Archaeology: update on Stonehenge

I am reluctant in writing something on Stonehenge again partly because I do not want to overstate the current research and partly because the preliminary results are still unknown. However, the interest is high, and it might be the right time to publish a short update. First of all, there are two excavations that have been carried out recently, one at Durrington Walls and one on the outskirts of the circle, next to a blue stone. The former excavation is sponsored by the National Geographic Society, while the latter is sponsored by the BBC. There is nothing wrong with archaeological excavations being sponsored by media companies, but understandably they need to transform the painstaking work of archaeologists into a work often producing sensational discoveries, when instead useful data is often gathered little by little, and usually understood much later.

The preliminary results from the latest excavations at Durrington Walls have been embargoed. However, the director of the excavation, Mike Parker Pearson, and archaeozoologist Umberto Albarella, of the University of Sheffield spoke with me about the first results and their ideas; a podcast was produced in that occasion and you can still listen to it. Durrington Walls, a settlement located near Stonehenge, is the most extensive excavation, the one that will produce new data. Its interpretation is being debated, as the different views expressed in the podcast demonstrate. This is positive: there would be no point in opening up a trench if those doing so were unprepared to open their minds as well. Durrington Walls has been interpreted by Mike Parker Pearson as part of the social and cultural landscape of Neolithic Stonehenge, the area of the living, where processions and great rituals were taking place, carried out by those building or visiting the monument. Stonehenge itself would be instead the area of the dead. However, Durrington Walls is also a very interesting site worth studying even ignoring for a moment its vicinity and possible relation with Stonehenge, as Umberto Albarella suggested in the podcast. In particular, the many animal bones recovered from the site can tell a story that might be as rewarding as any centred on Stonehenge, if we can listen to it. Durrington Walls is actually two sites: a processional way near the river, and a series of huts near an enclosure, perhaps the huts of the builders of Stonehenge. However, Grooved Ware has been found digging the huts and such ceramics are rare at Stonehenge.

(Miles Russell digging at Stonehenge in April 2008; image above from original photograph by Tom Goskar, published in Flickr under a Creative Commons licence)

A very small trench has been opened instead next to the standing stones by Professors Tim Darvill and Geoffrey Wainwright, with the declared purpose of collecting organic material that could be used to date the blue stones. A preliminary report is due this week and has been announced in the BBC website. No matter how many buckets of potsherds they found, none appears unique, nor we are going to know if a secure date can be retrieved from any object until much later in the year. An interesting report on both excavations published by Current Archaeology warns already of the risks of intrusions mentioning the finding of a Roman coin at the lower level of the pit, supposedly datable to an earlier period, the Neolithic. The excavators themselves were pleased in finding so much evidence, but the complexity of the stratigraphy, almost an urban one with interconnecting pits, makes it also very difficult to read. In that report it is even suggested that the Romans may have restored (e.g. modified) the stone circle. From the bulletins published in the BBC website so far I can only say that Neolithic pottery was found as well. The excavators have their own ideas about the blue stones, coming from a separate study: they were deemed to have healing powers. According to them, Stonehenge was the centre of action, the theatre or arena in which the action took place.

In reality, the archaeological evidence suggests that some important activities took place at both Durrington Walls (which includes an enclosure) and Stonehenge. Whether these activities were synchronic for part of the time and whether at any time it is possible to declare one site more important than the other, it remains to be seen. As mentioned in the previous blog post on Stonehenge, the only conclusion that we can draw at the moment is that Stonehenge has become a popular phenomenon, and it matters to us today perhaps even more than to ancient people at some moments of its long history.

(BBC cameras at Stonehenge in April 2008; image above from original photograph by Tom Goskar, published in Flickr under a Creative Commons licence)

Because of its long history, Stonehenge very likely carried different meanings for different people, and even today the monument still embodies new meanings, so do not expect that a single view can summarise its meanings, or that only one view can be right. Yet, beware from the hype transmitted by the media to the public or the trumpeting of interpretations as yet unproven. Stonehenge has still a lot to reveal and because it is very much in the hearts and minds of many people, it is still a monument making history, rather than simply representing a moment in history. When more news from the recent excavations will be released, there will be another commentary. Stay tuned! Till next time…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 15th, 2008 at 5:46 pm and is filed under Archaeology, Humanities. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.