Changed format: I'll simply provide my take-away message.
Links will be provided now and again to more detailed justifying arguments, supplied elsewhere, notably my specialist Stonehenge site, set up in early 2012.
But the main aim is to provide a flavour (beware: strong stuff, definitely not for the faint-hearted) of the main conclusion arrived at, as summarised in the title of this posting!
1. Geographical location of Stonehenge : upper reaches of the Hampshire Avon, approx 20 km (12 miles) as the crow - or seagull- flies from source at Pewsey , and approx 50 km (30 or so miles) from estuary almost directly due south on English Channel at Christchurch. So it was a means second to none for getting progressively inland, remaining close to lush river valley, easily navigable with simple crafts - wood logs as recently suggested. (Link)
Fig.1: Map with (a) Stonehenge (b) Amesbury (c) Christchurch (d) River Avon
Now a modern day picture of the Avon at Amesbury - easily navigable.
Fig.2: Description. English: River Avon, Amesbury Amesbury is an attractive small town embraced by a loop of the River Avon as it cuts through the high plateau of Salisbury Plain.
Date 28 June 2008;Source From geograph.org.uk; AuthorTrish Steel
2. As riverside population grew so did the demand for funeral services. The modern day Amesbury on an unhelpful U-bend became seen as a good location for specialized funeral service. Bodies of the deceased could be transported to nearest access to the River Avon, then taken up to Amesbury via log raft etc.
(Consider a link to one or other Jacques articles - though I have to say there's much in his narrative to which I have no great enthusiasm. But he's right to emphasise the advantages offered by Amesbury as a place for human settlement - those curious warm water spring, allegedly with year-round constant temperature of 11 degrees (really?), ease of access by river etc etc
Link:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2019/11/02/britains-first-city-discovered-archaeologists-say-home-people/
See refs to Profs Albert Lin and David Jacques.
3. But there was a problem with "simple" means of body disposal, whether (a) burial aka inhumation (b) cremation (whole-body).
Why? Neither was simple, not in pre-Bronze Age era.
Reasons? Let's not dwell on the detail except to say
1. Burial
(a) Lack of metal digging implements requiring antler picks etc (b) simple burial raised fears of entrapment of body spirit, need for 'soul release'(c) no means of writing, no means of a headstone inscription indentifying the buried individual.
2. Cremation (whole body): slow, needing constant attendance, probably incomplete etc etc
4. Our Neolithic forbears adopted a practice what might shock some modern folk (despite being used to this day in some parts of the world).
Technically it's called excarnation , i.e. initial defleshing of body to semi-skeletal state. That's then followed by end-stage cremation (faster and more fuel efficient that whole body cremation). Excarnation can be done manually, with sharp flints (or later with metal blades). But there was an alternative, one that was seen as offering advantages. I refer to "sky burial", where body is exposed to elements, where it's spotted by scavenger birds who then proceed to make short work of it, at least under ideal conditions.
Links to just one of several of my initial postings on sky burial, May 2016:
https://colinb-sciencebuzz.blogspot.com/2016/05/was-mark-1-stonehenge-initially.html
But that's the problem: achieving those idea conditions such that sky burial becomes practical, reliable, able to be completed in a reasonable time-course etc etc.
5. Making sky burial more practical, more dependable on a day-to-day basis, maybe year-round, maybe not: there are a number of ways.
(a) strip the turf off a chalky soil, lay body out. Hope birds spot it.
(b) provide elevated perches in form of bank, with adjacent ditch from which chalk was excavated
(c) timber posts (bird perches) maybe with cross pieces to provide greater room.
(d) Display animal remains in quiet periods to keep the birds on site.
Here's that iconic Pentre Ifan dolmen in Pembs, with some fascinating (and illuminating) detail...
Fig.3: Pentre Ifan versus Stonehenge (image from Brian John site). Note parallels with Stonehenge (uprights bridged with capstone (dolmen) or lintel (Stonehenge)
Design as a bird-friendly "feeding table" explains not only the capstone, but its overhangs, its resting on pointed uprights. How? It's designed to make it difficult for ground-based scavengers to get access to the 'free meal', deterring birds.
(e) standing stones
(f) stone circles (show graphic)
See Appendix 1 for a key passage in the wikipedia entry for "dolmen", making clear that there's no justification whatsoever for defining the dolmen simply as a "burial chamber".
It's a point I made strongly on the Megalithic Portal site (which I have now abandoned, once and for all, given its persistent control freakery!)
Fig.4: Small part of the vast Avebury stone circle:
(g) stone circles with cross-piece lintels. (Yes, we have finally arrived at Stonehenge). Refer to earlier graphic - comparison with dolmen. Stress the practical function of the lintels! No need to mention so-called carpentry joints.
6. Next step: how to make one's "sky burial" site better visible from the air?
Answer: introduce the so-called cursus ( two chalk embankment, approx 80 to 100 metres apart, with their excavation ditches (external to banks) also exposing chalk, doubling the area of 'gleaming white' visibility.
