Stonehenge Stone Circle News and Information

A clear out at Salisbury District Council’s Planning Office has uncovered a long lost Neolithic document, which experts say, ‘finally explains the purpose of Stonehenge’. After weeks of careful study by a team of Oxford University archaeologists – where the fragile deer hide document had be taken for radio carbon dating and translation – it was revealed today that the document is in fact a 5000-year-old failed planning application for the Stonehenge site.

Contrary to the widely accepted theory that Stonehenge was a place of pagan worship, which had been designed and built to act as some sort of giant celestial calendar – instead, the document details the henge’s intended use – that of a vast covered market place. Dr Amy Bogaard, lecturer in Neolithic and Bronze Age Archaeology at Oxford, explained, ‘Stonehenge was to be a place where local merchants and tradesmen could gather, in order to peddle their wares and services to the thousands of Bronze Age tribes people who occupied Salisbury Plain at the time’. The document includes a plan, which shows that originally 600 stalls were to be constructed over a 200 acre site that would have also boasted ample grazing for 3500 Oxen and cart. ‘Stonehenge was essentially going to be the world’s first out of town shopping centre,’ said Dr. Bogaard.

‘This is an amazing find that not only answers all of the questions we had regarding what Stonehenge was for and why it was built, but also gives us a fantastic insight into the day-to-day life of Bronze Age Britons, their beliefs, their values and their culture,’ Dr. Bogaard continued. ‘For example, we now know that Druidism is not a pagan religion at all. ‘Druids’ was actually the brand name of a chain of prehistoric pharmacists, the forerunner of their modern day counterpart ‘Boots’,’ she concluded.

The document also reveals that the developers of Stonehenge never actually completed construction of the market, as their planning application was turned down by the ‘Local Council of Elders’. The application was refused on the grounds that the planners had, ‘serious concerns over increased Oxen traffic’, ‘did not think that the developers use of imported Welsh stone was sympathetic to, or in keeping with, local architecture’ and felt that, ‘the construction of such a high rise building would detract from the natural beauty and innate flatness of the surrounding plain.’

Commenting on his department’s historically important discovery, the Chief Planning Officer for Salisbury District Council, Mr. Ken Dawson, said: ‘I’m just so thrilled that, although in a small way, my office has helped to solve the age old mystery of Stonehenge. In fact, I’m so proud that it almost feels a shame to have to bulldoze the site. UNESCO World Heritage Site or not, it’s still in breach of the planning laws.’

This short film shows the landscape around Stonehenge as recorded by LIDAR survey (airborne 3D scanning). Millions of measurements were taken across the landscape, and here they have been turned into a ‘solid’ computer model to show how well the archaeology is recorded by this method.

Prehistoric burial mounds (barrows), the great Cursus (a 2km Neolithic monument), the Bronze Age Avenue which links Stonehenge to the River Avon, and other henges such as Woodhenge and Durrington Walls are all clearly visible.

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The discovery of a small prehistoric circle of stones near Stonehenge may confirm the theory that the mysterious monument in southwest England was part of a massive funeral complex built around a river, researchers said Tuesday.
The new find shows that the second stone circle — dubbed “Bluehenge” because it was built with bluestones — once stood next to the River Avon about 1.75 miles (2.8 kilometers) from Stonehenge, one of Britain’s best loved and least understood landmarks.
The find last month could help prove that the Avon linked a “domain of the dead” — made up of Stonehenge and Bluehenge — with an upstream “domain of the living” known as Durrington Wells, a monument where extensive signs of feasting and other human activity were found, said Professor Julian Thomas, co-director of the Stonehenge Riverside Project.
Project director Mike Parker Pearson said it is possible that Bluehenge was the starting point of a processional walk that began at the river and ended at Stonehenge, the site of a large prehistoric cemetery.
“Not many people know that Stonehenge was Britain’s largest burial ground at that time,” he said. “Maybe the bluestone circle is where people were cremated before their ashes were buried at Stonehenge itself.”
There were very few signs of human life found around Stonehenge and Bluehenge, researchers said, lending credence to the idea that it was used as a funeral site, especially since there were signs that many human beings were cremated there.

