Saturday 28 January 2017

Unacceptable Stonehenge Tunnel Southern Route Option

The plan for the southern route and its junction is, in my view, completely unacceptable.


The junction is directly on the solstice alignment as identified by UNESCO (http://www2.astronomicalheritage.net/index.php/gallery/entities/stonehenge-world-heritage-site-united-kingdom), an alignment they recommend is kept free of any building. (Map below)


The position of the junction is at the same height as Stonehenge. The OS benchmark on Stone 16 is 103m above sea level, the A360 at this point is between 100 and 105m. Normanton Gorse ridge which is intended to shield the view is 111m. Clive Ruggles has published photographs of Stonehenge taken from a position taken 100m south of the proposed junction. http://www2.cliveruggles.com/index.php/image-coll/category/40-stonehenge-mwss which show its intervisibility.


The junction is planned to involve a flyover which would raise it above the visible horizon.


The new dual carriageway runs in the direction of the solstice alignment, head lights would be pointing directly at Stonehenge so even without any road lighting the light pollution would be unacceptable.

Thursday 26 January 2017

On top of Stonehenge - The tenon on Stone 56


Looking down to 55, the fallen lintel and the Altar Stone





And the view across to the Great Trilithon top


Click any to embiggen - Thanks to J for the photos

Your tourist snaps can help preserve threatened heritage sites for the future

Andrew Wilson, University of Bradford

Our present is intrinsically bound up with our past, our sense of identity shaped and moulded by the cultural legacies of our forebears. That’s why organisations such as UNESCO exist to protect the cultural heritage of the world for current and future generations.


Recent years have all too clearly shown the need for that protection, with wars in the Middle East leading to the destruction or looting of many ancient monuments, while others are lost to natural disasters, cultural vandalism and iconoclasm or neglect. What can we do to prevent the loss of precious cultural heritage in the future?


One way of preserving ancient monuments at least in a sense is to safeguard heritage using digital means such as laser scanning to create 3D models. But sometimes these efforts come too late for heritage sites – as with the iconic Drummond’s Mill in Bradford, ravaged by fire this year, or the deliberate destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan.


While this approach often requires specialist imaging equipment, another approach is to use something that we already have in abundance: the effort, curiosity and holiday photographs of millions of travellers worldwide. Curious Travellers is a project launched by researchers from the universities of Bradford, St Andrews, Nottingham Ningbo China and Birmingham, alongside international heritage consultancy MOSPA, that aims to preserve a record of sites and monuments in 3D digital form, built not from specialist scans but from compilations of tourist snaps.


Have you visited ancient sites and monuments? Do you have photographs of sites that are now at risk – or even those that have since been damaged or destroyed? The crowdsourcing project takes tourist photos and videos and combines them with other freely available resources scraped from websites such as travel blogs and social media sources in order to create 3D models of ancient monuments and sites. The reconstructed content is placed in context using relevant survey data that describes the site and landscape.





Syria has seen its cultural heritage suffer irrevocable damage, such as at the historical city of Palmyra.
Youssef Badawi/EPA



A community response to threatened sites


There’s more to this project than simply preserving tourist sights for those that haven’t seen them. Cultural heritage plays a key part in the quality of our lives, building our sense of identity, proving a rallying point around which we build social cohesion and pride in a shared heritage. Many sites also provide leisure opportunities, particularly for families, and provide an economic boost from tourism that can be particularly important for developing nations.


Global travellers are encouraged to get involved by donating images to Curious Travellers, a truly worldwide response to the threat of disappearing heritage and an opportunity to play a part in preserving it. The project will hopefully shape a fresh approach to recording sites and monuments, with travellers in future encouraged to photograph more obscure viewpoints at sites they visit. There have already been significant donations of images since launching at the British Science Festival in September – with some of the first 3D models soon to join examples on the project website.





A statue head of Antoninus Pius (138-161AD) at Cyrene dating from about 140 AD.
Tony Baggett/Shutterstock



Initially the project will highlight threatened or damaged heritage sites in North Africa, including Cyrene in northeastern Libya near present day Shahhat, as well as those in Syria and the Middle East where as many Islamic sites have been damaged and destroyed as pre-Islamic sites that have often received most media attention. However, the project is accepting images of any threatened historic site around the world. Previous archaeological surveys and 3D scanning efforts at sites such as Cyrene are being added to the project through a framework that can be augmented by additional crowd-sourced imagery.


Creating 3D digital models of sites alone is not a sufficiently strong argument for the project, but by putting them in context within their site and landscape setting we can continue to learn from them and use them to help inform site management and conservation. By linking these 3D models with geospatial data and other historic records within a historic environment record framework creates a meaningful legacy that can be used for education, future planning and development control.


Rebuilding


Aspirations to rebuild cities from the tatters of war-torn countries are emerging – architects are imagining ways to rebuild them and using architecture to heal deep rifts in the countries’ social fabric.


Technically, a digital model can be used to 3D-print, or CNC-mill a physical recreation. This isn’t feasible at a site or landscape scale, but viewing 3D digital models in context may serve an important purpose in highlighting and campaigning for the protection and repair of damaged and threatened areas.


A recent talk by Jeanine Abdul Massih presented at the World Archaeology Congress in Kyoto highlighted how important it is that the profile of threatened heritage sites is kept high to ensure they don’t suffer as cities are rebuilt. For example in Lebanon where international funding has flooded in to rebuild its cities, heritage sites face an uncertain future in the face of development pressure and soaring land prices. Without continued protection, the risk is that rebuilding during peacetime can be as damaging as the destruction during war.


The Conversation

Andrew Wilson, Senior Lecturer in Forensic and Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford


This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Wednesday 25 January 2017

Looking down on Stone 11

On the southern side of the now incomplete outer sarsen circle at Stonehenge there is a diminutive stone that leans. This is Stone 11 which has been broken. How it was broken and whether it has been re-erected are unknown. Its small size is often claimed to be evidence that the circle was never completed with lintels but the stone is broadening as it goes up and would have had a top that would have been wide enough to support lintels. Whether it did or not will never be known. I think the size of it may be related to it being on the route in from from the southern entrance to the henge. Next to it there is the remarkable Stone 10 which does still have its full height and as can be seen in the picture two tenons. it is obviously designed to hold a lintel on both sides, including one to go over Stone 11. There appears to be wear and a ridge formed on the top surface where the lintels were. Maybe evidence that the circle was completed with lintels.

