Orientation of Prehistoric Monuments in Britain: A Reassessment

Orientation of Prehistoric Monuments in Britain: A Reassessment PDF Author: Alistair Marshall
Publisher: Archaeopress Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 1789697069
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 704

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Book Description
Reassesses major axial alignment at many megalithic ritual and funerary monuments (Neolithic to Bronze Age) in Britain and Ireland, not in terms of abstract astronomical concerns, but as an expression of repeated seasonal propitiation involving community, agrarian economy and ancestry in an attempt to mitigate variable environmental conditions.

Orientation of Prehistoric Monuments in Britain: A Reassessment

Orientation of Prehistoric Monuments in Britain: A Reassessment PDF Author: Alistair Marshall
Publisher: Archaeopress Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 1789697069
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 704

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Book Description
Reassesses major axial alignment at many megalithic ritual and funerary monuments (Neolithic to Bronze Age) in Britain and Ireland, not in terms of abstract astronomical concerns, but as an expression of repeated seasonal propitiation involving community, agrarian economy and ancestry in an attempt to mitigate variable environmental conditions.

Monuments and Landscape in Atlantic Europe

Monuments and Landscape in Atlantic Europe PDF Author: Chris Scarre
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134482191
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
Atlantic Europe is the zone par excellence of megalithic monuments, which encompass a wide range of earthen and stone constructions from inpressive stone circles to modest chambered tombs. A single basic concept lies behind this volume - that the intrinsic qualities encountered within the diverse landscapes pf Atlantic Europe both informed the settings chosen for the monuments and played a role in determining their form and visual appearance. Monuments and Landscape in Atlantic Europe goes significantly beyond the limits of existing debate by inviting archaeologists from different countries with the Atlantic zone (including Britain, France, Ireland, Spain and Sweden) to examine the relationship between landscape features and prehistoric monuments in their specialist regions. By placing the issue within a broader regional and intellectual context, the authors illustrate the diversity of current archaeological ideas and approaches converging around this central theme.

Stonehenge

Stonehenge PDF Author: Clive Ruggles
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISBN: 1835532713
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 243

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Book Description
Stonehenge is one of the most famous ancient monuments in the world and its solar alignment is one of its most important features. Yet although archaeologists have learned a huge amount about this iconic monument and its development, a sense of mystery continues about its purpose. This helps fuel numerous theories and common misconceptions, particularly concerning its relationship to the sky and the heavenly bodies. A desire to cut through this confusion was the inspiration for this book, and it fills a gaping hole in the existing literature. The book provides both an introduction to Stonehenge and its landscape and an introduction to archaeoastronomy—the study of how ancient peoples understood phenomena in the sky, and what role the sky played in their cultures. Archaeoastronomy is a specialism critical to explaining the relationship of Stonehenge and nearby monuments to the heavens, but interpreting archaeoastronomical evidence has often proved highly controversial in the past. Stonehenge: Sighting the Sun explains why. It makes clear which ideas about Stonehenge are generally accepted and which are not, with clear graphics to explain complicated concepts. This beautifully illustrated book shines new light on this most famous of ancient monuments, and is the first in-depth study of this fascinating topic suitable both for specialists and for anyone with a general interest.

Archaeoastronomy And The Roots Of Science

Archaeoastronomy And The Roots Of Science PDF Author: E. C. Krupp
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429725000
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
Archaeoastronomy is a rapidly developing interdisciplinary inquiry into the minds of our prehistoric and ancient ancestors, one that attempts to reconstruct the ways in which early peoples made use of the sky and its significance to them. Astronomy appears to be a fundamental component of culture, making the scope of archaeoastronomy worldwide. Thi

Riddles in Stone

Riddles in Stone PDF Author: Richard Hayman
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
ISBN: 9781852855666
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 354

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Book Description
Who built Avebury and Stonehenge? Why and when were more than 600 stone circles, and thousands of barrows and cairns, erected in prehistoric Britain? What were they used for and what do they tell us about the beliefs and culture of their builders? Riddles in Stone is a history of the extraordinary variety of answers that have been given to these questions, by amateurs and professionals, archaeologists and astronomers, mystics and systems theorists. While modern excavation and radiocarbon dating has undoubtedly advanced our knowledge of the sequence and date of the monuments, their purpose and meaning is still hotly debated. Indeed no previous century has changed its mind so often as the twentieth - or provided such a welter of differing opinions. Each theory has as much to say about its own time as it has about prehistory. The stones have been used to enhance the authority of the Bible, to endorse the civilizing mission of the British Empire - and to argue that the Ancient Britons could work a computer. In a reaction to modern industrial society, they have been credited with spiritual powers and natural energies. Even the views of modern archaeologists often seem to reflect the latest academic fad, rather than a lasting solution. Riddles in Stone is an entertaining and instructive account of a debate on a subject of endless fascination.

The Past in the Past: the Re-use of Ancient Monuments

The Past in the Past: the Re-use of Ancient Monuments PDF Author: Richard Bradley
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134641176
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
First published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Stonehenge

Stonehenge PDF Author: Mike Parker Pearson
Publisher: The Experiment
ISBN: 1615190791
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 434

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Book Description
An archeologist who participated in a seven-year excavation at the historic monument describes recent findings that correct previously-held notions about the site, including the dating and significance of the structure as well as how the builders lived.

The Significance of Monuments

The Significance of Monuments PDF Author: Richard Bradley
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 0415152046
Category : Architecture, Prehistoric
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
The Neolithic period, when agriculture began and many monuments - including Stonehenge - were constructed, is an era fraught with paradoxes and ambiguities. Starting in the Mesolithic and carrying his analysis through to the Late Bronze Age, Richard Bradley sheds light on this complex period and the changing consciousness of these prehistoric peoples. The Significance of Monuments studies the importance of monuments tracing their history from their first creation over six thousand years later. Part One discusses how monuments first developed and their role in developing a new sense of time and space among the inhabitants of prehistoric Europe. Other features of the prehistoric landscape - such as mounds and enclosures - across Continental Europe are also examined. Part Two studies how such monuments were modified and reinterpreted to suit the changing needs of society through a series of detailed case studies. The Significance of Monuments is an indispensable text for all students of European prehistory. It is also an enlightening read for professional archaeologists and all those interested in this fascinating period.

Ancient Places

Ancient Places PDF Author: Glyn Daniel
Publisher: Constable & Robinson
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description


Stonehenge: The Story of a Sacred Landscape

Stonehenge: The Story of a Sacred Landscape PDF Author: Francis Pryor
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1681777037
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
An illustrated, evocative narrative of the nature and history of Stonehenge that places the enigmatic stone megaliths in a wider cultural context. Perched on the chalk uplands of Salisbury Plain, the megaliths of Stonehenge offer one of the most recognizable outlines of any ancient structure. Its purpose—place of worship, sacrificial arena, giant calendar—is unknown, but its story is one of the most extraordinary of any of the world's prehistoric monuments. Constructed in several phases over a period of some 1500 years, beginning in 3000 BC, Stonehenge's key elements are its “bluestones,” transported from West Wales by unexplained means, and its sarsen stones quarried from the nearby Marlborough Downs. Francis Pryor delivers a rigorous account of the nature and history of Stonehenge, but also places the enigmatic monument in a wider cultural context, bringing acute insight into how antiquarians, scholars, writers, artists–and even neopagans—have interpreted the mystery over the centuries.