rock basin camera
this large 'sunstone camera’ is a up-ended 'captured' rock basin that forms this intriguing standing stone that sits on the northern edge of the central tor at zennor hill. in its original form it would have been larger as its northern flank has been split away with some of remains lying close by. the large rock basin now turned perpendicular to its horizontal position, occupies most of its eastern face. this forms a relatively flat surface and it is against that we can see the sun rays projected.
this is the result of a hole that pierces the southern edge of the basin (see right). this makes a rude ‘camera’ lens that projects the sun rays across the face of the basin.. what is important to this effect is the precise angle of elevation and its north-south orientation (to within a fraction of a degree). what this achieves is a seasonal sundial at around noon each day casting a different angle for different times across the year. one could certainly read the winter and summer solstices and equinoxes (given the appearance of the sun in the sky). that it has been in this elevated position for some time is evidence by the water trough that has cut its way into the bottom of the basin. that this fortuitous combination of sun and water, is the result of natural phenomena is without doubt but that the articulation of its form and function into a possible ritual / ceremonial celebration of the seasons and/or as a marker for possible agricultural calculation, cannot be discounted. the close adjacency this stone has to important ceremonial sites at zennor and sperris quoits also adds weight to this speculation.
this stone is one in an extraordinary set of stone outcrops at zennor hill that holds many unusual features, from rock basins to zoomorphic forms - deep fissures, runnels, voids, chamber-like enclosures and holed stones. some rock formations are uncannily like the quoits that occupy the flat hilltop of zennor hill, between of carn zennor and sperris croft. tilley observes in his archaeology of supernatural places. ‘slabs that have toppled from the top of the rock stacks... rest horizontally or vertically against their sides, creating slanting roofed chambers large enough to enter and walk through.’ the proximity of zennor and sperris quoits raises the possibility that these dramatic rock formations were deliberately mimicked by the builders of these early monuments. ‘the tors were not only their source of inspiration, but they were constructed in the form of tors. in elevating large stones, these people were emulating the work of a super-ancestral past. furthermore, the stones from which they were built were taken from the tors. the dolmens, in effect, were the tors dismantled and put back together again to resemble their original form. once constructed, they could themselves be tors, something emphasised by the landscape setting of some of them on hills that lacked tors.’
this unusual cup-shaped stone sits at the far end of zennor hill closest to the sea and is part of a larger arrangement of stratified tors. it makes a vertical accent to a stone ‘room’ formed from low lying natural stone walls.this stone formed from a large rock cut water basin has been lifted vertically with its surface in direct north/ south orientation so that a small hole on its south side projects the sun across this cupped surface to produce a triangular illumination that functions as a seasonal calendar.
.rex henry
SUNSTONE THE HOLE IN THE STONE 50.18962 -5.55514 122X122CM HOUSE PAINT, ACRYLIC, ASH