An 8-foot carved wooden pole has mysteriously appeared on a cliff in southeast England. The pole, thought to be carved from a single tree, is inscribed with the name Perkūnas, a Baltic god of thunder and lightning. From The Guardian:
Keen to keep the artwork situated in the Capel-Le-Ferne nature reserve, Kent Wildlife Trust is in the process of applying to Dover district council for retrospective planning permission. But its appeal to find the artist behind it has so far proved unsuccessful[…]
Jerzy Sikora, a medieval archaeologist at the University of Łódź, noted on Twitter that the Kent totem looked similar to the Wolin Svetovit, a ninth- or 10th-century wooden carving depicting Svetovit, a Slavic god of abundance and war, found in Poland in 1974.
Young concurred that this might be the inspiration for the Kent sculpture, given the lack of other source material[…]
Patrick Knill, 57, a support worker from Folkestone, who visited the totem pole on Tuesday, said it reminded him of a prop from a dark metal band rather than an authentic Lithuanian artefact.