Stone 10 on the ground plans is slightly out of true with the circle, but the stone twists as it goes up and the top is exactly in line with the circle, one of my favourite demonstrations of the clever engineering that went into building Stonehenge.



Click to enlarge - Thanks to J for the photos.

Tuesday 24 January 2017

Archaeologist: the A303 is a crucial part of Stonehenge’s setting

Dan Hicks, University of Oxford

Stonehenge has a traffic problem. The A303 has been the UK government’s preferred trunk road from London to the West Country since 1958 – but it runs within 165 metres of the 5,000-year-old monument. Narrowing to a single carriageway, it slows many a summertime car journey. The bottleneck brings noise and pollution, and presents a barrier to exploring the landscape on foot.


On January 12, Transport Secretary Chris Grayling announced plans for a Stonehenge Bypass, transforming the A303 into an “Expressway to the South West”. It involves building a dual carriageway and tunnel across the Stonehenge UNESCO World Heritage Site. As Highways England launched a six-week public consultation on the plan, the estimated cost of £1.4 billion was heralded by Historic England as “the biggest single investment ever made by government in this country’s heritage”.


But the Stonehenge Bypass is absolutely not in the best interests of cultural heritage.





Map of Stonehenge World Heritage Site with route of the proposed bypass and tunnel.
Highways England



Two old ideas


The Stonehenge tunnel is, in fact, an old idea. Proposed in the 1989 Roads for Prosperity government White Paper, which launched the last major programme of roadbuilding in England, over the subsequent three decades arguments over a variety of schemes have multiplied, at an estimated cost of £30m in consultants’ and lawyers’ fees.


This time around, the project is billed as in the best interests of cultural heritage. The existing road “spoils the setting of Stonehenge”, suggests Highways England. A new road would “improve our understanding and enjoyment of the Stonehenge monument,” chimes the joint National Trust and Historic England statement.



Another old idea is being revived hand-in-hand with the tunnel – heritage restoration. The focus is the stones, not their landscape. Stonehenge is reimagined as a Stone Age exhibit untouched by modernity. The A303 would be grassed over at the stones while a new road twice as wide is cut across the World Heritage Site, but tunnelled within the paying visitors’ view. The aesthetics of this “Stonehenge Restored” are determinedly Georgian. A stately monument within rolling lawns from which shuttles run along a new coaching-road between Bath and London. That carriageway hidden from the monument, so customers can stroll an “authentic” landscape of the past, never glimpsing the present.


A living monument


Why bury a road? The bypass plans turn back the clock to the kind of temporal connoisseurship widely dismissed since John Ruskin argued in 1849 that:


Neither by the public, nor by those who have the care of public monuments, is the true meaning of restoration understood. It means the most total destruction … a destruction accompanied with false description of the thing destroyed.


In Ruskin’s alternate vision of a “living monument”, the qualities of age-value and patina emerge through layers built up and eroded through human life and the passage of time. In the 1870s, this became the logic of William Morris’s “Anti-Scrape” movement – the world’s first heritage campaign. Ruskin and Morris understood that erasing later features to restore traces of some imagined original period leads not just to Georgian follies, but to downright misrepresentation.


The 21st-century “scraping” of Stonehenge would conjure the illusion of an unchanging Neolithic relic. But the monument has been a centre of gravity attracting human activity throug five millennia. The mosaic of henges, cursuses, round barrows, inhumations, settlements, enclosures, field systems – and even buildings and roads – represents an ongoing sequence of movement, building, living, and deposition. It’s the prime example of what WG Hoskins famously described as the “palimpsest” of the English landscape, a layered document repeatedly written over.





Approach to Stonehenge in 1930, from the east: A303 running to the left, A344 (closed 2013) to the right.
National Archives



This story encompasses the A303’s own history: laid out in the early 1800s as the “New Direct Road”, a coaching route from London to Exeter. It was less used from the 1840s with the railway boom, then became a major road from 1933, being defined as a trunk road by the Ministry of Transport in 1958. Stonehenge is not a site or an artefact, but an ever-changing landscape.


Driving west on the A303 today, we glimpse the monument. This modern view is endangered. Since the 1960s, archaeology’s Rescue Movement has defended our past against the threat of destruction from the present day. Today, it is Stonehenge’s modernity that is under threat from a narrow vision of the past.


Hiding the road from the stones would hide the stones from the public. Some 1.3m people will pass through the Stonehenge giftshop this year, but perhaps ten times that number will witness the monument from a passing vehicle. Those thrilling, often unexpected views may not be celebrated among the iconic experiences of global prehistory, but they are surely among the most democratic. Through these encounters, Stonehenge lives on as a public space. Year by year since the 1980s, public access to Stonehenge has been gradually restricted. This bypass would deal another blow to any chance of seeing the monument without paying the £15.50 entrance fee.





‘Stonehenge under threat’: the iconic image of the 1970s Rescue movement. © Rescue, The British Archaeological Trust.




Save the A303!


“Every age has the Stonehenge it deserves – or desires,” wrote visionary archaeologist Jacquetta Hawkes in 1967. What do we desire for Stonehenge today?


For some, the tunnel is the best compromise. New excavations would add to our understanding of the landscape (and bring jobs for archaeologists). Others call for a longer tunnel. And some dismiss the project as a destructive “time-bomb”. After all, with sliproads and dual carriageways, the project could result in a net increase in road surface within the World Heritage Site.


One promising idea is to make the A303 one-way westbound, building an alternative route for eastbound traffic away from the monument – cutting traffic at Stonehenge in half while saving millions. In preserving the A303, that solution reminds us of the ongoing lives of our ancient monuments in the modern world.


Stonehenge’s value lies not just in its prehistory, but also in its modernity. Today, the A303 is a crucial part of the monument’s setting. Yes, we must reduce the traffic. But why hide the stones from the world?


The Conversation

Dan Hicks, Associate Professor and Curator, Pitt Rivers Museum and School of Archaeology, University of Oxford


This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Notes on the Stonehenge Tunnel Proposal

It is important to acknowledge that there are many good and valid reasons why the A303 needs to be improved as it passes Stonehenge. If the monument wasn’t there it would be a trivial Highway engineering problem. We must therefore also acknowledge that the taxpayer is expected to pay something in the order of £1.5 billion in additional costs to protect the World Heritage Site. The benefits to the setting of Stonehenge and associated monuments are largely obvious and need no extensive recital here. These notes only cover the broadest outline of the plan and not minor details.