Fig. 5: Stonehenge Cursus (a) as is, from air (b) with highlighting to re-create bird's eye view with gleaming white chalk
Orientation of the cursus is critical: it has to be visible 'square on' to the best of the UK excarnators, that being? Answer: the gull, aka seagull, migrating inland up the Avon river from the Channel. Look at the orientation of the River Avon and the Stonehenge cursus: approx N-S and E-W respectively, i.e. mutually at right angles!
Fig.6: Stonehenge Cursus: orientation with respect to River Avon and other landscape features
7. How was the idea of the Cursus as a direction pointer hit upon?
Was it entirely planned from word go? Maybe, one will never know. But it could have been arrived at by accident. How? Someone exposed chalk on which to lay out a corpse to give it greater visibility to LOCAL bird life. Over period of time they noticed that the exposed chalk was attracting more and more gulls. They extended the area of exposed chalk, far more than needed for body display, and, hey presto, summoned up still more gulls!
The future Stonehenge - industrial scale Stonehenge- was in the making, albeit in its infancy.
So the idea took hold that one could use two separate areas of exposed chalk: a smaller one for display, and a larger, much larger one for signposting the free offering. The display area alone was initially a causewayed enclosure, apols for slipping in that technical term, see link, with excavated pits used to provide chalk that was then perhaps scattered across the central area. That later evolved into the "henge" (another technical term, see link) excavated as a complete, bar the odd one or two openings. The external bank provided added advantage privacy!
Let's at this point make brief reference fo Thornborough Henge with its dressing of imported white gypsum - designed we're told by wiki to render site more visible. Correction: "visible from the air".
Thornborough henges (give wik link) . Some references single out the central of the 3 henges as dressed with imported white gypsum. Others say all three were coated.
Quote from wiki entry on Thornborough Henges:
"Archaeological excavation of the central henge has taken place. It has been suggested that its banks were covered with locally mined gypsum. The resulting white sheen would have been striking and visible for miles around".
8. Initially, the sky burial site was reserved for the elite of society, whose relatives paid the necessary fees for what was a specialized service available to the privileged only. what's more the cremated remains were in some, maybe most cases, interred on the spot of what was seen as a privileged location.
Maybe an image of Stonehenge's cremated bone. Maybe a mention of La Varde with evidence of prior excarnation.
Fig.7: interred cremated bones from Aubrey Hole at Stonehenge> Some hint that individual's bones were separately packaged prior to interment in something that has since decayed away (leather pouches?).
But there was a problem, as well as a compensating advantage. As demand for the site's facilities grew, space for interment of cremated bone began to become scarce. But as demand grew, so did the population of resident birds. So did "knowledge" of the site's whereabouts to coastal gulls, aided by the river and the end-stop Cursus.
9. A bold step was taken. The service offered by the site was opened up to less wealthy folk, the first step towards industrial-scale Stonehenge, but on one condition: , namely that relatives collected the cremated remains and took them back home, for storage or disposal as they saw fit.
(Probably wrong on part of some to suggest that absence of later absence of cremated bone implied cessation of cremation. Reminder: absence of evidence in archaeology should not be taken to imply evidence for absence!).
Second: the need was seen for a bigger and better Cursus approx halfway between the Channel and Amesbury that will serve as a better 'signpost'. Cue the Dorset Cursus - still some 80-100 metres in width, but length now extended, first to about 5 then to 10km no less!
Fig 8: Graphic showing the location and orientation of the Dorset Cursus.
Show that same earlier map, but with an extra large inserted RED arrow to show the location of the Dorset Cursus approx halfway between the coast and Stonehenge.
10. We have an explanation for the (a) Heel Stone and (b) nearby Slaughter Stone at Stonehenge. (Stone 16 also while we're about it, also with bird bowls/bird bath).
Graphics of Heel Stone and Slaughter Stone (close ups, why few if any mentions of shape - at least not in the major internet sites!). What are you afraid of?
Fig 9: proximity of Heel and Slaughter Stone
Fig.10: close-up of Heel Stone (!)
Alignment of the open end of the innermost trilithon horse shoe to the Heel Stone. (Also ensured illumination of displayed offerings first thing on midsummer sunrise
11. We now have an explanation for the Altar Stone and why it is where it is, both in terms of (a) alignment (b) depth of embedding in turf. Graphic: Altar Stone? say there's scarcely any visible above ground.
Shoe the B.John diagram with its strategic-situation.
Image to be added shortly
Fig.11: Location of the near-totally obscured/buried Altar Stone.
Image to be added shortly
Fig 12: Close up of scarcely-visible Altar Stone, immediately above red arrows (ignore fallen pillars on top, shown with red crosses)
12. Most important of all, we have an explanation for the lintels, and indeed the stone circles. (perch v light'shadow).
Fig. 13: Birds congregating on Stonehenge lintels
13. We now have an explanation for the salt-tolerant lichens at Stonehenge
Fig 14: Photo of Lintel Page, 2011 Visitors' Guide to Stonehenge
Heading (top left, under title "Lichens") reads: "Many of the lichen species found at Stonehenge usually grow only on exposed coastlines:their presence at Stonehenge remains mysterious".
