Where the missing Sarsens went?

One of the mysteries of Stonehenge is what happened to the missing Sarsens. Assuming it was complete somewhere in the order of 300 tonnes of sarsen stone is missing. Apart from the edge damage caused by visitors it seems that complete stones were removed and that they were chosen from within the monument for some reason. Why take that lintel but leave the easier to remove fallen stone here? The stones don't seem to be present in any local buildings and it seems to odd to suggest they were broken up for roadstone when the easier pickings of the bluestones don't seem to have been so.

Julian Richards has suggested that one reason that sarsens were removed was for the stone to be used for producing grinding querns. There is very little stone in neighborhood suitable for stones to grind grain with and some sarsen stone types are very suitable, other less so. So a source of excellent source material may have been irresistible in the later Bronze Age, and a quern manufactory set up.

"East of (north Fargo) plantation the field system corresponds with an area of later Bronze Age activity identified by extensive surface collection in the winter of 1980-81 and subsequently sampled more intensively (Richards, J 1990 The Stonehenge Environs Project. HBMC: London ). The surface scatter consisted of pottery and large quantities of burnt flint and burnt and broken sarsen, including quern fragments, and was interpreted as a small nucleated area of later Bronze Age settlement, lying within the area of regular field"

Research Department Report Series 82-2011 

STONEHENGE WORLD HERITAGE SITE LANDSCAPE PROJECT LEVEL 1 FIELD INVESTIGATIONS ARCHAEOLOGICAL SURVEY REPORT 

Sharon Bishop

Vicki Cummings Papers on Academia.org

https://uclan.academia.edu/VickiCummings/Papers 

A selection - excuse formatting.

Cummings, V. 2012. What lies beneath: Thinking about the qualities and essences of stone and wood in the chambered tomb architecture of Neolithic Britain and Ireland. Journal of Social Archaeology 12, 29-50.

This article considers the interpretation of stone and wood in Neolithic chambered tomb architecture in Britain and Ireland. Against a broader theoretical agenda of both relational materialities and animistic ontologies, it is argued that... more

Research Interests: 

Neolithic Archaeology, Materiality (Anthropology), Megalithic Monuments, and Long barrows and chambered barrows

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161

Cummings, V. and Harris, O. 2011. Animals, people and places: the continuity of hunting and gathering practices across the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in Britain. European Journal of Archaeology 14:3, 361-82.

This article considers the long-debated and thorny issue of the transition from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic in Britain. The apparently polarised debate that has dominated this discussion is, we suggest, unhelpful, and rather than... more

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15

DELIVERING, ASSESSING AND PROVIDING FEEDBACK FOR FIELDWORK MODULES: A CASE STUDY FROM ARCHAEOLOGY

Abstract In this paper we highlight some of the issues surrounding the delivery of fieldwork modules, using archaeological excavation as an example. There are a whole range of issues surrounding the assessment of fieldwork-based modules,... more

Journal Name: UCLan Journal of Pedagogic Research

Publication Date: 2012

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28

Cummings, V. 2011. Scale and senses of belonging: thinking about regionality in the Neolithic of the Irish Sea zone. In A. Jones and G. Kirkham (eds), Beyond the core: reflections on regionality in prehistory, 33-40. Oxford: Oxbow.

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21

Cummings, V. 2011. A view from the outside: some thoughts on the research priorities for Mesolithic and Neolithic lithic studies in Britain and Ireland. Lithics 31, 68-77.

This paper considers some possible avenues for new research into the study of lithics for British and Irish assemblages dating from the Mesolithic and Neolithic. While scholars have been successful in extracting detail on technological... more

183

Cummings, V. 2010. Formalising the sacred ? The late Mesolithic and early Neolithic monumental landscapes of Britain and Ireland. In G. Warren and B. Finlayson (eds), Landscapes in transition: understanding hunter-gatherer and farming landscapes in the early Holocene of Europe and the Levant. Amman: Council for British Research in the Levant.

One of the big unanswered questions is whether the start of the Neolithic in Britain and Ireland saw the arrival of a new population, bringing with them new forms of material culture from the continent, or whether native hunter-gatherers... more

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6

Cummings, V. 2009. Monuments at the centre of the world: exploring regional diversity in south-west Wales and south-west Scotland. In K. Brophy and G. Barclay (eds), Regional diversity in the Neolithic of Britain and Ireland. Oxford: Oxbow.