Highways England have commendably included a mass of technical documents on their consultation page about the Stonehenge Tunnel (https://highwaysengland.citizenspace.com/cip/a303-stonehenge/ ). They include the technical reports and particularly in TAR appendix G and H they score their proposals against the various aims and policies of the stakeholders.
They are holding a series of exhibitions over the next few weeks where the details can be examined and experts are on hand to answer questions. I would recommend visiting one of these.

Originally they narrowed down the options to the tunnel or a southerly non-tunnelled route that would take the A303 outside of the WHS completely. The latter is no longer apparently an option.
They are two options up for discussion. They differ as to whether they take a northerly or southerly route around Winterbourne Stoke. By their criteria there is little to choose between the two options and having studied them both there is no obvious reason relating to Winterbourne Stoke which one to prefer.


The route within the WHS can be split into the eastern and western end for consideration. It can be presumed that, unless another Wilsford Shaft is on the route, the tunnel itself has no possible adverse effect on the area’s archaeology. There is a question as to whether it might change the hydrology and aquifer which might be detrimental to the springs at Blick Mead but that is a question that needs relevant expertise to answer and I am satisfied that Highways England are fully aware of it and will take appropriate measures.

The eastern end of the route involves a new flyover at Countess Roundabout, mainly utilising the present A303 until it reaches a new portal just to the east of where the Avenue crosses the A303, out of sight of Stonehenge.

There is a small area of virgin land that will lost to the portal which is close to Mesolithic finds and the scheme passes close to Blick Mead. The balance of landscape and archaeological loss and gain is so narrow that the cost of moving the portal to the east of the WHS could not be justified to me.

Others with more knowledge and involvement in that area disagree. There certainly is a case for the flyover at the Countess Roundabout running north-south rather than east-west to keep the height of the A303 the same.

The western portal is designed to be hidden from Stonehenge by the small wood at Normanton Gorse and the twenty foot high ridge the wood is on.

The western portal and the new road are planned to be within the vicinity of the Mid Winter Solstice Sunset (MWSS) alignment of Stonehenge. The precise location is still under development, but is expected to be very close to the plans made available for consultation



Detail from plan with MWSS alignment added in red.

Attention has mainly been given so far to the danger that the road will spoil the dark sky and the solstice sunset. Highways England’s Volume 1 TAR red section 8.6 details the assumptions about carriageway and portal lighting, and that until a detailed assessment is done the assumption is that there will be none. My opinion is that even if there is no lighting planned there is a real danger that it will be added, as has happened on so many roads, at a later date for safety reasons. There will, especially with the southern route, shown in orange, also be vehicle lights impacting the night sky.

But the danger of spoiling the night sky is only a part of the problem.

Siting the portal and road within this the most important astronomical alignment of Stonehenge is contrary to the UNESCO Statement of Outstanding Universal Value (see below) and UNESCO’s Astronomy and World Heritage Initiative recommendation with regard to the alignments that: “Assuming that these were once largely clear in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, it is important to try and ensure that the sightlines are as clear as possible today. All plans should ensure that no further planting or development takes place along them.”

In addition the Stonehenge and Avebury World Heritage Site Management Plan 2015 (http://www.stonehengeandaveburywhs.org/assets/Stonehenge-and-Avebury-WHS-Management-Plan-2015.pdf) lays out various policies including:
Policy 3c – Maintain and enhance the setting of monuments and sites in the landscape and their interrelationships and astronomical alignments with particular attention given to achieving an appropriate landscape setting for the monuments and the WHS itself.

It can be seen that by ignoring the astronomical alignments and sightlines in their assessment the plan fails both the UNESCO and the local policies.
I believe that this part of the plan is unacceptable for these reasons and there is still time to influence the design to be changed to a more acceptable solution. As Highways England say in their proposal document; “The precise location and design of the portals at either end of the tunnel is something we will be developing in consultation with heritage stakeholders and to take account of additional survey work as it becomes available.”


Appendix:
Extracts from UNESCOs Astronomy and World Heritage Initiative
One of the most important features of Stonehenge one that has been recognised since the 18th century when it was noted by the antiquarian William Stukeley is that its principal axis of symmetry is aligned upon winter solstice (midwinter) sunset in one direction and summer solstice (midsummer) sunrise in the other...

Stonehenge WHP can and should be seen within a regional context of sites in the Neolithic and Bronze Age in north-west Europe that have astronomical alignments. These include monuments such as the Newgrange passage tomb, part of the Br
ú na BóinneArchaeological Ensemble of the Bend of the Boyne WHP, and various stone circles and monuments. All seem to have had some sort of funerary or ceremonial function, although astronomical practices in domestic contexts are also noted on occasion.

The monuments of the Stonehenge WHP provide the earliest evidence in Britain or Ireland of a consistent local practice of aligning monuments with some precision upon sunrise or sunset around the solstices. This is in contrast, for example, to the solstitial orientation of Newgrange, a
one-off alignment among the Boyne Valley tombs; to the very broad pattern of orientation clustered around the intercardinal directions observed among Neolithic tombs and houses in the Orkney Islands; and to evidence that Early Neolithic long barrows in the Salisbury Plain area, in the vicinity of Stonehengewhich preceded the construction of the Stonehenge stone circle by about a millenniumfollowed a broad pattern of orientation within the sun-rising/sun-climbing arcs, between north-east and south...

In prehistory, one or more observers would probably have stood at an appropriate point and viewed the sun or moon appearing or disappearing behind a distant horizon at specific times of the year. Thus, clear and unobstructed sightlines and horizons are important to aid our understanding of how these monuments functioned...



