Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a
prehistoric monument in the English county of
Wiltshire, about 2 miles (3.2 km) west of
Amesbury and 8 miles (13 km) north of
Salisbury. One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is the remains of a ring of
standing stones set within
earthworks. It is in the middle of the most dense complex of
Neolithic and
Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred
burial mounds.
Archaeologists believe it was built anywhere from 3000 BC to 2000 BC, as described in the chronology below.
Radiocarbon dating in 2008 suggested that the first stones were raised between 2400 and 2200 BC,whilst another theory suggests that
bluestones may have been raised at the site as early as 3000 BC (see phase 1 below).
The surrounding circular earth bank and ditch, which constitute the
earliest phase of the monument, have been dated to about 3100 BC. The
site
and its surroundings were added to the
UNESCO's list of
World Heritage Sites in 1986 in a co-listing with
Avebury Henge. It is a national legally protected
Scheduled Ancient Monument. Stonehenge is owned by
the Crown and managed by
English Heritage, while the
surrounding land is owned by the
National Trust.
Archaeological evidence found by the
Stonehenge Riverside Project in 2008 indicates that Stonehenge could have been a
burial ground from its earliest beginnings. The dating of
cremated
remains found on the site indicate that deposits contain human bone
from as early as 3000 BC, when the ditch and bank were first dug. Such
deposits continued at Stonehenge for at least another 500 years. The site is a place of religious significance and pilgrimage in
Neo-Druidry.
Etymology
The
Oxford English Dictionary cites
Ælfric's 10th-century glossary, in which
henge-cliff is given the meaning "precipice", or stone, thus the
stanenges or
Stanheng "not far from Salisbury" recorded by 11th-century writers are "supported stones".
William Stukeley
in 1740 notes, "Pendulous rocks are now called henges in Yorkshire...I
doubt not, Stonehenge in Saxon signifies the hanging stones."
Christopher Chippindale's Stonehenge Complete gives the derivation of the name
Stonehenge as coming from the
Old English words
stān meaning "stone", and either
hencg meaning "
hinge" (because the stone lintels hinge on the upright stones) or
hen(c)en meaning "
hang" or "
gallows" or "instrument of torture". Like Stonehenge's
trilithons, medieval gallows consisted of two uprights with a lintel joining them, rather than the inverted L-shape more familiar today.
The "henge" portion has given its name to a class of monuments known as
henges. Archaeologists define henges as earthworks consisting of a circular banked enclosure with an internal ditch.
As often happens in archaeological terminology, this is a holdover from
antiquarian usage, and Stonehenge is not truly a henge site as its bank is inside its ditch. Despite being contemporary with true
Neolithic henges and
stone circles,
Stonehenge is in many ways atypical – for example, at over 7.3 metres
(24 ft) tall, its extant trilithons supporting lintels held in place
with
mortise and tenon joints, make it unique
Early history
Plan of Stonehenge in 2004. After Cleal
et al. and Pitts.
Italicised numbers in the text refer to the labels on this plan.
Trilithon lintels omitted for clarity. Holes that no longer, or never,
contained stones are shown as open circles. Stones visible today are
shown coloured
Mike Parker Pearson, leader of the Stonehenge Riverside Project based at
Durrington Walls, noted that Stonehenge appears to have been associated with burial from the earliest period of its existence:
Stonehenge was a place of burial from its beginning
to its zenith in the mid third millennium B.C. The cremation burial
dating to Stonehenge's
sarsen
stones phase is likely just one of many from this later period of the
monument's use and demonstrates that it was still very much a domain of
the dead.
— Mike Parker Pearson
Stonehenge evolved in several construction phases spanning at least
1,500 years. There is evidence of large-scale construction on and around
the monument that perhaps extends the landscape's time frame to 6,500
years. Dating and understanding the various phases of activity is
complicated by disturbance of the natural
chalk by
periglacial effects and animal burrowing, poor quality early
excavation
records, and a lack of accurate, scientifically verified dates. The
modern phasing most generally agreed to by archaeologists is detailed
below. Features mentioned in the text are numbered and shown on the
plan, right.
Before the monument (8000 BC forward)
Archaeologists have found four, or possibly five, large
Mesolithic postholes (one may have been a natural
tree throw),
which date to around 8000 BC, beneath the nearby modern tourist
car-park. These held pine posts around 0.75 metres (2 ft 6 in) in
diameter which were erected and eventually rotted
in situ. Three of the posts (and possibly four) were in an east-west alignment which may have had
ritual significance; no parallels are known from Britain at the time but similar sites have been found in
Scandinavia.
