Craig Rhos-y-felin: a Welsh bluestone megalith quarry for Stonehenge.
Pearson, Mike Parker ; Bevins, Richard ; Ixer, Rob 等
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Introduction
Stonehenge is notable for the unusually distant origins of some of
its stones. The larger stones are of sarsen, a silicified sandstone that
is found in dense concentrations within 20 miles of Salisbury Plain. The
smaller ones, known as 'bluestones', are of a variety of
lithologies that can have only come from in and around Mynydd Preseli
(Preseli mountains) in west Wales, c. 140 miles away (Figure 1). Of the
43 identified Welsh bluestones at Stonehenge, 30 are of dolerite (mostly
spotted). These have long been recognised as coming from Preseli (Thomas
1923), although only recently has a large sample of them been pinpointed
to three sources, most on the northern flank of Mynydd Preseli (Bevins
et al. 2014):
* Group 1: from the outcrop of Carn Goedog.
* Group 2: from the outcrops of Cerrigmarchogion and Craig
Talfynydd (these lack the distinctive spotting).
* Group 3: from Carn Breseb, Carn Gyfrwy, the Carn Alw area or an
un-named outcrop west of Carn Ddafad-las; Group 3 might also come from
an unsampled part of Carn Goedog.
The largest of the spotted dolerite outcrops, Carn Menyn (or Carn
Meini), was once suggested as the source of the Stonehenge bluestones
(Thomas 1923), although the sample set currently available provides no
geological evidence for this (contra Darvill & Wainwright 2014;
their description of Group 3 as 'Carn Gyfrwy/Carn Menyn' is
unsupportable because Carn Menyn is not among the potential geological
sources identified for Group 3 on the basis of the present sample set).
Other types of Welsh bluestone at Stonehenge are at least three
different types of rhyolite, two types of sandstone (one of them is a
meta-sandstone, the other, the Altar Stone; Ixer & Turner 2006), and
various argillaceous tuffs. One of the types of rhyolite, known from
stone chippings found within and around the monument, is described
macroscopically as 'rhyolite with fabric'. This has recently
been provenanced to an isolated outcrop at Craig Rhos-y-felin within the
Brynberian valley, two miles downstream from Carn Goedog (Ixer &
Bevins 2011). The sources of the remaining rock types have yet to be
located within the Preseli area, although the Altar Stone derives from
the Senni Beds, perhaps from 50 miles east of Mynydd Preseli in the
Brecon Beacons; the Cosheston Beds near Milford Haven can be ruled out
(Ixer & Turner 2006; Thomas et al. 2006).
The distant origins of some of Stonehenge's monoliths have
given rise to a variety of hypotheses about how and why they might have
come so far. The theory that the stones were carried by glaciers,
transported during an Ice Age to Salisbury Plain or its margins
(Kellaway 1971; Thorpe et al. 1991; Williams-Thorpe et al. 1997, 2006),
has not been refuted until now, even though there is no evidence for
glacial deposition within southern central England (Thomas 1923; Green
1973; McMillan et al. 2005; Gibbard & Clark 2011; Clark et al.
2012).
The bluestones were certainly in place at Stonehenge around 2500 BC
within the Qand R Holes (Atkinson 1956: 46-50; Darvill et al. 2012: fig.
4), and were probably first set up within the Aubrey Holes (Darvill et
al. 2012: fig. 3), forming a stone circle at Stonehenge around 3000 BC,
long before the sarsen circle and trilithons were erected (Parker
Pearson et al. 2009; Parker Pearson 2012: 193).
Geological prospection of the 'rhyolite with fabric'
source
More than 1200 chippings from the 2008 Stonehenge Riverside Project
(Parker Pearson 2012) and the SPACES project (Darvill & Wainwright
2009), and from excavations at Stonehenge in 1980 (Pitts 1982), have
been characterised as 'rhyolite with fabric' (Ixer &
Bevins 2010; Bevins etal. 2011). Most of these have been found in the
centre of Stonehenge, but they also occur in its environs, almost as
extensively as the spotted dolerite chippings. Six 'rhyolite with
fabric' chippings were recovered from Aubrey Hole 7 in 2008. Of the
27 from the Stonehenge Avenue, one was found in a layer beneath the
Avenue's banks, and was thus deposited before 2480-2280 cal BC (see
Darvill et al. 2012), indicating that 'rhyolite with fabric'
was present at Stonehenge before the Early Bronze Age.
The fabric of this particular type of rhyolite is macroscopically
typically planar, with a prominent foliation developed on the millimetre
scale. In thin section, the foliation is seen to be slightly lensoidal,
and contains flattened, ovoid lithic clasts (2-5cm) of microtonalite.
