Rollright
: PLACES AND FAMILIES: Popular Rhymes And Nursery Tales
The "Druidical" stones at Rollright, Oxfordshire, are said to have been
originally a general and his army who were transformed into stones by a
magician. The tradition runs that there was a prophecy or oracle which
told the general,--
If Long Compton thou canst see,
King of England thou shalt be.
He was within a few yards of the spot whence that town could be
observe
transformation,--
Sink down man, and rise up stone!
King of England thou shalt be none.
The general was transformed into a large stone which stands on a spot
from which Long Compton is not visible, but on ascending a slight rise
close to it, the town is revealed to view. Roger Gale, writing in 1719,
says that whoever dared to contradict this story was regarded "as a most
audacious freethinker." It is said that no man could ever count these
stones, and that a baker once attempted it by placing a penny loaf on
each of them, but somehow or other he failed in counting his own bread.
A similar tale is related of Stonehenge.
More
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