14. We have an explanation for Seahenge (one that briefly attracted the e-word from the BBC in its 1999 Report).
Display the 1999 BBC Page (to come shortly)
Fig 15: Seahenge, BBC 1999
The timbers are now on display in a local museum, with no e-word in the internet page, indeed little on the site itself, more on what the neighbouring human settlement would have looked)! Nuff said. (Give link to my recent posting on the Museum's display).
15. We now have an explanation for the Thornborough Cursus, cutting across the central of the three henges:
https://megalithix.wordpress.com/2009/08/26/httpwp-mepi6d8-1fy/
More to come
16. We now have an explanation for innumerable (150+) yet, even now, mysterious cursus in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. I'll be putting the spotlight on one of the three in Ireland in the next day or two.
17. We now have an explanation for ????? More to follow.( Yes, am keeping an option in reserve, one of several).
18. We now have an explanation for the location of Woodhenge and Durrington Walls .
Woodhenge a proto-Stonehenge,constructed as the name indicated with earlier timber. Durrington: Housed the sky burial specialists , not too close, not too far from Stonehenge itself. A discreet distance. How remunerated? Maybe with livestock. maybe with sustenance for lives. Cue the versatile pig, which could have been housed in pens at Durrington, the accumulations of their bone mistaken for "winter feasting". (The seasonal link was based on the assumption that the pigs were born in spring. Why? Pigs are happy to breed year round!).
19. We now have an explanation for Silbury Hill.
"Silbury Hill is the largest artificial prehistoric mound in Europe. Probably built over a short period between about 2470 and 2350 BC, it is one of the most intriguing monuments in the prehistoric landscape of the Avebury World Heritage Site"
Note it came relatively late. Maybe sky burial was going out of fashion. Maybe manual excarnation with copper or bronze blades, then making their first appearance.
See my posting on Ancient Origins (give link - or maybe screen grab) with a suggested role for earthworms as soil rather than sky "burial".
Fig.16: screen grab, my Ancient Origins posting on proposed function of man-made Silbury Hill.
Link
20. We now have an explanation for the curious route taken by the "Avenue", initially in the direction of upstream Durrington/Woodhenge, then turning sharply down to a more southerly stretch of the Avon, avoiding that awkward bend.
Fig 17: Circuitous route, Avenue (graphic from current posting)
Graphic showing the curious route taken by the Avenue. (Yes. There's the interesting claim that it follows natural chalk stripes, created by melting ice in Ice Age, but there are as many questions as answers).
20. Why the difficulty in getting one's message across? Answer: when a claim is made via a newspaper headline, the search engine displays the headline as clickbait, and those clicks then assist its rise in rankings. When an internet blogger such as myself composes what one hopes is an eye-catching title for the latest posting, guess what?
Here's a partial screen grab of 2014 Mail Online article on Amesbury as the "London" of Neolithic Britain.
The title of one's new (poaaibly newsworthy?) postings is invariably ignored! The (major) search engine may give some of one's SITE (not posting) title. It may pull a few words from one's posting, eye-catching or otherwise, it may give a date (usually from an older posting, months, even years earlier, but rarely the date of one's latest posting) but it never, repeat NEVER displays one's posting title. So is it any wonder that one's idea(s) fail to get a look-in, alongside those trumpeted through newspaper headlines like the one above! Use of the internet as a a real-time learning curve (esp by retired scientists no longer with lab access and other back-up facilities ) is a total waste of time for as long as the present state of affairs continues. Learned societies - kindly get your oar in. Register a protest on behalf of retired scientists and other professionals. Condemn the system for its gross inadequacies!
This posting will probably the last on Neolithic Britain where new observation, new content is concerned. I shall now sit and await reactions, from whatever quarter - internet initially, hopefully (later on) from academe and the media too (though holding out no great hope where 'being noticed' is concerned, lacking as I do a published paper in a refereed journal, Press Officer. But think of the hundreds of papers in those refereed journals, instantly flagged up by the media, all promulgating the same old 'solstice celebration" narrative (or as some woukld say, fantasy). Evidence: virtually zilch, not counting correlation ("the axis of Stonehenge faces the Heel Stone, then the Avenue, then the north-east. Ipso facto Stonehnge is oriented towards the midsummer sunrise, or maybe the midwinter sunset, or if they don't quite fit, substitute something else that is vaguely astronomical, like either of the two equinoxes, or, if really desperate, phases of the Moon bla bla....).