Locally, the fabric is extremely well developed and described as
'Jovian' because it resembles the swirling weather patterns on
Jupiter (Ixer & Bevins 2011). The main rock is commonly traversed by
thin quartz veins that are tightly folded, with their folds being axial
planar to the foliation, suggesting that the rock fabric is most
probably not a primary texture but a later (tectonic) flattening fabric.
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A strong petrographic match for these rhyolite fragments has been
found with outcrops in the Pont Saeson area just north of Mynydd
Preseli, specifically the outcrop of Craig Rhos-y-felin, belonging to
the Fishguard Volcanic Group, of Ordovician age (Ixer & Bevins 2010;
Bevins et al. 2011). This match is closest for samples from the north
end of the outcrop's near-vertical western edge (Figure 2 [location
marked as 11]).
The actual position of a 'rhyolite with fabric' monolith
(or monoliths) at Stonehenge has not yet been positively determined; the
four currently exposed rhyolitic orthostats are not of this type, and
the highly protected status of Stonehenge and its stones makes access
for sampling difficult. On the basis of macroscopic appearance, Bevins
and Ixer identify SFf32d, a buried and unsampled laminated stump
recorded by Atkinson and Piggott in 1954 as a 'spotted
dolerite' bluestone, even though its appearance is most unlike
spotted dolerite (Figure 3). Its dimensions of c. 0.4 x 0.45m in width
and thickness (Cleal et al. 1995: 226, figs 120 & 141) correspond
closely with those of a recess at Craig Rhos-y-felin, adjacent to the
location of the matching sample (location 4 adjacent to location 11 in
Figure 2).
Archaeological excavation of the Craig Rhos-y-felin 'rhyolite
with fabric' source
Five field seasons of excavation were carried out in 2011-2015 to
the north and west of this north-east-south-west oriented outcrop.
Archaeological deposits form a 2m-deep stratigraphic sequence on the
west side that extends from the Early Mesolithic, through the Neolithic
and Bronze Age to the Iron Age, to the ninth to eleventh centuries AD
onwards (Figures 4-6). Colluvium has buried and protected the remains of
prehistoric quarrying from subsequent stone removal and disturbance in
the medieval and modern era. The archaeological sequence lies on a bed
of glacial till within a small tributary valley on the west side of the
outcrop. This tributary valley feeds into the Brynberian stream, which
rises at various points in Mynydd Preseli, including the dolerite
bluestone sources of Carn Goedog (Group 1) and Cerrigmarchogion (Group
2).
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Mesolithic activity
Four Early Mesolithic hearths were set sequentially within the top
of a large, humanly dug pit. Eight dates on carbonised hazelnut shell
and roundwood from these hearths show little stratigraphic consistency
but range between 8550-8330 cal BC (SUERC-50761; 9229 [+ or -] 21 BP),
and 8220-7790 cal BC (SUERC-51165; 8851 [+ or -] 44 BP) at 95.4%
probability (Figure 7; Table 1). The hearths were incorporated within
the A horizon of a buried soil (098) containing oak charcoal that dated
to 7490-7190 cal BC at 95.4% probability (combine of OxA-30523 and
SUERC-51163). Another date for Mesolithic activity comes from a
carbonised hazelnut shell in layer 069 at the northern tip of the
outcrop: 5210-4947 cal BC (SUERC-46204; 6114 [+ or -] 31 BP). The only
artefact from the sequence of hearths was a tiny flint flake. There was
no evidence of any Mesolithic quarrying or working of rhyolite from the
outcrop.
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Neolithic activity
The Mesolithic layer 069 was covered by a localised Neolithic
occupation layer (059 = 159), which includes a hearth against the north
end of the outcrop (Figure 8). Two radiocarbon dates on carbonised
hazelnut shells from this layer provide dates of 3500-3120 cal BC
(SUERC-46205; 4590T30 [+ or -] BP) and 3620-3360 cal BC (OxA-30502; 4667
[+ or -] 30 BP), both at 95.4% probability. Within this stratigraphic
horizon are three features associated with the quarrying of megaliths.
Two of these are stone orthostats set in pits that contained carbonised
wood or nutshell fragments dating to the late ninth to early eighth
millennium BC; these fragments are probably thus residual from the Early
Mesolithic layers into which the pits were cut (as detailed below).
The Neolithic occupation layer (2m NE-SW x 3.5m SE-NW) consists of
dark brown, charcoal-rich sediment (059 = 159) at the foot of the
northern tip of the outcrop. Its focus was a small but multi-layered
hearth, set in a small bowl-shaped pit, close to the vertical face of
the outcrop and associated with 5kg of burnt stone (Figure 8). The
complexity of the hearth and the quantity of localised burnt stone in
its vicinity indicate that it was used many times. Finds include a small
flint flake and rhyolite flakes.