Salisbury Plain was then still wooded but 4,000 years later, during the earlier Neolithic, people built a
causewayed enclosure at
Robin Hood's Ball and
long barrow tombs in the surrounding landscape. In approximately 3500 BC, a
Stonehenge Cursus was built 700 metres (2,300 ft) north of the site as the first farmers began to clear the trees and develop the area.
Stonehenge 1 (ca. 3100 BC)
Stonehenge 1. After Cleal
et al.
The first monument consisted of a circular bank and ditch
enclosure made of
Late Cretaceous (
Santonian Age) Seaford
Chalk,
(7 and 8), measuring about 110 metres (360 ft) in diameter, with a large entrance to the north east and a smaller one to the south
(14). It stood in open
grassland on a slightly sloping spot. The builders placed the bones of
deer and
oxen in the bottom of the ditch, as well as some worked
flint
tools. The bones were considerably older than the antler picks used to
dig the ditch, and the people who buried them had looked after them for
some time prior to burial. The ditch was continuous but had been dug in
sections, like the ditches of the earlier causewayed enclosures in the
area. The chalk dug from the ditch was piled up to form the bank. This
first stage is dated to around 3100 BC, after which the ditch began to
silt up naturally. Within the outer edge of the enclosed area is a
circle of 56 pits
(13), each about a metre (3'3") in diameter, known as the
Aubrey holes after
John Aubrey, the 17th-century
antiquarian who was thought to have first identified them. The pits may have contained standing timbers creating a
timber circle,
although there is no excavated evidence of them. A recent excavation
has suggested that the Aubrey Holes may have originally been used to
erect a
bluestone circle. If this were the case, it would advance the earliest known stone
structure at the monument by some 500 years. A small outer bank beyond
the ditch could also date to this period.
Stonehenge 2 (ca. 3000 BC)
Evidence of the second phase is no longer visible. The number of
postholes dating to the early 3rd millennium BC suggest that some form
of timber structure was built within the enclosure during this period.
Further standing timbers were placed at the northeast entrance, and a
parallel alignment of posts ran inwards from the southern entrance. The
postholes are smaller than the Aubrey Holes, being only around 0.4
metres (16 in) in diameter, and are much less regularly spaced. The bank
was purposely reduced in height and the ditch continued to silt up. At
least twenty-five of the Aubrey Holes are known to have contained later,
intrusive,
cremation
burials dating to the two centuries after the monument's inception. It
seems that whatever the holes' initial function, it changed to become a
funerary one during Phase 2. Thirty further cremations were placed in
the enclosure's ditch and at other points within the monument, mostly in
the eastern half. Stonehenge is therefore interpreted as functioning as
an
enclosed cremation cemetery
at this time, the earliest known cremation cemetery in the British
Isles. Fragments of unburnt human bone have also been found in the
ditch-fill. Dating evidence is provided by the late Neolithic
grooved ware pottery that has been found in connection with the features from this phase.
Stonehenge 3 I (ca. 2600 BC)
Stonehenge from the
heelstone in 2007 with the 'Slaughter Stone' in the foreground
Stonehenge, late afternoon, 2008
Plan of the central stone structure today; After Johnson 2008
Fisheye image of Stonehenge showing the circular layout
Graffiti on the sarsen stones. Below are ancient
carvings of a dagger and an axe
Computer rendering of the overall site
Stonehenge from the south
Archaeological excavation has indicated that around 2600 BC, the
builders abandoned timber in favour of stone and dug two concentric
arrays of holes (the
Q and R Holes)
in the centre of the site. These stone sockets are only partly known
(hence on present evidence are sometimes described as forming
‘crescents’); however, they could be the remains of a double ring.
Again, there is little firm dating evidence for this phase. The holes
held up to 80 standing stones (shown blue on the plan), only 43 of which
can be traced today. The
bluestones (some of which are made of
dolerite, an igneous rock), were thought for much of the 20th century to have been transported by humans from the
Preseli Hills, 150 miles (240 km) away in modern-day
Pembrokeshire in Wales. Another theory that has recently gained support is that they were brought much nearer to the site as
glacial erratics by the
Irish Sea Glacier.
