A Recent paper by the University of London, Southampton,
and Manchester; about the discovery of the quarry that provided the
'bluestones' for Stonehenge at Craig Rhos-y-felin
caught the eye of the world by archaeologists announcing Stonehenge was
originally built in Wales then transferred to Salisbury Plain 500 years later.
Which is
totally incorrect and wholly inaccurate?
The ‘Craig
Rhos-y-felin: a Welsh bluestone megalith quarry for Stonehenge’ was a report
published in December’s Edition of Antiquity Magazine, it stated that a series
of radiocarbon dates were found on the site by a 4m long monolith (ready for
transportation) made of a rock which was microscopically identified as the same
bluestone as the rocks that surround the existing Stonehenge site. Moreover, the report’s authors
had decided that just two random sample dates (the two closest to their well-publicised hypothesis on Stonehenge's
construction date) would be headlined and advertised to the mass media.
In spite of these published radiocarbon dates the
archaeologists had an obvious problem, as the samples were still 500 years
older than the dates, they were hoping to find.
So they had to invent a new ‘story' to compensate for this ‘poor
science’ and so started the speculation, in their report, that the monument was
originally built in Wales then moved at a later date. This
will no doubt be followed by another report in a few year's time
(archaeologists love to do the lucrative lecture tours on limited ‘titbits’ of
information) finding remains of a few small bluestones within a short distance
from the quarry site and claiming them as evidence of the original Stonehenge –
probably followed by even more lucrative lecture tour.
Nevertheless,
if we take an unbiased and more analytical view of the report, we find
something very different from the media claims and much more scientifically
interesting.
Mike Parker Pearson et al. Craig Rhos-y-felin: a Welsh bluestone megalith quarry for
Stonehenge. Antiquity, 89, pp 1331-1352. doi:10.15184/aqy.2015.177.
|
What was contained in detail within the report but
overlooked, was the fact that a considerable number of Mesolithic carbon dates
(fourteen compared to just two Neolithic dates the report headlined) were
obtained from actual human-made hearths much, much earlier in history compared
to two random nutshells found in an ‘occupation area’ - which could have been
scattered by animals or even the weather?
Consequently,
the lowest material found in the excavated area (remembering not the entire
site was excavated) was dated at 8550 - 8330 BCE.
These
earlier and more frequent dates are from hearths
rather than just random nutshells and was
completely overlooked by the team, as it was 'perceived' to be too early
to have a connection to Stonehenge. Nevertheless, this connection was well
established some fifty years ago and was reported in a 'press release' by
myself in August 2011 - entitled ‘The Stonehenge Enigma; an inconvenient
truth’:
The
article shows that English Heritage did their utmost to conceal the truth about
the real 'probable' date of Stonehenge being 5,000 years earlier than their
current position. This scientific evidence was
based on radiocarbon dating of the
three ‘giant’ post holes found in the visitor’s car park during its
construction in 1966.
At the
time the wooden remains of the posts (found at the bottom of the post holes)
were labelled Neolithic in origin to support the existing antler pick dating
hypothesis and was placed on a shelf probably for eternity. Fortunately, some years later an inquisitive Ph.D.
student writing a thesis on the Stonehenge’s environment found these samples
and concluded that they could not be as claimed by the archaeological
community, as they were from pine trees which pollen analysis had concluded
were ‘extinct’ in this area at this time of Stonehenge’s supposed construction.
The officials (of the Historic Buildings and Monuments
Commission, which was later renamed English Heritage) were dismay when they
found out that their 'experts' were wrong, and the student was absolutely
correct (sadly, never gave her a deserved job as she clearly knew more than the
supposed ‘experts’) in her assumption as the carbon dating placed them at the
start of the Mesolithic of 8860 to 6590 BCE just after the ice age.
So, rather than then admitting their fundamental error and
re-opening the site to look for more holes and dates to get to the bottom of
this unique mystery (which would have been the case for most credible
scientific disciplines) they came up with a remarkable and unproven 'story'
that these were random 'totem poles' placed by wandering 'hunter-gatherers'
which did not relate to the Stonehenge site just 50m away. But was a sheer
coincidence, which should be totally ignored.