Bronze Age deposits
The Neolithic layer 059 = 159 was covered by a deposit (040)
radiocarbon dated by carbonised Pomoideae roundwood to 2200-2030 cal BC
(SUERC-46206; 3717 [+ or -] 27 BP) and by hazelnut shell to 1420-1260
cal BC (OxA-30508; 3076T26 BP). Farther south, beside the outcrop's
north-west face, a prone monolith rests on a level artificial terrace
that contains charcoal of Mesolithic and Early Bronze Age date. The
monolith probably dates to the Early or Middle Bronze Age (see below) as
the terrace is stratigraphically below Late Bronze Age and Iron Age
deposits.
Most of the site was then covered by a layer of yellow colluvium
(035), dated by oak charcoal to 1030-910 cal BC (combine SUERC-46199;
2799 [+ or -] 30 BP and SUERC-46203; 284l [+ or -] 28 BP). This deposit
is contemporary with the uppermost fill of a palaeochannel of the
Brynberian stream that flowed past the northern tip of the outcrop.
Charcoal of Corylus and Tilia from the basal fill of this palaeochannel
dates to 5800-5640 cal BC (OxA32021; 6833 [+ or -] 40 BP) and 5620-5460
cal BC (OxA-32022; 6543 [+ or -] 37 BP), both at 95.4% probability.
Iron Age occupation
The Late Bronze Age colluvial deposit did not reach the
north-western face of the outcrop, where the prehistoric buried soil
(098) was covered by a layer (081) with a wide range of dates from the
Late Bronze Age onwards. Layer 81 was covered by a sequence of Iron Age
layers (041 and 020) and localised deposits (e.g. pit 047). The Iron Age
activity consisted of a sequence of two cultural layers with cut
features, an iron artefact, worked flints and sherds of pottery. Dates
of 3095-2925 cal BC (SUERC-46483; 4400 [+ or -] 23 BP) and 2840-2495 cal
BC (SUERC-42906; 4074T19 BP) fall within the Neolithic but come from
hazelnut shell fragments in the fill of an Iron Age pit (047). Thus,
their context cannot be considered to relate to the Neolithic horizon.
Megalith-quarrying features
Six megalith-quarrying features have been discovered at Craig
Rhos-y-felin, three of them dating to the Bronze Age. From south-west to
north-east, they consist of a prone monolith sitting on an artificial
platform, a threshold slab embedded in the north end of this platform,
two stone orthostats set in pits, a recess from which a pillar has been
removed and a lower artificial platform revetted with a drystone wall
above the bank of the palaeochannel.
Bronze Age quarry features: the prone monolith and platform
A 4m-long prone megalith sits on a bed of horizontally laid stones,
the largest of which are two rail-like pillars to its rear (south-west)
end (Figure 9). This bed of stones lies on a level artificial terrace 6m
long and at least 4m wide, built on the sloping ground beside the
outcrop. This platform was formed from at least 8 tons of
0.3-0.4m-diameter dumps of sediment and stones (layer 115), to reach a
depth of 0.5m at its north end. Three determinations on Corylus charcoal
from this platform fill date to 2140-1950 cal BC (OxA-31779; 3665 [+ or
-] 28 BP), 2200-1980 cal BC (OxA-31780; 3700T30 BP) and 4330-4050 cal BC
(OxA-31812; 5367 [+ or -] 33 BP), all at 95.4% probability.
The megalith is matched petrographically with the adjacent
near-vertical face of the outcrop. It has been split off the rock face
but is not dressed or shaped in any way. A large stone shard has
splintered off the base of the monolith, possibly explaining why the
monolith was never moved out of the quarry.
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Bronze Age quarry feature: the threshold slab
In front (north-east) of this prone megalith, a large
'threshold' slab lies perpendicularly at the front of the
artificial terrace. Crush and scrape marks indicate that a large stone
was pulled over the top of this slab, possibly when a previously
extracted megalith was removed from the quarry.
Undated quarry feature: the orthostat north-east of the threshold
slab
Immediately north-east of the threshold slab, prone monolith and
platform (and stradgraphically earlier than them; see layers 110 and 115
in Figure 5), a lm-high orthostat was set upright within a hole, densely
packed with stones of different sizes (Figure 2). This small standing
stone has crush damage on its top, indicating that it must have
supported a heavy stone at some point. It appears to have served as a
prop or fulcrum for moving a megalith within the quarry. This feature
was set into a larger Early Mesolithic pit with a sequence of hearths.
