Images of a Bronze Age dagger and 14 ax heads were carved on sarsen 53, and there are carvings of ax heads on stones 3, 4 and 5. It is not clear what these dagger images represent. Was there a moment in the important ritual that took place at this location, in which the priest presented a dagger for a specific symbolic reason?
STONEHENGE 3-III
Back to Top
Stonehenge 3 III was a brief phase during which the bluestones were re–erected. They were placed within the outer sarsen circle and possibly trimmed anew, a few wood-working style cuts can be noticed. These arrangements were well spaced and they may have been linked with a large stone circle using lintels.
Two of the latest four C-14 dates from antler picks in the stone holes date the erection of the sarsens (Phase 3 II) after the first phase of bluestone alignment (Phase 3 I) to c.2400-2200 B.C. Re-appraisal of the earlier dating which is often quoted, has determined that those two dates come from a large pit dug after the giant trilithon had been set in place. The sarsen phase is now understood to be best dated by these two earlier dates and the period 2640-2480 B.C, at which time Durrington Walls and the Southern Circle are believed to be still in active use.
Stonehenge – Trilithons E & C / Ordnance Survey 1867
Archival Photo Blumenberg Associates LLC
Within the boundaries set by the archeological record of the Salisbury Plain, Stonehenge is the greatest 'scientific' and ritual achievement of its era. Population density sufficed to provide the requisite muscle power. Political power must have been stable in the regional kingdoms of one or more rulers or the project could not have been executed successfully. An entity of profound mythic valence constructed and activated. This project commanded the complete attention of regional Wessex society and polity.
Metaphysical Cognition
Artist Univ. California Davis / Neuroscience Graduate Program
Solstice, equinox and the annual journeys of the sun and moon through the zodiac would now be tracked with a level of detail and precision heretofore not possible. Human anwareness and understanding of the gods and goddesses in their celestial realm would be greatly increased. The relationship with deity force would be expanded and deepened.
The northeast and south entrances to the stone henge were guarded by an adult and child burial. An embayment and north side pit were cut into the now filled-in U-shaped Cursus ditch. A very important shift in the sacred axis was implemented, and we can infer a significant change in myth and ritual. The sacred axis was shifted to North-South. North and south side ditches were redug as small pits, followed by a V shaped recut along a portion of the southern side, 2560-2140 B.C.
Stonehenge Plan / 1810
Historic Print megaliths.net
Was such a change in the sacred axis introduced by a new group that had become dominant in the Stonehenge priesthood? The Amesbury Archer and Boscombe Bowmen, whose burials are close to Stonehenge and date a century later, establish the presence of the Beaker Culture on the Salisbury Plain. It is very possible that the Beakers arrived earlier than these two dated burials. Their culture was different than the indigenous people that they met. As a recently arrived, dominant elite, new rituals with changes in prominent sacred variables were likely to have been set in place. This change in orientation of the sacred axis of the Curus is important and supports this proposal.
Stonehenge aerial photo / 1920s
Archival Photo Len Saunders / Stonehenge Solved
The line of small pits may have been a boundary marker that separated the Stonehenge sacred area from that of Durrington Walls. A cremation burial of a 25 year-old woman was situated in this new ditch on the northern side. A date of 2570-2340 B.C places her death within the period when the sarsens were erected as judged by their latest C-14 dates. Very soon after c.2400 B.C, the Stonehenge Archer was buried in the outer ditch. He may have a dramatic association with the Avebury Archer and/or the Boscombe Bowmen as discussed below.
DURRINGTON WALLS
Back to Top
Durrington Walls / Avenue
Photo - University Sheffield - Archeology
Only 3.2km (2.0m) from Stonehenge, Durrington Walls is a complicated, important archeoastronomy site on the Salisbury Plain. It contains several structures including a large timber circle (wood henge) and sacred avenue. Durrington Walls contains the largest henge in Britain which has a diameter of 40m. There is evidence for huge fires on the banks of the River Avon at this time. The oldest evidence for human activity at the Durrington Walls site, is a handful of pottery fragments that date to the beginning of the Neolithic. Durrington Avenue was built before the three wood henges.
