"Clearly sophisticated practices demonstrate that the people were so in tune with natural events to an extent that we can barely conceive in the modern world we live in today," said Richard Bates, of university's the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences. While Stonehenge was positioned in relation to the solstices, or the extreme limits of the suns movement, Gaffney said the newly discovered circular shape suggests a huge cosmological statement and the need to inscribe it into the earth itself. Staff writers news.com.au June 23, 2020 5:29pm Other archaeologists, including Michael Parker Pearson at University College London, have suggested that, while Stonehenge, with its standing stones, was an area for the dead, Durrington, with its wooden structures, was for the living.. June 26, 2020 8.30am EDT Archaeologists studying the monument site from above ground. The site is 1.9 miles north-east of Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, near Amesbury, Wiltshire. December 28, 2020. but the coronavirus pandemic meant this year's event was canceled. He added: Stonehenge has a clear link to the seasons and the passage of time, through the summer solstice. The major new prehistoric monument is just a short distance away from Stonehenge. CNN Sans & 2016 Cable News Network. The team believe the shafts -- positioned about two miles northeast of Stonehenge -- were built as a boundary to a sacred area or precinct associated with the henge. Prof Vincent Gaffney, a leading archaeologist on the project, said: This is an unprecedented find of major significance within the UK. The Durrington Shafts discovery, announced on Monday, is all the more extraordinary because it offers the first evidence that the early inhabitants of Britain, mainly farming communities, had developed a way to count. Geochemical testing indicates that 50 of Stonehenge's 52 pale-grey sandstone megaliths, known as sarsens, share a But then these are the same people who also built Stonehenge, dragging bluestones to the site from south-west Wales about 150 miles away. As the area around Stonehenge is among the worlds most-studied archaeological landscapes, the discovery is all the more unexpected. New discovery reveals clues to Stonehenge's origins a new discovery raises the possibility that there's a grain of truth in the 900-year-old tale of Stonehenge's origins. The shafts combine to form a circle more than two kilometers (1.2 miles) in diameter, archaeologists from the University of St Andrew's said. Coring of the shafts has provided crucial radiocarbon dates to more than 4,500 years ago, making the boundary contemporary with both Stonehenge and Durrington Walls. Stonehenge will open on 4th July 2020 The origin of the giant sarsen stones at Stonehenge has finally been discovered with the help of a missing piece of the site which was returned after 60 years. New prehistoric shafts Major new ancient discovery as important as Stonehenge made thanks to Irish heatwave An ancient circular enclosure was recently discovered near Newgrange, Co Meath. The site is 1.9 miles north-east of Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, near Amesbury, Wiltshire. In today's 5 minute history we talk about the brand new Neolithic circle discovered near Stonehenge. Published June 22, 2020 Updated June 24, 2020. The boundary may have guided people towards a sacred site within its centre or warned against entering it. Key researchers on Stonehenge and its landscape have been taken aback by the scale of the structure and the fact that it hadnt been discovered until now so close to Stonehenge.. Archaeologists have discovered a massive series of Neolithic-era pits very close to the Stonehenge site in southern England. Updated 10:34 AM ET, Mon June 22, 2020 The new circle was discovered near Stonehenge. The latest technology including geophysical prospection, ground-penetrating radar and magnetometry showed them as geophysical anomalies and revealed their true significance. The first stage of Stonehenge was constructed around 3,000 BC. But with the Durrington Shafts, its not the passing of time, but the bounding by a circle of shafts which has cosmological significance.. Though the purpose of Stonehenge remains unknown to modern archeologists and historians, the famous stones are positioned in relation to the solstices and the sun's movements. Mon 22 Jun 2020 01.00 EDT 06.25 EDT Durrington Walls in Wiltshire is located at the centre of the newly discovered prehistoric site known as Durrington Shafts. About 40% of the circle is no longer available for study as a consequence of modern development. Approximately 20 have been found and there may have been more than 30. Jun 24, 2020 Four thousand five hundred years ago, the