Undated quarry feature: the recess left by a pillar removed from
the outcrop
The geological sample that provides the closest match for the
'rhyolite with fabric' bluestone chippings from Stonehenge was
taken near the north end of the outcrop. Its precise location is
immediately beside a recess in the otherwise even surface of the rock
face, just 1.5m west of the Neolithic occupation layer. The dimensions
of the recess indicate that a pillar 2.5m long, 0.4m wide and c. 0.4m
thick was removed from here in antiquity (Figure 10).
Undated quarry feature: the orthostat associated with the recess
At the foot of the recess, 0.5m from the rock face, a 0.65m-high
standing stone was set vertically in a pit amongst large packing stones.
Signs of damage on the standing stone's top and the stone's
evident displacement suggest that it once supported a heavy weight. It
is interpreted as a fulcrum for pivoting a monolith after it had been
detached from the outcrop.
Undated quarry feature: the plaform above the palaeochannel
A level terrace or platform, 4.3m E-W x 3.5m N-S, was constructed
4m north of the north-east end of the outcrop by levelling up the uneven
surface of the underlying glacial till with re-deposited sediment. Five
stones were set on edge within this sediment, forming an arc with its
open side facing north-eastwards (Figure 11). This array may have served
to consolidate the platform's looser material. Remains of a
three-course drystone revetment wall (Figure 12) form the
platform's north-eastern edge, located above the Mesolithic
sediments of the palaeochannel but covered by those of the Bronze Age.
This artificial stone wall would originally have stood 0.9m high. We
suspect that this platform and revetment wall formed a 'loading
bay' where monoliths could be lowered onto wooden sledges or
cradles to be transported away from the quarry. Two very large stone
blocks sit at each end of the platform, although one of these--the
north-eastern one--has slid off the wall. A flat-bottomed hollow way
(not illustrated) leads northwards from the foot of the platform.
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Dating the quarrying activity
Most of the quarry features at Craig Rhos-y-felin cannot yet be
dated more closely than to the fourth to second millennia BC. The prone
monolith and its artificial platform date to after
2140-1950 cal BC (at 95.4% probability) and thus are many centuries
later than the dates of the bluestone erections at Stonehenge. The most
probable dates associated with the removal of the rhyolite pillar from
its recess are 3500-3120 cal BC (SUERC-46205; 4590 [+ or -] 30 BP) and
3620-3360 cal BC (OxA-30502; 4667 [+ or -] 30 BP), both at 95.4%
probability, provided by carbonised hazelnut shells from the small
occupation layer just 1.5m away from it.
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The later phase of quarrying at Craig Rhos-y-felin, represented by
the prone monolith and its platform, dates to the Early Bronze Age, more
than a thousand years after the Middle Neolithic activity. Intriguingly,
the quarrying of a spotted dolerite pillar at Carn Menyn also dates to
the Early Bronze Age (start of quarrying dating to 2160-1960 cal BC at
95.4% probability [start of dolerite-working]; Darvill & Wainwright
2014). This suggests that the Early Bronze Age was a period when
numerous standing stones were quarried and erected in Pembrokeshire,
long after the bluestones had been taken to Stonehenge.
How were the bluestones extracted and when were they dressed?
There is relatively little debris within the quarry to indicate the
methods used for detaching monoliths from the rock face. Nor is there
any evidence of fire-setting to split the monoliths from the rock, as is
known from the north Italian Alps where it was used to detach long
thermal flakes from jadeite boulders to make axeheads (Petrequin et al.
2008).
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The rock's tendency to break into natural pillars makes the
outcrop's near-vertical northwest face an ideal place to extract
such pillars with comparatively little effort and little need for stone
tools. It seems probable that monoliths were detached by exploiting
preexisting fissures in the rock, hammering in wooden wedges and perhaps
enlarging fissures to allow access for such wedges. In the case of the
recess from which the 'rhyolite with fabric' monolith was
extracted, a 0.07m-wide indentation on its north edge appears to be a
hollowed-out wedgehole. The only other archaeological excavation of a
Neolithic megalith quarry in Britain, at Vestra Fiold (Orkney), provides
similar inferences that monoliths were detached by driving wooden wedges
into jointing fissures (Richards et al. 2013: 140).
Stonehenge is the only stone circle in Britain to have dressed
stones. Current evidence suggests that this happened long after the
bluestones reached Stonehenge. Most of Stonehenge's bluestones,
however, were never dressed. Of those that were, most form the inner
horseshoe of bluestones that share a pattern of dressing similar to that
of the sarsen trilithons but not the sarsen circle (Abbott &
Anderson-Whymark 2012: 25), making it probable that these
inner-horseshoe bluestones and the sarsen trilithons were dressed at the
same time: this was probably around 2780-2485 cal BC at 95.4%
probability (Model 1: start_stone_settings) (Darvill et al. 2012;
Marshall et al. 2012: 38).
