Mazes and Labyriths: Chapter XVII. Stone Labyrinths and Rock Engravings

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This is a chapter from a scholarly antiquarian study of mazes and labyrinths, drawing on archaeological fieldwork and historical sources to trace the geographic distribution of labyrinth designs across northern Europe and beyond. Matthews catalogs stone labyrinths found along the coasts of Finland, Sweden, Iceland, Lapland, and Denmark — structures formed from pebbles ranging from palm-sized to boulder-scale — noting their consistent association with shorelines and islands, and documenting the variety of local names applied to them, including "Troy-town" variants, "Maiden's Dance," "Giant's Fence," and "Walls of Jericho." He argues that this Scandinavian evidence lends credibility to the 17th-century claim that Britain received its turf mazes from Danish ancestors, and pushes the tradition's possible origins back to the Bronze Age or earlier, pointing to suggestive but inconclusive prehistoric rock engravings in Northumberland and Brittany. The chapter also examines a striking outlier: a Cretan-type labyrinth figure found among the Pima Indians of Arizona, recorded in a Spanish manuscript from 1762, though Matthews judges it probably introduced by early Spanish colonizers rather than evidence of independent invention or shared ancient origin. His conclusion is that definite labyrinth cult evidence remains confined to Europe and the Mediterranean, roughly coinciding with cromlech-building cultures, leaving the question of ultimate origin unresolved but productively narrowed.

Mazes and Labyriths: Chapter XVII. Stone Labyrinths and Rock Engravings

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