Stonehenge News

Neil
You cite 28 as the number of stones at Bluestonehenge. The literature seems a moving target with 24-27 mentioned depending on interpretation and whether you consider the shape a circle or ellipse. Where did you get the 28 and what is it based on?

so I think we should continue to explore the Ceremonial/Spiritual Separation idea, rather than the Moat or Water-Table theory.

Agreed. I was thrown by ryszard’s comment (elsewhere) about the approach to the avenue. Could it be that instead of congregating along the Avenue, the congregation instead approached the monument in groups or one by one to take a form of communion from the cup of light?

Moats will always be controversial but as such it does give one of the more plausible explanations for the depth of the Avebury ditch (banks provide viewing facilities?) as well as the findings of Hawley at Stonehenge (dark layer) . I have yet to be convinced about the idea but I do feel water had an important part to play as suggested in this article: http://www.archaeologyuk.org/ba/ba120/feat3.shtml
and of course by Geoffrey of Monmouth who, in my opinion, should not be dismissed too lightly ( others including at this excellent site http://www.earlybritishkingdoms.com/arthur/kapopular.html
also appear to be thinking along those lines) and of the change of direction of the Avenue at a possible water source at Stonehenge Bottom.

Wouldn’t it be a nice neat arrangement if everything fell into multiples of 7? However the Celts considered it a sacred number and a line of thought I am pursuing at present is extrapolating back what is known of the Celtic society to help explain agricultural society in the Neolithic.

Thanks Dan. An interesting site which I did not know about. I see Angie has commented on Megalithic Portal although it appears the site has not been properly investigated.

I fully agree water must have played a very important and has an important role in early explanations of the workings of the universe. http://mukto-mona.net/new_site/mukto-mona/Articles/brent_meeker/cosmology.htm

Given the similarities between the Sumerian and Egyptian notions it seems possible that they derived from a earlier common source and possibly shared by the many as opposed to the few.

However even if it was a local idea rather than generally shared view the concept is more than likely to have spread with agriculture and could have eventually manifested itself in surrounding, or attempting to surround, sacred places with water?

Thanks Angie the boggy conditions you reported, if also prevailing when the monument was in use, are likley to have restricted the options. But as I understand it Cornwall became waterlogged during the course of the Bronze Age forcing the abandonment of many settlements. Maybe Arthur’s Hall was effected in a similar way.

“Stonehenge: Solving The Neolithic Universe” is Jonathan’s new book and it is reviewed on Brian John’s Blog at:-

http://brian-mountainman.blogspot.com/

on February 22nd 2013.

Yes, of course! Because people do this all the time. It’s only the human way. I rarely–if ever–say this, but: WTF? Sigh…

The most interesting one for me was:

“The findings overturn the belief that Stonehenge was built as an astronomical calendar or observatory, Professor Mike Parker Pearson from University College London said.”

Might be an out of context remark, so will be interesting to watch the documentary

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2013/03/09/stonehenge-was-glastonbury-of-its-day-but-was-not-built-for-astronomy-91466-32950367/

Neolithic house-building near Stonehenge video.

I’ll spare everyone the heavy sigh-provoking title and simply say: More on Vespasian’s Camp.

And another, with some nice photos.

Interview with David Jacques about Vespasian’s Camp.

In reading Mr Pitts article, I find it interesting that the emphasis is on Mesolithic activity at Vespasian’s Camp, not any later Neolithic, Bronze Age or Iron Age doings. The form of the earthwork, made less distinct by time and the plough, is something associated with these later stages, not the Mesolithic. As I recall, construction of earthworks ranging from Causewayed Camps, Henges, Cursi and Hillforts was not begun until sometime in the 4th millenium BC and continued apace throughout this long expanse of time. Since Vespasian’s Camp is technically an Iron Age hillfort, as is Old Sarum to the north; it was presumably “dug” in the Iron Age which implies the Mesolithic hunters confined their interest to the balmy climate and good hunting near the spring where the trove of stone artifacts were found in an incredibly small area. I wonder what it was used for by the people who did the incredible amount of digging necessary to define its boundaries? Apparently, they only did it for the exercise.

