Stonehenge
...245 miles away. They were dragged down to the sea, floated on huge rafts, brought up the River Avon, and finally overland to where they are today. Weighing between 3 and 6 tons, the transportation of these stones all the way from South Wales would have been a remarkable feat, and taken unbelievable dedication. The Beaker people came from Europe at the end of the Neolithic Period and invaded Salisbury Plain around 2000 B.C. Their name comes from one of their ancient traditions in which they would bury beakers, or pottery drinking cups, with their dead. Instead of burring their dead in mass graves, they showed more reverence for death by placing them in small round graves marked by mounds called tumuli. The Beaker people were highly organized, industrious, used sophisticated mathematical concepts, and managed their society by using a chieftain system. Scientists believe they were sun worshipers who aligned Stonehenge more exactly with certain important sun events, such as mid summer and winter solstices. The bluestones were dug up and rearranged and this time. Larger stones, weighing as much as 50 tons each, were brought in from the Marlborough Downs, 20 miles away. Once on site, these giant sandstones or Sarsen stones, as they are now called were hammered to size using balls of stone known as “mauls.” Even today, you can see the drag marks. It was then dragged until the end was over the opening of a large hole that had been previously dug. Great levers were inserted under the stone and it was raised until gravity made it slide into the hole. At this point, the stone stood on about a 30° angle from the ground. Ropes were attached to the top and teams of men pulled from the other side to raise it into the full upright position. It was secured by filling the hole at its base with small, round packing stones. At this point, the lintels were lowered into place and secured vertically by mortice and tenon joints, and horizontally by tongue and groove joints. The Wessex people are considered the third and final peoples to work on the Stonehenge site. They arrived around 1550 B.C., at the height of the Bronze Age. These people are thought to have been responsible for the bronze dagger carving found on one of the large sarsen stones within Stonehenge. They were a very smart culture, wealthy, and used greater precision in their calculations and construction. It believed they used these talents in finalizing Stonehenge into what we see today. Many myths and Legends have arisen over the ages pertaining to Stonehenge. One such connection may be made to the Beaker people, who believed in an Earth Mother and a Sky Father. With this knowledge, scholars believe that the arrangement of the stones of Stonehenge could constitute an open-sky temple, dedicated to the worship of the Earth Mother. This is because the circles and the U-settings appear to represent the womb of the Earth Mother, while the middle trilithon arch in the outer circle is her vulva. On the summer solstice the sun, representing Father Sky, rises directly above the heel stone to penetrate the middle-arch of the womb. Furthermore, a shadow cast by the Heel Stone (a stone which is arguably the Sky Father's lithic personification on earth) also enters the vulva arch to penetrate the womb. This symbolizes th...