Summers Lane, Broad Hinton, Wiltshire (2)

The pretty village of Broad Hinton lies close to Hackpen Hill in Wiltshire, just north of Avebury, and close to Winterbourne Bassett. All these locations have been regular spots for crop circles over the years.

This formation was one of two to appear on the same night in adjoining barley fields (see here for information about the adjoining circle). They lie close to St Peter ad Vincula church in the village. You can read more about the 12/13th century church here.

This formation was very different in style and feel to its neighbour. This is such a pretty design, a pentagram accompanied by a confetti (if one might use this word as a noun) of tiny circles. Unlike many crop circles, here the pentagram is not drawn inside a circle, but is rather free standing – an interesting accomplishment in terms of geometry. The tiny circles are of two diameters, one slightly larger than the other. There is more than a passing resemblance to many of the fractal formations that have appeared over the years where tiny circles like this are used to indicate further interactions of the fractal pattern that are too small or intricate to be rendered equitably in the crop. These small circles echo and draw attention to the five-ness of the overall design.

Five is the number of life and the ratios of the pentagon generate the golden section proportion and the Fibonacci numbers. Five is also the number of Man as the number and the Golden ratio generate his form. Five itself is known as the number of regeneration – as the golden ratio often dictates the proportions and growth patterns of living things. The affinity we have with five and in particular five-pointed stars, can be seen reflected in the number of times it is used in logos and patterns in everyday life.

When five is seen in crop circle designs, it iterates to me the living quality of this phenomenon, something which has a life and spirit of its own, no matter how hard some might try to pin it down, or own it. While the circle (1), or seven might be numbers of the Divine or the soul, five is the number of the human spirit – perhaps the reason stars have been used as a symbol of the spirit since time immemorial.

Visiting the Circles? If you are thinking of visiting any crop circles this summer, please read our Visiting the Crop Circles section. It’s full of useful information and etiquette for visiting the countryside and the crop circles. Please remember that you should not enter any fields without the express permission of the farmer.

Please Help to keep us Flying in 2017: If you have enjoyed looking at our pictures and information please consider making a small donation to keep us flying. There are so few of us left regularly recording the circles it’s really important that we continue. And while some now use drones to record the circles, it is important that there are still images taken from aircraft where the best quality camera equipment can be used and images that include the broad vista of the landscape can be taken. This kind of photography is expensive and it gets harder with each passing year to raise the funds we need to continue our work, but if everyone who regularly looked at this website made a small donation we would meet the funds we need. You can make a donation here. You could also purchase a photo print of this circle here.

NOTE: Some of the images below are beautiful landscape scenes. Click on each image to enlarge them and see the whole picture.

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Geometry Gallery

In the original crop circle the star itself is slightly asymmetric in the field. My drawing of this circle has idealised the star. It will be interesting at some point to look at the degree of asymmetry to see if it might have any meaning – but that is for another time. What I found of interest was the fact that this pentagram star was fashioned as a stand alone shape, with no containing circle – that would be difficult enough to achieve on paper (I didn’t even attempt it) – never mind in a field. I drew my pentagon inside a circle – I had the luxury of being to erase the lines afterwards!

Karen currently has a section of her original paintings (from 2017) for sale. Click here to see the paintings available.