[13]
Other standing stones may well have been small sarsens, used later as
lintels. The stones, which weighed about four tons, consisted mostly of
spotted
Ordovician dolerite but included examples of
rhyolite,
tuff and
volcanic and
calcareous
ash; in total around 20 different rock types are represented. Each
monolith measures around 2 metres (6.6 ft) in height, between 1 m and
1.5 m (3.3–4.9 ft) wide and around 0.8 metres (2.6 ft) thick. What was
to become known as the
Altar Stone (1), is almost certainly derived from either
Carmarthenshire or the
Brecon Beacons and may have stood as a single large
monolith.
The north-eastern entrance was widened at this time, with the result that it precisely matched the direction of the
midsummer sunrise and
midwinter
sunset of the period. This phase of the monument was abandoned
unfinished, however; the small standing stones were apparently removed
and the Q and R holes purposefully backfilled. Even so, the monument
appears to have eclipsed the site at
Avebury in importance towards the end of this phase.
The
Heelstone (5), a
Tertiary
sandstone, may also have been erected outside the north-eastern
entrance during this period. It cannot be accurately dated and may have
been installed at any time during phase 3. At first it was accompanied
by a second stone, which is no longer visible. Two, or possibly three,
large
portal stones were set up just inside the north-eastern entrance, of which only one, the fallen Slaughter Stone
(4), 4.9 metres (16 ft) long, now remains. Other features, loosely dated to phase 3, include the four
Station Stones (6), two of which stood atop mounds
(2 and 3). The mounds are known as "
barrows" although they do not contain burials.
Stonehenge Avenue,
(10), a parallel pair of ditches and banks leading 2 miles (3.2 km) to the
River Avon, was also added. Two ditches similar to
Heelstone Ditch circling the Heelstone (which was by then reduced to a single monolith) were later dug around the Station Stones.
Stonehenge 3 II (2600 BC to 2400 BC)
During the next major phase of activity, 30 enormous
Oligocene-
Miocene sarsen stones
(shown grey on the plan) were brought to the site. They may have come from a quarry, around 25 miles (40 km) north of Stonehenge on the
Marlborough Downs, or they may have been collected from a "litter" of sarsens on the
chalk downs, closer to hand. The stones were
dressed and fashioned with
mortise and tenon
joints before 30 were erected as a 33 metres (108 ft) diameter circle
of standing stones, with a ring of 30 lintel stones resting on top. The
lintels were fitted to one another using another woodworking method, the
tongue and groove
joint. Each standing stone was around 4.1 metres (13 ft) high, 2.1
metres (6 ft 11 in) wide and weighed around 25 tons. Each had clearly
been worked with the final visual effect in mind; the
orthostats
widen slightly towards the top in order that their perspective remains
constant when viewed from the ground, while the lintel stones curve
slightly to continue the circular appearance of the earlier monument.
The inward-facing surfaces of the stones are smoother and more finely
worked than the outer surfaces. The average thickness of the stones is
1.1 metres (3 ft 7 in) and the average distance between them is 1 metre
(3 ft 3 in). A total of 75 stones would have been needed to complete the
circle (60 stones) and the trilithon horseshoe (15 stones). Unless some
of the sarsens have since been removed from the site, the ring appears
to have been left incomplete. The lintel stones are each around 3.2
metres (10 ft), 1 metre (3 ft 3 in) wide and 0.8 metres (2 ft 7 in)
thick. The tops of the lintels are 4.9 metres (16 ft) above the ground.
Within this circle stood five
trilithons of dressed
sarsen
stone arranged in a horseshoe shape 13.7 metres (45 ft) across with its
open end facing north east. These huge stones, ten uprights and five
lintels, weigh up to 50 tons each. They were linked using complex
jointing. They are arranged symmetrically. The smallest pair of
trilithons were around 6 metres (20 ft) tall, the next pair a little
higher and the largest, single trilithon in the south west corner would
have been 7.3 metres (24 ft) tall. Only one upright from the Great
Trilithon still stands, of which 6.7 metres (22 ft) is visible and a
further 2.4 metres (7 ft 10 in) is below ground.
