The view of Stonehenge from the A303

In 1599 Samuel Daniel speaks of the ‘gazing passenger’, that ‘Enquires and asks his fellow traveller’ what he knows of the site and his opinion of it.

the gazing passenger,…looks with admiration,

And faine would know his birth, and what he were,

How there erected and long agone,

Enquires, and asks his fellow traveller,

What he hath heard and his opinion,..

Then he turns again,

And looks and sighs, and then admires afresh,

Angry with time that nothing should remain,

Our greatest wonders wonder, to express.

That a ‘good view of Stonehenge from the A303’ is important, was acknowledged by English Heritage when launching the ‘Save Stonehenge’ campaign in September 1995. Writing to The Times in November that year, Lady Bowman announced that ‘The glimpse that I get of Stonehenge, halfway through such journeys, never fails to rejoice my heart.’

Stonehenge c.1832 / 1843 Stonehenge, Mezzotint by David Lucas after John Constable.