There is a growing consensus that the midwinter sightline was more important than the midsummer one. Today the integrity of this sightline, and its intermediate ridge lines and final horizon, is marred. Looking out from Stonehenge, the first problem is the A303 (0.5 km), which runs relatively close to the monument, and presents a considerable visual and noise intrusion to this alignment. Moving further south-west, the round barrow known as the Sun Barrow
which is on the alignment and on the Normanton Down ridge lineis intact (0.9 km), but the sightline then quickly runs into the plantation known as Normanton Gorse (1.1 km), which obscures it. Still further south-west is another plantation known as The Diamond (2.2 km), before the alignment continues towards the place that would form the visible horizon from Stonehenge in the absence of intervening vegetation, at Oatlands Hill to the west of the A360 road (and outside the WHP) (4.4 km). This horizon is also obscured by yet another plantation, at The Park. The sightline probably ends at the site of a much later Iron-Age/Romano-British settlement. It is difficult to determine the exact place because the various obstructions mean that we must rely upon computer modelling.

The Stonehenge Avenue looking south-west (midwinter sunset) shares the same alignment, and the same issues apply regarding its integrity. On the initial approach towards Stonehenge along the Avenue from the
elbow at Stonehenge Bottom, Stonehenge itself forms the horizon; the more distant landscape only appears during the final stages of the approach.


A retrospective Statement of Outstanding Universal Value (SOUV) was prepared for the Property by the State Party in 2011 and has been approved by UNESCO. The relevant parts of that SOUV in relation to astronomy are quoted here:

Statement of Significance

The Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites WHP is internationally important for its complexes of outstanding prehistoric monuments


They provide an insight into the mortuary and ceremonial practices of the period, and are evidence of prehistoric technology, architecture and astronomy


The complexes of monuments at Stonehenge and Avebury provide an exceptional insight into the funerary and ceremonial practices in Britain in the Neolithic and Bronze Age. Together with their settings and associated sites, they form landscapes without parallel.

The design, position and inter-relationship of the monuments and sites are evidence of a wealthy and highly organised prehistoric society able to impose its concepts on the environment. An outstanding example is the alignment of the Stonehenge Avenue (probably a processional route) and Stonehenge stone circle on the axis of the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset, indicating their ceremonial and astronomical character



Assuming that these were once largely clear in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, it is important to try and ensure that the sightlines are as clear as possible today.
 All plans should ensure that no further planting or development takes place along them.

Thursday 19 January 2017

Planned Stonehenge Tunnel Western Portal and Roads on the Solstice Sunset


(c) Pete Glastonbury

Click to enlarge - larger version available - just ask.

The red arrow shows the direction of the Winter Solstice Sunset from Stonehenge - an alignment that UNESCO says should be protected. The orange and lilac lines are the options for the roads and the blue circle the portal position.

Wednesday 18 January 2017

Move the Western End of the Tunnel - CBA

"Just moving the western end by three or four hundred metres would make a huge difference to not damaging the key views and relationships which are important to understanding the landscape"
CBA director Mike Hepworth said..
"This is one of the most significant monuments in the world and we have a responsibility to maintain it for future generations."


CBA statement on Stonehenge proposals

18 January 2017
Trustees of the Council for British Archaeology met yesterday (17 January) and considered the charity’s response to the latest proposals for the A303 in the World Heritage Site around Stonehenge in Wiltshire.
Stonehenge A303
Trustees based their discussion on the CBA’s position statement on the management of Stonehenge agreed by CBA members in November 2016 after considerable consultation and debate.

Before finalising the charity’s position on the A303 proposals, trustees agreed that it would be important to consider all available evidence in detail, and to await the outcome of the advisory mission from the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) which is due to visit the site at the end of January. Further detailed information is needed to appreciate the full archaeological implications of the proposals for the A303 and the CBA urges open publication of recent archaeological evaluation work along the proposed new route of the A303 within the consultation period.

The CBA is willing to host an open public meeting in Salisbury or Amesbury in mid-February to enable the latest archaeological results to be presented and discussed, along with a range of views from key stakeholders on the new proposals, with the aim of encouraging open debate and to inform responses to the consultation (which are due by 5 March).

In the meantime, trustees agreed that the CBA should reiterate support for a long bored tunnel as the road solution which would achieve the greatest environmental gain. The removal of the A303 from a large area of the World Heritage Site would be highly beneficial and the CBA encourages Highways England on behalf of the Government to continue to work with the heritage sector to find the most beneficial achievable solution for the proposed tunnel in the area.

Trustees recognised that the latest proposals are an improvement on previous options (eg. the 2.1k tunnel examined a public inquiry in 2004), but still have considerable concerns about the impact of the tunnel portal locations and the new surface dual carriageways on the archaeological landscape and the Outstanding Universal Value of the World Heritage Site, particularly at the western end.

Subject to information to be made available in the coming weeks, from ICOMOS and others, the CBA is likely to express a clear preference for a longer tunnel, extended on the western side, moving the portal further away from key prehistoric barrow groups in the vicinity. The implications of the proposals for the eastern side of the World Heritage Site also need further detailed examination.

We are keen to work constructively with Highways England and other stakeholders to find an achievable solution to ensure that the benefits of removing the A303 from the landscape around Stonehenge can be realised in the coming years.

Tuesday 17 January 2017

The Bush Barrow Macehead

I recently noted in my collection of stones collected from field walking at All Cannings Cross that when washed one of them wasn't a sarsen but a fossil sponge or coral.

It appears to be identical and of very similar size to the fossil that the mace head found at Bush Barrow was made from.

Bush Barrow macehead - from Wiltshire Musem in Devizes - and the fossil.


Click to embiggen

The references call it a fossil stromatoporoid from commonly found in the tin mining areas of South Devon. Are they also found on the Wiltshire chalk, or shall I invoke glacial transport to explain finding it here?

William Cunnington, wrote of the excavation of it:
We next discovered, on the right side of the skeleton, a very curious perforated stone, some wrought articles of bone, many small rings of the same material, and another article of gold. The stone is made out of a fossil mass of tubularia, and polished ; rather of an egg form, or as a farmer who was present, observed, resembling the top of a large gimlet. It had a wooden handle, which was fixed into the perforation in the centre, and encircled by a neat ornament of brass, part of which still adheres to the stone. As this stone bears no marks of wear or attrition, I can hardly consider it to have been used as a domestic implement, and from the circumstance of its being composed of a mass of seaworms, or little serpents, I think we may not be too fanciful in considering it an article of consequence. We know, by history, that much importance was attached by the ancients to the serpent, and I have before had occasion to mention the veneration with which the glain nadroeth was esteemed by the Britons ; and my classical readers will recollect the fanciful story related by Pliny on this subject, who says, that the Druid's egg was formed by the scum of a vast multitude of serpents twisted and conjured up together. This stone, therefore, which contains a mass of serpularia, or little serpents, might have been held in great veneration by the Britons, and considered of sufficient importance to merit a place amongst the many rich and valuable relicks deposited in this tumulus with the body of the deceased.
From the description by Wiltshire Museum of the mace head

Monday 16 January 2017

Tunnellers ask what about the radioactive waste?