The images of a 'dagger' and 14 'axeheads' have been carved on one of
the sarsens, known as stone 53; further carvings of axeheads have been
seen on the outer faces of stones 3, 4, and 5. The carvings are
difficult to date, but are morphologically similar to late Bronze Age
weapons;
recent laser scanning work on the carvings
supports this interpretation. The pair of trilithons in the north east
are smallest, measuring around 6 metres (20 ft) in height; the largest,
which is in the south west of the horseshoe, is almost 7.5 metres
(25 ft) tall.
This ambitious phase has been
radiocarbon dated to between 2600 and 2400 BC,
slightly earlier than the
Stonehenge Archer, discovered in the outer ditch of the monument in 1978, and the two sets of burials, known as the
Amesbury Archer and the
Boscombe Bowmen, discovered 3 miles (4.8 km) to the west. At about the same time, a large
timber circle and a second avenue were constructed 2 miles (3.2 km) away at
Durrington Walls
overlooking the River Avon. The timber circle was orientated towards
the rising sun on the midwinter solstice, opposing the solar alignments
at Stonehenge, whilst the avenue was aligned with the setting sun on the
summer solstice
and led from the river to the timber circle. Evidence of huge fires on
the banks of the Avon between the two avenues also suggests that both
circles were linked, and they were perhaps used as a procession route on
the longest and shortest days of the year. Parker Pearson speculates
that the wooden circle at Durrington Walls was the centre of a 'land of
the living', whilst the stone circle represented a 'land of the dead',
with the Avon serving as a journey between the two.
Stonehenge 3 IV (2280 BC to 1930 BC)
This phase saw further rearrangement of the bluestones. They were
arranged in a circle between the two rings of sarsens and in an oval at
the centre of the inner ring. Some archaeologists argue that some of
these bluestones were from a second group brought from Wales. All the
stones formed well-spaced uprights without any of the linking lintels
inferred in Stonehenge 3 III. The Altar Stone may have been moved within
the oval at this time and re-erected vertically. Although this would
seem the most impressive phase of work, Stonehenge 3 IV was rather
shabbily built compared to its immediate predecessors, as the newly
re-installed bluestones were not well-founded and began to fall over.
However, only minor changes were made after this phase.
Stonehenge 3 V (1930 BC to 1600 BC)
Soon afterwards, the north eastern section of the Phase 3 IV
bluestone circle was removed, creating a horseshoe-shaped setting (the
Bluestone Horseshoe) which mirrored the shape of the central sarsen
Trilithons. This phase is contemporary with the
Seahenge site in Norfolk.
After the monument (1600 BC on)
The last known construction at Stonehenge was about 1600 BC (see '
Y and Z Holes'), and the last usage of it was probably during the
Iron Age. Roman coins and
medieval artefacts have all been found in or around the monument but it is unknown if the monument was in continuous use throughout
British prehistory and beyond, or exactly how it would have been used. Notable is the massive Iron Age
hillfort Vespasian's Camp built alongside the Avenue near the Avon. A decapitated 7th century
Saxon man was excavated from Stonehenge in 1923.The site was known to scholars during the
Middle Ages and since then it has been studied and adopted by numerous groups.
Function and construction
In the Mesolithic period, two large wooden posts were erected at the
site. Today, they are marked by circular white marks in the middle of
the car park.
Stonehenge was produced by a culture that left no written records.
Many aspects of Stonehenge remain subject to debate. This multiplicity
of theories, some of them very colourful, are often called the "mystery
of Stonehenge". A number of myths surround the stones.
There is little or no direct evidence for the construction techniques
used by the Stonehenge builders. Over the years, various authors have
suggested that supernatural or anachronistic methods were used, usually
asserting that the stones were impossible to move otherwise. However,
conventional techniques, using Neolithic technology as basic as
shear legs,
have been demonstrably effective at moving and placing stones of a
similar size. Proposed functions for the site include usage as an
astronomical observatory, or as a religious site.
More recently two major new theories have been proposed. Professor
Geoffrey Wainwright OBE, FSA, president of the
Society of Antiquaries of London, and Professor
Timothy Darvill, OBE of
Bournemouth University have suggested that Stonehenge was a place of healing – the primeval equivalent of
Lourdes. They argue that this accounts for the high number of burials in the
area and for the evidence of trauma deformity in some of the graves.