My view on alignment, orientation? Stonehenge was aligned originally with the Heel Stone, a sarsen that was probably where it is, or nearly so, prior to the arrival of Neolithic man, who was immediately taken with its bird-like features, especially when turned upright from an initial recumbent position. But Stonehenge could have been at any point on the compass, facing the Heel Stone. Why point it at Heel Stone AND the north-east? Answer: nothing to do with summer or winter solstices as such (longest and shortest days respectively). How could one celebrate one or other day at sunrise or sunset if the sky were cloudy? Why construct a vast monument to celebrate just one or maybe two days a year? Who would want to celebrate a winter solstice late in December?
No, there's a more down to earth explanation for a north east orientation, towards the Heel Stone AND the north east. It ensured that there was illumination of the central 'business area' of the trilithon horseshoe first thing (i.e.crack of dawn) in the summer months and, as an added basis, last thing (sunset) in the winter months. We're talking now about optimizing to seasonal sunlight, i.e. over months, not singling out particular days of then year to put garland in our hair and dance around pillars, with mighty labour-intensive lintels (probably over decades) serving no role beyond mere decoration.
Postscript: Saturday Nov 23
On Monday, in two days time, I'll try a slightly different tack as a means of getting the sky burial explanation for Stonehenge better known (without at this stage involving the mass media). That's industrial-scale sky burial you realize, which explains why things were done (finally) on a megalithic scale, having evolved from much humbler beginnings (henges, timber posts, single standing stones etc).
Here's what I intend to do. I have drawn up a list of 22 points that each contribute some indirect, i.e. circumstantial, evidence that support the sky burial thesis. They will be divided into a First X1 and a Second X1, cricket-style. Each of the stronger points selected for the First X1 will come with a brief, nay telegraphic summary, so as to provide a quick takeaway mental checklist. (I'll withhold a similar back-up screed for the Second X1 for the moment, so as not to overload the reader).
Why the reluctance on the part of the internet-readership in general thus far to signal acceptance of what's set out in this posting, to say nothing of previously since early 2012?
Answer? The chief one is clearly to do with the mechanics of sky burial, aka excarnation, aka defleshing. Accompanying plus points as regards soul-release, or reference to cremation as a final clean-up seem to make little impact. Sky burial is simply seen as somehow alien to Britishness, not just modern but Neolithic too (overlooking the new evidence that the builders of Stonehenge sailed in originally from the far away eastern end of the Mediterranean (Aegean Sea, Anatolia etc) , only to be subsequently displaced by the Beaker folk ). But I suspect its also to do with the nature of the evidence - not compellingly direct , but a less dramatic accumulation of indirect evidence, brick by patiently introduced brick...
Meanwhile, English Heritage continues to promote its solstice celebration narrative as if rock-solid fact. Not so, English Heritage. There is a dearth of evidence to support your narrative, nay rose-tinted fantasy. I say its time you began to address hard fact, time to start articulating the likely function of Stonehenge as an industrial-scale site devoted entirely to sky burial, followed by cleansing end-stage cremation of left-overs.
Further postscript, Nov 24, 2019
Have just responded to Andy Burnham, founder of the Megalithic Portal website. Here's a screen grab (yes, naughty I know) with his response first to my complaint against "dolmen" being equated with "burial chamber", followed immediately after by my own:
Apols. It's somewhat faint and blurry. Try clicking to enlarge. Alternatively, you may prefer, dear reader, to visit the above thread, via the following URL:
https://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=6019#comments
Further PS (Tuesday Nov 26, 2019)
The comment above, posted to Megalithic Portal. protested initially at a particular "dolmen" being categorized by a fellow commenter as a "burial chamber". Imagine then my surprise at being told by site founder Andy Burnham that it was official site policy to treat the dolmen as a sub-category of burial chamber, and allow the two to go unchallenged in so-called News items . Anyone disagreeing with that policy should place, correction, bury their protest on a particular "Forum" section of the site's bewildering array of tabs (labelled "sacred", "mystery"!). Talk about control freakery!
My contempt for that site grows by the day, attempting as it does to call the shots on all matters related to megalithic additions to the landscape.
At least my comment above is still where I placed it - under the offending News item. It has not been shunted into a Forum or elsewhere, which is more than one can say for yesterday's latest crossing of of swords with the control-freak owner of Meg Forum.
Latest run-in?
Another "News" item appeared yesterday, one which referred to "rock art" and "decorations" on prehistoric stones, lying horizontally in the turf at the "Whitehall" site in east Dunbartonshire. I have taken the liberty of reproducing here the accompanying image:
Here was my immediate comment sent to the same "News" item (no, not to an obscure forum):
Here's a bolder version of what I wrote:
Get real, for heaven's sake! Cup-marked stones, with or without surrounding concentric circles and linear drainage channels, served not as art but as rainfall reservoirs for sky burial platforms. Read bird bowls.
Here's a detailed account of those thoughtful (bird-friendly) man-made additions, correction, subtractions (gouged-out rock).
Link
Shame about the failure on the part of an otherwise excellent review to put two-and-two (conceptually) together.