How were the bluestones moved to Stonehenge?
There are four hypothesised routes for taking the bluestones from
Mynydd Preseli to Stonehenge:
* Overland south to Milford Haven where they were loaded onto boats
and brought around the south Wales coast to England, crossing the Severn
Estuary and then up the Somerset Avon towards Salisbury Plain (Atkinson
1956: 104).
* The longer and more hazardous sea route, initially along the
south Wales coast and then around Land's End to the mouth of the
Wiltshire Avon (Atkinson 1956: 103).
* Overland north to the valley of the River Nevern, then westwards
to the sea at Newport, Pembrokeshire, and thence by sea around St
David's Head, a route considered improbable because of dangerous
cliffs and currents (Atkinson 1956: 101).
* Alternatively, overland eastwards along the upper Nevern valley
and thence along a series of conjoining flat-bottomed, glaciated valleys
of the Teifi, Tywi, Usk and Wye to meet the River Severn at Longford,
north of Gloucester. The River Severn could have been forded here, and
the bluestones taken over the pass beside Crickley Hill Neolithic
causewayed enclosure and thence south to Salisbury Plain. Whilst the
shorter sea route is about 180 miles long, this land route is around 220
miles.
Although there is no evidence along any of the hypothesised routes
(Figure 13) for the bluestones having passed that way--whether by sea or
by land--a number of points can be made about the probable methods and
directions of megalith transport. The position of the Craig Rhos-y-felin
monolith quarry north of Mynydd Preseli, together with the recent
discovery of the dominant source of the spotted dolerite bluestones on
the northern slopes of these mountains, makes it unlikely that the
bluestones were ever taken southwards to Milford Haven. To do this, the
megaliths would have to have been brought up the steep northern edge of
Mynydd Preseli before being carried down the southern slopes to the
valley of the Afon Cleddau to Milford Haven. The most obvious route out
of the quarries would have been northwards to the foot of the Preseli
mountains before heading inland.
The overland route can be favoured for two reasons. The rejection
of the Altar Stone's source as being Milford Haven (Ixer &
Turner 2006) reduces the likelihood that Milford Haven served as an
entrepot for the bluestones. Secondly, a study of animal migration as a
proxy for human routes of movement through south Wales identified this
overland route through Brecon as a major corridor in prehistory (Webley
1976). Webley even goes so far as to state that Although the Prescelly
[sic] Stones at Stonehenge suggest a coastal route, it was the inland
route that was most favoured' (1976: 26).
The sea route for the bluestones has been popular for decades, yet
there is new information that suggests that the land route may have been
less challenging than previously thought. The recent analysis of
laser-scanned images of Stonehenge's stones reveals that the
bluestones were on average much lighter than Richard Atkinson's
estimate of 4 tons each; the new analysis provides more accurate
estimates of 2 tons or less (Abbott & Anderson-Whymark 2012: 60).
Monoliths of this weight can be easily moved by lifting and carrying
them on rows of poles and rectangular frameworks of poles, as recorded
in China, Japan and India, especially across hilly and forested terrain
(Gowland 1902: 74, pi. 5; Hutton 1929: 337, pi. 14). A 4m-long monolith
of 2 tons could have been carried by up to 60 people, with the average
weight thus borne by each carrier being no more than 30-50kg. Such a
mode of transport would enable the weight-bearers to protect the
monolith from breakage while traversing uneven ground. In our view, the
land route is the most probable because of this simple carrying
arrangement, the minimisation of risk by avoiding open water, and the
capacity for integrating communities along the route into the ceremony
and spectacle that the megalith-moving would have attracted as the
stones were passed from community to community.
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When did the bluestones travel? The mystery of Boles Barrow
The Neolithic long barrow known as Boles or Bowls Barrow at
Heytesbury, 12 miles west of Stonehenge, was excavated by William
Cunnington in 1801. At a depth of 1.37m he found a ridge of stones and
flints, and at 3.2m a surface of flints on which were laid the remains
of 13 skeletons. He notes: "I discover among them [the ridge of
stones] the Blue hard Stone also, ye same to some of the upright Stones
in ye inner Circle atStonehenge" (Cunnington 1924). It is highly
probable that this is the broken but un-dressed bluestone pillar
fragment currently in Salisbury Museum (Figure 14; Pitts 2001: 198-204),
now identified as spotted dolerite of Group 3 (Bevins et al. 2014).
