2020-05-01 iD

SECRETS OF

STONEHENGE

The enormous standing stones near

Salisbury, England, have been attracting

visitors for millennia. Archeologists working

there have discovered human artifacts more

than 8,000 years old. The fi rst sandstone ring,

Stonehenge I, was built in prehistoric times,

starting around 3100 BC. This original ring

was used for some 500 years before the site

reverted to scrubland. Stonehenge II was built

of bluestone pillars circa 2100 BC to create a

second concentric circle. Work on Stonehenge

III began around 2000 BC, and the complex

remained in use for another thousand years.

When was

STONEHENGE BUILT?

“How grand! How incomprehensible! How

wonderful!” That’s how British archeologist

Sir Richard Colt Hoare described Stonehenge in

Volume I of his The Ancient History of Wiltshire

(1812). The structure was long considered one of

history’s great mysteries. Surprisingly, Geoffrey

of Monmouth’s 12th-century story that Merlin had

magically transported Stonehenge from Ireland to

Salisbury Plain was long accepted. While there is

still little evidence as to what rites may have taken

place there, modern analysis has shown that great

care was taken to align the monument with the

movements of the Sun. So it may have been the site

of ceremonies connected with the summer and winter

solstices, when the Sun’s apparent path is farthest

north and south, respectively, from the Equator.

Why were the

STONE CIRCLES BUILT?

Standing upright in the barren landscape like a

group of pious pilgrims, Stonehenge’s largest

stones weigh an average of 25 tons. For a long time it

remained a mystery where the stones came from and

how they got to the site. In its present form, Stonehenge

consists of an outer ring of huge sandstone blocks and

an inner ring of much smaller blocks of bluestone. The

sandstone occurs naturally about 20 miles away. But

some of the bluestones match a rocky outcrop in Wales,

160 miles from the Stonehenge site. The sandstone blocks

were most likely moved on sleds that slid across rollers.

The bluestones probably traveled by river on rafts.

How did the

GIGANTIC STONES GET THERE?

May 2020 38 ideasanddiscoveries.com

questions

Ask a simple question, get a simple answer? Think again! Scientists often have to work meticulously to come up with explanations
for basic processes—and sometimes they inadvertently discover marvels that can change our perception of the world.