Colin Berry
But you won't find it there any longer. Why not? Because Andy Burnham popped up, saying I had been warned that my kind of comment had no place under a "News" item. Yes, it's been moved, goodness knows where, possibly deleted for all I know. (Oh, but my link to that detailed 2012 review on cup-marked stones etc has been retained, though don't ask me where).
I just had time to return with a short message, saying that this retired non-nonsense scientist had no time for the Forum sections of Meg Portal's site, that anytime it wishes me to resume informed comment on its NEWS items it has only to let me know. In the meantime, I shall stay away from Megalithic Portal. with its mental blitz of tabs, many of them repetitive , to say nothing of its galloping control-freakery.
You need to curb your controlling bullying tendency, Megalithic Forum. You need to acquaint yourself with the scientific method, which takes an exceedingly dim view of those who deploy loaded terminology that attempts to pre-empt scientific enquiry, to stunt scientific progress. I say that it's wrong, entirely wrong to pre-classify dolmens as burial chambers. I now say it's also wrong, entirely wrong, to pre-classify those cup-shaped markings on kerbs, dolmen capstones etc as mere decorative art. Both are related , I say, to the practicalities of modifying megaliths to serve as sky burial platforms, i.e. to make them bird-friendly.
Start of late insertion (Nov 30, 2019)
I say that Meg Portal - to say nothing of a few other websites - is acting as an internet roadblock to an understanding of our nation's TRUE hitherto concealed, totally unadorned, PROTO -industrial history.
Yes, monumental Stonehenge represented the highest point of a steadily-growing pre-Bronze Age industrialized development of THE preferred means of human body disposal.
Method? Answer: two-stage body disposal, namely via (admiitedly unsightly) SKY BURIAL , followed by (admittedly unsightly|) end-stage CREMATION of left-overs. But that two-stage process was considered marginally superior to (a) "simple" inhumation (burial) or (b) "simple" whole-body cremation.
Reasons? Ask Neolithic man! He would given you any number of reasons, all now lost in the mists of time to our modern-day Homo interneticus, bar it seems this single unsentimental hard-headed, lone voice it an otherwise the online wilderness. !
If that be the modern world - then so be it. I and the modern world will now go their separate ways! May your mind rest easy with those spoon-fed fond delusions, dear reader, constantly sustained by those dodgy supportive websites, pandering continually to your fancy, rarely if ever to hard, albeit unsavoury facts.
You read it here first, dear reader, starting in a small way on this very website some 7 years ago!
Why hide one's light under a bushel when pretty well everyone else, on and off the internet, is trying to hide one's "tell-it-the-way-it is, no-holds-barred" torch-light?
I say it's time that we as a nation faced up to truth regarding our own history - bestowed to us via those allegedly 'enigmatic' megalithic monuments. Yes, they continue to litter our national landscape, all having served essentially the same purpose - to assist with disposal of the dead via sky burial, culminating in Salisbury Plain's spectacular end-stage Stonehenge! Then copper and bronze tools came along (spades, picks etc) simple burial became a faster practical option, and sky burial quickly went out of fashion.
Memories of sky burial were gradually lost. Some better-informed folk (centuries ago) recoiled no doubt at the sight of those dolmens, knowing or suspecting their true function, and proceeded to cover some of them over with mounds of earth (causing later generations, the current one in particular, epitomized by Megalithic Portal) to mistake them for "burial chambers"! Kid yourselves if you wish, Meg Portal. Just don't expect the rest of us to swallow your fanciful rewriting, indeed gross misrepresentation, of pre-Bronze Age history...
(End of late insertion)
Here's a screen grab of the front cover of that flagged-up Varner review:
Why on earth would anyone bother placing "decorative art" (read "cup-holes") on the upper surface of a so-called "burial chamber" (read "dolmen capstone")?
For heaven's sake, Megalithic Portal! Cease mixing up ideas with your mangled semantics. You are a disgrace to the world of knowledge... It is folk like you, Megalithic Portal, who give the internet a bad name, shunned and/or ignored by academe and mainstream media alike. You queer the pitch for everyone else (this retired scientists included) trying to use the internet as a responsible medium of communication.
Sorry to have to say it (graphically) but...