Durrington Walls / Southern Circle – replica
Photo - University Sheffield - Archeology
The largest henge is the Southern Circle, a complicated timber pole, construction of several concentric circles. There is almost no evidence that speaks to the details of ceremonies were performed here but human movement was ‘controlled’ by pathway placement, and there were points at which a superb vista of the surrounding landscape was apparent. Individual poles may have represented ancestor figures before whom offerings were made. The timber circle was oriented towards the rising sun at mid-winter solstice which is in opposition to the solar alignments at Stonehenge. Because of close proximity and similarities in architectural plan, it is possible that the Southern circle at Durrington Walls was the model for the megalithic stone circle at Stonehenge.
Durrington Walls / Village – House 547
Photo – University Sheffield - Archeology Report 2006
Adjacent to Southern Circle, was a village that might have been the largest during the Bronze Age in all of northwest village. Perhaps 300 houses provided homes for the workers who labored at Stonehenge, Durrington Walls and Avebury. It is possible that the Avebury Archer and Boscombe Bowmen lived here. Two of the eight houses excavated were larger than the others, and situated within ditched, palisaded, enclosures. Small numbers of arrivals from the Beaker Culture of continental Europe may have been an elite class who managed the large work crews and lived in special houses such as these in the Durrington Walls village.
The Southern Circle fell into disuse long before the religious potency changed at Stonehenge. There is evidence that later individual offerings placed in the timber pole recut holes, were intended to acknowledge the former greatness of the powerful wood henge. Likewise, the Y and Z holes at Stonehenge may have held posts intended to be ritual analogs of the two largest posts at the Southern Circle, or representations of the later timber poles that were placed in the post hole recuts.
The Avenue at Durrington Walls is aligned to the Summer Solstice Sun Set. The Avenue at Stonehenge is aligned to Summer Solstice Sun Rise. The Southern (timber) Circle at Durrington Walls aligns with Winter Solstice Sun Rise, and a portion? of Stonehenge is aligned to Winter Solstice Sun Set. The presence of a timber henge at this earlier phase of Stonehenge is noted and easily accommodated. The latest and earlier dating at Stonehenge for the great sarsen circle, implies it was built when the Southern Circle at Durrington Walls was still ‘alive’ and not an unattended relic whose active days were centuries earlier. Alternatively, the assumed, older timber henge at Stonehenge might coincide with the active lifetime of the Southern Circle at Durrington Walls.
The Avenue at Durrington Walls is aligned to the Summer Solstice Sun Set. The Avenue at Stonehenge is aligned to Summer Solstice Sun Rise. The Southern (timber) Circle at Durrington Walls aligns with Winter Solstice Sun Rise, and a portion? of Stonehenge is aligned to Winter Solstice Sun Set. The presence of a timber henge at this earlier phase of Stonehenge is noted and easily accommodated.
The HERO in the BLUESTONES GOES to BRITAIN
Back to Top
Wales – Presili Mts / Carn Menyn, Bedd Arthur
Photo claonaite / flikr
Why were the bluestones moved from southern Wales to the Salisbury Plain? They are large and weigh several tons each. The effort to move them 250km from the Preseli Mountains to the Salisbury Plain is extreme. There had to be something very special about these Welsh bluestones that provided a powerful argument for the astronomer-priest-architects at Stonehenge to get cooperation from regional kings. Megalithic constructions are built for mythic reasons, almost every large building serves sacred purpose and Stonehenge was no exception. As an astronomical observatory and solar/lunar calendar, its science would serve the relationship between the only two sentient species in the universe – human beings and the gods/goddesses.
Excalibur finds King Arthur
Digital Scan / Book Illustration - DavepapeBot / Wikimedia / From “The Boy's King Arthur", N.C. Wyeth 1922.
The had to be something embedded in the Preseli Mountain bluestones, it is not sufficient to consider them large beautiful boulders and leave it a that. The only substance that suffices to move those great stones in the mythic realm is sacred energy. Embedded within the bluestones was condensed powerful energy, perhaps that of a great hero of the distant past now transformed into a warrior and solar god. When the bluestones went to the Salisbury Plain, they brought a new, very potent power that would be instilled in Stonehenge. With such motivation, the proposal of astronomer-priest-architects to regional kings who were charged with organizing a large work force would be compelling.
