Loving Our Lost Legacies
English Heritage’s youth engagement programme ‘Shout Out Loud’ enables young people across the country to explore and unearth lesser-known heritage spaces and untold narratives, breathing life back into places lost to time. As part of this initiative, local photographer Serena Burgis was tasked with the metaphorical excavation of a piece of human history right here in Dorset.
Half-buried and forgotten in a farmer’s field a few miles north of Abbotsbury rest eighteen fallen sarsen stones. They lay embedded within the soil, arms outstretched in an imperfect ring, obscured by time as they gaze out to sea. The sea gazes back in an unspoken bond unbroken by the steps of man; the Kingston Russell Stone Circle is off the beaten track. There isn’t an expensive gift shop. No faded picnic tables or overflowing car parks. Just eighteen stones and the odd dog walker retracing the steps of our Neolithic ancestors who lived and died four-thousand years ago.
The Kingston Russell Stone Circle is one of countless overlooked historic sites in Dorset. Deep into the process of forgetting, almost consigned to the past, whispers and ghosts of the life that once surrounded them fading and slipping away. And though we cannot be certain of their original purpose, we can surmise that this stone circle was once full of life.
Though likely not a place for a home or an archaic workplace, our ancestors may have brought the stones to bear as the setting for important religious ceremonies and weddings. People may have met there to build trade agreements, to make decisions, and to settle disputes; all atop a hill in what is now the heart of Dorset.
The circle’s purported significance to the land’s ancient inhabitants is at odds with the etymology of the stones. The name "sarsen" is derived from the word for ‘non-Christian’ or ‘foreign’. These same words were used by Edward Said in his book ‘Orientalism’ to describe the East. Intertwined with the land here in Dorset for millenia, the Kingston Russell Stone Circle is one of nine-hundred such stone circles in the British Isles which remain, determinedly, on the fringes of settlements, described as non-native despite their undeniable connection to the ground beneath them.
This paradox is what led Serena to look within and then across the globe to her native Thailand, where the spiritual significance of circles and connection to the land is integral. In a religious ceremony, or if you’re blessing a home, you’ll walk together in a circle. Community elders or Buddhist monks will wrap a sacred string called sai sin around your wrist to bless you. Sai sin is also used in formal ceremonies where the monks will tie it around their heads, connecting them to each other through a large web.
The way in which Serena has experienced the Kingston Russell Stone Circle feels like an invitation to do the same. A small, mostly forgotten, place in the middle of the Dorset countryside, surrounded by a lack of historical certainty, now assuredly revived by its perceived connection not just to what once was four thousand years ago, but what is, five thousand miles away.
Visit english-heritage.org.uk to discover one of these places for yourself. Pick somewhere you’ve never heard of, tell your friends and family, and give a love-barren location another chance to live.
Serena is one of three artists invited to work on the Shout Out Loud project with English Heritage, in collaboration with Photoworks and Arts Council England. Check out their work on Instagram:
Serena Burgis → @serena.burgis
Sally Barton → @bartonmade
Yuxi Hou → @ciciyx_