Over the last four years since my
‘press release’ was ignored by the archaeology world, the story has moved on
with even more evidence of English Heritage’s continuing cover-up.
Archaeologists have now found charcoal from fires in the
centre of the Stonehenge monument, which date back to the same early period
(but again the news was suppressed) and less than a mile away at the top of the
hill that overlooks Stonehenge a site called ‘blick mead’ excavated by the Open
University, which is showing us that people were living and 'feasting' at this
same earlier period yet this 'totem pole' myth is still firmly entrenched
in EH's view of our prehistoric history through their many costly guidebooks.
Moreover,
recently the Stonehenge site has had a major transformation as it has closed the b-road
that went past the stones and gave access to the old visitor’s car park - which
was now moved a mile up the road to the
new multi-million-pound visitors centre.
Consequently, the aged tarmac was removed and was replaced by grass to make it
look more like it did at the time of Stonehenge’s construction.
Now one might imagine that if you were going to remove the tarmac
from the old visitor's car park (knowing you have found something quite
extraordinary underneath in the past) you would take this 'once in a lifetime
opportunity’ to excavate the car part fully to see if you can find any more
evidence about the Mesolithic Period of Stonehenge’s history?
Did they?
- did they heck!!
“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance;
it is the illusion of knowledge.”
― Stephen Hawking
So I was
personally saddened that further evidence which could support my theory (that
these post holes were mooring posts for boats bring the stones from the Preseli
Mountains of Wales) would be lost
forever. However, a recent blog post has opened up a new light in this matter.
Tim Daw was a warden at Stonehenge, and he has always been
active in taking pictures on the site as he worked on a day-to-day basis at
Stonehenge and published them on his blog site.
Last year, he found patch marks by the centre upright stones that were
identified as the possible missing circle stones of the Inner Circle, therefore
his contribution to the investigation of Stonehenge has been immense.
Tim Daws picture of the post hole - EH would like
to lose!! How much history is being lost
through ignorance and propaganda??
|
Tim also took
some shots of trenches dug during the reinstatement of the grass over the old
visitor’s car park and found something quite remarkable - but he was not
allowed to publish as EH had warned him that his unauthorized blog activities
had to stop or else.... three guesses why this happened? Tim being a man of
principal resisted and resigned so continuing his blog work and as a
consequence, these new ‘unofficial’ pictures have been made available, showing, even more, post holes are under the car park.
This newly
discovered post hole is on the line of four other known post holes. Moreover, it supports my hypothesis, that they are all on the shoreline of the River
Avon at about 8400 BCE. Furthermore, the fact that rivers in Britain
were ten times larger in the past than today
effected on not only the River Avon. - but the River Nevern, at Craig Rhos-y-felin which the current ‘Brynberian Stream, (which feeds the Nevern) is
only 20m away, from the newly identified quarry
site.
Consequently, during the Mesolithic period, the newly
quarried stones could be placed in boats on the shoreline of the quarry in
Wales and could be sailed almost ‘directly’ to Stonehenge, via just two or
three enlarged rivers. And not over the longer sea route, some archaeologist
attempted to consider in the past.
This
report also goes into great depth in the analysing
of the Stone structure of the bluestones from other Preseli sites such as Carn
Goedog, Cerrigmarchogion and Craig Talfynyydd, Carn Breseb, Carn Gyfrwy and
finally Carn Alw areas. All of which have streams and rivers connecting them
with the River Nevern – unfortunately, the archaeologists only can conceive this
connection as a ‘religious’ connection rather than something quite functional. Yet,
archaeologists seem able to consider the existence of a hypothetical road system
such as Mike Parker-Pearson’s ox-cart route, that follows the current A40 route,
which doesn’t take into account the woods, swamps and even forests of that
period, which would make passing impossible.
Nevertheless,
this should be no surprise to readers of the Craig Rhos-y-felin report is full of inconsistencies and logical
inaccuracies as the layout of the site was never
taken into consideration. My analysis of the area shows that the
‘Brynberian Stream’ by the rocky outcrop was much higher in the past - such as
in the period directly after the last ice age. This flooding of this area is
well known to geologists for they found sand deposits are in the sub-soil.
