Stonehenge altar stone from Scotland

Nick Pearce analyzes Neolithic standing stones in Orkney

Remarkable new scientific research at Stonehenge has revealed an extraordinary new mystery. Mineralogical tests on the massive six-tonne stone at the heart of the monument show that this central rock, known as the altar stone, was brought to Stonehenge from the far north of Scotland.

• [The greatest disappointment when visiting Stonehenge is that there is a sign along the walkway from the car park to the stones that explains that the stones were adjusted for millennia. So it is not as if some group, human or extraterrestrial, knew what it was meant to be and do (as a calendar) and did it. It has been adjusted all along, perhaps never more than about 50 years ago when cranes and modern equipment were brought in to lift fallen stones and place them just so. What we have today is what was recently created from stones that had laid around in a fallen state for who knows how long. The use of cranes was not a secret when it was happening, but it sure seems to be one now. Most people have no idea of the modern interference.]

The altar stone is arguably the most ritually important stone in Stonehenge, because it is the rock that marks the intersection of the prehistoric temple’s two most important celestial alignments – the winter solstice sunrise to summer solstice sunset alignment, and the summer solstice sunrise to winter solstice sunset alignment.

It’s already known that some of the monument’s smaller stones were brought to the site from southwest Wales, around 120 miles away. But moving a rock from northern mainland Scotland or Orkney would have involved a journey of well over 500 miles.

The discovery has huge implications and is likely to transform archaeologists’ perceptions around key aspects of life in prehistoric Britain.

Up to now, most scholars have assumed that British Neolithic society was exclusively local or regional (based on tribal, clan or similar identities), but the newly discovered Stonehenge-Scotland link, when combined with the Welsh origin of some of the Stonehenge stones, suggests that there might also have been a pan-British aspect to how Neolithic Britons lived.

• PHOTO: Aberystwyth University geologist Nick Pearce analyzes Neolithic standing stones in Orkney (Prof. Richard Bevins, Aberystwyth University)

Protest the environment with cornstarch.

The newly revealed Scottish link implies that 4,500 years ago, there was already at least some political and religious cooperation across Britain. That’s because the Neolithic people who transported the six-tonne rock from northern Scotland or Orkney to southern England must have known that Stonehenge existed, that it was being expanded, and precisely what shape and size of giant rock was required.

That suggests geopolitical cooperation, or even some religious commonality. More: Mystery of Stonehenge deepens after ‘jaw-dropping’ discovery

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• David Keys, The Independent, Aug. 15, 2024; Pat Macpherson, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly