Origins of the sarsen megaliths at Stonehenge

David Nash; Jake Ciborowski; Stewart Ullyott; Mike Parker Pearson; Timothy Darvill; Susan Greaney; Georgios Maniatis; Katy Whitaker

doi:10.1126/sciadv.abc0133

Origins of the sarsen megaliths at Stonehenge

David Nash, Jake Ciborowski, Stewart Ullyott, Mike Parker Pearson, Timothy Darvill, Susan Greaney, Georgios Maniatis, Katy Whitaker

Past Human and Environment Dynamics Research Excellence Group

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

The sources of the stone used to construct Stonehenge around 2500 BCE have been debated for over four centuries. The smaller "bluestones" near the center of the monument have been traced to Wales, but the origins of the sarsen (silcrete) megaliths that form the primary architecture of Stonehenge remain unknown. Here, we use geochemical data to show that 50 of the 52 sarsens at the monument share a consistent chemistry and, by inference, originated from a common source area. We then compare the geochemical signature of a core extracted from Stone 58 at Stonehenge with equivalent data for sarsens from across southern Britain. From this, we identify West Woods, Wiltshire, 25 km north of Stonehenge, as the most probable source area for the majority of sarsens at the monument.

Original language	English
Article number	eabc0133
Pages (from-to)	1-8
Number of pages	8
Journal	Science Advances
Volume	6
Issue number	31
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abc0133
Publication status	Published - 29 Jul 2020

Bibliographical note

Copyright © 2020 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license, which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, so long as the resultant use is not for commercial advantage and provided the original work is properly cited.

Keywords

sarsen
silcrete
Stonehenge
geochemistry
Multidisciplinary

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10.1126/sciadv.abc0133Licence: CC BY-NC

Origins ofthe sarsen megaliths at StonehengeFinal published version, 489 KBLicence: CC BY-NC

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/31/eabc0133 Licence: CC BY-NC

Cite this

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AU - Darvill, Timothy

AU - Greaney, Susan

AU - Maniatis, Georgios

AU - Whitaker, Katy

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Origins of the sarsen megaliths at Stonehenge

Abstract

Bibliographical note

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Georgios Maniatis

David Nash

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Origins of the sarsen megaliths at Stonehenge

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

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Georgios Maniatis

David Nash

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