Geologists on the team seemed to have created a false assumption that these
flood waters are from ‘ice melt’ and rapidly disappeared after the ice age into
the sea. Sadly, this idea is easy shown to be a false
assumption as, if true, the sea levels would
have risen to a couple of meters short of today’s levels then plateaued – but
this is not the case as the evidence shows that the ‘seepage’ into the oceans
took thousands of years to occur and hence Doggerland off the East coast of
Britain, took almost ten thousand years to disappear under the North Sea.
This misunderstanding of the past water levels has lead to Geologists
misinterpreted the sediments or the past.
A very similar soil found in one location is given a different name to
the same type of soil in another location – so the term ‘Colluvium’ and
‘Alluvium’ is a case in point. If it is
found in a dried-up land area it as called Colluvium, but if it’s by an active
river, it’s called Alluvium – the point is THEY ARE THE SAME MATERIAL – a
combination of silt and sand.
Remembering
this lack of distinction, we find in the report that an old river ran around
this quarry as long ago as 5620 – 5460 BCE and
possibly up to 1030 – 910 BCE.
“Most of
the site was then covered by a layer of yellow colluvium (035), dated by
oak charcoal to 1030–910 cal BC (combine SUERC-46199; 2799±30 BP and
SUERC-46203; 2841±28 BP). This deposit is contemporary with the uppermost fill
of a palaeochannel of the Brynberian
stream that flowed past the northern tip of the outcrop. Charcoal of Corylus
and Tilia from the basal fill of this palaeochannel
dates to 5800–5640 cal BC (OxA- 32021; 6833±40 BP) and 5620–5460 cal BC
(OxA-32022; 6543±37 BP), both at 95.4% probability”
Consequently, what the report is trying to tell us, is that
an enlarged stream that feed into the River Nevern was flowing at during the
Mesolithic Period up to the quarry outcrop rocks and just a few metres away even
up to 1000BCE, the obvious system to transport large stones to their
destination as we have seen from other such construction else where in the
world like Egypt.
The 'enlarged stream' is more of a huge river -
perfect to float a boat with a four-tonne
bluestone down river to the Nevern
|
Moreover,
the site layout also gives a clear indication on when the stone was truly quarried. There is a single monolith ready for transportation is by the river on the
east side of the site and the hearths which are clearly man-made are a few
metres south of this monolith – where you would expect them. The problem for archaeologists is that these
are Mesolithic hearths, and they're not just one but four hearths dating from
8550 – 8330 BCE; 8220 – 7790 BCE 7490 – 7190BCE and 5210 – 4947 BCE and yet the
report quite clearly states:
“There is
no evidence of any Mesolithic Quarrying or working of Rhyolite from this crop”
This is an
astonishing unscientific claim for how would they know what tool marks are
Mesolithic or Neolithic (would they not be the same tools?) And secondly, what do
they think they were doing there during at
the quarry during this 1500 year period?
However,
what is quite remarkable is the fact that this is a ‘rhyolite’ Quarry. For back
at Stonehenge Pit 9580 which was excavated in 1989, was found to be in line
with not only with the four post holes found in 1966, but moreover, the one
found last month by Tim Daw we talk about earlier
The excavation report stated that Pit 9580 width started at 1.3m and was then
widened to 1.9m – so what was this large
trunk of a tree used for? The
archaeologists believed it to be a ‘totem pole’ – but why remove such a pole to
put in a larger version at a later date? What I am sure is that it could take a considerable weight if
required – but what could be the load be?
The answer comes 20cm down the infill of this post hole as they
found a piece of Rhyolite (would you believe?) And the date of this deposit can be estimated
as the soil deposit it was sitting upon was carbon dated as 7560 - 7335 BCE
overlapping with the date of hearth number three found at the quarry site.
The final and conclusive proof of my hypothesis!!
Post holes at Stonehenge on the shoreline of the
River Avon - taking off the Preseli bluestones from the boats
|
Moreover,
we can now narrow down the exact date for the construction of Phase I of
Stonehenge (bluestone placements in the Aubrey holes) to 7490 to 7335 BCE. In fact, if we look at the carbon dating of the
hearths at Craig Rhos-y-felin and the Car park post hole samples date at
Stonehenge we see something quite remarkable – not only do we have one hearth
matching radio carbon dates at Stonehenge – we have all three!!