An interesting article from the tunnelling industry experts.

At a meeting lecture of the British Tunnelling Society last month (October 2014), Professor Rory Mortimore of Brighton University, as a leading geologist with specialist knowledge of chalk geology and Managing Director of ChalkRock Ltd, provided further insightful information for the spiralling costs above the initial construction estimates.

According to Mortimore, the preliminary design and cost estimate of the tunnel in the late 1990s was established before a detailed investigation of the geology had been carried out. The assumption, he reported to the BTS audience, was that the chalk geology of the Stonehenge area was same as other familiar chalk deposits in the UK; but in reality, as revealed by the detailed site and ground investigation studies, it is significantly different and complex.

“The big surprise,” said Mortimore, “was discovery that the geology on the tunnel route contains a large deposit of phosphatic chalks which contain weak and poorly banded sand and silt layers and a high register of radon radiation. Such a large deposit of phosphatic chalks were unknown in Wiltshire and, indeed, in Europe and their impact on the proposed tunnel project were profound.”

When the site investigation programme began, the prime objective was to know how extensive is the 15m thick layer of phosphatic chalk, and to investigate how it was formed. Following that, the impact of the engineering properties and behaviours of the deposits had to be incorporated into the project estimates.

“As a tunnelling medium, the weak chalk, with its poorly banded layers of sand and silt presented the potential of loose running ground in the face, which was not favourable for the assumed open face NATM or sequential face excavation method, similar to the now completed twin-tube highway tunnel for the A3 route at Hindhead in Surrey that was being developed at the same time,” said Mortimore. “A tunnelling method that provided positive face support would be required to reduce construction risk and this increased the cost of the tunnelling operation.”

Another aspect that increased the estimated cost of the project was the special handling required for the radon-contaminated tunnel material and the potential of working in the material to cause phosphate contamination of the groundwater. “Disposing of radon contaminated phosphatic chalk in a landfill presented major concerns and special handling of groundwater and construction wastewater added to the tunnelling and construction cost estimates,” said Mortimore.

More at http://www.tunneltalk.com/UK-21Nov2014-Stonehenge-TBM-bored-road-traffic-tunnel-revived.php

Thanks to Nettie for the link.

Sunday 15 January 2017

The Stonehenge Tunnel Option Videos





A303 Stonehenge southern bypass option - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaTYviSTSfk


A303 Stonehenge southern bypass option and Stonehenge in the distance - the solstitial alignment is marked with an arrow.





A303 Stonehenge northern bypass option - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRGHZ9gRf-E


A303 Stonehenge northern bypass option and Stonehenge in the distance - the solstitial alignment is marked with an arrow.

Click pictures to embiggen them.

(Both videos are on YouTube with the warning "This video is unlisted. Be considerate and think twice before sharing." I have done so.)

The Stonehenge Solstitial Alignment and the Tunnel Proposal

From the Highways England video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZapaIn_ZI6M I have grabbed a screen and overlain the narrowest possible interpretation of the solstitial alignment view that UNESCO says should be protected from any building. I would argue that the sightline should be at least from the width of the monument (the station stones are also markers of the alignment) and by any measure of sanity a lot wider than that. It shows it is not just road lighting we need to worry about it is also vehicle headlights.




Highways England consultation page about the Stonehenge Tunnel for more details and to send them feedback.


From UNESCO's Full Description (IAU Extended Case Study format): Stonehenge World Heritage Property, United Kingdom

A retrospective Statement of Outstanding Universal Value (SOUV) was prepared for the Property by the State Party in 2011 and has been approved by UNESCO. The relevant parts of that SOUV in relation to astronomy are quoted here:

Statement of Significance


The Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites WHP is internationally important for its complexes of outstanding prehistoric monuments…

They provide an insight into the mortuary and ceremonial practices of the period, and are evidence of prehistoric technology, architecture and astronomy…

The complexes of monuments at Stonehenge and Avebury provide an exceptional insight into the funerary and ceremonial practices in Britain in the Neolithic and Bronze Age. Together with their settings and associated sites, they form landscapes without parallel.

The design, position and inter-relationship of the monuments and sites are evidence of a wealthy and highly organised prehistoric society able to impose its concepts on the environment. An outstanding example is the alignment of the Stonehenge Avenue (probably a processional route) and Stonehenge stone circle on the axis of the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset, indicating their ceremonial and astronomical character…


UNESCO’s Astronomy and World Heritage Initiative adds: "Assuming that these were once largely clear in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, it is important to try and ensure that the sightlines are as clear as possible today. All plans should ensure that no further development takes place along them."




Stonehenge and Avebury World Heritage Site Management Plan 2015
 lays out various policies including:

Policy 3c – Maintain and enhance the setting of monuments and sites in the landscape and their interrelationships and astronomical alignments with particular attention given to achieving an appropriate landscape setting for the monuments and the WHS itself


Friday 13 January 2017

Fatal Flaw of the Stonehenge Tunnel Technical Assesment

Highways England have commendably included a mass of technical documents on their consultation page about the Stonehenge Tunnel (Do visit it, read it and leave feedback). They include the technical reports and particularly in TAR appendix G and H they score their proposals against the various aims and policies of the stakeholders.

I have read and searched as thoroughly as I have been able to in the limited time I have had these documents and I have failed to find where they have scored their proposals against two key policies. There is a thin gloss over a generalised Policy 3 from the WHS management plan but it fails to discuss the meat of Policy 3c (see below) and I can find no reference at all to UNESCO's Statement of Outstanding Universal Value which discusses the astronomy of the WHS (also below).

This oversight is so egregious that it invalidates the whole technical assessment, it needs to be redone.

Placing a tunnel portal directly on the most important astronomical alignment of Stonehenge fails these policies so badly that it draws the whole plan into doubt.

It is a pity that the Highway engineers didn't take dear Oscar's advice and rise up from the gutters and look at the stars.




