Clonehenge

Sometimes a real jewel pops up in the overcrowded blogosphere and Clonehenge is just such a site for anyone that likes megaliths.

As they say –
“It is a celebration of those first builders who erected Stonehenge as we understand it today, whose idea has turned out to be the ancestor of all icons, so powerful in image that five thousand years later people feel compelled to emulate their achievement, often in the most unlikely places and unsuitable media. It is also a celebration of the ingenuity and mad genius of those people today who decide, usually for no reason except fun and the challenge, to make Stonehenges out of anything they can lay their hands on. Hurray for the builders!”

Paju City Stonehenge (South Korea). Image credit Sonja J Freeman

Each clone is given a score in “druids” out of ten (yes, they do know the druids didn’t build it!). The one above scores 7 druids and this one scores a well deserved 8½…

Nunica Henge, Michigan. Image credit Daniel E Johnson

Two of our favourites are the UK’s Foamhenge (having been inside it we’d give it 9½ druids for sheer power and atmosphere) and Straw Echo henge , built temporarily by a farmer in the summer of 1996 right next to the original, for it’s sheer exhuberance, the pleasure it gave to visitors and the fact it had no function other than to pay a quiet local tribute to the genius of the original. Perhaps our least favourite is Privy Henge  where for once Banksy was off form.

The site also has many small-scale tributes and of these Beach Henge that once stood fleetingly in Wales, is one of the nicest.

Altogether, Clonehenge is well worth a visit. We’re sure they’ll welcome more nominations.