BOSCOMBE BOWMEN
Back to Top
Boscombe Bowmen / mass grave
Photo - Wessex Archeology Ltd
Who moved the huge Welsh bluestones to the Salisbury Plain? Incredibly, burials have been found of men who may have worked on the grandest building phases of Stonehenge. It has been understood for some time that people from the Beaker Culture of continental Europe, which is contemporaneous with the megalithic stone building projects at Stonehenge, crossed the English Channel in small groups. Finds of Beaker pottery provide the map of their settlements.
Boscombe Bowmen / arrowheads, bone toggle
Photo - Wessex Archeology Ltd
In May 2003, a water pipe dig in Boscombe Down accidentally uncovered a Bronze Age burial that is dated c.2300 B.C. There are seven individuals in this mass grave: three adult men, a teenage boy and three children. Grave goods that included Beaker pottery were provisions for this group’s afterlife journey through the Underworld. Flint arrowheads were also found in quantity in the grave and this group was named the Boscombe Bowmen. Life was short and extreme in Bronze Age Europe. The oldest male was 40 years old when he died. The other men died before they were 30 years old. Archeologists wonder if the Boscombe Bowmen were a family, a Band of Brothers who come to the Salisbury Plain with their children to work at Stonehenge.
Isotopic analysis of strontium and oxygen determined that the men lived in southern Wales until the age of 6 and then moved to another locality until the age of 13. Did older Boscombe Bowmen help move the Welsh bluestones to the Salisbury for the grandest of Stonehenge’s building projects ? Were the Boscombe Bowmen upper class Beaker people? As an elite class, did they assumed authority at Stonehenge and direct the megalithic building projects ? Did the Boscombe Bowmen ‘family’ live in one of the large, palisaded houses in the village at Durrington Walls?
An UPPER CLASS, PROJECT MANAGER COMES to STONEHENGE
Back to Top
Amesbury Archer / burial
Photo - Wessex Archeology Ltd
One year before the discovery of the Boscombe Bowmen, a routine archeological survey in advance of a housing project at Amesbury found Beaker pottery and a gold hair tress on site. These finds quickly led to the burial of an adult male from the early Bronze Age, c.2300 B.C. The locality in Amesbury (Wiltshire) was 3 miles southeast of Stonehenge. The grave was not discovered until mid-afternoon on Friday, May 3, 2003. It was clear to the archeology team that the situation was very important and could not be left unattended over a holiday weekend. Rescue archeologists worked intensely until 2 AM Saturday to learn everything possible about this Amesbury Archer.
Amesbury Archer_copper knives
Photo - Wessex Archeology Ltd
The grave goods were the richest ever found in a British Bronze Age burial. More than 100 items were catalogued that included five Beaker pots, a slate wrist guard to protect the arm from the recoil of an archer's longbow, two small gold hair tresses, a cushion stone used for metal working, 16 barbed and tanged flint arrowheads, three copper knives, four boar tusks accompanied a complete male skeleton. The gold was dated to 2470 B.C and is the oldest gold found in Britain. Many of the objects were goods for use in the after life, and it is possible the grave was originally covered by a barrow (mound).
Beaker Culture / pottery
Photo - Wessex Archeology Ltd
The Amesbury Archer was between 35 and 45 when he died. He has suffered a serious injury that tore out his left knee cap. The Archer would have walked with a straight left leg gait. He also suffered from a painful bone infection and sadly would have lived out his last years in severe, permanent pain. Isotopic analysis of tooth enamel – ratio of ‘heavy oxygen O18 to common O16 – revealed that the Amesbury Archer lived in central Europe when a child. Why had he come to southern Britain?
Nearby was a second burial of younger man, who was no more than 25 at the time of death. Two gold hair tresses were found in the mud in his jaw. Bone analysis supports a family relationship with the older Amesbury Archer and a life lived entirely in Britain. Was this the son of the Amesbury Archer, born in Britain?
Amesbury Archer / companion
Photo - Wessex Archeology Ltd
The rich Beaker culture grave goods portray the Amesbury Archer as a member of an elite class. His burial near Stonehenge must have been deliberate because of an important relationship with the awesome megalithic stone circle and astronomical observatory. Was the Amesbury Archer a project manager at a time when two important constructions were executed at Stonehenge? He might have helped organize the erection of the 4 tonne Welsh bluestones into a circle, and/or also the establishment of the 20 tonne Sarsen stones that had been brought to Stonehenge from Marlborough Downs. The ability to work gold would have been a rarity that quickly conferred a high status upon the Amesbury Archer.