From Full Description (IAU Extended Case Study format): Stonehenge World Heritage Property, United Kingdom

A retrospective Statement of Outstanding Universal Value (SOUV) was prepared for the Property by the State Party in 2011 and has been approved by UNESCO. The relevant parts of that SOUV in relation to astronomy are quoted here:

Statement of Significance


The Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites WHP is internationally important for its complexes of outstanding prehistoric monuments…

They provide an insight into the mortuary and ceremonial practices of the period, and are evidence of prehistoric technology, architecture and astronomy…

The complexes of monuments at Stonehenge and Avebury provide an exceptional insight into the funerary and ceremonial practices in Britain in the Neolithic and Bronze Age. Together with their settings and associated sites, they form landscapes without parallel.

The design, position and inter-relationship of the monuments and sites are evidence of a wealthy and highly organised prehistoric society able to impose its concepts on the environment. An outstanding example is the alignment of the Stonehenge Avenue (probably a processional route) and Stonehenge stone circle on the axis of the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset, indicating their ceremonial and astronomical character…


UNESCO’s Astronomy and World Heritage Initiative adds: "Assuming that these were once largely clear in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, it is important to try and ensure that the sightlines are as clear as possible today. All plans should ensure that no further development takes place along them."




Stonehenge and Avebury World Heritage Site Management Plan 2015
 lays out various policies including:

Policy 3c – Maintain and enhance the setting of monuments and sites in the landscape and their interrelationships and astronomical alignments with particular attention given to achieving an appropriate landscape setting for the monuments and the WHS itself

Thursday 12 January 2017

What UNESCO actually says about the Stonehenge Tunnel Threat to The Winter Solstice Sunset

Full Description (IAU Extended Case Study format): Stonehenge World Heritage Property, United Kingdom

(Extracts from the document linked above)

..One of the most important features of Stonehenge – one that has been recognised since the 18th century when it was noted by the antiquarian William Stukeley – is that its principal axis of symmetry is aligned upon winter solstice (“midwinter”) sunset in one direction and summer solstice (“midsummer”) sunrise in the other...

Stonehenge WHP can and should be seen within a regional context of sites in the Neolithic and Bronze Age in north-west Europe that have astronomical alignments. These include monuments such as the Newgrange passage tomb, part of the Brú na Bóinne—Archaeological Ensemble of the Bend of the Boyne WHP, and various stone circles and monuments. All seem to have had some sort of funerary or ceremonial function, although astronomical practices in domestic contexts are also noted on occasion.

The monuments of the Stonehenge WHP provide the earliest evidence in Britain or Ireland of a consistent local practice of aligning monuments with some precision upon sunrise or sunset around the solstices. This is in contrast, for example, to the solstitial orientation of Newgrange, a “one-off” alignment among the Boyne Valley tombs; to the very broad pattern of orientation clustered around the intercardinal directions observed among Neolithic tombs and houses in the Orkney Islands; and to evidence that Early Neolithic long barrows in the Salisbury Plain area, in the vicinity of Stonehenge—which preceded the construction of the Stonehenge stone circle by about a millennium—followed a broad pattern of orientation within the sun-rising/sun-climbing arcs, between north-east and south...

In prehistory, one or more observers would probably have stood at an appropriate point and viewed the sun or moon appearing or disappearing behind a distant horizon at specific times of the year. Thus, clear and unobstructed sightlines and horizons are important to aid our understanding of how these monuments functioned...



There is a growing consensus that the midwinter sightline was more important than the midsummer one. Today the integrity of this sightline, and its intermediate ridge lines and final horizon, is marred. Looking out from Stonehenge, the first problem is the A303 (0.5 km), which runs relatively close to the monument, and presents a considerable visual and noise intrusion to this alignment. Moving further south-west, the round barrow known as the Sun Barrow—which is on the alignment and on the Normanton Down ridge line—is intact (0.9 km), but the sightline then quickly runs into the plantation known as Normanton Gorse (1.1 km), which obscures it. Still further south-west is another plantation known as The Diamond (2.2 km), before the alignment continues towards the place that would form the visible horizon from Stonehenge in the absence of intervening vegetation, at Oatlands Hill to the west of the A360 road (and outside the WHP) (4.4 km). This horizon is also obscured by yet another plantation, at The Park. The sightline probably ends at the site of a much later Iron-Age/Romano-British settlement. It is difficult to determine the exact place because the various obstructions mean that we must rely upon computer modelling.

The Stonehenge Avenue looking south-west (midwinter sunset) shares the same alignment, and the same issues apply regarding its integrity. On the initial approach towards Stonehenge along the Avenue from the “elbow” at Stonehenge Bottom, Stonehenge itself forms the horizon; the more distant landscape only appears during the final stages of the approach.


A retrospective Statement of Outstanding Universal Value (SOUV) was prepared for the Property by the State Party in 2011 and has been approved by UNESCO. The relevant parts of that SOUV in relation to astronomy are quoted here:

Statement of Significance


The Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites WHP is internationally important for its complexes of outstanding prehistoric monuments…

They provide an insight into the mortuary and ceremonial practices of the period, and are evidence of prehistoric technology, architecture and astronomy…

The complexes of monuments at Stonehenge and Avebury provide an exceptional insight into the funerary and ceremonial practices in Britain in the Neolithic and Bronze Age. Together with their settings and associated sites, they form landscapes without parallel.

The design, position and inter-relationship of the monuments and sites are evidence of a wealthy and highly organised prehistoric society able to impose its concepts on the environment. An outstanding example is the alignment of the Stonehenge Avenue (probably a processional route) and Stonehenge stone circle on the axis of the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset, indicating their ceremonial and astronomical character…


Assuming that these were once largely clear in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, it is important to try and ensure that the sightlines are as clear as possible today. All plans should ensure that no further planting or development takes place along them.

The Threat To The Winter Solstice Sunset at Stonehenge From The Tunnel


It is important to point out that the position of the tunnel portal is still officially under consultation but the only tunnel plan offered has its western portal in line with the winter solstice sunset as seen from Stonehenge. Mike Pitts says of this plan that it: "scored highly on its OUV impact"... "OUV. That’s “outstanding universal value”, a concept that is taken very seriously in assessing any changes in the landscape. How would a tunnel portal so close to the stones affect OUV, bearing in mind floodlights at night (if such things were visible, they’d be a problem all year round, not just on midwinter day)? I’d say very badly."





