The ruins of Stonehenge in England are iconic reminders of an ancient and mysterious past but they are not the only links to that past. As author Beeaff points out in this fascinating book, there are thousands of such prehistoric memorials—standing stones, chambered tombs, stone circles—still remaining for us to ponder. The scope of this book is limited to England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, and Brittany, but that is not a limitation at all; there are more than 900 stone circles in the British Isles alone.
Beeaff gives us a detailed history of how these memorials came into being, who built them and why, and what they signified for their builders. But this is not some dry, dusty academic study of stone memorials, which are rocks, after all. The author gives us much more. After examining the monuments in terms of their cultures, architectural designs, motifs, and their usage as sacred spaces, she goes on to speculate on the various cultures’ beliefs relative to life and death, heaven and earth, the secular and sacred, and body and soul. In a section titled “Spiritual Fitness” the author shows how prehistoric monuments still have a connection to our modern times, either as healing agents or as repositories of myth and legend.
Profusely illustrated with color photos this is a beautiful and intelligent read. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in the ancient ways of megalithic peoples.
John Kachuba
