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The Bluestones

 
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The Bluestones

 Broadly speaking the monument is made up of two stone types. Sarsens and Bluestones.

The Sarsen stones, the Heel Stone, the stones of the outer Sarsen circle and the central Trilithons, are 'local' to the area. These hard sandstone stones were transported from the Marlborough Downs; about twenty miles to the north-east of Salisbury Plain.

 

There is a bluestone circle inside the outer sarsen circle and a bluestone horseshoe inside the trilithons. Originally they may have comprised as many as eighty Bluestones, weighing up to five tons each.

The Bluestones have tended to be overshadowed by their larger neighbours.

 

Stonehenge is not the first site where the bluestones stood as a circle. The stones show evidence of having been erected somewhere else previously.

 

 

 

Before their erection at Stonehenge these stones comprised a sacred circle. Robert Graves said this sacred circle was transported to Stonehenge for it's religious significance; in the words of Professor Rhys ' the stones were regarded as divine or as seats of divine power'. 

The bluestones are not local to the area of Stonehenge; so where did the bluestones originate?

The frequently maligned early historian Geoffrey of Monmouth, in his  'History of the kings of Britain' written around 1139AD, wrote

"If you are desirous," said Merlin, "to honour the burying place of these men with an everlasting monument, send for the Giant's Dance, which is in Killaraus, a mountain in Ireland. For there is a structure of stones there, which none of this age could raise, without a profound knowledge of the mechanical arts. They are stones of a vast magnitude and wonderful quality; and if they can be placed here, as they are there, round this spot of ground, they will stand forever."

At these words of Merlin, Aurelius burst into laughter, and said, "How is it possible to remove such cast stones from so distant a country, as if Britain was not furnished with stones fit for the work?" Merlin replied, "I entreat your majesty to forbear vain laughter; for what I say is without vanity. They are mystical stones, and of a great medicinal virtue. The giants of old brought them from the farthest coast of Africa, and placed them in Ireland, while they inhabited that country. ....There is not a stone there which has not some healing virtue." When the Britons heard this they resolved to send for the stones....A fleet therefore being got ready , they set sail, and with a fair wind arrived in Ireland. ...they went to the mountain Killaraus, and arrived at the structure of stones, the sight of which filled them both with joy and admiration. Merlin. .began his own contrivances. When he had placed in order the engines that were necessary, ho took down the stones with an incredible facility, and gave directions for their carrying to the ships, and placing them therein. This done they set sail again, to return to Britain; where they arrived with a fair gale... Merlin set up the stones... in the same manner as they had been in the mountain Killaraus."

Geoffrey of Monmouth, History of the Kings of Britain pp133+

 

 

download the History of the kings of Britain in .pdf format

However Geological analysis in relatively recent times has shown that the bluestones at Stonehenge came from somewhere in the Preseli mountains in Pembrokeshire, Southwest Wales. The Preseli mountains lie in that part of westernmost Britain in an area settled by the Irish and sometimes referred to as Ireland in Geoffrey's time (More on this here)

So Geoffrey was not wrong about where the stones came from;

but what about the rest? Stonehenge had already stood for millenia by the time of Ambrosius. (More on this here)

 Did Geoffrey attribute the movement of the stones across great distances to Merlin's magic because he truly believed that or was he just saying he didn't really know how they'd been moved.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" - Arthur C. Clarke

 

The use of 'It must have been magic' can be as much an expression of ignorance as it is of superstition. It's a term still used to refer to something not understood, inexplicable.

The extent of our knowledge on the subject is well summed up by Julian Richards in his book  'Stonehenge.' "Human transport, despite the distances and effort required, still seems a more reasonable concept."

Several hundred years later, despite all the advances in science, we still don't know how the stones were transported.

Stonehenge Now

Until the advent of the railways transport by water was the only way to effectively move large heavy objects over long distances.

(read more on water vs land transportation)

 

It's likely that much of the transportation of the bluestones from the Preseli Mtns. to Stonehenge was by water. First by river, then along/across the Bristol Channel/Severn Estuary, then lastly by river(s) to Stonehenge; and while we can't be certain which rivers were used we can be certain that in their passage across the Bristol Channel/Severn Estuary the bluestones would have been carried past Lundy Island

 

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"The great dolmens of Stonehenge, all of local stone, look as thought they were erected to give importance to the smaller stones, which were placed in position shortly after they themselves were. It has been suggested that the smaller ones which are known to have been transported all the way from the Prescelly Mountains in Pembtokeshire, were originallt disposed in another order there and rearranged by the people who erected the larger ones." - Robert Graves; The White Goddess, p282.

 

 

 

An existing sacred circle, whose stones originated in West Wales, was transported to Salisbury Plain, re-erected at Stonehenge and a mirror structure of local stone was erected around it.

 

 

The Bluestones

 

 

So, where did the bluestone circle first stand?

 

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The previous home of the Bluestones must have been a special place, a holy place, to contain such an illustrious circle.  

The physical effort alone involved in transporting over 80 stones weighing up to five tons each to Stonehenge testifies to some special significance possessed by their previous home. 

Stonehenge, which is treated as the foremost Megalithic stone circle, is unique in several ways, not least of which is the builders use of stone lintels, a feature not found in any other ancient stone circle.

But there is an other, even more important feature of Stonehenge which makes it different. Megalithic stone circles consist of stones erected to align with, or indicate, natural features in the landscape. Mountains or hills over which the sun, moon or other celestial object rise or fall on certain significant dates.

'Throughout time the coincidence of a sunrise or sunset with a natural feature such as a mountain or an island has always been, and indeed still is, awe inspiring. Any site which possessed such an alignment was a natural indicator of a heavenly event and thus sacred.' :- Henry Lincoln

The same author also says 'Any place which possessed such alignments was holy.'

The significant alignments are there, in the landscape, with or without the stones.

Not so Stonehenge. All the alignments are marked by the stones, they indicate no natural features, without the stones there are no alignments. 

Stone circle on Lundy

The move also left a special place without a stone circle.

 

Where?

 

Is it possible that special place could have been Lundy Island (read more)

a connection between Stonehenge, Lundy and the Preseli Mountains

visit the Megalithic Portal

 

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