MOSCOW, August 26 (RIA Novosti) - 15 new Neolithic monuments have recently been discovered in the vicinity of Stonehenge as a part of the Stonehenge Hidden Landscapes project, as reported by the Smithsonian Institute.
These new discoveries provide more insight into Neolithic human technology and design and also give the ancient site the feeling of being “cathedralesque” says Vince Gaffney, co-head of the project.
The Stonehenge Hidden Landscapes project has been a 4 year endeavor between Gaffney’s team and the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Archaeological Prospection and Virtual Archaeology in Austria. The researches created a detailed subsurface archeological map of the area, using a variety of different techniques including ground-penetrating radar and 3D laser scanning, which are thought to be less destructive than traditional digging exploratory ones.
The researchers used this information to “create total digital models of the Stonehenge landscape at a true 'landscape scale’” says the website of the project.
To their surprise, they discovered 15 unknown or poorly understood parts of the well-known Stonehenge Monument. Further analysis of the location of the monuments showed that they aligned with sunrise and sunset at specific dates during the year.
These discoveries hopefully will give further insight into the ritual practices of our ancestors. A critic Parker Pearson said ““Until you dig holes, you just don’t know what you’ve got...What date it is, how significant it is. [There are] extraordinary new features coming up, and we’re thinking well, what are they?”
The article has Gaffney saying is hopeful about the discovery:“This is fantastic stuff that’s been done, and it’s raised a whole series of new questions,” however he did note that “It’s going to take years” to process and uncover all of the newly found monuments.
The Stonehenge monumental site remains one of the most mysterious monuments in the world. Located on Salisbury Plain in England, it is set as a ring of standing stones within earthworks. And is believed to be built somewhat between 3000 BC to 2000 BC.
The monument is supposed to have a certain meaning, but nobody so far has offered an exact explanation what it could be.
