2023 Circles: Field Barn, Winterbourne Bassett Groundshots
Photograph by Crop Circle Explorer
DETAILS
Date Reported: 4 June 2023
Location: Field Barn, Winterbourne Bassett, Wiltshire
For me, the peak of the circles phenomenon wasn’t in the opening ten years of the 21st century. Instead, it was that truly wonderful two-season stretch across 1990 and 1991. It was a period of innovation. Plain circles and rings were no longer all you could expect from the circles. These features were accompanied by straight lines, avenues, keys, forks and all other kinds of weird details into what we now know as pictograms.
It goes without saying that we all remember the massive East Field pictogram that found its way onto the front cover of Led Zeppelin’s Remasters album, but it wasn’t an isolated appearance. Rather, it was one of a lengthy sequence of circles in a specific style. A second pictogram was found on the same morning as the East Field event at nearby Stanton St Bernard. Earlier in 1990, the very first pictogram was found close to the ancient city of Winchester on Chilcomb Down. There have been plenty of examples of the style through the years, including a cute relation in 2021 at Watership Down in Hampshire. Then, in June 2023, this pictogram turned up close to Winterbourne Bassett in Wiltshire.
Photograph by Crop Circle Explorer
On the ground, the circle was visible driving up the hill from Winterbourne Bassett and when travelling towards Swindon from Avebury. I got there after other visitors had found their way inside. From my estimates, this formation is far from the tiny circle it’s being portrayed as in some quarters. With rough calculations based upon my strides along the central line, it’s somewhere in the region of 80m in length from end to end.
Inside the circle, I captured some photos and briefly spoke to the visitors who were locals. They had visited the circle a mile or so away, the previous weekend, at Broad Hinton. We went our separate ways and I departed with my eyes streaming from a combination of the bright sunlight and intense barley pollen.
I later heard the farmer had arrived at the circle and had apparently confronted both croppies and walkers at a lay-by close to the field. He felt strongly enough to return the following morning and deface the circle. That’s his prerogative but this circle seems to be a reminder of how things used to be, and possibly, how things will be again.
GALLERY BY CROP CIRCLE EXPLORER
