It is one of the most famous prehistoric places in the world, but much about the origins of the Stonehenge landscape remains a mystery. Stunning new information about the Stonehenge landscape, especially in the third Millennium BC, has been uncovered by a number of university research teams in the twenty-first century.

Looking at Stonehenge, this book considers not only its wider setting, but also its status in time, from 10,000 BC right down to the modern day.

Our knowledge about Stonehenge has changed dramatically as a result of the Stonehenge Riverside Project (2003-2009), led by Mike Parker Pearson, and included not only Stonehenge itself but also the nearby great henge enclosure of Durrington Walls. This book is about the people who built Stonehenge and its relationship to the surrounding landscape. The book explores the theory that the people of Durrington Walls built both Stonehenge and Durrington Walls, and that the choice of stone for constructing Stonehenge has a significance so far undiscovered, namely, that stone was used for monuments to the dead. Through years of thorough and extensive work at the site, Parker Pearson and his team unearthed evidence of the Neolithic inhabitants and builders which connected the settlement at Durrington Walls with the henge, and contextualised Stonehenge within the larger site complex, linked by the River Avon, as well as in terms of its relationship with the rest of the British Isles. Parker Pearson's book changes the way that we think about Stonehenge; correcting previously erroneous chronology and dating; filling in gaps in our knowledge about its people and how they lived; identifying a previously unknown type of Neolithic building; discovering Bluestonehenge, a circle of 25 blue stones from western Wales; and confirming what started as a hypothesis - that Stonehenge was a place of the dead - through more than 64 cremation burials unearthed there, which span the monument's use during the third millennium BC. In lively and engaging prose, Parker Pearson brings to life the imposing ancient monument that continues to hold a fascination for everyone.

"Stonehenge Landscapes" is the largest digital analysis of the archaeological landscape and monuments of Stonehenge ever attempted. The study uses data from more than 1200 monuments. The contents of the Stonehenge barrows are collated for the first time and presented in a series of appendices. The result of this endeavour is a major phenomenological study of the development of the Stonehenge landscape from the Mesolithic to the Early Bronze Age. The authors explain how the landscape emerged over time, the developing relationships between the public monuments, and how these monuments created new spaces for social action in prehistory. The way monuments were used and perceived is discussed and the results are demonstrated through interactive software which displays GIS data, animations of movement along monuments and through the landscape, as well as 3-dimensional views of the landscape, panoramic photographs and videos. Uniquely, the reader can access all the data through their web browser, permitting them to perform their own studies and produce their own reading of the landscape of Stonehenge. "Stonehenge Landscapes" is a radical step forward in archaeological publishing, integrating computing and phenomenological study: permitting new insights into a well-known landscape and allowing the reader to participate in the study and interpretation of the results. The Stonehenge Lanscapes CD includes a software program to display various data sets. The copyright owner of this program is Ronald Yorston. Archaeopress holds a licence to distribute the program as part of the electronic version of Stonehenge Landscapes.

This book is an imaginative exploration of a place that has fascinated, intrigued and perplexed visitors for centuries. Instead of seeing Stonehenge as an isolated site, the author sets the stones within a wider landscape and explores how use and meaning have changed from prehistoric times right through to the present. Throughout the millennia, the Stonehenge landscape has been used and re-used, invested with new meanings, and has given rise to myths and stories. The author creatively explores how the landscape has been appropriated and contested, and invokes the debates and experiences of people who have very different and often conflicting experiences of the same place. Today, heritage managers, archaeologists, local people, free festivallers, and druids come to the place with entirely different understandings and agendas. The book demonstrates that the creation of spaces and places for people to express divergent viewpoints is powerfully constrained by social and political forces that allow some voices to be heard while others are marginalized. With dialogues and illustrations that range from the conventional to the cartoon strip, this multi-vocal book not only presents a wide range of views in an innovative way, but provides important new insights on how people shape and are shaped by landscape.

Stonehenge is arguably the greatest prehistoric monument in western Europe; as a World Heritage Site it ranks in significance with such sites as the Acropolis of Athens, the Pyramids of Giza, Great Zimbabwe and Machu Picchu. Stonehenge sits at the heart of a landscape rich in other monuments and remains of the Neolithic period and Bronze Age that are also part of the World Heritage Site. Recent research by English Heritage's landscape archaeologists within the Stonehenge World Heritage Site has led to the identification of previously unknown sites and, perhaps even more importantly, the re-interpretation of known sites, including Stonehenge itself. This work has been carried out alongside recent and on-going independent research initiatives conducted by a number of academic institutions, involving international co-operation. This book presents the most significant findings of the English Heritage research and shows how it integrates with the results of work undertaken by colleagues in other research bodies. It traces human influence on the landscape from prehistoric times to the very recent past and presents an up-to-date synthesis of the results of recent fieldwork. It will be of value to anyone interested in Stonehenge itself, in megalithic monuments, in the Neolithic period and Bronze Age of Europe and in the historic evolution of chalkland landscapes.

