A handful of scraps of charred wood and a little pile of stone chips - finds from the first excavation at Stonehenge in more than 40 years - have added thousands of years to the history of one of the world's most famous prehistoric monuments.There was no gold or bronze, but to the archaeologists who led the excavation, Professors Tim Darvill and Geoffrey Wainwright, the unlovely heap of finds is real treasure. They are convinced the stone chips are evidence of belief in the healing power of the "bluestones" brought 150 miles from south Wales, which endured long after the monument was thought to have been abandoned.The magicalbluestone, spotted dolerite which when newly quarried is a dark blue speckled with brilliant white stars of quartz, made Stonehenge into the Lourdes of prehistoric Europe, they believe, or as Darvill put it yesterday, "the accident and emergency unit of southern England".
The charcoal
fragments also add haunting new evidence to the Stonehenge story.
Darvill and Wainwright revealed yesterday, at the Society of
Antiquaries in London, that the earliest has been dated to 7,000BC, and
the most recent to medieval times, suggesting that the site was already
important 4,000 years before the oldest stone circle, and continued to
draw visitors for centuries after it was believed to have been
abandoned.
Although they concede
Stonehenge was probably "multifunctional", possibly also serving as a
giant calendarmarking the solstices, as well as a site of ancestor
worship, they are convinced its true importance came from the modest
bluestones, the size of a man or smaller, dwarfed by the awesome
sarsens.
Two of the original
bluestones were broken, many chipped into fragments, and some survive
only as stumps underground after being broken up to serve as healing
talismans.
Organic remains, including
a few specks of grain and seed, have allowed secure dating for the
first time of the bluestone circle: around 2,300BC, three centuries
later than previously thought.
The stones were repeatedly
moved and rearranged, and the enormous sarsen trilithons added, before
the final outer circle of sarsen uprights and lintels was created
around 1,900BC, creating the world-famous profile of the monument.
Although the double-decker
busheight s.......
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'Cursus' is older than Stonehenge
Pagans mark end of Stonehenge dig
Uncovering stone circle's secrets
"Bluehenge" discovered
