Origins of Stonehenge - Original Purpose of the Stonehenge Site

The Original Purpose of the Stonehenge Site

Contents -

(1) The Social Evolution from a Nomadic Culture to a Settled One

(2) The Need For Settled Farming and a Season/Weather Forecaster

(3) An Understanding of Nomadic Life

(4) Successful Transition from Nomadic to Farming Culture

There is a possibility that the origins of the Stonehenge site may lie in the need for a system of fixed markers to enable the observation of the position of a sunrise on the horizon. This would enable the current point of the annual cycle of seasons to be established and the expected weather to be forecast.

Equipped with this knowledge, the British Neolithic people could then establish long term reliable and successful farming, and the social evolution from a small tribe nomadic culture to a large population settled one.

For details of this refer to the first section of wikipedia.org/wiki/Neolithic_Revolution

The following article attempts to justify this possibility. At the time of writing, although evidence is shown, irrefutable proof not yet available - but is being sought.

(1) The Social Evolution from a Nomadic Culture to a Settled One

The start of successful settled farming in Britain (and the transference from a nomadic culture to a settle rural one) requires an accurate understanding of the weather patterns and their accurate prediction.

A rural clock, or season/weather forecaster, would be essential to the establishment of successful farming, and it does seem that the development of the Stonehenge site coincides with the progress of farming in this area.

'Stonehenge: The Biography of a Landscape' (Timothy Darvill 2006, out of Allen 1997) describes the following stages of the growth of settled rural activity in this area as follows -

pre-4000 BC Wild woods with little or no cultivation.

~4000 BC to 3000 BC Reduce wild woods with some cereal cultivation in small plots and domestic cattle well represented.

~3000 BC to 1600 BC Emergent downland with predominant grassland and domestic livestock of cattle and pig. Some wheat and barley cultivation.

~1600 BC to AD 1500 Farmed downland with field systems and a wide range of livestock and cereal crops.

This coincides with the dates of various structures of Stonehenge as follows;

~ 8000 BC Pine posts holes

~ 3100 BC Aubrey holes

~ 2600 BC Q and R holes

~ 2500 BC Sarsen stones

~ 1600 BC (?) Y and Z holes

Sources - please refer to the bibliography at the end of this article.

Note, the above dates are given as approximate, as dates are assumed from the presences of organic material. So an earlier smaller hole structure replaced by a bigger one would be completely lost - and the Y and Z holes could date back far further than has been assumed. i.e. 3500 BC.

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The Rural Cycle

A simple and primitive rural annual cycle necessary for reliable and successful farming is as follows -

April - expect and care for the spring lambing, the sowing of crops when weather permits.

May - prevent impregnation of ewes by removal of tups (rams), care of land and fences.

June - hay making and sheep shearing, halt all sowing.

July - care of crops and live stock, start drying and storage of fruit, nuts and jerky (meat)

Aug - crop harvesting when weather permits.

Sept - preparation for winter, winter fuel collection, winter shelters repair, storage of crops.

Oct - end of month impregnation of ewes for spring lambing (5 month gestation).

Nov - cease out door activities, bring live stock into sheltered pasture and feeding pens. expect bad weather, stay indoors, no journeys.

Dec - mid winter, reallocation of winter rations, stock culling, trade surplus stock and grain for deficiencies.

Jan - stay indoors, care for live stock.

Feb - prepare land for spring, clearance of wooded areas and weeds before spring foliage growth.

Mar - prepare for spring lambing, land preparation for sowing.

Note, the breeding of goats, pigs, and cattle is not considered above, only that of sheep.

In addition, regular market fairs would need to be held so all those needing to trade could do so. Spring, midsummer, autumn, and midwinter would be sensible and practical times to enable those with surpluses and deficiencies to trade and balance their resources.

The above activities are very much effected and dictated by the seasons of the annual cycle. Unfortunately the daily weather in Britain can be a very unreliable guide as to forecasting the current and future seasons and expected weather. Hence the need for a season/weather forecaster.

