It is worth recording the theory of how the bluestones were brought to Stonehenge by ice before it goes the way of so many other historic Stonehenge theories; the diluvian destruction, the Mycenaeans, the giants etc.
Simply, when Wales was as cold as charity and covered in ice, down to the white line, Preselian boulders were picked up in the ice and carried along the route of the arrow, see above.
The hills to the south of the Bristol Channel, circled, were periglacial tundra with all the associated landforms - https://www.antarcticglaciers.org/glacial-geology/glacial-landforms/periglaciation/antarctic-periglacial-environments/ has examples.
It was a bit more complicated around Bristol with icy wastes pushing up the channel and flowing down from the surrounding higher ground, but that doesn't concern the theory.
The only way through the hills that serve in the office of a wall to protect this blessed plot is across the Somerset levels, which barely rise above sea level.
However even they eventually give way to higher ground.
And unfortunately for the theory there are no traces of the boulder bearing behemoth ever having passed across the green and pleasant. No glacial erratics, no moraines, nothing. No evidence at all.
"What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence". - Christopher Hitchens. "God Is Not Great: How religion poisons everything" 2009
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments welcome on fresh posts - you just need a Google account to do so.