스톤헨지(Stonehenge) 안내. 솔즈베리(Salisbury)

스톤헨지(Stonehenge) 안내. 솔즈베리(Salisbury). 영국(England)

english-heritage.org.uk

Explore the Stonehenge landscape

The World Heritage Site

From here you can explore the monuments in the unique landscape surrounding Stonehenge, and walk in the footsteps of our prehistoric ancestors.

 

The fields around Stonehenge are owned by the National Trust and are 'permissive access', which means you are free to explore. Take time to discover the monuments, built thousands of years ago by people who shaped and marked their landscape.

 

 

Cursus barrows

Visible in front of you are some early Bronze Age burial mounds, or round barrows. These are nown as the Cursus barrows, because they were built alongside the much older Cursus. The people who were buried here lived several hundred years after the stones were raised at Stonehenge.

 

Stonehenge Avenue

The route of the Avenue, defined by parallel banks with outer ditches, links Stonehenge to the river Avon. It was built in about 2300 BC, about the time that the bluestones at Stonehenge were being rearranged. Much of the Avenue has been ploughed flat, but the part closest to Stonehenge still survives as low earthworks. This section is aligned with midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset.

 

 

Welcome to Stonehenge

Time of Stonehenge

Stonehenge is a prehistoric temple, its great stones raised about 4,500 years ago. It is a masterpiece of engineering, with the stones carefully arranged to line up with the movements of the sun.

 

The ruin that we see today is the end result of many different stages of construction and rebuilding in prehistory. The first major event, 5,000 years ago, was the construction of a large circular enclosure. About 500 years later enormous sarsen stones were raised in a horseshoe and a circle, with smaller bluestones placed between them. Later the bluestones were rearranged.

 

Since construction activities at Stonehenge ceased in the early Bronze Age, some of the stones have been removed from the site & many have fallen. Some were re-erected during restoration, which started in 1919, continued in episodes and was completed in 1964.

 

 

Before Stonehenge

In the area in front of you, some strange large pits have been discovered. They date from about 10,000 years ago and so are far older than Stonehenge or any of the other monuments in this landscape.

 

Four large pits, and another hole where a tree may have stood, were excavated. The pits had all held substantial timber posts and were in a rough line, running east to west. No objects were found in them but fragments of pine charcoal were dated to about 8000 BC, in the Mesolithic period.

 

It is unclear whether the posts all stood at the same time. Could they have been some sort of totem poles, or posts along an ancient path ? Could they have marked the movements of the sun or moon ? All we know is that 4,500 years later the same place was chosen as the location for other prehistoric monuments and, shortly after this, for Stonehenge. It is possible that this area retained some significance for our ancestors over many thousands of years.

 

 

The Stonehenge Cursus is a huge rectangular earthwork enclosure, created by early Neolithic people about 1,000 years before the stones were raised at Stonehenge. Although difficult to see from here, it stretches across the landscape in front of you.

We do not know why it was built - perhaps it was a barrier to control the movement of people and their animals, or perhaps it was an ancient route for processions, marked out in the landscape. You can walk the entire length of the Cursus as it is owned by the National Trust.

 

There is more information in the exhibition at the Visitor Center, on your audio guide and on panels around the site. If you have any questions, please ask our staff.

 

                                        Trilithon       Tenon         Sarsen horseshoe 

                                             ▼             ▼                    ▼          ▼ Sarsen circle

                                                              ▲         ▲    ▲    ▲ Bluestones 

                                                       Solstice axis    

 

Many of the stones on this south-west side of Stonehenge have fallen and broken or have been removed from the site. Those that remain are not as regular in shape, and are not as finely worked, as the stones on the opposite entrance side of the monument.

 

Midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset

Stonehenge is celebrated for being aligned on the midsummer sunrise, which attracts thousands of people on the longest day of the year. But more important to prehistoric people may have been the midwinter sunset.

 

If you were to stand in the centre of the monument and look towards the Avenue, the sun rises just to the left of the Heel Stone. When othe stones were standing in the entrance, it may have given the impression of a corridor along which the sunlight would have shone into the centre of the monument.

