New English Heritage Reconstruction: Stonehenge Sarsens on Wooden Tracks and Rubble Ramps

A new reconstruction image of Stonehenge under construction, created for English Heritage and appearing in the book Stonehenge: The Story of an Icon by Dr Susan Greaney, shows how the 25-tonne sarsen stones may have been both transported and erected.

Infographic by The Independent/Picture Courtesy English Heritage

The illustration, based on laser-scan data and current archaeological understanding, depicts the stones being moved from the Marlborough Downs (around 15 miles away) along wooden trackways in wetland areas, and then raised into position using piles of rubble and earth rather than elaborate wooden scaffolding.

Transport: Wooden Tracks “Like a Railway”

Dr Greaney notes that previous assumptions favoured sledges running over rolling logs. The new reconstruction instead proposes static wooden trackways of laid-down timbers for sections of soft or wetland ground — preventing the sledge from sinking and allowing steady progress. She draws the comparison directly from early 20th-century photographs of megalith moving in Indonesia.

Real-world parallels still exist today. Communities on Sumba continue to drag multi-tonne stones for megalithic tombs using ropes, sledges, and organised human effort, sometimes supported by wooden infrastructure.

Upacara Tarik Batu Kubur, Anakalang, Sumba – Living Tradition

Community ritual pulling of a large megalithic tomb stone using ropes and collective effort.

Raising the Stones: Rubble Ramps and the Easter Island Parallel

Transporting the stones is only half the battle; getting a 25-tonne rock to stand perfectly upright is another. The new English Heritage visual also proposes a method for how the stones were hoisted. Rather than using complex wooden scaffolding, the builders likely used piles of rubble and earth to slowly wedge the stones upward.

“On Easter Island, it was noticed that the Rapa Nui used piles of rubble to help push the stones upright,” Dr Greaney explains. “We believe a similar method could have happened at Stonehenge.”

This comparative approach draws on ethnographic observations from Rapa Nui (Easter Island), where local people historically and in documented demonstrations used earth and rubble ramps or built-up mounds in combination with levers and ropes to raise the large moai statues.

Easter Island 1954 – Rapa Nui Demonstration of Raising Methods

Authentic 1950s footage from Thor Heyerdahl’s expedition showing Rapa Nui people demonstrating traditional quarrying, dragging, and raising techniques, including the use of levers and built-up earth/rubble.

Where to See the Full Reconstruction

The detailed reconstruction (including the wooden trackways and rubble-ramp raising method) features as a four-page fold-out in the new book:

Stonehenge: The Story of an Icon by Dr Susan Greaney (English Heritage, 2026)

Available from the English Heritage shop

Press coverage with images from the reconstruction appears in The Independent (29 June 2026).

Supporting Research

The transport element draws on comparative ethnography, particularly early 20th-century photographs from Nias Island, Indonesia, which show megaliths being moved on sledges over laid wooden tracks rather than free-rolling logs. Academic work, including Barney Harris’s 2018 paper “Moving megaliths: time to park the rollers” (Oxford Journal of Archaeology), has examined how many traditional societies used stable wooden trackways or slipways instead of the commonly imagined rollers.

The raising method proposed in the new reconstruction aligns with documented Rapa Nui practices and experimental archaeology that has tested earth/rubble ramp and lever combinations for uprighting large stones.