Neolithic peoples who constructed Stonehenge, a masterpiece of engineering, also dug a series of shafts aligned to form a circle spanning 1.2 miles (2km) in diameter. Based at the University of Bradford, he is the co-principal investigator of the Stonehenge Hidden Landscape project, which has been surveying tens of kilometres of landscape across Salisbury Plain. English Heritage's Susan Greaney said the discovery was "a real thrill". It demonstrates the significance of Durrington Walls Henge, the complexity of the monumental structures within the Stonehenge landscape, and the capacity and desire of Neolithic communities to record their cosmological belief systems in ways, and at a scale, that we had never previously anticipated., He added: I cant emphasise enough the effort that would have gone in to digging such large shafts with tools of stone, wood and bone.. Archaeologists said Monday June 22, 2020, they have discovered a major new prehistoric monument under the earth near Stonehenge that could shed new light on the origins of the Struck flint and unidentified bone fragments were recovered from the shafts, but archaeologists can only speculate how those features were once used. 5 Minute History - New Stonehenge Discovery. 1:27 Astonishing circle of pits found near Stonehenge WATCH: Archaeologists have made an exciting new discovery near Stonehenge, one of Britain's most famous landmarks. Mon 22 Jun 2020 13.38 EDT 2,166 Leading archaeologists say a 1.6bn scheme to build a road tunnel through the historic Stonehenge landscape July 2020. The boundary also appears to have been laid out to include an earlier prehistoric monument, the Larkhill causewayed enclosure, built more than 1,500 years before the henge at Durrington. Published July 29, 2020 Updated Aug. 4, 2020 Back in the 30s the 1130s the Welsh cleric Geoffrey of Monmouth created the impression that Stonehenge was built as - CH 04:00. Archaeologists have another reason to rejoice after the discovery nearby of a giant Neolithic structure. Exclusive: prehistoric structure spanning 1.2 miles in diameter is masterpiece of engineering, say archaeologists, Last modified on Mon 22 Jun 2020 11.25 BST. The consortium is publishing a scientific open-access paper in Internet Archaeology. The research has involved a consortium of archaeologists, led by the University of Bradford and including the universities of Birmingham and St Andrews, in an international collaboration with the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Archaeological Prospection and Virtual Archaeology at the University of Vienna. Archaeologists have made a gobsmacking discovery around the mysterious Stonehenge site that dates back thousands of years. Sheep graze as security guards patrol the prehistoric monument at Stonehenge in southern England, on April 26, 2020, closed during the national lockdown due Positioning each shaft would have involved pacing more than 800 metres from the henge outwards. The planning involved in contracting a prehistoric structure of this size must have involved a tally or counting system, he believes. Highways England has always maintained that the tunnel will reduce congestion and increase tranquillity in Gaffney said: What were seeing is two massive monuments with their territories. Archaeologists have discovered a major new prehistoric monument only a short distance away from Stonehenge. Share this work to reveal this extraordinary discovery and write a whole new Having filled naturally over millennia, the shafts although enormous had been dismissed as natural sinkholes and dew ponds. European Association of Archaeologists (@archaeologyEAA) June 22, 2020 According to the research, published in the online scientific journal Internet Archaeology, the Archaeologists working in Durrington, southwest England found evidence of at least 20 prehistoric shafts -- more than 10 meters (33 feet) in diameter and five meters (16 feet) deep -- on the ancient site where Stonehenge sits. A circle of deep shafts has been discovered near the world heritage site of Stonehenge, to the astonishment of archaeologists, who have described it as the largest prehistoric structure ever found in Britain. July 29, 2020. Geochemical testing indicates that 50 of Stonehenge's 52 pale-gray sandstone megaliths share a common origin at a site about 25 kilometres away, but The discovery makes up for the cancellation of this years summer solstice celebrations at Stonehenge on June 20th due to the ban on mass gatherings prompted by Covid-19. London (CNN) A huge, previously undiscovered prehistoric monument has The discovery makes up for the cancellation of this years summer solstice celebrations at Stonehenge on 20 June due to the ban on mass gatherings prompted by Covid-19.