Excavations at Stonehenge May Answer Questions

Smivs writes "The BBC are getting set to fund a dig at Stonehenge in Wiltshire, England. The two-week dig will try to establish, once and for all, some precise dating for the creation of the monument. An article from the BBC news website explains how the dig will investigate the significance of the smaller bluestones that stand inside the giant sarsen pillars. 'Researchers believe these rocks, brought all the way from Wales, hold the secret to the real purpose of Stonehenge as a place of healing. The researchers leading the project are two of the UK's leading Stonehenge experts — Professor Tim Darvill, of the University of Bournemouth, and Professor Geoff Wainwright, of the Society of Antiquaries. They are convinced that the dominating feature on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire was akin to a "Neolithic Lourdes" — a place where people went on a pilgrimage to get cured. Modern techniques have established that many of these people had clearly traveled huge distances to get to south-west England, suggesting they were seeking supernatural help for their ills.'"

Comments

The BBC andTimewatch are running this bigtime

[jd]

I know, it's the evil site, but you'll find every link I could find from the Timewatch team and the BBC. The Timewatch website gets daily podcats from the dig and hourly news bulletins, so this is no minor event.

Re:An alternate interpretation

[jd]

The injuries were inconsistant with Stonehenge-type construction, mostly very standard Neolithic injuries. The skull modifications are known from elsewhere as very primitive surgery with an amazingly high survival rate. They've found evidence of healing from the cranial modifications and they've found the tools used - superior to anything less than modern surgical steel. They also have the settlement where the workforce lived and are able to show that the workers were not the ones buried. Also, the Neolithic people were bigger on stealing magic for their own use than destroying it. This is backed up by the fact that those blue stones were deliberately quarried for Stonehenge (they found the quarry). You don't make an enemy something they can use so that you can destroy it... unless you're from Fox News or SCO. In short, the bloodthirsty theory doesn't hold with the available data.

Re:An alternate interpretation

[rts008]

I think he was trying to refer to this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trephining.

Advanced medical procedures do not = advanced knowledge.
Maybe they drilled the holes to let out the evil spirits affecting the patient...who really knows for sure?