47

Cummings, V. 2008. The architecture of monuments. In J. Pollard (ed.), Prehistoric Britain. Oxford: Blackwell.

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UPDATE:

TITLE: Cummings, V. 2007. From midden to megalith ? The Mesolithic/Neolithic transition in western Britain. In A. Whittle and V. Cummings (eds), Going over: the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in NW Europe. London: British Academy.

View the paper here: https://www.academia.edu/t/qx11-JWpNWMG-Q9NUP/2289666

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TITLE: Cummings, V. and Whittle, A. 2005. Pentre Ifan: east or west? The origins of monumentality in Wales and western Britain. In G. Marchand and A. Tresset (eds), Unité et diversité des processus de néolithisation sur la façade atlantique de l'Europe. Bulletin de la Société Préhistorique Française.

View the paper here: https://www.academia.edu/t/qx11-JWpNWMG-Q9NUP/2289670

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TITLE: Cummings, V. 2002b. Experiencing texture and touch in the British Neolithic. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 21:3, 249-61.

View the paper here: https://www.academia.edu/t/qx11-JWpNWMG-Q9NUP/2289692

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TITLE: Cummings, V., Jones, A. and Watson, A. 2002. In between places: axial symmetry and divided space in the monuments of the Black Mountains, south-east Wales. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 12:1, 57-70.

View the paper here: https://www.academia.edu/t/qx11-JWpNWMG-Q9NUP/2289693

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TITLE: From cairn to cemetery: an archaeological investigation of the chambered cairns and early Bronze Age mortuary deposits at Cairnderry and Bargrennan White Cairn, south-west Scotland. With Chris Fowler.

View the paper here: https://www.academia.edu/t/qx11-JWpNWMG-Q9NUP/2289621

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Mapping the Neolithic Spread by Genetics

Good starting point : http://www.eupedia.com/europe/neolithic_europe_map.shtml

Too much stuff to summarise.

Restoring Stonehenge and the Stonehenge Aerodrome Reports

Two excellent reports have just been released by English Heritage - go get 'em!

http://research.english-heritage.org.uk/Report.aspx?i=15238

Title	'Restoring' Stonehenge 1881-1939
Summary	Stonehenge was transformed considerably during the 20th century, the monument itself being subjected to more intervention and alteration from 1901 than at any time since the Bronze Age. Some of the most important episodes of excavation at Stonehenge during the 20th century were driven by a desire to interfere with the monument’s physical appearance, often but not always due to concerns about stability. The romantic ruin of previous generations – leaning monoliths, twisted trilithons and recumbent sarsens – was rationalised into a more upright, orderly design and secured for posterity with concrete. At the same time, the visibility of the enclosing earthworks was enhanced for the paying visitor, the enclosure ditch only partially backfilled and surplus material spread across the site to conceal old trackways. 1901 was also the year that the monument was first enclosed and an admission charge introduced, both intended as means of controlling the numbers and types of visitor. This report pays close attention to the circumstances surrounding three key episodes – the appearance in 1881 of some timber supports; the straightening and concreting of the massive Stone 56 in 1901; and the uncompleted ‘reparations’ of 1919-20.
Series	Research Department Reports
Pages	144
Authors	Barber, M
Keywords	Aerial Photograph Interpretation ,  Aerial Photography ,  Conservation
Hyperlinks	'Restoring' Stonehenge 1881-1939 (PDF) 'Restoring' Stonehenge 1881-1939 File size: 7.44 MB

