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The reason for Stonehenge's construction is unknown.
The reason for Stonehenge's construction is unknown.
The mysterious structure of Stonehenge may have been built as a symbol of peace and unity, according to a new theory by British researchers.
During the monument's construction around 3000 B.C. to 2500 B.C., Britain's Neolithic people were becoming increasingly unified, said study leader Mike Parker Pearson of the University of Sheffield.
"There was a growing islandwide culture - the same styles of houses, pottery and other material forms were used from Orkney to the south coast," Parker Pearson said in a statement, referring to the Orkney Islands of northern Scotland. "This was very different to the regionalism of previous centuries."
By definition, Stonehenge would have required cooperation, Parker Pearson added.
"Stonehenge itself was a massive undertaking, requiring the labor of thousands to move stones from as far away as west Wales, shaping them and erecting them. Just the work itself, requiring everything literally to pull together, would have been an act of unification," he said.
The new theory, detailed in a new book by Parker Pearson, Stonehenge: Exploring the Greatest Stone Age Mystery (Simon & Schuster, 2012), is one of many hypotheses about the mysterious monument. Theories range from completely far-fetched (space aliens or the wizard Merlin built it!) to far more evidence-based (the monument may have been an astronomical calendar, a burial site, or both).
The Culture of Stonehenge
Along with fellow researchers on the Stonehenge riverside Project, Parker Pearson worked to put Stonehenge in context, studying not just the monument but also the culture that created it.
What they found was evidence of a civilization transitioning from regionalism to a more integrated culture. Nevertheless, Britain's Stone Age people were isolated from the rest of Europe and didn't interact with anyone across the English Channel, Parker Pearson said.
"Stonehenge appears to have been the last gasp of this Stone Age culture, which was isolated from Europe and from the new technologies of metal tools and the wheel," Parker Pearson said.
Stonehenge's site may have been chosen because it was already significant to Stone-Age Britons, the researchers suggest. The natural land undulations at the site seem to form a line between the place where the sun rises on the summer solstice and where it sets in midwinter, they found. Neolithic people may have seen this as more than a coincidence, Parker Pearson said.
"This might explain why there are eight monuments in the Stonehenge area with solstitial alignments, a number unmatched anywhere else," he said. "Perhaps they saw this place as the center of the world."
Theories and mystery
These days, Stonehenge is nothing if not the center of speculation and mystery. The monument has inspired its fair share of myths, including that the wizard Merlin transported the stones from Ireland and that UFOs use the circle as a landing site.
Archaeologists have built some theories on firmer ground. Stonehenge's astronomical alignments suggest that it may have been a place for sun worship, or an ancient calendar. A nearby ancient settlement, Durrington Walls, shows evidence of more pork consumption during the midwinter, suggesting that perhaps ancient people made pilgrimages to Stonehenge for the winter solstice, Parker Pearson and his colleagues have found.
Stonehenge may have also been a burial ground, or a place of healing. Tombs and burials surround the site, and some skeletons found nearby hail from distant lands. For example, archaeologists reported in 2010 that they'd found the skeleton of a teenage boy wearing an amber necklace near Stonehenge. The boy died around 1550 B.C. An analysis of his teeth suggest he came from the Mediterranean. It's possible that ill or wounded people traveled to Stonehenge in search of healing, some archaeologists believe.
Other researchers have focused on the sounds of Stonehenge. The place seems to have "lecture-hall" acoustics, according to research released in May. One archaeologist even suggests that the setup of the stones was inspired by an acoustical effect in which two sounds from different sources seem to cancel each other out.
The culture that built Stonehenge was already unified, it wasn't becoming unified, osit. That teenage Mediterranean boy making the journey to Stonehenge is very interesting given what the Cassiopaeans have said about the Northern peoples being "responsible for civilizing the Meditteranean/Adriatic peoples:"
Q: I didn't think so. Okay, in this book it says: Diodorus Siculus, writing in the 1st century B.C., said that "certain sacred offerings wrapped in wheat straw come from the Hyperboreans into Scythia, whence they are taken over by the neighboring peoples in succession until they get as far west as the Adriatic. From there they are sent south, and the first Greeks to receive them are the Dodonaeans. Then, continuing southward, they reach the Malian gulf, cross to Euboea, and are passed on from town to town as far as Carystus. Then they skp Andros, the Carystians take them to Tenos, and the Tenians to Delos. That is how these things are said to reach Delos at the present time." So, from very ancient times, there was this practice of the Hyperboreans sending sacred offerings to the Island of Delos. Now, the Island of Delos is supposedly the birthplace of Phoebus Apollo, whose mother was Leto. Supposedly he was born on Mt. Cynthus. This is a very curious thing. This is contrary to the old view that the cultural flow was from the Mediterranean to the North, that civilization began in the Near East. It implies a cultural flow from the North to the South. What were these ancient Hyperboreans sending to the Island of Delos?
A: Leaves bearing cryptic codes.
Q: What was the connection between the Hyperboreans, including the Celts of Britain, I believe, and the people of Delos?
A: Northern peoples were responsible for civilising the Meditteranean/Adriatic peoples with the encoded secrets contained within their superior extra-terrestrially based genetic arrangement. Practice of which you speak was multi-trans-generational habit.
Q: Is it the case that some of them communicated with higher density beings via Stonehenge, and that these communications they received...
A: Stonehenge used to resonate with tonal rill, teaching the other wise unteachable with wisdoms entered psychically through crown chakra transceiving system.