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Geologists Find Where Some Stonehenge Rocks Came From, Debunking Old Research (cnn.com)
Slashdot reader schwit1 shares a report from CNN: A team of 12 geologists and archaeologists from across the United Kingdom unveiled research this month that traces some of the prehistoric monument's smaller stones to two quarries in western Wales. The team also found evidence of prehistoric tools, stone wedges and digging activity in those quarries, tracing them to around 3000 BC, the era when Stonehenge's first stage was constructed. It's rock-solid evidence that humans were involved in moving these "bluestones" to where they sit today, a full 150 miles away, the researchers say. "It finally puts to rest long-standing arguments over whether the bluestones were moved by human agency or by glacial action," University of Southampton Archeology Professor Joshua Pollard said in an email. Slashdot reader schwit1 adds: "This leaves the question of how..."
TL;DR It was aliens
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It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
I can think of a few uses for Catherine Zeta-Jones.
Have gnu, will travel.
From the first line of the article: Scientists have long known the stones came from the Preseli Hills, but the new research helps disprove claims about the original rock locations made in 1923 by famous British geologist H.H. Thomas. The correct quarries, called Carn Goedog and Craig Rhos-y-felin, are on the north side of the hills -- opposite their long-suspected location, the new findings indicate.
So it seems that yes, we have know for almost 100 years that the rocks came from quarries in western Wales. This has just changed the precise location of those quarries within the Preseli Hills.
150 miles over the hills of Wales and across the Severn into England?
Only if they were stupid.
The Preseli Quarry is only 5 miles from the coast of the Irish Sea (all downhill). From there, they could be moved by barge up the Bristol Channel. Then across 40 miles of flat ground to the Salisbury Plain.
Disclaimer: I use miles instead of kilometers because Britain wasn't metric yet in 3000 BC.
Britain still isn't metric now in terms of distances. All our roads, vehicles, etc. still measure everything in miles.
The new parts aren't quoted or are understated.
1. We already knew about the quarries, what we didn't have were the actual tools used. We now have them, including wooden items.
2. We already knew about how they could have moved the stones, they're smaller and lighter than sarsens, we didn't know the route. We now know some were transported overland.
3. We didn't know if the stones were quarried specifically for Stonehenge or for a circle in Wales that was dismantled and recycled. We now know it was the former.
The real mystery is why people make a mystery of the known, when the unknown is potentially more interesting.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
They would not have had domesticated horses. Too early. England didn't get those for a further 2,000 years.
In fact, horses weren't domesticated anywhere at the time Stonehenge was started. Proto-Indo-Europeans only domesticated them 5,000 years ago, but Stonehenge construction had been underway for maybe 500 years by then.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
It's basically the same reason that people still compete for the world's tallest building and for breaking Guinness's silly world records--because we can. I always cringe at documentaries that try to come up with silly explanations, including space aliens, because it's amazing that we still don't understand ourselves. Humans have always been symbolic creatures--not mere practical creatures--and so we do things because we feel them to be meaningful, not simply because we think they might be useful.
Incipiamus, fratres, servire Domino Deo, quia hucusque vix vel parum in nullo profecimus.
Interesting hypothesis. Achievements on behalf of your tribe, or atonement for punishments inflicted by your Gods? Note that Stonehenge embankments are profiled to defend against the INSIDE - what did they fear would emerge from within?