However they do concede that the site was probably multifunctional and
used for ancestor worship as well. Isotope analysis indicates that some of the buried individuals were
from other regions. A teenage boy buried approximately 1550 BC was
raised near the Mediterranean Sea; a metal worker from 2300 BC dubbed
the "Amesbury Archer" grew up near the alpine foothills of
Germany; and the "Boscombe Bowmen" probably arrived from Wales or Brittany, France.On the other hand, Professor Mike Parker Pearson of
Sheffield University
has suggested that Stonehenge was part of a ritual landscape and was
joined to Durrington Walls by their corresponding avenues and the River
Avon. He suggests that the area around Durrington Walls Henge was a
place of the living, whilst Stonehenge was a domain of the dead. A
journey along the Avon to reach Stonehenge was part of a ritual passage
from life to death, to celebrate past ancestors and the recently
deceased.
It should be pointed out that both explanations were mooted in the 12th
century by Geoffrey of Monmouth (below), who extolled the curative
properties of the stones and was also the first to advance the idea that
Stonehenge was constructed as a funerary monument. Whatever religious,
mystical or spiritual elements were central to Stonehenge, its design
includes a celestial observatory function, which might have allowed
prediction of eclipse, solstice, equinox and other celestial events
important to a contemporary religion.
Another theory, brought forth in 2012, suggests that the monument was
intended to unify the different peoples of the British island. This
theory suggests that the massive amount of labour involved in the
construction of Stonehenge necessitated the inter-regional cooperation
.
Modern history
Folklore
"Heel Stone," "Friar’s Heel" or "Sun-Stone"
The
Heel Stone
lies just outside the main entrance to the henge, next to the present
A344 road. It is a rough stone, 16 feet (4.9 m) above ground, leaning
inwards towards the stone circle. It has been known by many names in the
past, including "Friar's Heel" and "Sun-stone". Today it is uniformly
referred to as the Heel Stone or Heelstone. At summer solstice an
observer standing within the stone circle, looking north-east through
the entrance, would see the sun rise above the heel stone.
A
folk tale, which cannot be dated earlier than the seventeenth century, relates the origin of the Friar's Heel reference.
- The Devil
bought the stones from a woman in Ireland, wrapped them up, and brought
them to Salisbury plain. One of the stones fell into the Avon,
the rest were carried to the plain. The Devil then cried out, "No-one
will ever find out how these stones came here!" A friar replied, "That’s
what you think!," whereupon the Devil threw one of the stones at him
and struck him on the heel. The stone stuck in the ground and is still
there.
Some claim "Friar's Heel" is a corruption of "Freyja's He-ol" from the
Germanic goddess
Freyja and the Welsh word for
track. The Heel Stone lies beside the end portion of Stonehenge Avenue.
A simpler explanation for the name might be that the stone
heels, or leans.
The name is not unique; there was a monolith with the same name recorded in the 19th century by antiquarian Charles Warne at
Long Bredy in Dorset.
Arthurian legend
In the 12th century,
Geoffrey of Monmouth included a fanciful story in his work
Historia Regum Britanniae that attributed the monument's construction to
Merlin.
Geoffrey's story spread widely, appearing in more and less elaborate form in adaptations of his work such as
Wace's Norman French
Roman de Brut,
Layamon's Middle English
Brut, and the Welsh
Brut y Brenhinedd.
According to Geoffrey, the rocks of Stonehenge were healing rocks, called the Giant's dance, which
Giants had brought from Africa to Ireland for their healing properties. The fifth-century king
Aurelius Ambrosius
wished to erect a memorial to 3,000 nobles slain in battle against the
Saxons and buried at Salisbury, and at Merlin's advice chose Stonehenge.
The king sent Merlin,
Uther Pendragon (Arthur's father), and 15,000 knights, to remove it from Ireland, where it had been constructed on
Mount Killaraus
by the Giants. They slew 7,000 Irish but, as the knights tried to move
the rocks with ropes and force, they failed. Then Merlin, using "gear"
and skill, easily dismantled the stones and sent them over to Britain,
where Stonehenge was dedicated. After it had been rebuilt near Amesbury,
Geoffrey further narrates how first Ambrosius Aurelianus, then Uther
Pendragon, and finally
Constantine III, were buried inside the "Giants' Ring of Stonehenge". In many places in his
Historia Regum Britanniae
Geoffrey mixes British legend and his own imagination; it is intriguing
that he connects Ambrosius Aurelianus with this prehistoric monument as
there is
place-name evidence to connect Ambrosius with nearby Amesbury.