A five-university team has been excavating the greater Stonehenge site since 2003 in a bid to unravel its meaning and use.
“This find certainly confirms the idea we’ve put forward that the river is of fundamental importance and links everything,” Thomas said. “Everything is related to the river. That suggests that even before Neolithic time it may have had spiritual or religious significance. This find enhances the idea that all the monuments in this landscape are linked in various ways.”
Researchers did not find the actual stones used to mark the smaller circle found by the river, but they did find holes left behind when the stones were removed.
The scientists believe the massive stones used for Bluehenge were dragged from the Welsh mountains roughly 150 miles (240 kilometers) away. There were clear indications that the gigantic stones from the Bluehenge site were later removed whole for use in the construction of Stonehenge, Thomas said.
They hope to use radiocarbon dating techniques to better pinpoint construction dates.
Stonehenge, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is a favorite with visitors from throughout the world and has become popular with Druids, neo-Pagans and New Agers who attach mystical significance to the strangely-shaped circle of stones, but there remains great debate about the actual purpose of the structure.
Rare excavation work at the actual Stonehenge site was begun last year in a coordinated effort to unearth materials that could be used to establish a firm date for when the first set of bluestones was put in place there.

Have a look at this link – has he got the answer on how neolithic man moved those huge megalithic stones ? Clever guy………………..

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Solution

THE origins and purpose of Stonehenge have always been shrouded in mystery and now the ancient monument has made it on to a list of things Britons find most confusing.
‘Why and how Stonehenge was built’ came 28th in a survey of what people think are the most confusing things – and it wasn’t the only one on the list for Wiltshire, with crop circles coming in at 35th and Swindon’s Magic Roundabout at number 48.
The survey, which polled 4,979 people between the ages of 16 and 65, placed foreign call centres, algebra, what women see in Russell Brand and why Cheryl Cole is still with her husband were named as the top four biggest confusions in Britain.
Birmingham’s Spaghetti Junction ended up 37th in the survey survey, conducted by Confused.com.

ANOTHER stone circle has been discovered just a mile away from Stonehenge.

The find, on the west bank of the River Avon, has been named Bluestonehenge after the colour of the 25 Welsh stones from which it was formed.

The discovery was made during the Stonehenge Riverside Project, in which teams from British universities led by Professor Mike Parker Pearson from the University of Sheffield are studying the area around the famous monument.

The stone circle is 10 meters in diameter and surrounded by a ditch and external bank.

Although the stones at the site of the new discovery were removed thousands of years ago, the holes remain and show it was a circle of bluestones brought from the Preseli Mountains in Wales.

Like the stones that make up Stonehenge it appears they were dragged 150 miles 5,000 years ago and put up in a circle.

Archaeologists revealed the builders of the stone circle used deer antlers as pickaxes and radio carbon dating is being carried out to give more precise dates.

Experts also believe the stones from Bluestonehenge were removed by Neolithic people, and possibly dragged along the route of the Avenue to Stonehenge, to be incorporated within its major rebuilding in around 2,500 BC.

Director of the project, Prof Pearson said: “It could be that Bluestonehenge was where the dead began their final journey to Stonehenge.

“Not many people know that Stonehenge was Britain´s largest burial ground at that time. Maybe the bluestone circle is where people were cremated before their ashes were buried at Stonehenge itself.”

Dr Josh Pollard, co-director from the University of Bristol added: “This is an incredible discovery. The newly discovered circle and henge should be considered an integral part of Stonehenge rather than a separate monument, and it offers tremendous insight into the history of its famous neighbour. Its landscape location demonstrates once again the importance of the River Avon in Neolithic funerary rites and ceremonies.”