open letter about clodgy moor boat slate

Open letter about Clodgy Moor Boat Slate

Triangles are cross hatched

Above are 4 views of the same detail cropped from different angled light views on Thomas Goskar’s 3046 Reflectance Transformation Image data set of 28th May 2013.

Above are 4 views of the detail taken by my cameras and an auxilliary lens.

Above are both sides of a replica of Truro EDC(Woodcock Corner) Incised slate disc.The original was excavated with Grooved Ware pottery and hence has a secure Later Neolithic date range. I am using the comparison of cross-hatched triangles and lozenges which are in profusion on both this and The Clodgy Moor boat slate to stylistically date the latter which although found with Grooved Ware pottery and Later Neolithic flint has no secure datable context as it was found in ploughed soil.

The triangle shown from Clodgy Moor boat slate is of typical size for its cross-hatched motifs and is less than 2mm wide.Many of the features on this slate are of very small size so I will next demonstrate that they can be made by the unaided eye using a flint tool so that they cannot simply be dismissed as irregularities in the natural surface combined with wishful thinking.

A method of engraving tiny cross-hatched motifs

Dimensions on the edge are in millimetres and fractions of an inch.A fine flint short blade, serrated by another blade or a triangular point work.An artist might surprise us with what is possible.

Above: detail of oars and surf and axemen towards stern of boat.

Next I shall look for sightings of this boat or others like it during the British Grooved Ware period of about 2800-2300BC.It will have both a forward mounted mast, at least 7 rowing oars per side, a rising stern and likely a prominent bounded zigzag; whether it be a rail or circumferential truss for a stitched plank boat running around the top of the hull. It could be found any where between Egypt and Ireland.The fabulous details between the oars do not concern us in this document. If you want to read the wild and disorganised speculations about their meaning then Google: ‘Oh Mother; for the Love of Gold’.

Looking for ancient boats

On the next pages, bearing in mind the details on these examples let us look at a few examples of archaeological finds which may carry stylistic decorative details relating to naval architecture of the time.

Gold lunulae from Ireland have possible boat details and a solar motif is on the hull of the Clodgy Moor boat. See if it is easier to wear a lunula on your head as a halo or sun rather than creasing it to hang around the neck? Schliemann’s wife tried on the Gold earings. The decorative ends resolve as the boat sailing towards you, complete with Beaker edging to the sail and solar motif. The Naxos sauceboat sails in a red sea with the oars in motion and prominent hatched triangles seen through the upperworks like a rail. The stern is raised and it may have a ramming prow.Boat details may be found in the decoration of zoned beakers where diagonal and triangle motifs are sandwhiched between bands of horizontal lines; like the sherd I found at Clodgy Moor. Google: ‘Clodgy Moor Boat Slate.’Complete with its haft the axe hammer and boat axe symbolism becomes obvious as reasonable represntations of a fine sailing boat.Staying with The Cyclades; I shall unravel the ‘mysterious’ frying pans.

Above, Thanks to Wikimedia; a frying pan dated 2800-2300 BC. The boat has a hull(1) and many oars(2) and (2a). There is a visual pun in the fertility panel beneath in which the rowed boat becomes an ear of wheat(2b). (3a) has confounded scholars for years. It is not a prow or stern post. It is a far forward mounted mast and sail. The sail is basically triangular like on the gold earings and is a visual pun with the fertile vulva(3) and sails in the sea(5) becoming The Cyclades Islands(3b).(4) is the boat hull and field plots. The mast at (3a) carries a tattered pennant showing the wind direction. The mast is at a bent forward angle not just by wind but because it is showing the way to the Pole Star. The single lines at the end of the stern and off the top of the mast suggest to me that the boat shape is a recognisable part of the constellation Draco, which at the time pointed to the Pole Star, which was Thuban. Hence the mast is represented too far forward in order to impart vital navigation information. The Pole Star as a fish pointed to in this image I think represents another way of finding North, by putting a piece of lodestone in a fish shaped float in the middle of the water filled frying pan. Look at some other frying pans to see points of the compass motifs. Notice the cleat or rowlock style handles and the circumferential rope-like decoration around the edge as though we are on the deck within the truss that stiffens the boat.

This has been an abstract designed to lead any interested person to the possibility that the missing and largely unspoken part of the ‘Beaker cultural package’ that brought metal and an entirely new outlook to a large part of Europe has been found. Deeper implications of the boat and many insights gained have not been mentioned here so as not to deflect from a linear narrative. I am ashamed that over 5 years have been wasted in which many papers have been written in ignorance of this object and the wider population has been denied vital knowledge about its shared cultural heritage. July 16th 2013.Please can you help? Graham Hill. 25 Rosehill Gardens, Heamoor, Penzance. Cornwall. TR18 3RE. Tel. 01736 330117 [email protected]