Westbury White Horse, nr. Bratton Camp, Wilts.

(nr Rodfield Lane)

Detail: This circle was reported on the 20th of July and is in a field of golden wheat. It measures approximately 200ft in diameter. 

Visiting: This crop circle has now been harvested. The farmer has asked that no one enter this field. Please respect his wishes. There is a good view of the circle to be had from the top of Bratton Camp – which has a car park and you can walk across the top of the hill.

Location: Near Westbury White Horse and Bratton Camp. The crop circle is in a narrow field, underneath the south side of Bratton Camp Earthwork, and close to the Westbury White Horse.

Flight: This was a very difficult flight. Despite the forecast being for sunny spells, it was actually raining when we arrived on site. The crop circle was in a tricky position, near a road and near Bratton Camp Hillfort, which is popular with walkers (even in inclement weather!).  The cloud was quite low, as you can see in the pictures, but it was was very atmospheric. It’s a pity that the circle now has several walkways through the crop, clearly it has been visited. Please note (as stated above) the farmer does not want people in this field. 

History & Connections: Bratton Camp has been the location of many circles over the years, dating right back to the early 1990s. The last circle to appear there was on the 4th of August 2016. Click here for more information on that formation. 

From the English Heritage Website: 

The original Iron Age hillfort defences were built at Bratton Camp over 2000 years ago. These earthworks protected a settlement containing round houses, granaries, stores and workshops.  The design and construction showed the effectiveness of the hillfort to its enemies.

The site was excavated in the 18th century. However, three thousand years earlier a Neolithic long barrow existed on this hill, and later excavations in the 19th century uncovered human skeletons and cremations. 

Today, this extensive chalk grassland supports herb and grass species that provide a habitat for a diverse range of insects, including the rare Adonis Blue butterfly and the scarce forester moth.

The White Horse is visible from afar and is a famous local landscape.  Local records suggest that the horse was originally cut in the late 1600s, probably to commemorate the supposed Battle of Ethandun, thought to have taken place at Bratton Camp in AD 878.

Design & Symbolism: This formation is a 12-fold spinner (rotational symmetry – or the appearance thereof). Twelve is a number we have seen a lot during the 2019 crop circle season and is linked to measure, time, and the movement toward wholeness. You will have seen it discussed at some length in the commentary for some of the circles this year already. Twelve is the sum of 3 x 4, if three is the number of the divine-trinity and four is the number of mother-substance, then twelve is the the sum of the multiplication of both. This is a wonderful way of looking at twelve. 

The Movement Towards Wholeness: My favourite way of looking at twelve is as symbolising ‘the movement toward wholeness’. This is something the crop circles seem to be particularly concerned with. They bring back the mysterious into our lives as part of the whole, rather than outside of it, rejected and discarded. The mysterious and the paranormal (an expression of the mysterious), are part of the human narrative, that is, they are part of being human. It is an essential part of our psyche as, as breathing is to the body. In our rush to claim, explain and master, we forget the role the numinous can play in making us feel whole, and in particular, making us feel whole in relation to our environment, planet and the cosmos. It is the true root of our insatiable curiosity as a species. 

Food of the Cosmos: There is also something of the symbol of the sun about this design. The warmth the sun brings, the light the sun brings into our lives. The suns connection with deity can be found throughout human history. There is something nourishing about the sun, and I think also about the crop circles themselves. They are food for the soul, and heaven knows we need it! 

See Geometry Gallery below for more analysis as we have it.

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.

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Please Help to keep us Flying in 2019: 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.

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

Commentary on the geometry coming soon… Check back for updates.