{"id":696,"date":"2006-08-01T14:48:00","date_gmt":"2006-08-01T14:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=696"},"modified":"2006-08-01T14:48:00","modified_gmt":"2006-08-01T14:48:00","slug":"megaliths-archaeology-and-the-stoned-age","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=696","title":{"rendered":"Megaliths, archaeology, and the ‘stoned age’"},"content":{"rendered":"

In graduate school, I took a couple of classes on Mesoamerican religion taught by Davíd Carrasco<\/a>, an scholar of such edifices as El templo major<\/a> in Mexico City.<\/p>\n

One thing I came away with was that such structures served often to demonstrate how King Somebody’s reign was in sync with the gods, the will of Heaven, or however you want to phrase it.<\/p>\n

It made me look at places such as Stonehenge with new ideas. Could it really be not so much an observatory as an expression of Royal Will? (Or several Royal Wills, since it was built over centuries?) Ditto such American sites as Casa Rinconada, the huge kiva at Chaco Canyon<\/a>. Was it as imperialistic as Hitler’s Olympic stadium? Was Stonehenge laid out by a Neolithic Albert Speer<\/a>?<\/p>\n

And let’s bury once and for all the idea that megalithic structures told farmers when to plant. Farmers and gardeners do not need giant rock arrangements for that. Every locale has its signs in the natural world. “When the oak leaves are the size of a mouse’s ear, it is time to plant warm-weather crops” — or whatever works for you.<\/p>\n

All of this is a prelude to an interesting article about a megalithic site in Brittany that offers unusual opportunities for archaeological work<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In most cases, virtually no artifacts or other evidence of the builders has survived, leaving the field wide open for speculation:<\/p>\n

As man emerged from the caves and forests to cultivate open ground, he replicated the old, sacred caves by building cave-like tombs. These were made of groups of stones, covered with soil. At some point, in around 4000 to 3500 BC, mankind emerged further into the light. The pattern of stones within the tombs was expanded and uncovered to form ceremonial stone circles.<\/p>\n

What happened inside such enclosures has excited fevered speculation for centuries. Human sacrifice? Elaborate astronomical observations? Sexual and drunken orgies? Ceremonies at the winter and summer solstices to encourage the healthy growth of crops? Professor Burl suggests that, far from being elaborate astronomical observatories, most stone-circles are shaped by local topography. They do often, however, have alignments with summer and winter solstices and the movements of the Moon. Professor Burl’s best guess on their purpose is a mixture of propitiation of the crop gods and sexual and alcoholic-psychedelic orgies. There is much archaeological evidence that the late Stone Age was also a stoned aged.<\/em><\/p>\n

Read the whole thing, quick, before the link expires.(Hat tip: Cronaca<\/a>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In graduate school, I took a couple of classes on Mesoamerican religion taught by Davíd Carrasco, an scholar of such edifices as El templo major in Mexico City. One thing I came away with was that such structures served often to demonstrate how King Somebody’s reign was in sync with the gods, the will of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[20,41],"class_list":["post-696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-archaeology","tag-mexico"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-be","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10679,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10679","url_meta":{"origin":696,"position":0},"title":"Megalith Culture Spread by Seafarers?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 27, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"From Science, \"Stonehenge, Other Ancient Rock Structures May Trace Their origins to Monuments like This\" Stonehenge may be the most famous example, but tens of thousands of other ancient sites featuring massive, curiously arranged rocks dot Europe. A new study suggests these megaliths weren\u2019t created independently but instead can be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"Ancient megalithic monument in Brittany (Science magazine)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencemag.org\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/inline__699w__no_aspect\/public\/carnac_16x9.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencemag.org\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/inline__699w__no_aspect\/public\/carnac_16x9.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencemag.org\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/inline__699w__no_aspect\/public\/carnac_16x9.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":7304,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7304","url_meta":{"origin":696,"position":1},"title":"New Excavation at Marden Henge","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 28, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"A major archaeological effort beginning this summer will explore Marden Henge, a Neolithic monument that rivaled Avebury and Stonehenge but is less well known. Excavation within the Henge will focus on the surface of what is\u00a0thought to be one of the oldest houses in Britain,\u00a0a Neolithic building revealed during earlier\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.images.express.co.uk\/img\/dynamic\/1\/590x\/secondary\/Aerial-view-of-the-dig-site-306010.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.images.express.co.uk\/img\/dynamic\/1\/590x\/secondary\/Aerial-view-of-the-dig-site-306010.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.images.express.co.uk\/img\/dynamic\/1\/590x\/secondary\/Aerial-view-of-the-dig-site-306010.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2802,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=2802","url_meta":{"origin":696,"position":2},"title":"‘At Least It Was Dry’","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 21, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Photos from this year's summer solstice revels at Stonehenge.","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.dailymail.co.uk\/i\/pix\/2011\/06\/21\/article-2006112-0CA883D400000578-629_470x423.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4157,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4157","url_meta":{"origin":696,"position":3},"title":"Acoustic Stonehenge","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"April 28, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"People keep attempting to tease out the secret of Stonehenge. The astronomical-calculator explanation bulked large at one time and remains in popular consciousness, but do you really need to haul large stones for many miles in order to predict the solstice? If any thing, I suspect that it was more\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":34,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=34","url_meta":{"origin":696,"position":4},"title":"Solstice at the Stones","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 30, 2003","format":false,"excerpt":"Archaeology magazine got around to noting the contemporary Pagan use of Stonehenge and Avebury circles. The link will give you an abstract of the article; the full version is print-only.","rel":"","context":"In \"England\"","block_context":{"text":"England","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=england"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12928,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12928","url_meta":{"origin":696,"position":5},"title":"Who Were the People of Stonehenge?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 30, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"The British Museum is hosting a big exibition on the Neolithic context of Stonehenge, and obviously I cannot go.((\"Neolithic\" basically means stone tools + settled towns + agriculture + domesticated animals + pottery + some degree of social hierarchy.)) This what they said about it: The image of Stonehenge is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}