The megaliths of Stonehenge: new revelations

New revelations and new mysteries for Stonehenge: almost all the current megaliths come from a site 25 kilometres away. Except for two.

A study published in Science Advances seems to have almost completed our theories on Stonehenge and the origin of its megalithsanalysing the chemical composition of some of the sarsen stones of the site the researchers identified their place of origin, West Woods, 25 km from Stonehenge.

Some of the stones at Stonehenge were already there before the arrival of man

SARSEN AND BLUESTONE. The Neolithic monument at Stonehenge consists mainly of two types of stone, the sarsen and the bluestonethe subject of an extensive study published in early 2019bluestones are smaller stones scattered in different parts of the site. Stonehenge must originally have numbered about eighty sarsen, but today only 52 remain.

Stonehenge and other megalithic sites: do they have a common origin?

RAYS X. The origin of most of the bluestones, transported over 200 kilometres from Wales, was therefore already known, while the origin of many of the sarsen was unknown. Using the spectrophotometry the scholars analysed the chemical composition of the megaliths, comparing the results with each other and with other sarsen scattered around Britain: this led to the discovery that as many as 50 of the 52 remaining Stonehenge megaliths share the same composition and come from West Woods.

The prehistoric banquets at Stonehenge

INCOMPLETE PUZZLE. Although this research adds an important piece to the mysterious puzzle that makes up the Stonehenge picture, there are still several missing pieces. For example, the origin of two of the 52 remaining sarsen is still unknown. The study confirms, however, that those 50 megaliths were transported and placed at Stonehenge at the same time, dropping the old hypothesis that one of the megaliths studied - known as Heel Stone - was first brought to Stonehenge from a nearby location.

source: https://www.focus.it/cultura/mistero/i-megaliti-di-stonehenge-nuove-rivelazioni