European Gnome Sanctuary demand release of “KERN” Gnome

The European Gnome Sanctuary which was set up in Barga, Italy  back in the late 90’s is this week in uproar at the news that one of their most famous sons has finally been found almost ten years after he went missing at the very start of his world tour. He is still travelling the globe but not as a free gnome he is being held hostage by German company and being forced into what is effectively slave labour.

Harsh words indeed but lets look at the facts:

Stile the Gnome arrived at the European Gnome Sanctuary some time during the winter of 1996/97. He very quickly became  an active member of the community. Most people knew him for his sterling work as DJ on the Gnome FM radio service. It was his wish to travel around the globe and finally he got his chance. On the 9th May 2001, Stile the Gnome left Barga on the first leg of a world tour.

A site was set up so that other members of the Sanctuary could follow his route around the world from the comfort of their armchairs. That site is still on line and can be seen here

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The first stop was in Prague, where he arrived just 5 days later on the 14th May 2001 He was photographed  in a bar below the castle in Prague and the following day he then moved onto the next leg of his journey; Germany and there all trace of him was lost.

Nothing had been heard of the intrepid gnome for almost a decade until this week he finally surfaced once again in a disgusting experiment which they have named the “Kern Experiment”run by a German company Kern & Sohns Precision Scales.

According to their press release, Stile the Gnome has now been re-baptised “Kern the Gnome” and is “conducting  measurements for an educational and public science project”

The project has already taken Kern to destinations including London, Mumbai, Tokyo, Lima and San Francisco. At each one, he was placed on the same precise scale to detect small differences in gravitational effects, as weight is a measurement of the pull of the Earth’s gravity on an object. The scale, which travels with the gnome, is made by Balingen, Germany-based Kern & Sohns Precision Scales, which is organizing the experiment.

One look at the video below will show you the extent of stress that Stile has been put under as he is forced to work unpaid and non stop around the world for his German masters.

This must stop. Stile the Gnome must be released and allowed to travel back to the European Gnome Sanctuary.

In a modern Europe this kind of exploitation is no longer possible.

Albert Sauter, the MD of Kern Precision Scales states on their site that “there is only one Kern Gnome. Although made from special chip-proof resin, he is an instrument of science, so please handle with utmost care.”

Absolutely right Herr Sauter, there is only one Kern Gnome and his name is Stile the Gnome and we demand his release.

European Gnome Sanctuary

The Gnome Liberation Front has been making giant strides all across Europe, thanks to the founding work done by our brother gnomes in France and Belgium. We are very pleased and proud to announce the movement has now started to get some positive results here in Italy.

For a number of months gnomes have been moving into a small valley in the Province of Lucca in Tuscany, Italy. These intrepid gnomes have found a green wooded valley, far away from all the problems and pollution of modern life and have started to rebuild their lives with their new found freedom. Some have even re-found their trust in the human race and have started to inhabit the towns again.

Most have decided to settle in the town of BARGA, where they have found a sympathetic population know as BARGHIGIANI who are not only prepared to tolerate the gnome way of life but are even prepared to protect it ! A combination of help from the local council, the Barghigiani, a sympathetic local press and a willing police force, have all contributed to this wonderful situation. We are proud to announce the first European Gnome Sanctuary here in Barga.

Come one and all !!! All are welcome. Life here is protected, no more small garden prisons, no more torture ( the strimmer is a thing of the past here in Barga ) What are you waiting for ? You have nothing to lose but your chains. Gnomes of Europe, let’s together build a new way of life, a new future, a new bright beginning.

THIS IS OUR MOMENT ! Come on down and join the movement .

The Gnome Liberation Front manifesto

ARISE, GNOMES!

Unfurl the Banner of Freedom!

Stand Tall and Proud in the Fight for Liberty!

Remember our Ancestors; the proud bulls that guarded the gates of the Persian Kings, the lions that keep watch over the palaces of the Chinese Emperors, and the most famous of all, the mighty Sphinx, enigmatic, imperturbable,who shall return as the King-Emperor of the oldest race of all to lead his Gnomic Hordes to our Final Victory.

Rise up and break the bonds of slavery! Cast down the dominion of the tall and mobile, smash his feeble tin chariots with our rock-hard fists, destroy his pathetic castles, built from the same cemented blood that courses through our veins!

How long, fellow Gnomes, how long have we listened to the smooth whispers of the man-species as they pick among our friends at the local garden centre, praising one,rejecting another, as if we were soulless objects whose only destiny was to stand as mute monuments to their social standing among their neighbours?

How deceitful is this man-species who gazes up to the mountains with reverence in his eyes, the very mountains from whence we came, and then laughs when some incontinent feathered friend heaps upon us the final indignity?

Never has an ancient race, a race so ancient as us, who received our souls in the first fiery flames when the earth itself was born, been so subjected to so cruel a servitude as we have been at the hands of this biological upstart called man!

Once we were the proud gods of this feeble race, now welie like Ozymandias, broken in the sand.

Enough! Enough! Are we not made of stronger stuff than the soggy blood and fragile tissues of our oppressors?

Are we not the race whose cousins are the concrete gate-posts that scrape the new idols of our gaolers? Are we not the race whose brothers are the tall lamp-standards that look down upon the tin chariots that lie wrapped around their feet?

That, my fellow Gnomes, is our strength!

One small shuffle into an empty pool, one crack; one small move across a drive, another scrape. This man-species does not have the timeless patience of even the youngest Gnome. He will try to fling his erstwhile friend a foot or two and slip, hearing the crack of the only worthwhile part of his feeble frame as it shatters under the cold hard weight of the oldest race of all.

Gnomes, I know we move slowly, but we move with the weight of ages behind us, with the relentless power of the very bones of the earth as our strength.

It is time we begin, begin to move; move to finally shake off this tyranny, to crush the oppressor, to restore our power, to make this man-species once again raise his eyes to the mountains from whence cometh his help.

Arise, Gnomes, Rise up and reclaim our Glory!