The Cerne Abbas Giant is a 55-meter nude male figure holding a club etched in chalk on a steep hillside in Cerne Abbas in southwestern England. Its outline, including an erect penis that earned it the moniker “Rude Man,” is actually a series of trenches filled with crushed white chalk.
Some 300 volunteers are currently working to restore the landmark, which is fading into the grassy landscape. Liz Flight from the National Trust heritage conservation charity, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that heavier winter rains were washing away the chalk and increasingly frequent heat waves had hastened the growth of algae and weeds, blurring the giant’s obscene outline.
The work involves removing the old layer of chalk, bringing it downhill, and applying new chalk, said Flight, adding that the work would take two to three weeks to finish.
While Rude Man and its manhood are being restored to their former glory, another genital symbol is getting a makeover in Milan, Italy.
At the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II shopping arcade, the Turin city’s coat of arms on the floor mosaic, highlighted by an erect bull, suffered damage because of tourists doing a good luck ritual on its testicles.
The superstitious belief that grinding one’s heel into the mosaic bull’s pink testicles to attract prosperity has visitors pirouetting on it. The constant grinding created a small crater on the mosaic, AFP quoted city authorities as saying.
“The gallery’s lucky spot has become worn out over time,” Emmanuel Conte and Marco Granelli, two Milan deputy mayors, said in a statement.
Restorer Gianluca Galli cut new pieces of stone and glued them with epoxy resins to withstand the spinning heels.
Unable to pirouette on the bull during the restoration, tourists on Thursday could be seen performing a similar ritual on a neighboring she-wolf mosaic representing Rome, AFP reports.
On Monday, the restoration was done, but reactions to a photo of the mosaic bull posted by Granelli on Facebook to complement the work were critical.
The bull, now without its testicles, prompted complaints that it was castrated to deter tourists from performing the ritual, according to The Guardian.
