For a millennium and a half, Stonehenge has been rebuilt and redesigned, changing the layout many times. Extensive excavations in recent years, isotopic dating and genetic analyses of ancient DNA have helped scientists uncover almost all the secrets of this fascinating monument.
A Typical Henge
This monument, located in the south of Britain, in Wiltshire, is already mentioned in the chronicles of the XII century as well known to all. It has been studied for more than three centuries by historians, geologists, astronomers. During this time many legends were formed around it. Excavations have been conducted here since the beginning of the XX century. The last time was in 2008-2009.
Stonehenge was founded at the end of the Stone Age, about five thousand years ago, by indigenous Paleolithic tribes who lived in Europe. On the Salisbury Plain (the eponymous city is located 13 kilometers from the monument), they made a circular area, limiting its moat and rampart, where archaeologists found the bones of an ox, a deer, cremated human remains. Such structures are called henges by archaeologists. There are quite a few of them in Britain. The henges were set with stones or wooden poles.
A Stone Is A Symbol of Power
After a couple of hundred years, the plans change – it was decided to make a large-scale stone monument from the henge on Salisbury Plain. To do this they built five trilithons – U-shaped structures of stone, a red sandstone altar and several dozen vertical stones dug in circles. Stonehenge, the stone henge, was born.
Two types of rock were used – flint sandstone, known locally as sarsen, and “bluestone”, which is volcanic rock (diorites, rhyolites, tuffs).
The British archaeologist reveals one of the mysteries of Stonehenge
For a long time scientists have been finding out where the stones came from. Many now agree that the sarsens are of local origin. The stones came from the Marlborough Quarry, about thirty kilometers from Stonehenge. The bluestones came from the Preseli Mountains in Western Wales, about four hundred kilometers away. How were the nearly two hundred boulders (85 sarsens and 80 bluestones), fifty tons each, transported to Stonehenge, without any appliances? One hypothesis is that the Welsh stones did not need to be transported as they had been brought by a glacier long before construction began. But this is not confirmed by geologists. There is a version that the bluestones were installed in Wales, then dismantled and transported to a new location. Analysis of strontium isotopes in the teeth of 25 people buried within Stonehenge has shown that at least ten of them actually came from Wales. They may be the remains of the original builders.
A Place of Power
Fifty generations of people built Stonehenge over a period of fifteen hundred years. Scientists estimate that it took about a million man-hours to transport the megaliths-Sarsens alone.
During this time, several cultures changed. The original population had been driven out by the pastoralists who arrived from the steppes of southern Russia (the Yamnaya people, who to the north of Europe had transformed themselves to the Corded Ware culture). Stonehenge, on the other hand, remained sacred. Rituals and pilgrimages were performed here.
In the Roman era Stonehenge was also a place of worship. This is clear from the coins, pottery, brooches and even surgical instruments discovered during excavations. The cultural layers contain many objects and debris accumulated over the millennia.
The Embodiment of Ancient Culture
Stonehenge was not something unique. On the contrary, it embodied the local tradition, where builders used all their craftsmanship, technical and managerial skills and cultural achievements.
Megalithic structures of the Stone and Bronze Ages are found all over Britain and Europe. Round plan, horseshoe and oval structures, and trilithons are typical of cult structures, tombs and dwellings. Archaeologists discover how people were able to survive on Easter Island Stones were the basic building material. For example, the tombs of Bru-na-Boin in Ireland are lined with stones carefully chosen for their shape, size and were brought here from forty kilometers away. And this is the largest monument of the Stone Age, built hundreds of years before Stonehenge.
Stonehenge is inferior in size to Seabury Hill, an artificial mound forty metres high and 170 metres in diameter at its base. It has been estimated that 350,000 cubic metres of stone and earth and at least three million man-hours of work were required.
In order to implement projects on such a scale and mobilize people, it was necessary to have strong power and considerable wealth. This is why, say scholars, Stonehenge was built by wealthy communities in the south of Britain. This view is supported by the many pieces of gold found in the burials at Stonehenge. Precious metal was found in fifteen burial mounds from this period. There are five in Britain. This shows the concentration of powerful tribes in this region and at the same time puts an end to suggestions that the builders of the monument were of foreign or even “extraterrestrial” origin.
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