Given that British long barrows were constructed in the fourth
millennium BC and Stonehenge was built in the third millennium BC, this
discovery has proved something of a puzzle. Why would such a stone have
arrived on Salisbury Plain so early, well before even the commencement
of the first stage of Stonehenge in 3100-2920 cal BC (95.4% probability,
ditch constructed; Darvill et al. 2012; Marshall et al. 2012: 13)?
[FIGURE 14 OMITTED]
Although the Group 3 spotted dolerite source remains unexcavated,
the dates of 3620-3360 cal BC and 3500-3120 cal BC for Neolithic
activity beside the recess for a rhyolite monolith at Craig Rhos-y-felin
raise the possibility that some or all of Stonehenge's bluestones
were obtained at this early date. Within this period, Amesbury 42 and
Winterbourne Stoke long barrows were built on Salisbury Plain (dated to
3520-3350 cal BC [SUERC-24308; 4645 [+ or -] 30 BP] and 3630-3360 cal BC
[SUERC-42530; 4680 [+ or -] 29 BP] respectively). Other Wessex long
barrows have multiple phases of construction, commencing with burial
deposits in the first half of the fourth millennium BC and culminating
with stone structures, infillings and/or enlargements in the second half
of the millennium or later (Whittle 1994; Schulting 2000; Bayliss et al.
2007; Whittle et al. 2007). Of the 13 primary inhumations from Boles
Barrow, five have been dated, the latest to 3760-3630 cal BC at 95.4%
probability (Wk18474; 4896 [+ or -] 31 BP). It is possible that, as with
other Wessex long barrows, Boles Barrow's stone phase was not
constructed until the second half of the fourth millennium, after the
quarrying events at Craig Rhos-y-felin in 3620-3360 cal BC and 3500-3120
cal BC.
Were bluestones brought en masse to Salisbury Plain at this early
date, perhaps to form kerbs and faqades for Wessex long barrows in the
same manner as documented for sarsen orthostats at Millbarrow near
Avebury (as recorded by William Stukeley; Whittle 1994), Arn Hill,
Warminster, and possibly King Barrow, Bishopstrow (Eagles & Field
2004: 59)? Or were they brought at many different dates, ultimately to
be rounded up and installed at Stonehenge within its Aubrey Holes during
Stage 1? In this respect, it is interesting that Stonehenge's
enclosing ditch contains curated animal bones collected in 3400-2910 cal
BC (68.2% probability, start structured deposit; Marshall et al. 2012:
14).
Why were the bluestones moved to Stonehenge?
The discovery that the dominant bluestone sources (so far
provenanced) lie on the north side of Mynydd Preseli removes one of the
main lines of evidence for the healing theory proposed to explain the
bluestones' transportation, for as yet there is no convincing
geological evidence that Cam Menyn provided pillars for Stonehenge
(Bevins et al. 2014). Associations with medieval holy wells and
healing-related springs on the south side of Preseli (Darvill 2007;
Darvill & Wainwright 2009: 17-18; 2014: 1112) are thus no longer
sustainable on the current evidence. Similarly, the relevance of the
infirmities of the Beaker-period Amesbury Archer and Early Bronze Age
trepanned individuals from the Stonehenge environs (Darvill 2007), all
of them a thousand years after the Middle Neolithic quarrying at Craig
Rhos-y-felin, can now be called into question.
So why might the bluestones have been brought to Stonehenge around
3000 BC? Gordon Childe (1957: 331) suggested that they were indicative
of political unification or a sacred peace. Unification is certainly a
possibility given the increasingly widespread distribution of shared
styles of material culture such as Middle Neolithic Peterborough Ware
(c. 34002900 BC) across southern Britain at this time (Darvill 2010:
132-36). Equally, the date of quarrying at Craig Rhos-y-felin is around
the same time or shortly after evidence of conflict (c. 3400 BC) at the
causewayed enclosures of Crickley Hill, Gloucestershire, and Hambledon
Hill, Dorset (Dixon 1988; Mercer 1999; Mercer & Healy 2008).
Alternatively, the bluestones were brought by communities migrating
eastwards and settling on Salisbury Plain. This could explain the recent
strontium and oxygen isotopic results for a male burial (3630-3360 cal
BC at 95.4% confidence; SUERC-42530; 4680 [+ or -] 29 BP) in a single
grave beneath Winterbourne Stoke long barrow, 1.5 miles (2.4km) from
Stonehenge (Alistair Pike & Susan Greaney pers. comm.). He grew up
on Silurian and Devonian substrate in a region of high rainfall,
characteristic of western Britain.