Since VC has been ignored until recently, we have no idea of the possibilities as far as other archaeological riches in the large expanse of earthwork interior untouched at the present, but I cannot help but think that Old Sarum may well be a corollary. Activity at Old Sarum, an ‘Iron Age” hillfort goes back to 3000 BC suggesting that Iron Age people, being just as lazy (they enjoyed their beer as much as we) took advantage of the earlier efforts of some Neolithic or Bronze Age builders to minimize the effort necessary to turn the older earthwork into a fort. I believe the Mesolithic label is a misnomer for the importance of VC and that proper excavation, considering all the possibilities, will reveal much, much more and address Dennis’s speculation that VC was mentioned in Hecateus and was the city of the Boreades. I certainly hope so, but am not optimistic as a knee jerk excavation plan, going Mesolithic, will probably preclude determining the full development of VC in the Stonehenge landscape.

You have to associate the Mesolithic Vespasian’s Camp with the post holes in the Stonehenge car park. The post holes implied a nearby settlement and now it has been found the association has to be investigated. Indeed it might throw a light on the relationship of VC with the Stonehenge of millenia later. We have to ask would VC have lost its import even with the apparent significance – albeit temporary in the scheme – of Robin Hood’s Ball, Coneybury Henge and even later Durrington Walls. But VC’s history, it seems lasts through all the ages.

Stonehenge in context with other monuments or places in the area have shown us the cultural weaving together of this landscape over an enormous length of time, both long before and long after the Henge was relevant. That the geography itself was considered important from the Mesolithic onward cannot be overstated. But how the various components either influenced or connected with one another has been difficult to pinpoint. The car-park posts, Coneybury, the Cursus and many other sites must all play roles for which we have little sense of continuity.

One of the fortunate corollaries to my interest in Stonehenge over the years has been a fruitful association with some very on-the-spot individuals who are either in the actual ‘trenches’, so to speak, or are in active touch with those who are. One of the important things that’s been transmitted to me recently is that we see a long period of continuous activity at VC before the Stone Phase at SH, and appropriately morphed activity well into the Bronze and Iron Age.
But there’s not a lot of activity while Durrington Walls was in operation as a ‘staging area’ for the Stones, ritual and otherwise.

This is a significant revelation which seems to indicates a glimmer of that missing thread of continuity passing through the landscape, whereby all hands were called together to participate in an ongoing event with an overarching rationale.

Neither all the layers nor the entire VC site have been examined, but when completed in future it would be very interesting to see how the timing and nature of the artifacts found will influence our present perceptions of both the daily routine as well as the overall social morphology of the long-term inhabitants before, during and after the Stonehenge Era.
Very cool stuff.

Neil

The Mesolithic post holes, Robin Hoods Ball, the various long barrows, cursuses, the henge(s), bluestones, Avenue, Durrington Walls and sarsens all required someone to conceive and put together a plan of action and be capable of fulfilling it. It can be argued this initial planning did not originate at the individual site – as it was not there – but away from it albeit, necessarily, nearby?

Of course over the span of millennia it is perhaps inconceivable that every project in an area such as Salisbury Plain would have had a common source. It must have surely been a matter of various individuals in different places at different times coming up with a plan to put something in place on the Plain regardlessly adding to or replacing what was already there? (Leave aside any “not in my back yard” opposition)

But then how would such individuals have been able to organise the resources necessary to put their ideas literally on the ground? Indeed it is the requisite organisation of resources required to construct the monuments which implies there must have been at least a degree of central authority and control.

It is therefore arguable, particularly as we move away from the notion that prehistoric Britons were just howling savages, that most, if not all, of the ideas could have emanated from common locations. In the case of Salisbury Plain this may well have been Vespasian’s camp.

At many prehistoric sites there is evidence for continuity of use through the ages. There is therefore no reason to dismiss the notion that a place originally considered suitable or desirable for settlement could not retain an import lasting thousands of years. This import would have been boosted by the development of the familiar from family through the clan to the tribe as well as the gravity of centralisation. This was the place where the ‘wise’ would meet (or stayed) and it would not seem to be an enormous leap of faith to believe that it was from such places that the planning, authority and control necessary for monument building emanated?

Of course sites, such as Durrington Walls, could become more important during the execution of a project but then that was only temporary. In the background there was always another place with a far longer tradition overseeing it all and exerting an influence and then, continuing as the power base?

An interesting, recent blog about Geoffrey of Monmouth and Stonehenge.