One of the most intriguing and mysterious ancient sites in Britain is Stonehenge, which continues to this day to captivate and fascinate the public. Standing in solitude in the hills of Wiltshire and pre-dating the pyramids of Egypt, the 'henge' itself was constructed first.
Submitted by Sean Williams on Thu, 10/22/2009 - 17:41
Archaeologists have discovered the remains of a prehistoric city, buried beneath a reservoir in southern England. The 'mini-Atlantis' was unearthed after water levels were lowered at the old Tottiford Reservoir, near Moretonhampstead - and comes complete with a Stonehenge-esque ceremonial site.
Archaeologists observing the city are justifiably astonished at its existence.
About a mile away from Stonehenge, at the end of the 'Avenue' that connects it to the River Avon, archaeologists have discovered a smaller prehistoric site, named - appropriately, after the colour of the 27 Welsh stones it was made of - Bluehenge. The newly discovered stone circle is thought to have been put up 5,000 years ago - which is around the same time work on Stonehenge began - and appears to be a miniature version of it. The two circles stood together for hundreds of years before Bluehenge was dismantled. Researchers believe its stones were used to enlarge Stonehenge during one of a number of redevelopments.
It's more than 4,000 years since people have stood around this grave-site unified by such an electrifying sense of awe and anticipation. Here in the tiny hamlet of Forteviot, nestled in a bend of the River Earn in the floor of a lush agricultural valley six miles southwest of Perth, the lid is about to be lifted on what archaeologists hope is a burial cist in one of the biggest Neolithic monuments in Scotland.
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"If this henge was built of stone, rather than earth and timber, it would be a place that pagans and hippies would worship, it would be more important than Stonehenge."
Kilmartin Glen is an area in the Argyll region of north western Scotland that yields one of the largest and most important concentrations of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments on the entire Scottish mainland. There are some 350 monuments within a six mile radius of the village of Kilmartin. 150 of them are prehistoric.
Among the monuments are standing stones - such as the 4,000 year old Ballymeanoch complex and the equally as venerable pair of stone circles at Temple Wood - and a large wooden henge dating to 2600 BC which, it has been said by experts, in its day would have dwarfed Stonehenge. Additionally there are numerous concertations of burial chambers, cairns and cists. Displays related to the rich history of Kilmartin Glen can be seen in the Kilmartim House Museum of Ancient Culture, in the village of Kilmartin itself.
Submitted by Sean Williams on Thu, 05/14/2009 - 11:25
Stonehenge may have a history spanning almost 5,000 years, but the last century has been one of its most poignant and fascinating, seeing it restored from its former dilapidated state into one of Britain’s officially most loved tourist sites.
An Auspicious Start
Before 1901 Stonehenge was in a bad way. Many of the huge stones had sunk out of position; some had fallen over; and much of the land around the monument had been excavated beyond recognition. Seemingly every scholar who wanted to make a name for himself would visit Stonehenge for some reason or another. Even Charles Darwin commented on the area’s archaeological remains for his book The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms.
Submitted by Ann Morgan on Tue, 04/07/2009 - 12:43
Reading the Rings
Standing solemn and mysterious in the rolling Wiltshire countryside in south-west England, Stonehenge has to be one of the most powerful and intriguing ancient sites in Britain. So much so, that writers from Sir Philip Sydney to Thomas Hardy have drawn on it in their work, and as many as 900,000 people come every year to marvel at this ancient feat of engineering about which so much is still unexplained.
Spanning a period equivalent to the time between the fall of the Roman Empire and today, the construction of Stonehenge began during the Middle Neolithic Age in around 2,900 BC – 200 years before the first pyramid would appear in Egypt. The Neolithic Age was characterised by the arrival of farming in Britain from mainland Europe, a change which prompted a shift away from the hunter-gatherer way of life towards more settled living.
The Rollright Stones are a complex of megalithithic sites situated near the village of Long Compton, on the Oxfordshire/Warwickshire border. The complex consists of three main groups - The Kings Men stone circle, the King Stone, and the Whispering Knights.
The King's Men, around 70 closely-spaced stones forming a 33 m diameter circle, are set on top of a circular bank with an entrance to the southeast marked by two portal stones. The King Stone - a single, weathered 2.4 m high monolith - stands 76 metres east of the King's Men. Meanwhile, the Whispering Knights are the remains of the burial chamber of an early/middle Neolithic portal dolmen and lie 400 metres east of the King's Men. Four of the Knights are still standing, forming a two metre square chamber around a fifth recumbent stone, probably the collapsed roof capstone.
The name 'Rollright' is believed to derive from 'Hrolla-landriht', meaning the land of Hrolla.
About a mile away from Stonehenge, at the end of the 'Avenue' that connects it to the River Avon, archaeologists have discovered a smaller prehistoric site, named - appropriately, after the colour of the 27 Welsh stones it was made of - 
It's more than 4,000 years since people have stood around this grave-site unified by such an electrifying sense of awe and anticipation. Here in the tiny hamlet of 