Thus the motivation for moving the bluestones such a distance was
probably related to their significance as symbols of identity. This
supports the hypothesis that their identity was ancestral, with stones
representing the deceased ancestors (Parker Pearson & Ramilisonina
1998), because the earliest contexts in which bluestones were
placed--Boles Barrow and the Aubrey Holes--were monuments with ancestral
and funerary associations (Parker Pearson et al. 2009; Parker Pearson
2012).
It is possible that the bluestone monoliths were taken directly
from their quarries to Salisbury Plain. An alternative explanation
postulates 'the removal of a venerated stone circle from Preseli to
Salisbury Plain' (Thomas 1923: 258). Might the bluestones have
formed one or more monuments within Wales that were dismantled and moved
in order to be incorporated, eventually, into Stonehenge? Such an act
could have served to merge two sacred centres into one, to unify two
politically separate regions, or to legitimise the ancestral identity of
migrants moving from one region to another. Future research into
Neolithic monuments within north Pembrokeshire may shed light on these
possibilities.
Acknowledgements
We thank landowners Huw and Dilys Davies, our many project staff
and volunteers, Phil Bennett and colleagues at the Pembrokeshire Coast
National Park, Christian Baars and Jim Turner (photomicrography), Amanda
Valentine-Baars (thin sections), D.Q. Bowen (for drawing our attention
to recent literature on the lack of any evidence for ice sheets reaching
Salisbury Plain), R.K. Mohanty of Deccan College, India (for his
suggestion that bluestone monoliths were carried), Tim Daw, Paul
Rainbird (for further observations on stone-carrying and moving), Vicki
Cummings, Dave Field and Alison Sheridan (for comments on an earlier
version of this paper). The Stones of Stonehenge project is funded by
the National Geographic Society, the Natural Environment Research
Council (radiocarbon dating), the Society of Antiquaries of London, the
National Museum of Wales and the Royal Archaeological Institute.
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Received: 9 January 2015; Accepted: 3 April 2015; Revised: 18 April
2015
Mike Parker Pearson (1), Richard Bevins (2), Rob Ixer (1), Joshua
Pollard (3), Colin Richards (4), Kate Welham (5), Ben Chan (6), Kevan
Edinborough (1), Derek Hamilton (7), Richard Macphail (1), Duncan Schlee
(8), Jean-Luc Schwenninger (9), Ellen Simmons (10) & Martin Smith
(5)
(1) Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31-34
Gordon Square, London WC1H OPY, UK (Email: m.parker-pearson@ucl.ac.uk)
(2) National Museum of Wales, Cathays Park, Cardiff CF 10 3NP, UK
(3) Department of Archaeology, University of Southampton, Avenue
Campus, Highfield, Southampton SO 17 1BF, UK
(4) School of Arts, Languages and Cultures, University of
Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, UK
(5) Department of Archaeology, Anthropology and Forensic Science,
Bournemouth University, Talbot Campus, Fern Barrow, Poole BH12 5BB, UK
(6) Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University, Postbus 9514, 2300
RA Leiden, the Netherlands
(7) Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre, Rankine
Avenue, Scottish Enterprise Technology Park, East Kilbride G75 OQF, UK
(8) Dyfed Archaeological Trust, Shire Hall, Llandeilo SA19 6AF, UK
(9) Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art,
University of Oxford, Dyson Perrins Building, South Parks Road, Oxford,
UK
(10) Department of Archaeology, University of Sheffield, Northgate
House, West Street, Sheffield S1 4ET, UK
doi: 10.15184/aqy.2015.177
Table 1. Radiocarbon and OSL dates from Craig Rhos-y-felin in
stratigraphic order. Calibrated dates are given at 95.4% probability.
