, dating cannot be determined with certainty due to how they've oxidized. According to Sinnott, who wants to organize a dig this summer to look for more stone faces amidst the debris of a much older civilization that can be more easily carbon-dated, there is no evidence the carvings were made with metal tools.
Ed Hood, an archaeologist and research historian at Old Sturbridge Village, disagrees. After examining the stones, Hood couldn't tell whether metal tools were used or whether the marks left by modern tools have been masked. Others have speculated that the stones were used for sacrificial rituals, their flat backs supposing a supine position so that the faces could stare at the stars while their mouths held burnt offerings. However, members of the Nipmuc, a Native American tribe that dwelled in central Massachusetts for thousands of years, have stated that the carvings match nothing their tribe has ever done.
Even though Sinnott does not believe the faces to be a modern-day hoax, he is open to any other explanation as to their origin.
Source: Associated Press (10 May 2003)