Arrival of the Beaker Culture into Britain at the time of Stonehenge 3 is documented at many localities and should not be thought of as a military invasion. It seems that small numbers of a Beaker Culture aristocracy came to Britain from continental Europe to facilitate trade networks and strongly position themselves within regional politics. The Amesbury Archer has a profile that fits this scenario.
The STONEHENGE ARCHER
Back to Top
Wessex Archer
Artist - Wessex Archeology Ltd
A grave discovered in 1978, further illustrates the turbulent times at Stonehenge. A tall and strong man no more than 30 years old had met a violent death, c.2300 B.C.. Arrows in the grave imply that he was shot from behind by as many as six men. A stone wrist guard in the grave implies this man was an archer, but then the bow was ubiquitous in Wessex Culture at this time. Was this a ritual killing in which the victim quietly complied, perhaps after being drugged? After all, it is near impossible for six men to sneak up behind an intended victim without notice. The stone wrist guard. which was a prestige item, could have been placed in the grave after the killing as a mark of respect. Three thousand years later, Strabo wrote of the Celtic practice of killing sacrificial victims with a volley of arrows before impaling them in their place of death. But then several arrows hardly constitutes a ‘volley’.
As this Stonehenge Archer died at approximately the same time as the Amesbury Archer and the oldest of the Boscombe Bowmen, at least one writer has tried to connect the three. The Amesbury Archer and oldest Boscombe Bowman each had crippling injuries to their upper left leg, possibly inflicted by a strong right handed man wielding a stone mace. The Stonehenge Archer fits that profile but aside from the coincidence of dates with significance variance, there is no hard evidence to back up this story. Still .. We shall always wonder.. Did the surviving family of the Amesbury Archer and/or Boscombe Bowmen hunt down the Stonehenge Archer and kill him in revenge? We shall never know …
MOUNT HEKLA, ICELAND
Back to Top
Iceland / Mt. Hekla eruption / Abraham Ortelius' (1585)
Map –
altiplano / Wikipedia
"But Wait, There is More" ... Mount Hekla in Iceland is the most active volcano in the northern hemisphere, and it continues to erupt on a large scale with an unpredictable pattern. Active periods can last several years. Mt. Hekla is situated on a long volcanic ridge, of which 5.5 km is the Hekla fissure. In 2310 B.C. Mt Helkla erupted on a massive scale and the output of tephra and ash was enormous. This eruption occurred at least a century after the construction of the great sarsen circle as determined by the latest and earlier dates. Several years without summer might have occurred, and tree growth may have stopped for a one or more years. We can image these environmental effects were traumatic, and provided a strong motivation for new rites with which to talk to the gods and plead for their help to return the earth to long familiar seasonal patterns of sun, rain, temperature and growth.
BLUEHENGE
Back to Top
Bluehenge at Stonehenge / Arrival of the Dead – River Avon
Artist –
University of Manchester
A important new discovery at the Stonehenge site was announced in the first week of October, 2009. One mile from Stonehenge itself and coincident in time with some of its assembly phases, a smaller stone henge was constructed from Welsh bluestones. Twenty Seven, 4 ton sarsens of Preseli Spotted Dolerite were erected in a circle 60 meters in diameter. Preseli Spotted Dolerite is the dominant igneous igneous rock at Stonehenge and is harder than granite. Bluehenge was identified from rock holes in which dolerite chips still remain. The bluestones of Bluehenge could have been highly polished to bring out flecks of blue that would resemble stars in the night sky. Bluehenge was later taken down to make its stones available for the largest of the sarsen circles.
Bluehenge / Funeral rituals at Three Henges / Stonehenge site
Graphic Art Souls of Distortion
The ashes of the dead drifted, or were guided on small rafts to the sacred Avenue that led from the River Avon to the Stonehenge site. The ashes of the dead may have brought ashore at Bluehenge, the newly discovered smaller stone henge that is positioned at the shore of the River Avon. A ceremony at Bluehenge would be followed by a solemn processional along the Avenue to Stonehenge more than one mile distant. The sanctified ashes of the dead were likely the focus of a ritual performed within Stonehenge. Perhaps in the Bronze Age, it was believed that the souls of the dead were free to leave this earthly realm for the ‘heavens’.
