Aubrey Holes update

I received an email from Mike Parker-Pearson with an update on what is happening with the remains recovered from the Aubrey Holes.

We've now had a chance to assess what more needs doing with analysis of the cremations. There is so much material that the researcher is going to have to write a whole PhD on the assemblage.

That means that we will need a 2-year extension to the MoJ licence (to commence from August 2010).

I will keep you all informed about the progress of work. So far, we have identified the remains as being predominantly adult men with two women and probably two children (though these numbers may well change). Generally they were reasonably healthy in life. A few had osteoarthritis, and one had a benign soft tissue tumour behind the knee.

Please bear in mind with this apparently lengthy work schedule that the bone fragments are very small and it is very painstaking work to properly analyse them. It can't (and shouldn't) be rushed.

The remains will continue to be looked after in Sheffield.

It is my considered opinion that two years (the statutory length of time for studying bones under the new legislation) is not long enough.

Talk about Riverside Project research

Mike Parker-Pearson will be talking at Wiltshire Heritage Museum in Devizes at 7pm on Saturday 10 October about the recent research of the Stonehenge Riverside Project.

You can book a ticket online from Wiltshire Heritage Museum.

Bluestonehenge

Mike Parker-Pearson has issued a press release about Bluestonehenge, the site near Stonehenge whose existence was leaked on Saturday. (Another version is available from the University of Sheffield.)

The new stone circle is 10m (33 ft) in diameter and was surrounded by a henge – a ditch with an external bank. These standing stones marked the end of the Avenue that leads from the River Avon to Stonehenge, a 1 3/4-mile long (2.8km) processional route constructed at the end of the Stone Age (the Neolithic period). The outer henge around the stones was built around 2400 BC but arrowheads found in the stone circle indicate that the stones were put up as much as 500 years earlier – they were dragged from Wales to Wiltshire 5,000 years ago.

Picture by Peter Dunn

Human remains at Stonehenge

The government has issued a response to an e-petition requesting the reburial of remains from the Aubrey Holes at Stonehenge.

Apparently the Ministry of Justice licence for exhuming the bones stipulated that they must be reburied after two years anyway.

Is two years actually long enough for studying human remains? How will the remains be protected from decay once they are returned to the ground? What if better techniques are devised for studying them in the future?

Not so far from the truth

An amusing skit on NewsBiscuit about Stonehenge...

'Stonehenge was to be a place where local merchants and tradesmen could gather, in order to peddle their wares and services to the thousands of Bronze Age tribes people who occupied Salisbury Plain at the time'. The document includes a plan, which shows that originally 600 stalls were to be constructed over a 200 acre site that would have also boasted ample grazing for 3500 Oxen and cart. ‘Stonehenge was essentially going to be the world’s first out of town shopping centre,’ said Dr. Bogaard.

Actually they do think that stone circles were used for trade and politics as well as ritual, so it's not as far-fetched as it sounds. For instance, Arbor Low is located at the meeting point of the boundaries of three tribal lands - so could well have been used for trade and negotiation. Just as churches were used as sanctuaries from the law, a stone circle could have been neutral territory because of its sacredness.

I did like the idea of druids as pharmacists, as well.

Hat-tip to Cariadwen.

Arthur's protest

My response to Arthur's protest at Stonehenge

Context: Arthur's 7-month protest at Stonehenge is mainly in response to the excavations of human remains by the Riverside Project, but also about the re-siting of the visitor centre.

English Heritage held a consultation about where to put the new visitor centre and it is a difficult decision because just about everywhere around Stonehenge is archaeologically sensitive. I responded to that consultation, and Arthur could also have done so if he wished (maybe he did, I don't know). The new location was announced in May 2009, and it takes time to build things, so I am not quite sure of the need for that part of Arthur's protest.

Also, as English Heritage is a quango, it is not "the government".

As far as the remains in the Aubrey Holes are concerned, they were removed from their context and jumbled up in the 1930s (according to what Arthur said), so I am not too sure of the need either to retain them for study, or to rebury them. Presumably if they are being retained for study, there must be something that can be learned from them. Apparently they were in excellent condition and are being studied.

