Title
Solving Stonehenge : the new key to an ancient enigma / Anthony Johnson.
ISBN
9780500051559
0500051550
Imprint
London ; New York : Thames & Hudson, 2008.
Language
English
Description
288 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, plans ; 25 cm.
Call Number
DA142 .J57 2008
Dewey Decimal Classification
936.2319
Summary
From the Publisher: A completely new and convincing solution to the key puzzles of Stonehenge. As Anthony Johnson reveals in this astonishing book, patient detective work and detailed computer analysis of clues hidden within this famous monument can be made to yield remarkable new insights into how the earthwork and stone circle were conceived and laid out. The story begins with a reappraisal of over 250 years of fieldwork, excavation, and speculation, including John Wood's highly accurate but often overlooked survey of 1740. It is the most important record of Stonehenge ever made, and the only reliable plan of the monument before the fall of several major stones and their subsequent re-erection in the twentieth century. The prehistoric engineering skills involved in the construction of Stonehenge have long been recognized, but Johnson presents for the first time tangible evidence to show that locked within the symmetry of the stones are precise formulae that determined their numbers, spacing, and relationships. He explains how the Neolithic surveyors set out the fifty-six Aubrey Holes, four Station Stones, and the thirty stones in the Sarsen Circle; and the significance of the horseshoe arrangement of massive trilithons at the heart of the monument. The implications are far reaching, demonstrating that the people who designed Stonehenge in all its phases of construction, spanning over 1,000 years, employed simple and elegant geometric rules. Elaborate sightline theories, alignments, and astronomical computations are questioned, allowing the rationale behind Stonehenge and other prehistoric sites, some of which conformed to the same model, to be reassessed. 135 illustrations, 35 in color.
Bibliography, etc. Note
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Acknowledgments
Introduction : Seeking explanations
1. Landscape & opportunity
2. Myth, legend & the early antiquarians
3. Fieldwork, excavation & speculation
4. The early earth & timber monument
5. The stone monument
6. Astronomy or architecture?
7. The prehistoric surveyors
8. The geometry of the early monument
9. The geometry & construction of the stone monument
Conclusion : Reassessing Stonehenge
Appendices
Notes
Bibliography
Sources of illustrations
Index.
