Stonehenge...history and pictures
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Pictures of Stonehenge
click...wil3.typepad.com...in the upper left of the album to get to the site main/first page...
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Stonehenge is an ancient religious site constructed on the Salisbury Plain in Southern England. It dates back thousands of years to approximately 3100 BC.
There were three construction stages...
3100 BC-A large earthwork or Henge was constructed consisting of a circular ditch, a bank and a ring of pits named Aubrey holes(after their discoverer).Then no construction for 1000 years. Even with no construction Stonehenge is believed to have been in use continually during that time period.
Construction started again in 2150 BC...This was the beginning of the stone construction and was accomplished without the use of heavy draft animals. Stone tools were used and the stones were taken from quarrys, 30-240 miles from Stonehenge....It has been calculated that it would have taken 500 men using leather ropes to pull each of the largest stones and another 100 men to lay wooden rollers in front of the sledges on which the stones were transported.
2150 BC-... 82 Bluestones from the Preseli mountains in South-West Wales were moved to the site. Each of these stones weighs 4 tons and were placed to form the inner circle.
2000 BC-...Sarsen stones weighing 6-50 tons were placed to form the outer circle. The Sarsen Circle with it's lintels is considered to be the most remarkable feature of Stonehenge in terms of precision stonework and engineering.....Trilithons, ten upright stones, are arranged in five freestanding pairs each with a single horizontal lintel. These Trilithons were erected within the Sarsen Circle and form a horseshoe with the open side facing North-East towards the main entrance.....The existence of the Heel Stone, weighing 35 tons, provides possible evidence that it was used to make astronomical calculations. This is so because of the position of the Heel Stone in relation to the sun during the summer solstice. Also this Heel Stone could have been used to predict solar and lunar eclipses.
1500 BC-Construction ends.
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Two Myths about Stonehenge...
First Myth-Druids constructed Stonehenge and worshipped there...Julius Caesar (55 BC) told of a Celtic(Druid) priesthood at the time of his conquest of Briton. The stones at that time had already been standing for 2,000 years and were in a ruined condition. Furthermore it is well known that Druids worshipped in forest temples.
Second Myth-Merlin engineered the construction...Geoffrey of Monmouth, a twelfth century writer, in his History of the Kings of Britain states that Merlin brought the stones to the Salisbury Plain in England from Ireland. And that the stones, of the "Giant's Ring", were originally brought to Ireland from Africa by giants. Good fairy tale.
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