- Craig Rhos-y-felin (BCE) Stonehenge Visitor's Car Park(BGE)
- Hearth One: 8550 – 8330 Post A. HAR-455 8820 - 7730
- Hearth Two: 8220 – 7790 Post B. GU-5109: 8090 - 7690
- Hearth Three: 7490 – 7190 Post C. QxA-4220: 7580 – 7090
- OxA 30503: 7490 – 7190 Post B. Har-456: 7480 – 6590
- SUERC-51163: 7540 - 7300 Post 9580. QxA- 4219: 7700 - 7420
EH has
invested millions in its new 'money spinner' the Stonehenge Visitors Centre.
Within it you will see many claims and models about the origin and possible
function of Stonehenge - this exhibition has cost hundreds of thousands of
pounds to design and build. BUT what would happen if their assumptions are proven wrong?
Not only would it have to scrap all the exhibits and a new
ones installed, but also the books and literature were written over the decades
would need to be 'pulped' as they tell a story of nonsense, just as the
Victorian literature was ‘shelved’ when carbon dating revealed that it was not
a Roman Temple after all. Moreover, the directors
responsible for this multi-million pound
fraud would suffer a potential financial and credibility loss would have to
'fall on their swords' and find new jobs (and there is not many jobs around for discredited archaeologists or
historians).
Or they
are just very good at their job!
Excellent as always Robert! (The aerial photo of the post-holes with Tim Daw's "D" in the car park seems too small to view even when clicked on. I managed to just about make out the new post by zooming the image in my software).
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, it looks as though there *should* be another post between C and D (?)
Absolutely right... I would guess their are a complete series of Post holes - and that's the point really - why are they covering this area up rather than investigating..it's a sandal!!
ReplyDeleteWill try to enlarge that photo and put it back on the blogs.
Thanks!!
Are these ancient monuments older or more complex (in terms of engineering) than those of Peru, Bolivia, Egypt? I can maybe fathom moving those bluestones by boat (some big, impressive boats no?!), but not the giant 150-tonne plus blocks making the enormous walls and roads in Peru. That blows my mind. Then there are the obelisks in Egypt, etc, which are thousands of tons and appear to be LASER-CUT?!?! What the hell is going on.
ReplyDeleteEngineering skills of the ancient Stone Masons we greatly underestimated by current archaeologists. We know that vast 100 tonne blocks we moved by boat down the Nile as there are pictures inside Tombs depicting this process. You need not place stone blocks on boats - you can use a simple raft or the most easiest form is to tie wood to the block with string - it will float!! making it easy to move as for 'laser cuts' straight cuts can be obtained by understanding the grain of the rock and a system of wedges and water to expand the wood would give you these fine edges!
ReplyDeleteHmm, you say:
Delete"straight cuts can be obtained by understanding the grain of the rock and a system of wedges and water to expand the wood would give you these fine edges"
I'm not convinced. Look at these cuts, curves and polished edges:
http://www.gizapower.com/pma/index.htm
Surely we're looking at MACHINE precision. And they'd have to have powered those machines.
Some quotes from one engineer on site:
"The tools displayed by Egyptologists as instruments for the creation of many of these incredible artifacts are physically incapable of reproducing them." [...]
"there are several artifacts that indicate machinery power being used by the pyramid builders. [...] exhibit marks that are the same as those resulting from cutting hard igneous rock with modern machinery.
And:
"there is unmistakable evidence of machine tooling methods. It will probably surprise many people to know that evidence proving that the ancient Egyptians used tools such as straight saws, circular saws, and even lathes has been recognized for over a century. The lathe is the father of all machine tools in existence, and Petrie submits evidence showing that not only were lathes used by the ancient Egyptians, but they performed tasks which would, by today’s standards, be considered impossible without highly developed specialized techniques, such as cutting concave and convex sperical radii without splintering the material."
"I can say with reasonable confidence that no lasers were used in cutting the materials which went into building the Great Pyramid." [...]
Petrie once said:
"The material of these cutting points is yet undetermined; but only five substances are possible - beryl, topaz, chrysoberyl, corindum or sapphire, and diamond. The character of the work would certainly seem to point to diamond as being the cutting jewel; and only the considerations of its rarity in general,...interfer with this conclusion."