In another legend of Saxons and Britons, in 472 the invading king
Hengist
invited Brythonic warriors to a feast, but treacherously ordered his
men to draw their weapons from concealment and fall upon the guests,
killing 420 of them. Hengist erected the stone monument—Stonehenge—on
the site to show his remorse for the deed.
16th century to present
With farm carts,
ca. 1885
Stonehenge has changed ownership several times since
King Henry VIII acquired
Amesbury Abbey and its surrounding lands. In 1540 Henry gave the estate to the
Earl of Hertford. It subsequently passed to
Lord Carleton and then the
Marquis of Queensbury. The Antrobus family of Cheshire bought the estate in 1824. During World War I an
aerodrome
had been built on the downs just to the west of the circle and, in the
dry valley at Stonehenge Bottom, a main road junction had been built,
along with several cottages and a cafe. The Antrobus family sold the
site after their last heir was killed serving in France during the First
World War. The auction by
Knight Frank & Rutley
estate agents in Salisbury was held on 21 September 1915 and included
"Lot 15. Stonehenge with about 30 acres, 2 rods, 37 erches of adjoining
downland." [c. 12.44 ha]
Sunrise over Stonehenge on the summer
solstice, 21 June 2005
Cecil Chubb
bought the site for £6,600 and gave it to the nation three years later.
Although it has been speculated that he purchased it at the suggestion
of—or even as a present for—his wife, in fact he bought it on a whim as
he believed a local man should be the new owner.
In the late 1920s a nation-wide appeal was launched to save
Stonehenge from the encroachment of the modern buildings that had begun
to appear around it. By 1928 the land around the monument had been purchased with the appeal
donations, and given to the National Trust in order to preserve it. The
buildings were removed (although the roads were not), and the land
returned to agriculture. More recently the land has been part of a
grassland reversion scheme, returning the surrounding fields to native
chalk grassland.
Neopaganism
10th Battalion, CEF marches past, winter 1914–15 (
WW I); Background: Preservation work on stones, propped up by timbers
Throughout the 20th century, Stonehenge began to be revived as a place of religious significance, this time by adherents of
Neopagan and
New Age beliefs, particularly the
Neo-druids. The historian
Ronald Hutton
would later remark that "it was a great, and potentially uncomfortable,
irony that modern Druids had arrived at Stonehenge just as
archaeologists were evicting the ancient Druids from it."
The first such Neo-druidic group to make use of the megalithic monument was the
Ancient Order of Druids,
who performed a mass initiation ceremony there in August 1905, in which
they admitted 259 new members into their organisation. This assembly
was largely ridiculed in the press, who mocked the fact that the
Neo-druids were dressed up in costumes consisting of white robes and
fake beards.
Between 1972 and 1984, Stonehenge was the site of the
Stonehenge Free Festival. After the
Battle of the Beanfield in 1985, this use of the site was stopped for several years and ritual use of Stonehenge is now carefully controlled.
Some Druids have arranged an assembling of monuments styled on Stonehenge in other parts of the world.
Setting and access
As motorised traffic increased, the setting of the monument began to
be affected by the proximity of the two roads on either side – the
A344 to
Shrewton on the north side, and the
A303 to
Winterbourne Stoke
to the south. Plans to upgrade the A303 and close the A344 to restore
the vista from the stones have been considered since the monument became
a World Heritage Site. However, the controversy surrounding expensive
re-routing of the roads has led to the scheme being cancelled on
multiple occasions. On 6 December 2007, it was announced that extensive
plans to build
Stonehenge road tunnel under the landscape and create a permanent visitors' centre had been cancelled.
On 13 May 2009, the government gave approval for a £25 million scheme
to create a smaller visitors' centre and close the A344, although this
was dependent on funding and local authority planning consent.
On 20 January 2010 Wiltshire Council granted planning permission for a
centre 2.4 km (1.5 miles) to the west and English Heritage confirmed
that funds to build it would be available, supported by a £10m grant
from the
Heritage Lottery Fund.
Approval is still needed for the closure of the A344 and two nearby
byways, which are popular with
off-road enthusiasts whose objections may further jeopardise the scheme.
When Stonehenge was first opened to the public it was possible to
walk among and even climb on the stones, but the stones were roped off
in 1977 as a result of serious erosion.
