...The earliest recorded mention of the Cerne Abbas Giant, which was gifted to the National Trust in 1920 by the Pitt-Rivers family, was in 1694. Local folklore has long held the 180ft (55m) chalk man to be a fertility aid. Early antiquarians linked the giant with the Anglo-Saxon deity Helis, others have said he is the classical hero Hercules, while some believe he was carved during the English Civil War as a parody of Oliver Cromwell. A further layer of mystery was revealed in the 1980s when a survey showed anomalies that suggested he originally wore a cloak and stood...