I disagree with the automatic assumption that respect means reburial. Osteoarchaeologists do treat remains with respect, and respect can also mean perpetuating the memory of the ancestors.

Also I think people should refrain from saying, "As Pagans we believe..." because Pagans do not all believe the same things.

See also: A member's response and the comments on this post

Stonehenge consultation

English heritage has produced a spiffy new website with details of the Stonehenge consultation.

The government has ruled out spending lots of money on diverting the road or building a tunnel, so the only options on the table are the ones outlined in the consultation website. This is not English Heritage's fault.

Links to the forms are here, but it's worth going to the website and reading the various options and background material before plunging in.

• World Heritage Site Management Plan Feedback form
• Environmental Improvements Feedback form

Stonehenge

The seemingly endless round of consultations about what to do about Stonehenge is apparently being given new impetus by, of all things, the 2012 Olympic Games. A rich irony considering that heritage funding is being taken away to fund the sporty nonsense.

King Arthur is camping near Stonehenge in an attempt to embarrass the government into doing something about the ghastly visitor centre (which, if you haven't seen it, looks like some kind of Stalinist monstrosity).

The problem is, whatever they decide to do about visitor access to Stonehenge, someone is going to be unhappy about it. If they dig a tunnel for the A303 it will disturb other archaeology. Personally I liked the idea of taking away all the roads and fences and making people walk from a couple of miles away. That way the experience would be more like a pilgrimage and less like a gawp-fest. The merely idly curious would be satisfied with a visit to the visitor centre, and only those who really cared would bother to walk the two miles to the actual site.

Multi-purpose sacrality

There has recently been a re-evaluation of what Stonehenge was for. Professors Timothy Darvill and Geoff Wainwright have said that they think it was a place of healing, because they have found a large number of skeletons with evidence of trauma.

Professor Timothy Darvill and Professor Geoff Wainwright ... are not convinced, as others have been, that Stonehenge was a holy place or a secular tool for calculating dates. Instead, they think Stonehenge was a site of healing.

"The whole purpose of Stonehenge is that it was a prehistoric Lourdes," says Wainwright. "People came here to be made well."

Other archaeologists (such as Mike Parker Pearson) still think that

"Stonehenge... was built not for the transitory living but for the ancestors whose permanence was materialised in stone."

The New York Times (in less than serious mood) agrees:

Now, me well aware of controversy surrounding new Og Memorial Complex, also known as Massive-Rocks-Arranged-in-Mysterious-Circle. Some say it eyesore. Some say it waste of massive rocks. Some like concept of mysterious circle but find execution pedestrian. On behalf of Memorial Committee for Remembering of Og, me want to take opportunity to address concerns directly, and unpack some of artistic decisions involved in approving project like Massive-Rocks-Arranged-in-Mysterious-Circle.

But seriously folks, why can't it be a place of healing, and a place of the dead, and a place of spirituality and/or worship, and a big stone calendar?

Most sacred sites are multi-functional. If you go to Epidauros in Greece, it has a big theatre for performing sacred drama; there is a healing complex, and some tombs. If you visit a cathedral, it has tombs and it's a place of worship. Lourdes is a sacred place as well as a place of healing. Monasteries were places of prayer and healing and learning.

People didn't (and to some extent, still don't) separate these functions into sacred and secular. In the past, the boundary between sacred and secular was far more blurred than it is now (if it even existed), as archaeologists have told us. And healing was often associated with sacredness, as sickness was often held to be caused by spiritual forces or entities. For example the Asklepion (temple of Aesculapius on the Greek island of Kos) had dream incubation chambers, healing areas, and a huge temple. Why wouldn't Stonehenge be similarly multi-functional? Maybe aligning the stones on the solstices was believed to help with the healing process by bringing people back into harmony with the cosmos, or something (just a thought). Maybe the blue-stones, being brought from Preseli where there are lots of "ringing rocks" (Devereux, 2001) were held to have particularly good vibes or resonance with the spirit world, which would help with the healing; and infrasound affects both brain and body (Cook et al, 2008) so it could have beneficial effects.