The main complex of the America’s Stonehenge site in New Hampshire is a collection of stone chambers, enclosures, niches, standing stones, carved drains & basins, and astronomical alignments. The archaeological community has largely dismissed this seemly eclectic collection of structures as the work of an eccentric farmer named Jonathan Pattee who built his house on top of the ruins in the 19th century. Other researchers have sought to compare the chambers and astronomical alignments to stone structures from around the world built by other ancient peoples. No one has thought to evaluate the site on its own merits, specifically evaluating its architecture. Architecture can tell you a lot about a culture. Using this approach the author unravels the mystery surrounding the site. This architectural study revealed the site was built in a series of distinct phases each with its own unique style while at the same time incorporating key concepts and ideas from previous phases. There is a clear evolution of building skills and cultural ideas that can be followed through the architectural build-out of the site. Because key features and ideas were carried forward from one phase to the next, we now know that the site was the work of a single culture over a several thousand year period. Stone tools and pottery recovered from archaeological excavations at the site confirm that the builders were Native Americans. The idea of Native Americans building stone structures for ceremonial and spiritual purposes has gained a lot of credibility over the past twenty-five years. There is mounting evidence that hundreds of ceremonial stone landscapes (CSL) with stone cairns, niches, enclosures, standings stones, chambers and astronomical alignments found throughout northeastern United States are part of a broad based Native American cultural tradition. The America’s Stonehenge site is one of the most sophisticated and culturally complex of these sacred ceremonial places. The second part of this book uses primary source materials like deeds, town records, court cases and genealogy to reconstruct the history of the Pattee family who owned the hill where the site is found from 1739 through 1863. The Pattees started out in the 1700s as a prosperous family with a house in North Salem village and a 248 acre farm. By the 1820s, the third generation was reduced to owning 15 acres of the original farm and living in a small house built on top of the ruins of the site. Despite his many financial misfortunes, Jonathan Pattee (third generation) managed to hold on to and protect the site.

Reveals how Stonehenge was an extraordinary astronomical calendar used in the cultivation of ingredients for long-forgotten botanical cures • Explores how Stonehenge and other stone circles were ancient healing sanctuaries and celestial calculators for the preparation of natural medicines • Explains how the megalithic priesthood--and their successors, the Druids--developed astonishing memory techniques to preserve knowledge over generations • Draws upon the very latest discoveries from recent archaeological excavations and overlooked historical source material Stonehenge is just one of thousands of stone circles erected throughout Britain and Ireland for over three millennia from 3,000 BC on. How did this building tradition survive for so long, over such a large area and with such complexity and uniformity, when the people of the British Isles lived in separate, isolated communities and left no evidence of a central leadership or obvious communication network? Graham Phillips argues that these stone circles are evidence of an astonishing system of healthcare and preservation of ancient medical knowledge that held together a society scattered across the British Isles. With stones aligned to the sun, moon, and certain stars, these ancient monuments enabled the precise timings necessary for the cultivation of medicinal plants. He explains how the megalithic priesthood possessed medical knowledge well beyond their time and may even have discovered a cure for cancer. Furthermore, because they had no form of writing, the megalithic people developed phenomenal memory techniques to preserve their knowledge over many generations, resulting in a class of wisdomkeepers that were not only healers but the living libraries of their culture. Drawing upon the latest discoveries from recent archaeological excavations and overlooked historical source material, Phillips reveals that the megalithic culture survived far longer than previously thought and that the people who held it together were an enigmatic shamanic sect ultimately called the Druids. Uncovering the secrets of ancient megalithic culture and the purpose of their enigmatic stone circles, Phillips contends that all the evidence has now been gathered to unlock the secrets encoded in the stones--and perhaps discover remedies for diseases still uncured by modern medicine today.

Chalkland is the summation of more than four decades of first-hand involvement in the discovery and interpretation of the archaeology of Wessex, and of the Stonehenge region in particular. Far more than a reinterpretation of the sequence of events and construction phases which occurred at Stonehenge, this thorough, far-reaching and up-to-date narrative presents a new account of the Wessex chalklands.

Paul D. Burley's Stonehenge: As Above, So Below is a game changer. This book identifies the original design and purpose of the Stonehenge Ritual Landscape. It will change your understanding of the people who built the first and largest monument and many other mid-Neolithic structures that remain vital to functioning of this sacred landscape. You will discover the Stonehenge Landscape is the oldest and best preserved example of astronomically-related sacred symbolism ever constructed. In addition, Burley describes the purpose of heretofore enigmatic megalithic Stonehenge. His discovery was made while researching the objective of four stones inside the henge yet unnoticed by thousands of people viewing the monument each day. They are the Station Stones. Overshadowed by circles of much larger stones, the Station Stones justify the entire monument itself. They are the key to understanding the annual conception of new life by Earth Goddess and Sky King. Stonehenge: As Above So Below includes more than 90 illustrations. It is a major breakthrough unveiling a new paradigm for how Stonehenge was used 5500 years ago, and how we should view it today. Paul D. Burley is a researcher of ancient and indigenous symbolism. His experience includes almost 30 years as a registered engineer and environmental geologist. He is the author of The Sacred Sphere. "The best book on Stonehenge I have read for a very long time. Fresh and original throughout, thoroughly researched, convincing and thought provoking, Stonehenge: As Above, So Below opens new doors on the magic and the mystery of our most ancient past." Graham Hancock, Author Fingerprints of the Gods