For detailed information on the rural cycle refer to the following links;

medieval farming in brief - historylearningsite.co.uk/medieval_farming

medieval farming in detail - penultimateharn.com/history/medievalfarmingyear

modern farming - farm-direct.co.uk/farming/year/nmixed

Note - early medieval farming may be roughly compared to Neolithic as both appear to involve considerable manual labour with hand tools under the organisation of religious and warrior groups.

(2) The Need For Settled Farming and a Season/Weather Forecaster in 3000 BC

Nomadic Stone Age Cultures
Pre-Europe Contact North America Native Indians

Figure 2.1
Apache hunting party. Hunger appears to be part of their lives.
Early European contact (note - flint lock muzzle loading gun)

It is difficult to justify the need for a farming clock - or season/weather forecaster - as today’s townies just have no idea of what it is like to live by the sun and seasons, rising with the sun and going to bed at dusk with no other way of measuring or knowing the time. Nor in ancient times (around 3000 BC), with no DSS, of the annual struggle to get through winter without hunger or in the case of misfortune or a crop failure, actual famine and starvation - or of the problem of keeping track of the annual seasons, or even realising that there is an annual cycle at all with regular seasons, other than irregular warm and cold periods of unreliable duration.

Just look at the British weather in our time - an ancient person may well have found it difficult to believe that we have a regular cyclic winter, spring and summer, and found it difficult to judge when it was spring and time to sow, or mid summer when planting must be stopped as the crop will not have time to ripen before autumn - and to make a mistake could result in a winter famine and the deaths of the very young and old.

When thinking about the practical application of historical artefacts it should be considered as to what was important at the time of their build. Recorded history shows a state of continuous struggle to maintain a reliable source of food, with regular famines, and the struggle getting harder as history goes back in time. Records also show a state of almost continuous warfare and battles, and the need for fortifications and defence. Nomads tended to use mobile hit and run tactics, while the settled farmers built static forts, as illustrated by the North American nomadic Indian warfare with the European farming settlers in the 17th and 18th century. The hill forts of Britain could be an indication of developing farming settlements that needed the protection of a warrior group and a place of safety if attacked by the nomadic tribes.

If anyone wants to gain an idea of what must have been important to the ancient people then try going without food for just one day while exercising outdoors - that is with two nights, so it is 36 hours. I had to do this as part of my basic training in the army and have never forgotten the overriding obsession I had with food after 24 hours. I could literally think of nothing else ! Give it a try as part of life's experiences. No cheating ! Every schoolchild should do this - ahem, on a voluntary basis of course.

(3) An Understanding of Nomadic Life.

For an understanding of the life of nomadic tribes, read the real life experiences of Mary Rowlandson. She was taken captive by nomadic native American Indians before western culture changed their life style and subsequently wrote an account of them. Be warned, it is harrowing, but appears to be a primary source of information on the nomadic stone age life, especially as Mary was a devote Christian and would thus only recount the truth.

Follow these links - Mary_Rowlandson and Mary Rowlandson Experiences

or copy and search wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Rowlandson
and gutenberg.org/files/851/851-h/851-h.htm

It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, and that old pre-digital photographs do not lie. For photographs of the apparent hardness of life of a nomadic stone age culture please refer to Figures 3.1 to 3.7

( NOTE - click on figure for a full size view - and click on Windows 'previous screen' to return )

Figure 3.1
Unidentified - very early European contact - via photograph.
Evidence of a hard life with hunger and war?

Figure 3.2
Unidentified - very early European contact - via photograph.
Evidence of a hard life with hunger and war?

Figure 3.3
Unidentified - very early European contact - via photograph.
Evidence of a hard life with hunger and war?

Figure 3.4
North American Native Indians - very early European contact ? - via photograph and clothes.

Figure 3.5
North American Native Indians - after European contact ?
( via photograph and clothes)
This appears to be mid-summer and they appear well fed and healthy.

An indication of how serious hunger and famine may become in early cultures can be found on Wikipedia - Cannibalism, especially section 5.1, Accounts, Pre-history. To view, follow this link - Wikipedia - Cannibalism or search Wikipedia for ‘ cannibalism ‘.