Visitors are no longer permitted to touch the stones, but are able to
walk around the monument from a short distance away. English Heritage
does, however, permit access during the summer and winter solstice, and
the spring and autumn equinox. Additionally, visitors can make special
bookings to access the stones throughout the year.
The current access situation and the proximity of the two roads has drawn widespread criticism, highlighted by a 2006
National Geographic
survey. In the survey of conditions at 94 leading World Heritage Sites,
400 conservation and tourism experts ranked Stonehenge 75th in the list
of destinations, declaring it to be "in moderate trouble".
Archaeological research and restoration
17th century depiction of Stonehenge
Throughout recorded history Stonehenge and its surrounding monuments have attracted attention from
antiquarians and
archaeologists.
John Aubrey
was one of the first to examine the site with a scientific eye in 1666,
and recorded in his plan of the monument the pits that now
bear his name.
William Stukeley
continued Aubrey’s work in the early 18th century, but took an interest
in the surrounding monuments as well, identifying (somewhat
incorrectly) the Cursus and the Avenue. He also began the excavation of
many of the barrows in the area, and it was his interpretation of the
landscape that associated it with the
DruidsStukeley was so fascinated with Druids that he originally named
Disc Barrows as Druids' Barrows. The most accurate early plan of Stonehenge was that made by Bath architect
John Wood in 1740.His original annotated survey has recently been computer redrawn and published.
Importantly Wood’s plan was made before the collapse of the southwest trilithon, which fell in 1797 and was restored in 1958.
An early photograph of Stonehenge taken July 1877
William Cunnington
was the next to tackle the area in the early 19th century. He excavated
some 24 barrows before digging in and around the stones and discovered
charred wood, animal bones, pottery and urns. He also identified the
hole in which the Slaughter Stone once stood. At the same time
Richard Colt Hoare began his activities, excavating some 379 barrows on
Salisbury Plain before working with Cunnington and
William Coxe
on some 200 in the area around the Stones. To alert future diggers to
their work they were careful to leave initialled metal tokens in each
barrow they opened.
In 1877
Charles Darwin dabbled in archaeology at the stones, experimenting with the rate at which remains sink into the earth for his book
The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms.
Print of Stonehenge, 1895
William Gowland
oversaw the first major restoration of the monument in 1901 which
involved the straightening and concrete setting of sarsen stone number
56 which was in danger of falling. In straightening the stone he moved
it about half a metre from its original position.
Gowland also took the opportunity to further excavate the monument in
what was the most scientific dig to date, revealing more about the
erection of the stones than the previous 100 years of work had done.
During the 1920 restoration
William Hawley, who had excavated nearby
Old Sarum, excavated the base of six stones and the outer ditch. He also located a bottle of
port
in the Slaughter Stone socket left by Cunnington, helped to rediscover
Aubrey's pits inside the bank and located the concentric circular holes
outside the Sarsen Circle called the
Y and Z Holes.
The monument from a similar angle in 2008 showing the extent of reconstruction
Richard Atkinson,
Stuart Piggott and
John F. S. Stone
re-excavated much of Hawley's work in the 1940s and 1950s, and
discovered the carved axes and daggers on the Sarsen Stones. Atkinson's
work was instrumental in furthering the understanding of the three major
phases of the monument's construction.
In 1958 the stones were restored again, when three of the standing
sarsens were re-erected and set in concrete bases. The last restoration
was carried out in 1963 after stone 23 of the Sarsen Circle fell over.
It was again re-erected, and the opportunity was taken to concrete three
more stones. Later archaeologists, including
Christopher Chippindale of the
Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge and Brian Edwards of the
University of the West of England,
campaigned to give the public more knowledge of the various
restorations and in 2004 English Heritage included pictures of the work
in progress in its book
Stonehenge: A History in Photographs.
In 1966 and 1967, in advance of a new car park being built at the
site, the area of land immediately northwest of the stones was excavated
by
Faith and
Lance Vatcher. They discovered the
Mesolithic postholes dating from between 7000 and 8000 BC, as well as a 10-metre (33 ft) length of a
palisade ditch – a V-cut ditch into which timber posts had been inserted that remained there until they rotted away. Subsequent
aerial archaeology suggests that this ditch runs from the west to the north of Stonehenge, near the avenue.