The OUV component that concerns the sightlines is discussed on the UNESCO page http://www2.astronomicalheritage.net/index.php/show-entity?identity=49&idsubentity=1

The integrity of sightlines within the Stonehenge WHP

In assessing the integrity of these sightlines today, we make the assumption that they were largely kept clear in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, so that the monuments could be used in the way in which we presume they were used, with the sun or moon rising or setting behind distant horizons visible from the monuments themselves. The sightlines are shown in (this figure).


Astronomical sightlines at Stonehenge World Heritage Site and the surrounding area, with their end-points on horizons. These should be treated as indicative rather than necessarily exact. The WHS area is shaded in yellow. Produced by Nick Hanks, Historic England, February 2015. © Crown Copyright and database right 2015. All rights reserved. Ordnance Survey Licence number 100024900

Sightline from Stonehenge looking southwest (midwinter sunset)

There is a growing consensus that the midwinter sightline was more important than the midsummer one, as discussed above. Today the integrity of this sightline, and its intermediate ridge lines and final horizon, is marred. Looking out from Stonehenge, the first problem is the A303 (0.5 km), which runs relatively close to the monument, and presents a considerable visual and noise intrusion to this alignment. Moving further south-west, the round barrow known as the Sun Barrow—which is on the alignment and on the Normanton Down ridge line—is intact (0.9 km), but the sightline then quickly runs into the plantation known as Normanton Gorse (1.1 km), which obscures it. Still further south-west is another plantation known as The Diamond (2.2 km), before the alignment continues towards the place that would form the visible horizon from Stonehenge in the absence of intervening vegetation, at Oatlands Hill to the west of the A360 road (and outside the WHP) (4.4 km). This horizon is also obscured by yet another plantation, at The Park. The sightline probably ends at the site of a much later Iron-Age/Romano-British settlement. It is difficult to determine the exact place because the various obstructions mean that we must rely upon computer modelling.

As closely as I can I have overlaid the Ordnance Survey map with the position of the portal (marked within a red circle) and the UNESCO Southwest Sightline (thick red line). My calculation is that the centre of the sightline is 60m from the centre of the portal. With the margin of error, the width of the sightline and the size of a tunnel portal I would say that is pretty close to the portal being on the sightline, too close for my liking.



Click pictures to enlarge.

It is worth pointing out that it isn't just the central line at Stonehenge. The Station Stones also align to the midwinter sunset so one could fairly consider the solstitial line at the monument to be nearly 100m wide.

A303 Stonehenge plans published

Plans for tunnel under Stonehenge, part of roads package to cut congestion in the south-west.


Department for Transport, Highways England and The Rt Hon Chris Grayling MP
First published:

12 January 2017

A303 past Stonehenge.

Major plans to transform the A303 as part of a £2 billion investment in the south-west, which will see the construction of a tunnel at the historic Stonehenge site, have today (12 January 2016) been unveiled by Transport Secretary Chris Grayling.

The upgrade will develop the A303 corridor into a high quality, high performing route linking the M3 in the south-east and the M5 in the south-west, improving journeys for millions of people.
Secretary of State for Transport Chris Grayling said:

This government is taking the big decisions for Britain’s future, underlined by our record £15 billion funding for road schemes.

This major investment in the south-west will transform the A303 and benefit those locally by cutting congestion and improving journey times. It will also boost the economy, linking people with jobs and businesses with customers - driving forward our agenda to build a country that works for everyone and not just the privileged few.

Drivers, hauliers, residents and other road users are being invited to have their say on the proposal to upgrade a seven-mile single carriageway stretch of the A303 near Stonehenge in Wiltshire into a dual carriageway.

The single carriageway section of the A303 currently runs alongside the stones and the proposed option is to construct a 1.8 mile dual carriageway tunnel to improve journey times, remove the sight and sound of traffic and enhance the world heritage site.

The 2014 Road investment strategy committed to upgrading all remaining sections of the A303 between the M3 and M5 to dual carriageway standard, starting with 3 schemes:
at Stonehenge
between Sparkford and Ilchester
between Taunton and Southfields

Highways England Chief Executive Jim O’Sullivan said:

We are delivering the biggest investment programme in our roads in a generation.

Our plans for the A303 recognise the national importance of the route and these improvements will bring real benefit to the region and local communities.

The public exhibitions will provide an excellent opportunity to explain further our plans and to hear feedback from stakeholders on our proposals to deliver the scheme.

The Stonehenge consultation launches on 12 January and will offer the public the chance to view the proposals and meet the project team. Public consultation for the latter 2 projects will follow in due course.

The Stonehenge scheme proposals also include a bypass for the village of Winterbourne Stoke and improvements to existing junctions between the A303 and the intersecting A345 and A360 north-south roads.

The consultation runs between 12 January and 5 March. Following the consultation the preferred route will be announced later in 2017 and is subject to the completion of statutory procedures for development consent.

Public exhibitions will be staged at the following locations:
The Manor Barn, Manor House, Winterbourne Stoke on Saturday, 14 January (11am-5pm)
Antrobus House, Amesbury, on Wednesday, 18 January (2pm-8pm)
Shrewton Village Hall, The Hollow, Shrewton, on Friday, 20 January (5pm-9pm)
Avon Valley College, Recreation Road, Durrington, on Saturday 21 January (11am-5pm)
Larkhill Primary School, Wilson Road, Larkhill, Tuesday, 24 January (5pm-9pm)
The Manor Barn, Manor House, Winterbourne Stoke on Friday, 27 January (2pm-8pm)
Salisbury Guildhall, The Market Place, Salisbury, on Saturday 28 January (11am-5pm)
Grove Hall, Church Street, Mere, near Warminster, on Saturday 4 February (11am-5pm)
Society of Antiquaries, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, on Monday 6 February (2pm-8pm)
Antrobus House, Amesbury, Wednesday, 8 February (2pm-8pm)

Following the consultation, the preferred route will be announced later in 2017.