Observations by engineers sometimes lack knowledge of stone age tools that were available to Cro-Magnons such as obsidian.
DeleteThe hardest material out there is diamond, so logically a diamond knife should be the sharpest type. The difficulty is that diamond crystals tend to 'cleave' in what's called an octahedral fashion, which doesn't allow for a very sharp blade cross-section.
Glass on the other hand is 'amorphous', so it does not have any natural planes to split, or cleave to, making it much more suitable for making sharp edges.
A type of naturally occurring glass that has already been in use since the Stone Age as a blade is obsidian. Obsidian is a volcanic glass that is created when magma is pushed to the earth's surface and is cooled very rapidly. This stops it from forming a crystal structure and also introduces a form of 'compressive strength' which makes the material even stronger.
The Mayan Indians are credited with using obsidian blades first 2,500 years ago, although Stone Age spear tips made of obsidian have been found elsewhere in the world. Since obsidian will fracture down to a single atom, it is claimed to have a cutting edge five hundred times sharper than the sharpest steel blade, and under a high magnification microscope an obsidian blade still appears smooth, whereas a steel blade has a saw like edge.
So a obsidian cutting tool would leave a 'machine' like cutting edge.
Fascinating, I thought they would have sank primitive boats. Do you think they used a method like this?
ReplyDeletehttp://blog.stonehenge-stone-circle.co.uk/2012/10/03/moving-the-stonehenge-bluestones-at-last-a-successful-method-is-demonstrated/
That's the construction the Discovery Channel stole from my first edition book 'the Stonehenge enigma' - its not a boat its a landing platform - the earliest form of an hydraulic crane.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.the-stonehenge-enigma.info/2012/10/the-discovery-channel-tries-out-my.html
Brilliant article, I've been quietly following your work for some time and I have to say that I believe you have stumbled upon the truth, and I think I have a fair idea as to why the authorities are keen to suppress this information.
ReplyDeleteThe reason I personally believe they are suppressing this so much is due in part to something you yourself touched upon in this very blog post. The melting of sea ice doesn't increase the sea level, at least not by any serious degree. Obviously the compression and saturation of the land in Britain's case around this time makes a 'Water World' situation look possible, but that is only on the face of it. If modern scientists today were to take the findings you present, the cash-cow that is climate science would be under threat. Not only that, but the jobs of multiple so called 'archeologists' in work today (who are in truth not much better than the those 'experts' we had under Aubrey or Stukeley) would have their own positions under threat. Science today acts in a weird way, it shuns new information and it's become almost the new priesthood.
In any case, I wanted to talk to you about a programme I had watched some weeks ago with Tony Robinson, whereby he walks the route taken by a a supposed religious procession from Avebury to Stonehenge which followed the river. Not once was the importance of the river itself even referenced! I did watch it thinking of your hypothesis in mind thinking that you're material was being totally vindicated. (http://www.channel4.com/programmes/walking-through-history/articles/series-2/walking-guide-the-path-to-stonehenge)
Also I couldn't help but notice the 'discovery' of another henge at Durrington Walls was considerably close to the a waterway, and it's banks and entry certainly looks like it could have been used as some sort of harbour entrance.
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/archaeology/11844357/Huge-ritual-monument-found-hidden-near-Stonehenge.html)
I do believe that maybe these monuments served a duel purpose as both functional and religious, who is to know? However it is a little irritating that every discovery gets connected with ritual. According to most archelogists they spent so much time speaking to their Gods its a surprise they had time to grow food, hunt or fish to survive!
Anyway, please keep up the great work. I know it must be difficult working against the system, but I really do believe you are on to something with this project.
Best wishes!!
Thank you Captain!
DeleteYes slowly but surely the evidence for Post Glacial Flooding is becoming evident - which is a strange way will help us to understand the constant rise in sea levels and its causes!!
More new sites to come on the blog and I will be launching a new archaeological TV channel with videos and field walks (using my new toy..a drone to get air views) during the summer solstice - when I finish the editing of my new book to be launched on the same day...stay turned!!
the address..opps is Archaeological News TV
Delete