Context Context type Date cal BC/AD Date BP
5 Colluvium AD 780-1040 1090 [+ or -] 130
8 Colluvium AD 810-1030 1080 [+ or -] 110
9 Colluvium AD 780-970 1165 [+ or -] 35
39 Ash layer AD 570-650 1444 [+ or -] 30
20 Buried soil AD 540-650 1470 [+ or -] 35
20 Buried soil 750-390 BC 2400 [+ or -] 35
41 Occupation 373-203 BC 2216 [+ or -] 17
layer
41 Occupation 540-405 BC 2416 [+ or -] 16
layer
44 Charcoal 540-390 BC 2387 [+ or -] 29
concentration
44 Charcoal 750-400 BC 2434 [+ or -] 29
concentration
44 Charcoal 710-390 BC 2377 [+ or -] 29
concentration
63 Charcoal 390-200 BC 2243 [+ or -] 27
concentration
66 Charcoal 745-410 BC 2434 [+ or -] 20
concentration
66 Charcoal 735-410 BC 2432 [+ or -] 19
concentration
42 Upper pit fill AD 430-535 1575 [+ or -] 19
42 Upper pit fill 1415-1305 BC 3081 [+ or -] 18
42 Upper pit fill 2840-2495 BC 4074 [+ or -] 19
43 Lower pit fill 1765-1635 BC 3410 [+ or -] 21
43 Lower pit fill 3095-2925 BC 4400 [+ or -] 23
081 Lower topsoil AD 1660-... 161 [+ or -] 35
081 Lower topsoil 740-390 BC 2394 [+ or -] 35
081 Lower topsoil 1050-910 BC 2825 [+ or -] 25
081 Lower topsoil 790-540 BC 2504 [+ or -] 29
35 Colluvium 1030-890 BC 2799 [+ or -] 30
35 Colluvium 1090-920 BC 284l [+ or -] 28
35 Colluvium 5410-3590 BC 6500 [+ or -] 910
40 Sediment 2200-2030 BC 3717 [+ or -] 27
with
charcoal
40 Sediment with 1415-1265 BC 3076 [+ or -] 26
charcoal
115 Platform under 2140-1950 BC 3665 [+ or -] 28
monolith
115 Platform under 2200-1980 BC 3700 [+ or -] 30
monolith
115 Platform under 4330-4050 BC 5367 [+ or -] 33
monolith
59 Occupation 3500-3120 BC 4590 [+ or -] 30
layer
59 Occupation 3620-3360 BC 4667 [+ or -] 30
layer
110 Orthostat pit 7940-7650 BC 8750 [+ or -] 30
fill
116 Orthostat pit 8280-7970 BC 8966 [+ or -] 38
fill
116 Orthostat pit 8190-7680 BC 8795 [+ or -] 40
fill
69 Sediment with 5210-4950 BC 6114 [+ or -] 31
charcoal
69 Sediment with 7490-7190 BC 8301 [+ or -] 37
charcoal
153 Palaeochannel 5800-5640 BC 6833 [+ or -] 40
basal fill
153 Palaeochannel 5620-5460 BC 6543 [+ or -] 37
basal till
98 Buried soil 7460-7180 BC 8279 [+ or -] 37
98 Buried soil 7540-7300 BC 8355 [+ or -] 48
100 Hearth 8290-7970 BC 8984 [+ or -] 47
100 Hearth 8210-7790 BC 8848 [+ or -] 37
102 Hearth 8290-7970 BC 8970 [+ or -] 45
102 Hearth 8240-7850 BC 8890 [+ or -] 40
106 Hearth 8210-7790 BC 8851 [+ or -] 44
106 Hearth 8530-8280 BC 9157 [+ or -] 40
111 Hearth 8210-7960 BC 8888 [+ or -] 21
111 Hearth 8550-8330 BC 9229 [+ or -] 21
Context Sample number Material Species
5 OSL X5455
8 OSL X5456
9 SUERC-38133 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
39 SUERC-46207 Roundwood Pomoideae
20 SUERC-38132 Grain Hordeum sp.
20 SUERC-38134 Roundwood Unidentified
41 SUERC-44285 Roundwood Quercus sp.
41 SUERC-44286 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
44 SUERC-43194 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
44 SUERC-43195 Roundwood Quercus sp.
44 SUERC-43196 Roundwood Quercus sp.
63 SUERC-46198 Wood Quercus sp.
66 SUERC-46480; Roundwood Quercus sp.
66 SUERC-46481 Roundwood Quercus sp.
42 SUERC-42903 Roundwood Tilia sp.
42 SUERC-42905 Roundwood Tilia sp.
42 SUERC-42906 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
43 SUERC-46482 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
43 SUERC-46483 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
081 SUERC-51161 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
081 SUERC-51162 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
081 OxA-30504 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
081 OxA-30546 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
35 SUERC-46199 Wood Quercus sp.
35 SUERC-46203 Wood Quercus sp.
35 OSL X5454
40 SUERC-46206 Roundwood Pomoideae
40 OxA-30508 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
115 OxA-31779 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
115 OxA-31780 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
115 OxA-31812 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
59 SUERC-46205 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
59 OxA-30502 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
110 Beta-392850 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
116 OxA-30504 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
116 OxA-30547 Roundwood Quercus sp.
69 SUERC-46204 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
69 OxA-30503 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
153 OxA-32021 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
153 OxA-32022 Wood Tilia sp.
98 OxA-30523 Wood Quercus sp.
98 SUERC-51163 Wood Quercus sp.
100 SUERC-51164 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
100 OxA-30506 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
102 OxA-30548 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
102 OxA-30549 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
106 SUERC-51165 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
106 OxA-30507 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
111 SUERC-50760 Roundwood Corylus
avellana
111 SUERC-50761 Nutshell Corylus
avellana
