Talk:La Hougue Bie

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Find sources: La+Hougue+Bie — news, books, scholar Addhoc 14:01, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

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Hawkes describes it as follows: "A 20m long passage chamber covered by a 12m high earth mound. The 9m long passage opens out into a main chamber that has three smaller side chambers, the whole appearance being cruciform in shape. First excavated in 1925 by the Société Jersiaise when fragments of twenty vase supports were found along with the scattered remains of at least eight individuals and bits of pottery. The site had evidently been entered and ransacked at an earlier unknown date. The mound is crowned by two Medieval chapels."

Mark Patton comments: “In the Channel Islands there are five passage graves with side chambers (La Hougue Bie, Faldouet and Grantez in Jersey, La Varde and Le Déhus in Guernsey)… Side chambers are relatively rare features on passage graves in mainland Brittany.”

The Jersey Heritage site comments: “La Hougue Bie is a Neolithic ritual site which was in use around 3500 BC. It is one of the largest and best preserved passage graves in Europe. Although it is generally referred to as a tomb, the monument would have served a much more complex purpose, with a number of ritual and ceremonial functions, of which burial was only one.”

Mark Patton comments: “Although many passage graves have produced evidence for continued activity throughout the Late Neolithic period, some monuments were abandoned in the mid-fourth millennium cal. BC. This is particularly the case with some of the larger passage graves ... The passage grave of La Hougue Bie (Jersey) has provided no evidence for Late Neolithic activity (Patton 1987a), whilst the closure of the Gavrinis passage grave (Larmor-Baden, Morbihan) is dated by a radiocarbon date (Le Roux 1983b) of 4470±80 BP (3340-2910 cal. BC: Gif-5766).”

The above text could possibly be salvaged by rephrasing and citing sources. Addhoc 14:27, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Text rephrased and siting sources. This article was split off from another and lost the extensive supporting bibliography on the way, which I have reinstated, together with a precis of the original text, suitably rephrased.

--TonyinJersey 15:04, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

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If the citations are too long, and need rephrasing, please put a tag so that I can see rather than wholesale deletions, which take the substance of the article to pieces, and reduce it to a Tourist guide. Small quotations are not infringements of copyright - Avoid Copyright Paranoia.

--TonyinJersey 16:00, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Tony, thanks for your comments - I've given the article a rewrite so that it is now closer to an encyclopedia article, instead of a list of quotations. Addhoc 17:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

I've changed "temples" to "churches and cathedrals" as this is the picture employed both by Patton and Hutton, e.g. Westminster Cathedral has burials that are incidental to its function. The point of the picture is to illustrate it to to contemporary reader; moreover, temples did not always have burials, unlike cathedrals which invariably did.

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The Legend of Hougue Bie In the Dark Ages when there was a great marsh in the parish of St.Lawrence a dragon lived there wallowing in the mud and breathing out destructive bursts of fire. The news of the devastation it was causing in Jersey eventually reached Normandy and the ears of the Seigneur of Hambye, a Norman Knight. Nothing daunted and having taken a loving farewell of his wife, Hambye set sail from Normandy with his faithful squire, Francis, to see if he could deliver Jersey from its terrible scourge. After a great fight the knight slayed the dragon and with another slash he cut off the dragons head to prove his victory. Tired from the long battle he decided to lay down for a rest before setting sail for Normandy and his beloved wife. Then Came the betrayal. His supposed loyal squire plunged his dagger into the sleeping lords chest for it was his plan to claim the slaying as his own and, with this valiant deed to his credit, win the hand of the beautiful Lady Hambye whose love he had always coveted. Leaving the body of his master hidden in Jersey, the squire set sail with the dragons head to Normandy. There with downcast eyes he told Lady Hambye that the dragon had killed her husband and that he, Francis had himself slain the beast in revenge for his dear lord. Then, to persuade her further he added that just before he died Seigneur Hambye, greatly impressed by his squires brave deed in slaying the dragon, gave him as the most fitting reward his own wife’s hand in marriage. The widow believed every word of this wicked tale. With her blood still cold from the horror of what she had head and her voice failing on her lips, she never the less consented to become the bride of Francis in defence to her husband’s dying wish. Now for the final twist in the tale. One night it is said the new husband gave away his true character as a murderer by talking in his sleep. Immediately the betrayed wife had him hanged for his heinous crime and once the concealed body of her first husband was found in what was then the parish of St.Saviour, she caused it to be covered in a mound so high that she could see it from where she lived in Normandy. On top of the mound she had a chapel built,dedicated to Notre Dame de la Clarté—Our Lady of the Dawn. Here masses were to be said for her murdered husband’s soul.

Addhoc 09:27, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Comments by 212.9.11.61

It is said that she died still gazing out across the sea at her husband’s memorial mound; and so from this lady’s faithfulness to the memory of her first husband could have come the name by which we know the mound today, La Hougue Bie — from La Hougue Hambye.....how boring!!!!!! bla bla bla like we care!!!

If you are going to la Hougue Bie take a jumper cause it is really cold inside the chamber!!!