Friday 24 February 2012: A Long Island Yankee at the Quoit of King Arthur

I've blipped this burial chamber before but I couldn't resist the title. *

So here's Guinea Pig Zero (and Casey) stopping for a photo opp before we set out to walk the length of Traeth Mawr/Newport Sands. You can read an account of the expedition is his own blip.

The full name of this burial chamber is Carreg Coetan Arthur/Arthur's Quoit Stone. Since it's around 5000 years old it has nothing to do with King Arthur but the 18th centuries antiquaries who named these cromlechs had no idea of prehistory and imagined they could be associated with romantic, if apocryphal, characters from the past. It's not the only one to be likened to a quoit, both in Wales and in Cornwall.

Fanciful though it may be, it's fun to imagine King Arthur's court meeting here and competing to throw the big boulders before setting off to slay a few dragons. We only bagged some shellfish but they made an excellent supper.


*A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is an 1889 novel by American humorist and writer Mark Twain. The book was originally titled A Yankee in King Arthur's Court. Some early editions are titled A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur.

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