Stonehenge – Durrington Walls map / Journey from Life to Death
Map tim / remote central archives
The larger metaphor structuring these funeral rites views Durrington Walls as the Domain of the Living. The journey of the cremation ashes down the River Avon to Bluehenge would be a journey top the Land of the Ancestor wherein Bluehenge functions as a gateway to the Domain of the Ancestors. The final ritual inside Stonehenge transforms the souls of the dead so that they can join the Ancestors for all eternity.
STONEHENGE 3-IV
Back to Top
Stonehenge as found – plan / Ordnance Survey 1867
Archival Print Blumenberg Associates LLC
Bluestones were again re-arranged in this building phase. A second group of blue stones was brought in from the Preseli Mountains in Wales and set up between the Sarsen Circle and Trilithons. They are carefully spaced and there is no evidence that this bluestone arrangement was linked with lintels. An oval setting of bluestones was built with the horseshoe arc of the Sarsen Trilithons. The Altar stone may have been re-positioned within this central oval, and re-erected vertically. The processional Avenue that linked the River Avon with Stonehenge may have been built at this time as well. Interestingly, the overall workmanship of this building phase appears to have been rushed and not up to the high standard of earlier Stonehenge building.
STONEHENGE 3-V & VI
Back to Top
The northeastern section of the Phase 3 IV bluestone circle was taken down creating a horseshoe shaped, bluestone arrangement that mirrored the shape of the central sarsen trilithons. This is the architectural alignment of the bluestones that we see today. Part of the Bluestone Circle was removed creating the Bluestone Horseshoe which echoed the arrangement of the Sarsen Trilithons.
STONEHENGE 3-VI
Back to Top
Stonehenge 3 VI / Y and Z Holes
Plan - Dr. Christopher L. C. E. Witcombe / Sweet Briar College
The Y and Z holes were dug in concentric circles outside the Sarsen Circle but they never held stones. Perhaps the existing bluestones were to be moved and repositioned in the Y and Z holes, but this was never done. Another theory proposes that posts were intended for the Y and Z holes that would duplicate and honor those in a similar position at the Southern Circle of Durrington Walls.
Stonehenge photo, July 1877
Original Photo – Philip Rupert Acott / Owner, Tamsin Titcomb / Teapotgeorge, Wikipedia
STONEHENGE DECLINES
Back to Top
The southern section of the cursus ditch was dug out to from a V shaped ditch that was filled with calcified loessic soil, c.2000-1500 B.C.
Britain, Kingsmead Quarry / Early Neolithic House
Photo / Reconstruction - W. Foster, Tom Goskar / Wessex Archeology Ltd
The origin of this loessic soil is not known but it may have derived from wind erosion off surrounding land where the grass cover was broken up for the first time. This use of grass cover at Stonehenge signifies an important shift in how the mythopoetic potency of the site was viewed. If turf was stripped out for building barrows and/or to prepare the field for plowing, then the sacredness of Stonehenge has evaporated. Use of the landscape in this fashion tells us that there was no longer an extreme, religious sacredness embedded in this portion of the Salisbury Plain. Centuries have passed, cultures and religious systems had come and gone, and the ‘world’ had dramatically changed from the time when the great trilithons, Altar and Heel Stones revealed their secrets to the astonomer-priests and provided a sacred conduit to the cosmos. There is evidence for a similar shift at Woodhenge.
Stonehenge plan as of 2004
Original Plan – Adamsan / Kdhenrik / Wikipedia
A ragged ring of offering pits were placed around the perimeter of Stonehenge c.1500 B.C. The sacred avenue upon which ritual processions walked was extended to the River Avon which is the last construction of any significance at Stonehenge.
Tour at Stonehenge, 1776
Archival Print Blumenberg Associates LLC
Warfare and soil erosion catalyzed war, famine and disease. The population of Britain was reduced by one half between 1300 B.C. and 1100 B.C. Mount Hekla in Iceland underwent massive eruptions in ~1550 B.C. And 1100 B.C. The ash released was again prodigious and may again caused a decade long period of abnormal cold in northwest Europe, absence of summer, cessation of tree growth and severely reduced agricultural capacity. Centuries later, Celtic druids were in the area and we can only guess what they thought when first standing in the great stone circle of Stonehenge.
