[poconopundit]

Hey SunkenCiv, apparently the Brits have a knack for malarkey.

When Doug Bower and his co-conspirator Dave Chorley first created a representation of a “flying saucer nest” in a wheat field in Wiltshire, England, in 1976, they could not have foreseen that their work would become a cultural phenomenon.

Almost as soon as crop circles became public knowledge, they attracted a gaggle of self-appointed experts.  An efflorescence of mystical and magical thinking, scientific and pseudo-scientific research, conspiracy theories and general pandemonium broke out.

The patterns stamped in fields were treated as a lens through which the initiated could witness the activity of earth energies and ancient spirits, the anguish of Mother Earth in the face of impending ecological doom, and evidence of secret weapons testing and, of course, aliens.

Crop Circles: The Art of the Hoax — Smithsonian Magazine

[SunkenCiv]

Up by the wall in one of the forts not too many years back an archive of discarded correspondence was found, preserved by wet soil. One of the commanders of that fort, writing a report to his superiors, referred to the locals (in Latin of course) as "dirty little Brits".