The Boitin Steintanz ('Stone Dance') is a very special monument to mankind’s early history. There are altogether four stone circles in the forest near the village of Boitin in the vicinity of Bützow. Three of them lie close together, the fourth one at a distance of about 200 metres. Already long ago there were theories about the age and function of the arrangement. Today it is assumed that this is a calendar from the 12th century before Christ.
A saga gives a different interpretation of the stone circles: The legend has it that a frolicsome wedding party celebrated here long ago. The party bowled with bread and sausages until a ghost, appearing as an old man, asked the boisterous group to end the game. However, the wedding party did not do what they had been asked. They scorned the old man instead. So he turned the bride, the groom and the guests into stones. A shepherd, who happened to be nearby, was to be spared. But in spite of his promise, he looked back out of curiosity when fleeing and therefore was also transformed into stone together with his sheep and dog.
References:Goryōkaku (五稜郭) (literally, 'five-point fort') is a star fort in the Japanese city of Hakodate on the island of Hokkaido. The fortress was completed in 1866. It was the main fortress of the short-lived Republic of Ezo.
Goryōkaku was designed in 1855 by Takeda Ayasaburō and Jules Brunet. Their plans was based on the work of the French architect Vauban. The fortress was completed in 1866, two years before the collapse of the Tokugawa Shogunate. It is shaped like a five-pointed star. This allowed for greater numbers of gun emplacements on its walls than a traditional Japanese fortress, and reduced the number of blind spots where a cannon could not fire.
The fort was built by the Tokugawa shogunate to protect the Tsugaru Strait against a possible invasion by the Meiji government.
Goryōkaku is famous as the site of the last battle of the Boshin War.