CYMRII - KING ARTHUR
Back to Top
Geoffrey of Monmouth in his 12th century history of Britain has Merlin in charge of transporting the great Welsh bluestones and acting overseer for the Stonehenge construction.
Merlin Builds Stonehenge / Roman de Brut, c.1150-55
Written in Norman by the poet Wace, Roman de Brut is a ‘history’ of the new Anglo-Norman,
British territories. It includes a life of King Arthur and goes back to the mythical Brutus of Troy.
Digital Image / illuminated manuscript –
Dsmdgold / Wikipedia
Here we have the connection between ancient Celtic Britain and Stonehenge. Stonehenge fell into disuse many centuries before the first Celtic tribes and their druids arrived on the Salisbury Plain, and its religion was unlikely to have been be the great poetry, water deities and tree lore of the Celts. However, if the druids learned of the ancient solar hero brought to the Salisbury Plain to be embedded in Stonehenge, they may well have appropriated that power, perhaps as early as the La Tene culture at c. 500 B.C.
King Arthur Enthroned / Mathew Paris (England), ca.1200-1259
Painting manuscript - Acoma / Wikimedia
Much later, from the 8th century A.D. onward, the Welsh poets at the behest of their Cymrii kings were creating the legend of King Arthur as they embellished his true history of Brythonic warrior fighting valiantly against invading Saxons. When these bards draped King Arthur’s shoulders with the mantle of the timeless sacred power in Stonehenge, they were transforming this regional king into a timeless mythic hero and adding him to the lineage of that unknown great warrior who lived, fought and died in the Welsh mountains during the early Neolithic age.
WHAT DOES STONEHENGE DO?
Back to Top
Stonehenge – druid fantasy
Archival Print Blumenberg Associates LLC
Sacred constructions and spaces are almost always laid out with reference to a larger, surrounding sacred landscape that extends for many miles in each direction and into the heavens as well. The ‘landscape’ through which the deities undertake monthly and annual journeys of great significance includes the celestial. The astronomer-priest-architects of Stonehenge guided their people in their understanding so that many might participate in the sacred journeys of the gods and ancestors. When we can do that, then we truly nourish the gods and they will reciprocate by nourishing us. This is the dynamic of a coherent, healthy and sacred universe, something most leaders in this modern ‘world have lost and abandoned. In the Neolithic, the price often paid by a king who lost this truth was death. What is the price paid in our modern, technological age?
Stonehenge - druid festival fantasy / Italy c.1820
Print - Dr. C.L.C.E. Whitcombe / Sweet Briar College
OK, Stonehenge is built. Exactly what is it? How was Stonehenge used? Stonehenge was much more than a compelling stage set within which to assemble for important ceremonies. Stonehenge was not the Bronze Age equivalent of a dramatic antiquarian setting for a nightly ‘sound’ and ‘light’ show. If the day or night is clear, there are many places where the people can ‘look up’ and see what the priest wishes to be seen.
Stonehing 1575
Historic Print - Dr. C.L.C.E. Whitcombe / Sweet Briar College
Stonehenge is a working solar and lunar calendar, and a forthcoming web page will explore how it functions. Although it has no obvious ‘clock works’, no obvious working mechanism, Stonehenge is a dynamic observatory that was built to gather important sacred data that changes throughout the year. Properly understood, that data empowered the astronomer-priest-architects of the Wessex Culture to predict the most important actions undertaken by the gods and goddesses during their annual journey through the zodiac. A truly reciprocal relationship is then created between the only classes of sentient beings in the universe.
SOURCES
Back to Top
1. Stonehenge at Wikipedia
2. Interactive Map of Stonehenge at English Heritage
3. Canada's Stonehenge
4. Cursus: solving a 6,000-year-old puzzle
5. The Guys Who Moved the Bluestones from Wales to Stonehenge
6. The Amesbury Archer
7. The Boscombe Bowmen
8. Durrington Walls - Southern Circle and the Village
9. Stonehenge - New Key to an Ancient Enigma
10. Bluehenge at Wikipedia
11. Stonehenge Riverside Project - Fieldwork 2008
12. The Meaning of Stonehenge
13. The Constellation of Taurus the Bull
14. Beaker Culture at Wikipedia
15. Wessex Culture at Wikipedia
Stonehenge – Ditch in foreground
_Detail_from_map_of_Iceland_1585.jpg){kind=link}
