Stonehenge: A History Mystery
Experts Are Digging for Answers to Questions Surrounding England's Ancient Stone Circle

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

When you gaze at Stonehenge, it's impossible not to ask, "What, when, where, who and why?"

But even experts can't unravel the entire mystery of this ancient ring of huge stones in southern England.

However, they keep trying.

Earlier this year, Geoffrey Wainwright and Tim Darvill were digging among the stones while working on a documentary for the Smithsonian Channel. It was just the latest quest to find out more about the history and meaning of one of the world's most popular tourist attractions.

While the British professors dug and tourists from around the globe circled the outer ring of the lichen-covered stones in the middle of a windy plain grazed by sheep, Bridget Byrne was allowed to step inside the possibly "magic" ring and ponder the mysteries up close.

What is it?

Stonehenge is now a rather ramshackle broken ring of bluestones and sandstones. It's usually a drab gray, but sunshine and rain make it glisten, and it's positioned to frame the rising of the midsummer sun.

The smaller bluestones, some weighing almost five tons, formed an original ring, replacing what had once been built from earth and wood.

Later the bluestones were rearranged as giant-size sarsen sandstones, the heaviest weighing more than 40 tons, were added.

Why did that happen?

That's one of the mysteries the professors are trying to solve.

When was it built?

It's believed it was begun more than 50 centuries ago, around 3100 B.C., and the final stage, which included the addition of horizontal stones (lintels) along the top of the uprights, was completed around 1600 B.C.

Where is it?

It's on Salisbury Plain in the south of England, but the stones were hauled from other places. The sandstones were transported only about 20 miles, but, amazingly, the bluestones came over land and sea from the Preseli Mountains in Wales, more than 200 miles away.

How long did it take to move them?

"I have no idea," Wainwright says.

Who built it?

The mystery deepens here. An ancient religious group known as the druids claim the site as a temple, but there's no proof druids were responsible for it. "That the druids were priests and sacred people is beyond dispute, but we have no idea what they did then," says Darvill, explaining that it's not even known what the word for stone was in the Celtic language at the time Stonehenge was built.

Why was it built?

That's biggest mystery of all.

"We believe the bluestones were brought here because they were believed to have magic powers to do with healing," Darvill says.

In Victorian times you could rent a hammer and chip off a bit of stone as a souvenir. Now this World Heritage site, where the stones are scarred with graffiti from as far back as Roman times, is protected from such damage.