Post by Cornelia_Africana on Nov 2, 2005 20:19:19 GMT
Note: Saoirse is pronounced “Seersha”. Sidhe is pronounced “seethe”
“....and after Avebury, this is the largest stone circle in Europe.” said tour guide Saoirse O’Neill, as she led a group of tourists around the megaliths of the Dumha na mSidhe national monument, one of the many remarkable megalithic sites scattered across the valley of the Boyne. The tourists gaped at the giant megaliths, each one twice the height and four times the width of a man. Some stopped to ask questions about how the giant stones had been moved, five thousand years ago. Saoirse answered them all, but even as she was doing it, she could not take her eyes from a couple standing near one of the largest megaliths. One of them a young man in his early twenties, with his brownish-yellow skin and jet-black straight hair, who his companion addressed as “Katsumi” was obviously Japanese. Nothing unusual in that, they got a lot of Japanese tourists at the site, but it was that companion who had attracted Saoirse’s attention. He appeared to be in his early thirties, with shoulder-length brown hair and blue eyes and was dressed in a extradordinary Edwardian frock-coat. Definitely an eccentric, but then, there was nothing unusual about eccentrics in Ireland. Saoirse wrenched her attention away from him, and got on with the tour.
Inside the stone circle, and dwarfing it, loomed the gigantic shape of The Mound, three hundred feet across and a hundred feet high. It was surrounded by a wall of granite boulders but was otherwise overgrown with grass. However, Saoirse explained, five thousand years ago, it would have been covered with quartz crystals, glittering in the sunlight, and would have been visible to travellers for many miles around. She took a torch and led the group down the passage that led into the heart of the Mound. They reached the inner chamber, a six sided structure fifty feet across at its widest. Saoirse shone her torch up to highlight the corbelled roofing which reached upwards to a height of forty feet. An American tourist whistled.
”He must have been a very powerful chieftain, to be buried in a place like this.”
“Well, that’s the odd thing about it” Saoirse replied. “No trace of a burial has ever been found here. Archaeologists now doubt that it was ever intended as a tomb.”
”That’s interesting”, the man in the Edwardian frock coat chipped in. “If it wasn’t a tomb, I wonder what it was for.”
“Well, according to local legend, the place is the haunt of the fairy folk!”
There was a ripple of laughter. “What, the little people?” the American tourist asked.
Saoirse joined in the general laughter. “No, the little people are something else entirely! No, I mean the Tuatha de Danaan, tall, beautiful, robed in white, with musical, silvery voices. According to legend, they were the first inhabitants of Ireland. They arrived on ships that floated through the air, and many years later, when Ireland was under threat of invasion, went away again - to Fairyland, so it’s said. Many a local claims to have seen them as white, glowing figures around the mound at the time of the full moon, returned from Fairyland. In fact, it’s what the name of the site means in Gaelic – Dumha na mSidhe- Mound of the Fairies. In fact” – she looked at her watch – “it’s a full moon tonight, so if anyone wants to try, access to the Mound ends at half-past five, but you can wander around the stone circle any time you like, if you’d like to meet one of the Tuatha de Danaan!”
There was more laughter, but no-one looked as thought they wanted to take up the offer.
“To get back to reality, since the site has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, a team of archaeologists from UNESCO is arriving today. Over the coming weeks, they’ll be doing a full survey of the site, for a UNESCO guide to all its World Heritage Sites. In particular, they’ll be doing a sonar scan of the Mound, since owing to its size, there may be chambers in it that have not yet been discovered. So maybe at the end of their visit, we’ll know why the Mound was constructed.”
The tourists made their way back outside. As they did so, the Japanese tourist, Katsumi, got into conversation with Saoirse. “This reminds me of home”, he said. “We had a stone circle like this – though not so large – on my family’s ancestral home on Hokkaido island. My grandmother regarded it as the home of the protecting spirit of our farm.”
“Really? There are stone circles in Japan?”
“Yes. They’re roughly the same age as yours, too.”
“Katsumi”, his strange companion called. “We've got something to talk about, remember”
”Coming, Doctor”, Katsumi replied, and giving his regards to Saoirse, he joined him at the far edge of the circle of megaliths.
“Found anything yet, Doctor?” he asked in a low voice, as soon as they were out of range of the rest of the tourists.
“No” the Doctor replied. He was looking at a small meter he had in his hand, so small that hardly anyone could have seen it unless they were as close as Katsumi was now. “There’s a magnetic anomaly here, but that’s nothing unusual at these stone circles. But no trace of anything capable of dragging the TARDIS off course, or draining it of power.”
“Are you worried, Doctor?”
”Of course I am. Anything capable of interfering with the TARDIS must be very powerful indeed – a power source that should be detectable for light years off with an instrument like this. A power source that can drag the TARDIS off course, drain it off power, and keep itself concealed – that has me very worried indeed. And another thing worries me too”
“What’s that?”