Further postscript (still Nov 26)
The internet hugely bores me right now, at least as a medium for communicating original and dare I say informed viewpoints, developed over many years of patient study, leaving no stone unturned. Like, you know, Stonehenge as a site for sky burial (on a ceremonial, indeed industrial scale)
I've decided to return to an older interest, albeit intermixed with existing focus, namely current affairs, City and business issues especially, climate change, nutrition and health etc
Here's a comment I've just placed on the Telegraph Business Section. It was a quickie response to Juliet Samuel's article entitled " Johnson dare not risk losing this election for the sake of tax cuts". Link to Comments:
Appendices
1. Key passage in the wiki entry for DOLMEN (my bolded italics)
It remains unclear when, why and by whom the earliest dolmens were made. The oldest known are found in Western Europe, dating from c 7,000 years ago. Archaeologists still do not know who erected these dolmens, which makes it difficult to know why they did it. They are generally all regarded as tombs or burial chambers, despite the absence of clear evidence for this. Human remains, sometimes accompanied by artefacts, have been found in or close to the dolmens which could be scientifically dated using radiocarbon dating. However, it has been impossible to prove that these remains date from the time when the stones were originally set in place.[2]:
2. Here are three comments I have placed on Tim Daw's sarsen.org site (Friday 20 Dec):
Here's a hastily-assembled image created in MS Paint needed to 'unveil' a new theory for 'proto-Stonehenge", which I'm placing on Tim Daw's current sarsen.org posting:
https://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=6019#comments
Further PS (Tuesday Nov 26, 2019)
The comment above, posted to Megalithic Portal. protested initially at a particular "dolmen" being categorized by a fellow commenter as a "burial chamber". Imagine then my surprise at being told by site founder Andy Burnham that it was official site policy to treat the dolmen as a sub-category of burial chamber, and allow the two to go unchallenged in so-called News items . Anyone disagreeing with that policy should place, correction, bury their protest on a particular "Forum" section of the site's bewildering array of tabs (labelled "sacred", "mystery"!). Talk about control freakery!
My contempt for that site grows by the day, attempting as it does to call the shots on all matters related to megalithic additions to the landscape.
At least my comment above is still where I placed it - under the offending News item. It has not been shunted into a Forum or elsewhere, which is more than one can say for yesterday's latest crossing of of swords with the control-freak owner of Meg Forum.
Latest run-in?
Another "News" item appeared yesterday, one which referred to "rock art" and "decorations" on prehistoric stones, lying horizontally in the turf at the "Whitehall" site in east Dunbartonshire. I have taken the liberty of reproducing here the accompanying image:
Here was my immediate comment sent to the same "News" item (no, not to an obscure forum):
Here's a bolder version of what I wrote:
Get real, for heaven's sake! Cup-marked stones, with or without surrounding concentric circles and linear drainage channels, served not as art but as rainfall reservoirs for sky burial platforms. Read bird bowls.
Here's a detailed account of those thoughtful (bird-friendly) man-made additions, correction, subtractions (gouged-out rock).
Link
Shame about the failure on the part of an otherwise excellent review to put two-and-two (conceptually) together.
Colin Berry
But you won't find it there any longer. Why not? Because Andy Burnham popped up, saying I had been warned that my kind of comment had no place under a "News" item. Yes, it's been moved, goodness knows where, possibly deleted for all I know. (Oh, but my link to that detailed 2012 review on cup-marked stones etc has been retained, though don't ask me where).
I just had time to return with a short message, saying that this retired non-nonsense scientist had no time for the Forum sections of Meg Portal's site, that anytime it wishes me to resume informed comment on its NEWS items it has only to let me know. In the meantime, I shall stay away from Megalithic Portal. with its mental blitz of tabs, many of them repetitive , to say nothing of its galloping control-freakery.
You need to curb your controlling bullying tendency, Megalithic Forum. You need to acquaint yourself with the scientific method, which takes an exceedingly dim view of those who deploy loaded terminology that attempts to pre-empt scientific enquiry, to stunt scientific progress. I say that it's wrong, entirely wrong to pre-classify dolmens as burial chambers. I now say it's also wrong, entirely wrong, to pre-classify those cup-shaped markings on kerbs, dolmen capstones etc as mere decorative art. Both are related , I say, to the practicalities of modifying megaliths to serve as sky burial platforms, i.e. to make them bird-friendly.
Start of late insertion (Nov 30, 2019)
I say that Meg Portal - to say nothing of a few other websites - is acting as an internet roadblock to an understanding of our nation's TRUE hitherto concealed, totally unadorned, PROTO -industrial history.
Yes, monumental Stonehenge represented the highest point of a steadily-growing pre-Bronze Age industrialized development of THE preferred means of human body disposal.
Method? Answer: two-stage body disposal, namely via (admiitedly unsightly) SKY BURIAL , followed by (admittedly unsightly|) end-stage CREMATION of left-overs. But that two-stage process was considered marginally superior to (a) "simple" inhumation (burial) or (b) "simple" whole-body cremation.
Reasons? Ask Neolithic man! He would given you any number of reasons, all now lost in the mists of time to our modern-day Homo interneticus, bar it seems this single unsentimental hard-headed, lone voice it an otherwise the online wilderness. !
If that be the modern world - then so be it. I and the modern world will now go their separate ways! May your mind rest easy with those spoon-fed fond delusions, dear reader, constantly sustained by those dodgy supportive websites, pandering continually to your fancy, rarely if ever to hard, albeit unsavoury facts.
You read it here first, dear reader, starting in a small way on this very website some 7 years ago!
Why hide one's light under a bushel when pretty well everyone else, on and off the internet, is trying to hide one's "tell-it-the-way-it is, no-holds-barred" torch-light?