Excavations were once again carried out in 1978 by Atkinson and
John Evans during which they discovered the remains of the
Stonehenge Archer in the outer ditch
and in 1979
rescue archaeology
was needed alongside the Heel Stone after a cable-laying ditch was
mistakenly dug on the roadside, revealing a new stone hole next to the
Heel Stone.
In the early 1980s
Julian Richards led the
Stonehenge Environs Project, a detailed study of the surrounding landscape. The project was able to successfully date such features as
the Lesser Cursus,
Coneybury henge and several other smaller features.
In 1993 the way that Stonehenge was presented to the public was
called 'a national disgrace' by the House of Commons Public Accounts
Committee. Part of English Heritage's response to this criticism was to
commission research to collate and bring together all the archaeological
work conducted at the monument up to this date. This two year research
project resulted in the publication in 1995 of the monograph
Stonehenge in its landscape,
which was the first publication presenting the complex stratigraphy and
the finds recovered from the site. It presented a rephasing of the
monument.
More recent excavations include a series of digs held between 2003 and 2008 known as the
Stonehenge Riverside Project,
led by Mike Parker Pearson. This project mainly investigated other
monuments in the landscape and their relationship to the stones —
notably Durrington Walls, where another ‘Avenue’ leading to the River
Avon was discovered. The point where the Stonehenge Avenue meets the
river was also excavated, and revealed a previously unknown circular
area which probably housed four further stones, most likely as a marker
for the starting point of the avenue. In April 2008 Professor Tim
Darvill of the University of Bournemouth and Professor Geoff Wainwright
of the Society of Antiquaries, began another dig inside the stone circle
to retrieve dateable fragments of the original bluestone pillars. They
were able to date the erection of some bluestones to 2300 BC,
although this may not reflect the earliest erection of stones at
Stonehenge. They also discovered organic material from 7000 BC, which,
along with the Mesolithic postholes, adds support for the site having
been in use at least 4,000 years before Stonehenge was started. In
August and September 2008, as part of the Riverside Project, Julian
Richards and
Mike Pitts
excavated Aubrey Hole 7, removing the cremated remains from several
Aubrey Holes that had been excavated by Hawley in the 1920s, and
re-interred in 1935. A licence for the removal of human remains at Stonehenge had been granted by the
Ministry of Justice in May 2008, in accordance with the
Statement on burial law and archaeology
issued in May 2008. One of the conditions of the licence was that the
remains should be reinterred within two years and that in the
intervening period they should be kept safely, privately and decently.
A new landscape investigation was conducted in April 2009. A shallow
mound, rising to about 40 cm (16 inches) was identified between stones
54 (inner circle) and 10 (outer circle), clearly separated from the
natural slope. It has not been dated but speculation that it represents
careless backfilling following earlier excavations seems disproved by
its representation in 18th- and 19th-century illustrations. Indeed,
there is some evidence that, as an uncommon geological feature, it could
have been deliberately incorporated into the monument at the outset.
[11]
A circular, shallow bank, little more than 10 cm (4 inches) high, was
found between the Y and Z hole circles, with a further bank lying inside
the "Z" circle. These are interpreted as the spread of spoil from the
original Y and Z holes, or more speculatively as hedge banks from
vegetation deliberately planted to screen the activities within.
In July 2010, the
Stonehenge New Landscapes Project discovered what appears to be a
new henge less than 1 km (0.62 miles) away from the main site.
On 26 November 2011, archaeologists from University of Birmingham
announced the discovery of evidence of two huge pits positioned within
the
Stonehenge Cursus pathway, aligned in celestial position towards midsummer sunrise and sunset when viewed from the Heel Stone. The new discovery is part of the Stonehenge Hidden Landscape Project which began in the summer of 2010.The project uses non-invasive geophysical imaging technique to reveal
and visually recreate the landscape. According to the team leader
Professor Vince Gaffney, this discovery may provide a direct link
between the rituals and astronomical events to activities within the
Cursus at Stonehenge.
On 18 December 2011, geologists from University of Leicester and the
National Museum of Wales announced the discovery of the exact source of
the rock used to create Stonehenge's first stone circle. The researchers
have identified the source as a 70-metre (230 ft) long rock outcrop
called Craig Rhos-y-Felin (
51°59′30.07″N 4°44′40.85″W), near
Pont Saeson in north
Pembrokeshire, located 220 kilometres (140 mi) from Stonehenge
Some photos of the henge
A personal experience of the sunrise ceremony at stone henge
The building of stonehenge