”Something she didn’t tell you in there – that the fairy folk aren’t always benevolent in their dealings with mortals.”
“....and after Avebury, this is the largest stone circle in Europe.” said tour guide Saoirse O’Neill, as she led a group of tourists around the megaliths of the Dumha na mSidhe national monument, one of the many remarkable megalithic sites scattered across the valley of the Boyne. The tourists gaped at the giant megaliths, each one twice the height and four times the width of a man. Some stopped to ask questions about how the giant stones had been moved, five thousand years ago. Saoirse answered them all, but even as she was doing it, she could not take her eyes from a couple standing near one of the largest megaliths. One of them a young man in his early twenties, with his brownish-yellow skin and jet-black straight hair, who his companion addressed as “Katsumi” was obviously Japanese. Nothing unusual in that, they got a lot of Japanese tourists at the site, but it was that companion who had attracted Saoirse’s attention. He appeared to be in his early thirties, with shoulder-length brown hair and blue eyes and was dressed in a extradordinary Edwardian frock-coat. Definitely an eccentric, but then, there was nothing unusual about eccentrics in Ireland. Saoirse wrenched her attention away from him, and got on with the tour.
Inside the stone circle, and dwarfing it, loomed the gigantic shape of The Mound, three hundred feet across and a hundred feet high. It was surrounded by a wall of granite boulders but was otherwise overgrown with grass. However, Saoirse explained, five thousand years ago, it would have been covered with quartz crystals, glittering in the sunlight, and would have been visible to travellers for many miles around. She took a torch and led the group down the passage that led into the heart of the Mound. They reached the inner chamber, a six sided structure fifty feet across at its widest. Saoirse shone her torch up to highlight the corbelled roofing which reached upwards to a height of forty feet. An American tourist whistled.
”He must have been a very powerful chieftain, to be buried in a place like this.”
“Well, that’s the odd thing about it” Saoirse replied. “No trace of a burial has ever been found here. Archaeologists now doubt that it was ever intended as a tomb.”
”That’s interesting”, the man in the Edwardian frock coat chipped in. “If it wasn’t a tomb, I wonder what it was for.”
“Well, according to local legend, the place is the haunt of the fairy folk!”
There was a ripple of laughter. “What, the little people?” the American tourist asked.
Saoirse joined in the general laughter. “No, the little people are something else entirely! No, I mean the Tuatha de Danaan, tall, beautiful, robed in white, with musical, silvery voices. According to legend, they were the first inhabitants of Ireland. They arrived on ships that floated through the air, and many years later, when Ireland was under threat of invasion, went away again - to Fairyland, so it’s said. Many a local claims to have seen them as white, glowing figures around the mound at the time of the full moon, returned from Fairyland. In fact, it’s what the name of the site means in Gaelic – Dumha na mSidhe- Mound of the Fairies. In fact” – she looked at her watch – “it’s a full moon tonight, so if anyone wants to try, access to the Mound ends at half-past five, but you can wander around the stone circle any time you like, if you’d like to meet one of the Tuatha de Danaan!”
There was more laughter, but no-one looked as thought they wanted to take up the offer.
“To get back to reality, since the site has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, a team of archaeologists from UNESCO is arriving today. Over the coming weeks, they’ll be doing a full survey of the site, for a UNESCO guide to all its World Heritage Sites. In particular, they’ll be doing a sonar scan of the Mound, since owing to its size, there may be chambers in it that have not yet been discovered. So maybe at the end of their visit, we’ll know why the Mound was constructed.”
The tourists made their way back outside. As they did so, the Japanese tourist, Katsumi, got into conversation with Saoirse. “This reminds me of home”, he said. “We had a stone circle like this – though not so large – on my family’s ancestral home on Hokkaido island. My grandmother regarded it as the home of the protecting spirit of our farm.”
“Really? There are stone circles in Japan?”
“Yes. They’re roughly the same age as yours, too.”
“Katsumi”, his strange companion called. “We've got something to talk about, remember”
”Coming, Doctor”, Katsumi replied, and giving his regards to Saoirse, he joined him at the far edge of the circle of megaliths.
“Found anything yet, Doctor?” he asked in a low voice, as soon as they were out of range of the rest of the tourists.
“No” the Doctor replied. He was looking at a small meter he had in his hand, so small that hardly anyone could have seen it unless they were as close as Katsumi was now. “There’s a magnetic anomaly here, but that’s nothing unusual at these stone circles. But no trace of anything capable of dragging the TARDIS off course, or draining it of power.”
“Are you worried, Doctor?”
”Of course I am. Anything capable of interfering with the TARDIS must be very powerful indeed – a power source that should be detectable for light years off with an instrument like this. A power source that can drag the TARDIS off course, drain it off power, and keep itself concealed – that has me very worried indeed. And another thing worries me too”
“What’s that?”
”Something she didn’t tell you in there – that the fairy folk aren’t always benevolent in their dealings with mortals.”
