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Science Forum Index » Archaeology Forum » Stonehenge mystery hinges on unusual stones
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| Jack Linthicum |
 Posted: Sat May 03, 2008 10:23 am |
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This in the Los Angeles Times, one about four top papers in the U.S.
Photo number 3 at the cite tells the story: Archaeology student Steve
Bush is working on the excavation team at Stonehenge. “You could put
10 archaeologists in a room and you’d get at least 11 theories” about
the site, said Dr. Andrew Fitzpatrick of Wessex Archaeology.
March 31, 2008
The two men, Tim Darvill, a professor at the University of
Bournemouth, and Geoff Wainwright, president of the Society of
Antiquaries of London, hope to establish a more precise timeline, to
within 10 years, for the construction of Stonehenge by using
radiocarbon dating to compare samples from the excavation with those
taken from the site in Wales.
Stonehenge mystery hinges on unusual stones
A new excavation at Stonehenge seeks to prove that it was not a shrine
of the dead but a temple of healing utilizing unique bluestones from a
site 250 miles away in Wales.
By Thea Chard
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
May 3, 2008
AMESBURY, ENGLAND — The mysterious circle of stones that rises on
Salisbury Plain near here has stood as an archaeological marvel for
thousands of years, its origins and purpose shrouded in the mists of
history.
But a just-completed excavation of Stonehenge, the first within the
ancient circle in more than 40 years, could provide some of the first
reliable explanations for one of the greatest wonders of the
prehistoric world.
A team of British archaeologists hopes to prove its theory that nearly
4,000 years ago Stonehenge was regarded not as a place of sacrament
for the dead, but as a temple with healing powers.
The dig is looking closely at the 82 bluestones -- a double circle of
large rocks, some weighing as much as 4 tons, that were brought in
during the second stage of Stonehenge, the first stone construction at
the site that began about 2150 BC.
About 150 years later, these were rearranged and encircled by much
larger sarsen stones that have become iconic of Stonehenge.
Yet it is the bluestones, somehow hauled to the Salisbury Plain from
the Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire, Wales, that researchers say hold
the key to the mystery of Stonehenge.
Although the researchers found to their dismay that the area they
examined had been tampered with in Roman times, they still hope the
excavations will help show that the bluestones were once viewed as
having therapeutic powers.
Stonehenge's legends have been many. Some have said the devil bought
the stones from a woman in Ireland; another story suggests they were
placed on the plain by the fabled wizard Merlin; others have claimed
that aliens built the monument and left it as a place for worship, or
that Druids built it as a temple for sacrificial ceremonies.
"You could put 10 archaeologists in a room and you'd get at least 11
theories," said Dr. Andrew Fitzpatrick of Wessex Archaeology, a
private firm involved in the excavation, which was approved by English
Heritage, which manages Stonehenge.
"I think the one thing everybody would agree on is that Stonehenge is
a temple, which is easy to lose sight of in the kind of to-ing and fro-
ing of ideas."
But the recent realization that the site contained stones from
mountains 250 miles away in Wales shed new light on Stonehenge's
origins.
Tim Darvill, a professor at the University of Bournemouth, and Geoff
Wainwright, president of the Society of Antiquaries of London, have
spent the last six years researching Stonehenge and the rocky outcrop
Carn Menyn, thought to be the site in the Preseli Hills from which the
bluestones were taken.
Darvill and Wainwright, the co-directors of the dig, found the Welsh
site to be a center for ceremony and burials, where the springs that
flowed below the rocks were regarded by ancients as having medicinal
powers.
They hope that by finding evidence to tie the stones from the Preseli
Hills to those at Stonehenge, they will have an answer to the age-old
question of the site's purpose.
The two men hope to establish a more precise timeline, to within 10
years, for the construction of Stonehenge by using radiocarbon dating
to compare samples from the excavation with those taken from the site
in Wales.
The scientists also hope to shed light on whether the stones were
transported manually, as Darvill believes, or whether the former Irish
Sea Glacier might have pushed the stones to Salisbury. But one fact is
certain: Their presence at Stonehenge makes it unique among the stone
circles of its era.
"Once they arrive here, this monument becomes very different from any
other kind of monument in the British Isles. . . . And when they come
here they elevate this monument into something rather special,"
Darvill said one recent afternoon, gesturing toward points of interest
with a long hoe as a student volunteer sifted buckets of dirt through
a large metal sieve.
"You can make the analogy with a medieval cathedral -- it's a bog-
standard Paris church until they get those relics, and at that point
it becomes a beautiful, marvelous building," he said. "It changes its
purpose at about that time from a fairly standard henge to a temple of
really European renown."
This theory, first proposed by Darvill in a book, "Stonehenge: The
Biography of a Landscape," that he wrote nearly two years ago, is in
its infancy when compared with the many other beliefs and cult
theories about the monument that have been floated for hundreds of
years. Even so, Fitzpatrick said, it is also one of the two most
widely accepted current archaeological theories about the origins of
Stonehenge.
The second dominant theory is being explored by Mike Parker Pearson of
the University of Sheffield, who recently uncovered evidence of a
village in Durrington Walls, another henge monument a few miles from
Stonehenge.
Pearson believes that Stonehenge's true significance is in its
relationship to a sister temple found at Durrington Walls. He believes
that the two temples served as centers for religious observance --
Durrington Walls as a site of feasts for the living, Stonehenge as a
series of statues of the dead.
"There is certainly a debate going on amongst archaeologists in the UK
at the moment," Fitzpatrick said. "We're all kind of waiting to see
how it pans out; we're waiting to see if the new excavations provide
dating, which will help us resolve some of these questions."
Now that researchers have come to believe the bluestones come from
Wales, the question is why. If the bluestones were ordinary rocks in
the view of prehistoric people, surely they would not have labored to
move them so far.
One clue may lie in the ancient burial mounds that surround the site:
Are they commemorations of the dead or evidence of attempts to heal
the living?
"There's people in the landscape buried here who have come here
perhaps like pilgrims, in order to benefit from the things here,"
Darvill said. "You can imagine a big temple like this is going to have
shamans, it's going to have witch doctors, it's going to have all the
sorts of people who in prehistoric terms would look after those who
were ill."
Many of the remains uncovered during previous excavations show signs
of ailments and, in some cases, primitive surgery.
"One, for example, has a trepanation taken out of the top of the
skull, a circular piece of bone taken out to relieve pressure on the
brain," Darvill said.
"You've got to be feeling pretty unwell to let somebody get a flint
blade and cut the top of your head off."
Although the Romans may have destroyed some of the evidence that the
two scientists were hoping to find, they refuse to be deterred. Their
research "ties in with some big questions about the interpretation of
Stonehenge," Darvill said.
"Once these bluestones were moved here, people believed the place was
important, it was sacred, they could become pilgrims, they could come
here." But for what?
For Darvill and Wainwright, inching closer to an answer is all they
can ask for.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-stonehenge4-2008may04,0,4585446.story |
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