http://research.english-heritage.org.uk/Report.aspx?i=15239

Title	Stonehenge Aerodrome and the Stonehenge Landscape
Summary	Between 1917 and 1921, Stonehenge had an aerodrome for a near-neighbour. Initially a Royal Flying Corps training establishment, from January 1918 it became the No. 1 School of Aerial Navigation and Bomb Dropping, home to a contingent of RNAS Handley Page bombers. The aerodrome featured two camps either side of a take-off and landing ground, the first located close to Fargo Plantation, and a subsequent and more substantial technical and domestic site situated either side of what is now the A303, a few hundred yards west of Stonehenge. After the war, the aerodrome buildings became the focus of debate about what constituted unacceptable modern intrusions in the Stonehenge landscape. Converted to both agricultural and domestic use, the hangars and accommodation blocks prompted the first demands to ‘restore’ the Stonehenge landscape – not to what it had been prior to the war, but to something deemed more appropriate as a setting for the monument. Following a public appeal, the aerodrome and neighbouring farmland was purchased, the buildings dismantled and removed, and the land handed to the National Trust. The result was intended to be a landscape freed from “the restless and commonplace current of every day life”.
Series	Research Department Reports
Pages	116
Authors	Barber, M
Keywords	Aerial Photograph Interpretation ,  Aerial Photography ,  Airfield ,  First World War ,  landscape
Hyperlinks	Stonehenge Aerodrome and the Stonehenge Landscape (PDF) Stonehenge Aerodrome and the Stonehenge Landscape File size: 15.59 MB

The Stones of Stonehenge - The Guide.

http://www.stonesofstonehenge.org.uk/ - A site with a page devoted to each stone at Stonehenge.

A must bookmark for all scholars of the stones.

Free online Stonehenge Course - Highly Recommeneded

Free online Stonehenge Course from the University of Buckingham with Dr Graeme Davis

Highly recommended.

https://iversity.org/en/courses/stonehenge 


(This site may be quiet for a while as I participate in the course.)

About this course

Course Summary

When was Stonehenge built? Who built it? How was it built? Why was it built? Answers cannot be promised to all of these, but we can get better at asking the questions and work towards solutions. We can look at how people have responded to Stonehenge. Most of all we can begin to think about what Stonehenge means to us.

What do I learn?

• To understand present archaeological thinking about Stonehenge.
• To evaluate responses to Stonehenge in art, literature, music, architecture and culture.
• To consider your own response to Stonehenge, expressed through two peer-evaluated mini-essays.

What do I need too know?

No entry requirements. This MOOC is open to all.

Course Structure

Chapter 1: The Stonehenge Landscape Stonehenge as a landscape of prehistoric sites. A historical context: the Mesolithic, the Neolithic and the building of the Stonehenge.

Chapter 2: Who built Stonehenge? Theories: when, by whom, how and why.

Chapter 3: Stonehenge Problems Context - the Stonehenge landscape: problems with transportation and erection. Part destruction - why and how?

Chapter 4: Responses to Stonehenge An array of responses: Geoffrey of Monmouth (1138); the antiquarian tradition, the temple and astronomic alignments traditions; various amateur theories; the archaeological traditions. Stonehenge, Woodhenge: monuments in a landscape

Chapter 5: Cultural Contexts Stonehenge in fiction, poetry, music, art and popular culture.

Chapter 6: Stonehenge Today Stonehenge as a cultural icon, emblem of Britain, World Heritage site and sacred space. Blick Mead as the cradle of Stonehenge.

Chapter 7: Reassessing Stonehenge Written activity as an assessment

Chapter 8: Responses to Stonehenge Examination of students' responses through their essays. Integration of blog, Wiki, Twitter and eBook as a way of continuing the discussion after the course.

Workload

Approximately two hours per week for watching video lectures, completing quizzes and homework assignments.

Why is Stone 23 so clean?

As your average tourist walks on the hard path at Stonehenge one of the first sarsens they come close to is Stone 23. They will probably find a member of staff standing on the path at that point who during the long watches of the day may also have been looking at the stone.

The stone (arrowed in the picture below) is very clean in a band in the middle, this is usually thought to be from the cleaning off of graffiti but I think there may be another explanation.

Stone 23 unexpectedly fell over in March 1963,  and 1963 was when the centre of the  circle was gravelled. It was put back up in 1964.

In the pictures below, from Hawkins' book Stonehenge Decoded, it can be seen how the clean area was lying on the ground for that year and the bottom postcard, copyright 1970, shows the distinct band of clean stone. I think the fallen stone may have rocked a little as people stood on it and that area was sand blasted clean by this action of the stone on the ground.

As usual click to embiggen