I say it's time that we as a nation faced up to truth regarding our own history - bestowed to us via those allegedly 'enigmatic' megalithic monuments. Yes, they continue to litter our national landscape, all having served essentially the same purpose - to assist with disposal of the dead via sky burial, culminating in Salisbury Plain's spectacular end-stage Stonehenge! Then copper and bronze tools came along (spades, picks etc) simple burial became a faster practical option, and sky burial quickly went out of fashion.
Memories of sky burial were gradually lost. Some better-informed folk (centuries ago) recoiled no doubt at the sight of those dolmens, knowing or suspecting their true function, and proceeded to cover some of them over with mounds of earth (causing later generations, the current one in particular, epitomized by Megalithic Portal) to mistake them for "burial chambers"! Kid yourselves if you wish, Meg Portal. Just don't expect the rest of us to swallow your fanciful rewriting, indeed gross misrepresentation, of pre-Bronze Age history...
(End of late insertion)
Here's a screen grab of the front cover of that flagged-up Varner review:
Why on earth would anyone bother placing "decorative art" (read "cup-holes") on the upper surface of a so-called "burial chamber" (read "dolmen capstone")?
For heaven's sake, Megalithic Portal! Cease mixing up ideas with your mangled semantics. You are a disgrace to the world of knowledge... It is folk like you, Megalithic Portal, who give the internet a bad name, shunned and/or ignored by academe and mainstream media alike. You queer the pitch for everyone else (this retired scientists included) trying to use the internet as a responsible medium of communication.
Sorry to have to say it (graphically) but...
Further postscript (still Nov 26)
The internet hugely bores me right now, at least as a medium for communicating original and dare I say informed viewpoints, developed over many years of patient study, leaving no stone unturned. Like, you know, Stonehenge as a site for sky burial (on a ceremonial, indeed industrial scale)
I've decided to return to an older interest, albeit intermixed with existing focus, namely current affairs, City and business issues especially, climate change, nutrition and health etc
Here's a comment I've just placed on the Telegraph Business Section. It was a quickie response to Juliet Samuel's article entitled " Johnson dare not risk losing this election for the sake of tax cuts". Link to Comments:
Appendices
1. Key passage in the wiki entry for DOLMEN (my bolded italics)
It remains unclear when, why and by whom the earliest dolmens were made. The oldest known are found in Western Europe, dating from c 7,000 years ago. Archaeologists still do not know who erected these dolmens, which makes it difficult to know why they did it. They are generally all regarded as tombs or burial chambers, despite the absence of clear evidence for this. Human remains, sometimes accompanied by artefacts, have been found in or close to the dolmens which could be scientifically dated using radiocarbon dating. However, it has been impossible to prove that these remains date from the time when the stones were originally set in place.[2]:
2. Here are three comments I have placed on Tim Daw's sarsen.org site (Friday 20 Dec):
-
Here's a link to the notion flagged up in my above comment, hastily put together with the aid of MS Paint.ReplyDelete
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMIc5PVTUwo5xXwggISWgzwN0VTTQqLpd9mBsBg8waRhcx8lpx1MSec4FiF_0WUtNRRPkOA2caXSV-l-UQjGVrq-dZZND_ACkvSNL2t4W2jZiRCGY3bocuzoHNFtKLIad3SO_Qu53JH9jn/s400/Neolithic+airaid+shelter+blue+top.png
The "lintel" (colour-coded blue) might better be described as a (dolmen-like) capstone, albeit serving its own unique purpose for protecting migrants and unfamiliar territory, en route to the safer open expanses of the elevated chalk downland of Salisbury Plain.
-
Apols for the omitted passage: that should have read:
The "lintel" (colour-coded blue) might better be described as a (dolmen-like) capstone, albeit serving its own unique purpose for protecting migrants and their livestock, venturing into unfamiliar territory, en route to the safer open pastures of the elevated chalk downland of Salisbury Plain.
Here's a hastily-assembled image created in MS Paint needed to 'unveil' a new theory for 'proto-Stonehenge", which I'm placing on Tim Daw's current sarsen.org posting:
Two days ago I flagged up on Tim Daw's site what I believe to be a new and original alternative to glacial transport, one that might, just might, provide a rationale for human transport of megaliths over the 140 or so miles from Wales to Salisbury Plain. It's what I dub the "air raid shelter" model (my Model 2!). Thus far there has been absolutely no response to my invite to deploy a 'shop window' site different from my own to supply more detail (making more efficient use of the internet, notably those quirky search engines, one in particular, that look for initial cross-linking of websites).and followed it up later (still Sunday) with this one:
If Brian is in the market for what I consider a realistic and challenging alternative to his Model 1 (if only as a seasonal goodwill gesture!) then he has only to give the green light, and I'll send this site a concise 250 word summary, probably between Christmas and New Year.
... they disagreed with those who have claimed that ice transport was "impossible" ...
But it's not a question of whether ice transport was impossible, at least, not in strictly scientific terms at any rate. It's a question of whether human transport over the 140 or so miles from Wales was possible or not, given sufficient motivation.