During the public consultation, more details and a questionnaire will also be available at www.highways.gov.uk/a303stonehenge/consultation

For concerns about the effect of the tunnel on the Winter Solstice Sunset sightline see;http://www.sarsen.org/2017/01/the-threat-to-winter-solstice-sunset-at.html


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020 7944 3021
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Wednesday 11 January 2017

Ancient Britons probably didn't have wheat 2000 years before they had farms

Contesting the presence of wheat in the British Isles 8,000 years ago by assessing ancient DNA authenticity from low-coverage data

Clemens L Weiß Michael Dannemann Kay Prüfer Hernán A Burbano
Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology, Germany; Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Germany
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.10005
Published November 3, 2015


Abstract

Contamination with exogenous DNA is a constant hazard to ancient DNA studies, since their validity greatly depend on the ancient origin of the retrieved sequences. Since contamination occurs sporadically, it is fundamental to show positive evidence for the authenticity of ancient DNA sequences even when preventive measures to avoid contamination are implemented. Recently the presence of wheat in the United Kingdom 8000 years before the present has been reported based on an analysis of sedimentary ancient DNA (Smith et al. 2015). Smith et al. did not present any positive evidence for the authenticity of their results due to the small number of sequencing reads that were confidently assigned to wheat. We developed a computational method that compares postmortem damage patterns of a test dataset with bona fide ancient and modern DNA. We applied this test to the putative wheat DNA and find that these reads are most likely not of ancient origin.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.10005.001



Thanks to Martyn Barber for pointing this article out to me.

Sunday 8 January 2017

Ancient Britons had wheat 2000 years before they had farms


Vince Gaffney, University of Bradford and Robin Allaby, University of Warwick February 27, 2015

Wheat has been found in a settlement on England’s south coast dating back to 6000BC – 2000 years before farming reached Britain. This finding overturns many cherished archaeological beliefs – or myths – about the era. Though they were once patronised as simplistic hunter-gatherers, it turns out early Britons must have been active traders with the agricultural superpowers of their day in France and the Balkans. It’s time to reassess Mesolithic man.

The introduction of farming is usually regarded as a defining historic moment for human societies. Agriculture creates the conditions for permanent settlement, urbanisation and complex societies.

The positive impact and significance of farming, starting during the period known as the Neolithic, is often contrasted harshly with preceding hunter gatherer cultures. These societies, associated with a period entitled the Mesolithic in Britain (c. 10,000-4000 BC), were relatively mobile and the passage of time has been unforgiving in respect of the survival of their material culture.

This has meant a tendency to presume the peoples of pre-farming Britain were socially simple and geographically isolated. The recent TV show 10,000 BC, which approximates this period, perpetuates the view that life at this time was simply “nasty, brutish and short” with little for people to do other than eat hazelnuts as they waited patiently for wiser peoples from the East to arrive along with the lifestyle benefits of the new technology – farming.






Mesolithic northern Europe had lots of extra land (light green).
Eleanor Ramsey, CC BY-NC-SA



Yet Mesolithic societies were as complex as any other. For instance, the earliest built ritual monuments in Britain, usually associated with farming societies, emerged as early as 9000BC near Stonehenge and one structure in Scotland may represent a calendrical device nearly 5000 years older than the first historical calendars. The first permanent homes and domestication of animals including the dog also occurred before the introduction of farming.

Yet, the use of grain and specifically wheat, remained essentially absent and a key indicator of farming in regions far from south west Asia, where grain was domesticated 12000 years ago. Consequently, a debate continues as to whether farming was introduced following colonisation by groups already practising agriculture or the new technology was adopted by indigenous hunter gatherer populations. Was farming a movement of people or ideas?

Farming is thought to have been introduced to Britain in around 4000BC, perhaps held back by the island’s new isolation following sea level rises at the end of the ice age. The same processes, however, also provide an opportunity to preserve evidence and Britain’s continental shelf has exceptional archaeological potential.

Under the sea


To investigate whether early traces of farming might be preserved in sediments on the sea bed, we gathered a team from the Universities of Birmingham, Bradford and Warwick, together with the Maritime Archaeology Trust.

Our results, just published in the journal Science, suggest that grain, rather than indicating the onset of farming, was actually present in Mesolithic settlements in Britain 2000 years before local agriculture.

We found evidence of grain after analysing DNA recovered from the uniquely preserved Bouldnor Cliff off the south coast of Britain. In the past ancient DNA has most commonly been obtained from anatomically intact material, such as hair, bones and teeth. It has only recently become clear that DNA can also be retrieved from other materials, including sediments, or SedaDNA – a discovery which has the potential to revolutionise the field.

The sedaDNA sequences at Bouldnor Cliff suggested a mixed habitat of oak forest and herbaceous plants, much as we would expect. We found traces of animals that could indicate human activity – lots of dogs, for instance, and aurochs (ancestors of the modern cow), as well as deer, grouse and rodents.






Garry Momber of Maritime Archaeology Trust with 8,000 year old Bouldnor Cliff flints.
Author provided



However, in later sediments, dated to 6000 BC, the results revealed the presence of Einkorn wheat. This was 2000 years earlier than expected and at a time when the cutting edge of agriculture may have lain in the northern Balkans or possibly on the Mediterranean coast of France.

Mesolithic marketplace


What does this mean? In the absence of direct evidence for cultivation, it seems likely that wheat was imported rather than grown locally. If so the implications are considerable.

The presence of wheat suggests the existence of a web of social networks stretching between Mesolithic Britain and the advancing Neolithic front far to the south and east. Far from being simple or isolated, the Mesolithic peoples of southern Britain were probably engaged in trading or gifting exotic foodstuffs across much of continental Europe – it seems absolutely unreasonable to imply that hunter gatherer groups were passive recipients in such an exchange.

The results also indicate that key historical events, including the arrival of people in the Americas and agricultural development of Southeast Asia, may also be best explored through investigating the extensive land masses that were lost to the seas as a consequence of global warming. The results of the work at Bouldnor Cliff now suggests that that such landscapes also retain caches of genetic material that may not be preserved or even represented on land. If so the analysis of marine sediments may be an archaeological “game-changer”.

The Conversation

Vince Gaffney, Anniversary Chair in Landscape Archaeology, University of Bradford and Robin Allaby, Associate Professor, Life Sciences, University of Warwick

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.


Or did they? See https://elifesciences.org/content/4/e10005 for:

Contesting the presence of wheat in the British Isles 8,000 years ago by assessing ancient DNA authenticity from low-coverage data

Clemens L Weiß Michael Dannemann Kay Prüfer Hernán A Burbano
Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology, Germany; Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Germany
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.10005
Published November 3, 2015