 

The midwinter sunset is directly opposite the midsummer sunrise. Viewed from the centre, the midwinter sun would have set between the two upright stones of the tallest sarsen trilithon. We know that people were feasting at midwinter at nearby Durrington Walls, so perhaps midwinter ceremonies took place here too.

 

 

Several othe prehistoric sites in British Isles, all of a similar date to Stonehenge, were built to align with either the summer or winter solstice. At Newgrange in Ireland, a square hole above the doorway allows the rising sun at midwinter to shine into the burial chamber.

 

Landscape of ancestors

After Stonehenge was Built

All around Stonehenge, on ridges overlooking the monument, are early Bronze Age burial mounds, or round barrows. It was important for people to bury their dead within sight of Stonehenge

 

Round barrows were built between about 2300 and 1600 BC, after Stonehenge was constructed. on the horizon to your left, among the trees, is a line of barrows on the King Barrow Ridge. Close to Stonehenge is a large barrow which was opened in the early 19th century, when a cremation burial was found beneath an upturned pottery urn.

 

On the other side of the road is the Normanton Down barrow cemetery. Many of these barrows were excavated in the early 19th century. They are famous for containing some of the richest known burials, called 'Wessex burials', dating from about 2000 to 1700 BC.

 

A woman being buried on Normanton Down, before a round barrow is constructed over her grave. She is one of two women buried close to Bush Barrow whose graves contained necklaces and jewellery made of amber and gold, as well as miniature pottery cups. The finds from these barrows are on display in the Visitor Centre.

 

 

 

 

 

The people buried under the barrows on Normanton Down were accompanied by objects made of exotic or unusual materials such as amber, jet and gold, which would have been traded over long distances. The most spectacular discovery was the male Bush Barrow burial, found with many rich objects, including thest two lozenge-shaped sheets of gold, gold belt plate and fine bronze dagger.

 

These finds are on display at Wiltshire Museum, Devized

 

 

A dramatic entrance

Time of Stonehenge

You ar standing close to the original entrance to Stonehenge, looking at the most impressive and best-preserved part of the outer stone circle.

 

This north-east side has the most regular sarsen stones, which were carefully shaped and smoothed. This would have made a spectacular impression on those approaching along the Avenue, the processional route to the monument built in about 2300 BC.

 

This area, where the Avenue meets the earthwork enclosure, ws the focus of intense prehistoric activity, with various wooden posts and stones being erected, moved and removed over time. These restricted the movement of people into Stonehenge and may have been markers for astronomical events.

 

The huge unworked sarsen standing nearby is the Heel Stone. It weight about 40 tons. The fallen stone in front of you is the Slaughter Stone, one of two or three upright stones that once stood in a line across the entrance causeway. These replace lines of small wooden stakes.

 

 

● Avenue ditch     ● Heel Stone ditch     ● Stone hole

 

Excavations in 1979 revealed a circular ditch around the Heel Stone, and the location of an earlier large stone hole. This was either a prvious location of the Heel Stone, or where another stone once stood.

 

Why was Stonehenge built here ?

Before Stonehenge

Stonehenge was not the first monument in this landscape. The area had been important to Neolithic people for hundreds of years before building work started.

 

Stretching across the landscape in front of you, about 700 m away, is the Stonehenge Cursus, built about 500 years before Stonehenge was started. Further away and of a similar date is Robin Hood's Ball, an early Neolithic monument where people gathered to feast, exchange and conduct rituals. Scattered throughout the landscape are the ling barrows, where they buried their dead.

 

The Heel Stone, the large stone standing to your right, may originally have been a natural sarsen boulder, lying half-buried in the ground. Its presence, toghter with some natural geological features that may have been visible in this area, could have been the reason why people selected this site for Stonehenge.

 

The first part of Stonehenge to be contructed, in about 3000 BC, was a large circular ditch with an inner bank and smaller outer band. Ancient animal bones and other objects were placed in the base of the ditch.

 

The Stonehenge Cursus is a 1.7 mile long rectangular monument defined by a bank and ditch. We don't know the purpose or meaning of this huge enclosure, but its presence in the landscape may have influenced the siting of Stonehenge several centuries later.

- 안내문에서 -

 

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