certain that they were all connected by a continuous stone impost or architrave, though only six of these are now in situ.[1] The diameter of the circle is generally stated to be about 100 feet, and as this has been suggested as a reason for its being considered as post-Roman, it is important to know what its exact dimensions are. It turns out that from the face of one pier to that of the opposite one, where both are perpendicular, the distance is 97⋅6, or exactly 100 Roman feet. The distance from the outer face of these piers to inside of the earthen vallum that surrounds the whole is again 100 feet, though that cannot now be ascertained within a foot or two, or even more; but as this makes up the 100 yards and the 100 feet which recur so often in these monuments, these dimensions can hardly be considered accidental, and "valeant quantum" are an indication of their post-Roman date.[2]
Inside these outer circles stand the five great trilithons. Since the publication of Sir R. Colt Hoare's plan, their position and plan may be considered as settled. According to him, the height of the outer pair is 16⋅3, of the intermediate pair 17⋅2, and of the great central trilithon as it now stands 21⋅6. In their simple grandeur they are perhaps the most effective example of megalithic art that ever was executed by man. The Egyptians and Romans raised larger stones, but they destroyed their grandeur by ornament, or by their accompaniments; but these simple square masses on Salisbury plain are still unrivalled for magnificence in their own peculiar style.
- ↑ The history of the plan given on page 92, and from which all the dimensions in the text are quoted, is this. When I was staying with my friend, Mr. Hawkshaw, the eminent engineer, at Eversley, I was complaining of the incorrectness of all the published plans, when he said, "I have a man in my office whose plans are the very essence of minute accuracy. I will send him down to make one for you." He did so, and his plan—to a scale of 10 feet to 1 inch, is before me. I afterwards took this plan to Stonehenge, and identified the position and character of every stone marked upon it.
- ↑ I am almost afraid to allude to it even in a note, lest some one should accuse me of founding any theory upon it, like Piazzi Smyth's British inches in the Pyramids, but it is a curious coincidence that nearly all the British circles are set out in two dimensions. The smaller class are 100 feet, the larger are 100 mètres in diameter. They are all more than 100 yards. The latter measure is at all events certainly accidental, so far as we at present know, but as a nomenclature and "memoria technica," the employment of the terms may be useful, provided it is clearly understood that no theory is based upon it.
