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Huge Ritual Arena Discovered Near Stonehenge
New submitter pabloApicco writes: A row of 90 megalithic stones has been found buried beneath a grassy bank only two miles from the world-famous site of Stonehenge in Wiltshire, England. Believed to have been a huge ritual monument, the long line of megalithic stones lies 3 feet underground, and was found using sophisticated radar equipment. “What we are starting to see is the largest surviving stone monument, preserved underneath a bank, that has ever been discovered in Britain and possibly in Europe,” said Vince Gaffney, an archaeologist at Bradford University who leads the Stonehenge Hidden Landscape project. “This is archeology on steroids.” Here's a satellite map of the new site.
Intelligence is boring. Heads are just computers, and some are more powerful computers than others.
Map link didn't work with AdBlock/Privacy Badger... oh well, there's a good enough video & map in the first link.
It's funny they call this a monument/ritual area. To me it looks like a defensive structure - large stones to break up horse attacks, quick drop offs to either fill with oil/water or just to break legs/slow attacks of infantry/horses as they charge in. Opening is closest to the stream for easy access to water. Pretty standard looking military fort/permanent settlement to me.
That describes the topic of "History" in general.
I recall watching a documentary about how they now thing Tutankhamun died.
It was the most absurdly convoluted story I've seen involving him falling off the back of a chariot and landing in just the right manner to fracture his leg, for him to then have been up on his knees (despite his leg being fractured) and then getting hit by the wheel of another chariot at just the right angle to do some damage to his chest followed by a further bunch of random reasons why he then had to be buried quickly.
And that's okay, theories are good, but the problem is there was absolutely no real worthwhile evidence at all - they'd effectively created evidence to match their theory, rather than found evidence to back up their theory. They created this convoluted bodged computer simulations that were like "If it just hits him like this then you get this sort of damage!" - great, I can also think of a thousand other ways and things that could hit him just like that to create that damage which I could also simulate, why is your chariot one correct? He could just as well have been smacked around the leg with a club "in just the right way" by someone beating him to death, and then smacked even harder across the shoulder "in just the right way" and ended up in the exact same state with a completely different theory about the rapid burial, like it beginning to rain and thunder that day and the burial guy just wanting to get the job done and clock off home early so he can get his washing in that he left outside to dry before it gets too wet.
But I find this typical when watching history programmes, a "Historian" comes up with a theory and then makes up some evidence to show why their theory is right. There's a common lack of conclusiveness to their evidence, and it's possible to come up with a thousand other theories and fudge evidence in the same way, none of which has any more reason to be correct than the other.
It feels like in many cases history has become one of the most horribly unscientific subjects out there, it's become about story telling, you make up a story and then pretend something shows something conclusively (even though there's no conclusiveness at all) and declare yourself the world expert on that aspect of history. It seems to have become a modern day snake oil industry - you make up a fancy story, and just declare it true with supporting evidence that's entirely circumstantial or in itself just wholly made up or theoretical and unproven.
Long gone is the truth of the "History is written by winners" saying, nowadays history is written by anyone with a pet theory that they simply declare to be true true. Evidence and scrutiny not required. Bonus points if you write up your theory into a book and sell it as the self-described "leading work on the subject".
Fact is, with a lot of history, as you imply, we simply have absolutely no fucking idea what went on or why and at best we're just making shit up.