I say it was possible, and indeed went so far as to provide a reason in a comment submitted earlier today (still awaiting "moderation", Brian, read approval).
I say (Model 2) the megaliths that comprise present day Stonehenge arrived in small instalments, as mobile "air raid shelters", designed to protect long-distance pastoralist migrants from the spears and arrows of disgruntled hunter-gatherers, resentful of their territory being intruded upon, albeit en route to a distant location. The latter - extensive Salisbury Plain - was probably of little interest to them, but no doubt attractive to those seeking new safe open, largely unforested grazing for their livestock.
Am trying to remain positive, despite the deafening silence.
Here's my plan, given the festive season. I'll hold off posting formally on Model 2 (initial deployment of bluestones in transit from Wales to Salisbury Plain for use as overnight air raid shelter (protection from enemy spears and arrows).
I'll post the broad outline first on my sussingstonehenge site The more self-critical science-based evaluation will be on my sciencebuzz site shortly after.
Expect to see another new input: it's to do with the precise route taken from Pembrokeshire (etc?) to Salisbury Plain. I personally do not buy into sea transport, sharing the views of Mike Parker-Pearson and others. But that still leaves rivers, notably the Severn as major obstacles.
There's a point just a few miles downstream from Gloucesterwhere where the River Severn is a mere 100 yards or so across, just before widening out into the Severn Estuary. Rafting bluestones across would still be challenging assignment, especially if there were 80 or so to be shifted.
I suspect cross-river transport at that major point was assisted by a regular-as-clockwork phenomenon that occurs 130 days per year in response to tidal phases of the moon. Yup, it's called the Severn Bore, a mighty wave of heaped-up water which flows not just straight down the middle, but at certain bends in the river from one side to the other. Go figure! I reckon that wave was exploited by Neolithic bluestone transporters, needing to get their air raid shelter components from one side of a major river to the other...
Colin Berry
Here's my plan, given the festive season. I'll hold off posting formally on Model 2 (initial deployment of bluestones in transit from Wales to Salisbury Plain for use as overnight air raid shelter (protection from enemy spears and arrows).
I'll post the broad outline first on my sussingstonehenge site The more self-critical science-based evaluation will be on my sciencebuzz site shortly after.
Expect to see another new input: it's to do with the precise route taken from Pembrokeshire (etc?) to Salisbury Plain. I personally do not buy into sea transport, sharing the views of Mike Parker-Pearson and others. But that still leaves rivers, notably the Severn as major obstacles.
There's a point just a few miles downstream from Gloucesterwhere where the River Severn is a mere 100 yards or so across, just before widening out into the Severn Estuary. Rafting bluestones across would still be challenging assignment, especially if there were 80 or so to be shifted.
I suspect cross-river transport at that major point was assisted by a regular-as-clockwork phenomenon that occurs 130 days per year in response to tidal phases of the moon. Yup, it's called the Severn Bore, a mighty wave of heaped-up water which flows not just straight down the middle, but at certain bends in the river from one side to the other. Go figure! I reckon that wave was exploited by Neolithic bluestone transporters, needing to get their air raid shelter components from one side of a major river to the other...
Colin Berry
Here the key passage (with typo correction)
Expect to see another new input: it's to do with the precise route taken from Pembrokeshire (etc?) to Salisbury Plain. I personally do not buy into sea transport, sharing the views of Mike Parker-Pearson and others. But that still leaves rivers, notably the Severn as major obstacles.
There's a point just a few miles downstream from Gloucester where the River Severn is a mere 100 yards or so across, just before widening out into the Severn Estuary. Rafting bluestones across would still be challenging assignment, especially if there were 80 or so to be shifted.
I suspect cross-river transport at that major point was assisted by a regular-as-clockwork phenomenon that occurs 130 days per year in response to tidal phases of the moon. Yup, it's called the Severn Bore, a mighty wave of heaped-up water which flows not just straight down the middle, but at certain bends in the river from one side to the other. Go figure! I reckon that wave was exploited by Neolithic bluestone transporters, needing to get their air raid shelter components from one side of a major river to the other.
I am presently in the process of replacing my Model 1 (chiming bluestones) with Model 2. (I make no apologies, having discarded 9 models before arriving at my final Model 10 - flour-imprinting/radiant heat roasting - for the Turin Shroud).
I'm more than happy to unveil Model 2 here on Tim's site - even here, buried in Comments, should anyone be seriously interested.
Here's a handful of clues. Think difficulty but effective mobile air raid shelter for migrant Neolithic pastoralists. Think warm cuddly lambs (and a few less cuddly pigs for good measure), both needing protection from spears and arrows fired by dangerously close hunter-gatherers lurking in nearby woodland. Think Phase 1 lengthwise (not crosspiece) bridging lintels serving a highly practical (defensive!) purpose. Yes, air-raid shelter for both migrants and their accompanying livestock! Go figure!