Author: Michelle Franklin, Word Count: 718
Featured in Midsummer Archaeological Story Moot: Live Stream – Summer 2026
It was the 21st of June, the purported longest day of the year. He and his entourage gathered around the sacred stones like bees to an abandoned hive, eager to insinuate the takeover before anyone else could claim a place. It was still dark out, and he had brought his brood to get a good view. He planted himself beside the straightest of the sarsens and looked rather pleased with himself.
“They call it a henge,” he pronounced, smiling emphatically.
One in his set looked charily at the looming stones. “Aw fought they wuz cawled a circle.”
“Well,” he snuffed, “there is a bank and ditch, isn’t there?”
“Down’t see no ditch, dunnaw. Jus’ a whackin’, great circle, innit?”
This was not to be borne, but it was too early to begin the pedantic rows. He took his sandwich out of his pocket and offered it to everyone around him, more as a means of shutting them up than it was a peace-offering.
“You know,” said he, “this place has been here since ancient times, and they used to do all sorts of rituals and rites on the altar stone. Druids must have come here before Roman times– Druids didn’t build it, you know– but I think you’ll find,” with teeth sucking his lower lips, “I think you’ll find that in antiquity, today is generally thought of as the longest day of the year.”
No one had anything to day to this, or if they did, they kept it to themselves. He did not mind the unbelievers; he only minded when they tried to make the hedge seem less important than it was. One of them had called the circle a ‘pile of shchew-pid rocks, innit’, and he brought them here on purpose to see how very non-stupid the henge was. He munched his sandwich and sighed romantically over its being the longest day of the year, the only day on which it could be thought to be the longest day of the year, when a sudden whisper grazed his ear:
“… But is it, though?”
He put down his sandwich and looked about. “Who said that?”
No one made him any answer. His entourage gave him odd looks and went on lamenting over how dark it was and how they had been made to get up at 3am to see some rocks wave at the sun.
“Really,” the voice buzzed in his ear, “depending on the year, any day from the twentieth to the twenty-fifth might be said to be the longest day of the year.”
He turned toward the henge. The stones did not move, but they seemed to be probing his mind.
“Was that you, sarsens?” he asked. “Did you just say that?”
A chorus of voices spoke:
“No one knew we were good for anything till Stukeley said so…”
“Heh! Cracked, he was.”
“We were abandoned for hundreds of years.”
“No one came to see us till the Victorians made us important again.”
“And who knows if we were ever really right about anything!”
“They were probably wrong, but we get attention now, so I’m willing to believe whatever they said about us.”
“They said the Druids was ‘ere.”
“And they call us a calendar– preposterous!”
“A bit insultin’, if I’m honest.”
“And did ye see tha’? Ol’ Phil’s gorn and made us less important! Never thought his sort’d betray us like that. ‘E tol’ that lady from the ‘eritage site that our stupid cousin’s be’er than us!”
“Well, really,” he cut in, “the whole landscape is quite remarkable–“
“Pish! Who cares about the landscape– you can hardly see most of it!”
“And is the landscape made to line up with the midsummer sunrise?”
He sucked the inside of his cheek. “Well, I think you’ll find–“
“Durrington’s the most fatuous bint of ’em all! Made o’ wood an’ didn’t even larst a century!”
“Down’t say nufin’ about Avebury. That arse’s tellin’ people she’s eight-hunned years aulder an’ twice the size as us!”
He stared at the ground, shoved his sandwich in his pocket, and drew his crew away from the henge. “Perhaps we ought to go to Avebury instead,” he said, hurriedly, herding everyone along.
One of his crew looked back as he was dragged away. “Will they have coffee, d’you think?”
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