Before an understanding of the regular annual cycle of seasons and a reliable way of predicting and keeping track of them, farming, especially in Britain due to the variations of the weather, would be a very unreliable and risky business. Hence humanity must have led a nomadic life following the food supply - rather like many nomadic American native Indian tribes before European settlers discovered them in the 1500s.

But of course the people still managed to survive and even enjoy their lives when times were good. Please refer to Figures 3.9 to 3.11 below that illustrate the simple lives and equipment of the North America Native Indian nomads cir 1500 AD (Artist Leonard Everett Fisher)

Figure 3.9 The Dance Band tuning up

Figure 3.10 Dancing to impress the squaws

Figure 3.11 Advantages of the Stone Club !

As the settled farming culture emerged it's developing technology, made possible by the increasing population and permanent institutions, gave it an advantage that the nomadic culture could not compete with, and a social evolution appears to have taken place. Below are illustrations of the stark and sudden confrontation between the North American native Indian nomadic tribes, cir 1600 AD, and the settled farming culture of Europe by the ‘settlers’ of the ‘wild west‘. The outcome of this confrontation is well known ! Note the difference in technology and equipment resulting in the replacement of nomads by settlers; and the need for efficient agriculture and settled communities in order to survive and develop.

Figure 3.12
Nomads defend the hunting grounds
(Note the safe warm snug homes built by the settles behind)

Figure 3.13
Settlers defend the farms and homes
(Note how impressed the nomad is by the advanced technology of the settler)

The Aboriginal race of Australia were also nomadic hunter gatherers before European contact changed their culture. They also appeared to have hard lives with hunger and war a constant problem.

Figure 3.6
Nomadic Aboriginal hunters (cutting up a Kangaroo)

Figure 3.7
Nomadic Aboriginal gathers (digging for ground nuts)

Figure 3.8
Nomadic Aboriginal woman winnowing chaff (early farming ?)

The slenderness shown above is not genetic. A quick search of Google/Bing images will show that the Aborigines can be just as big as anyone.

(4) Successful Transition from Nomadic to Farming Culture.

For the successful transition from a nomadic hunting gathering culture to a settled farming one in Britain there must be a method of predicting the weather and an understanding of the cycle of seasons to enable reliable cropping and harvesting, and successful animal husbandry. Season/weather forecasts based on the progression of the sunrises would enable this.

This particularly applies to midsummer (late June). Seeds planted after this may not have time to ripen and the crop would be lost, along with the vital planting seeds - usually the best. Food could not be stored for any length of time in that climate and the building standards of the time, and with no backup the tribe would face a very difficult winter. Even if the winter was survived reasonably well, when the spring came what would be sown? The tribe might well have to disperse to join other groups or be forced back into a hunter gatherer nomadic life style. So it was vital to know the midsummer point which would end sowing and planting and start the preparations for winter.

Figure 4.2
Wild grass

Figure 4.3
Easy to gather

Figure 4.3
Easy to farm

The date of the start of the Stonehenge site of around 3100 BC seems to be coincidental with the start of the establishment of successful farming communities in the Salisbury area - as described in 'Archaeology and Environment' by Michael J Allen (a good read and well worth buying) and above in Section 1. A number of settlements are being found, and it seemed to have a surprisingly large population. Once farming could be organised along (more or less) regular seasons and a reliable and regular food supply could be depended upon, the tribes could increase their population and develop communities and civilisation with trades and specialists such as engineers, doctors, scientist, and most importantly sages and warriors to organise and manage the people - and humanity could then advance (?) rapidly to where we are today.

For a fuller description of the requirement for an astrological agricultural structure to enable a settled farming culture please refer to Appendix B - ‘' Stonehenge and Other British Stone Monuments Astronomically Considered '' Chapter 3, by Norman Lockyer, 1906. A through understanding of this is essential for the serious student of Stonehenge. Ahem.

( NOTE - click on figure for a full size view - and click on Windows 'previous screen' to return )

Figure 4.2
A nomadic hunting gathering culture tribe
North American Native Indians
Early European Contact

This seems to be late winter, and a lean time. Will they all survive until summer ?

Please make any comments to - degray1982@gmail.com

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