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Did humans truly transport these massive stones from Wales, or could a far more natural force be responsible?...The massive bluestones, each weighing several tons, might not have been laboriously hauled over 200 kilometers by Neolithic people, as widely believed, but were instead delivered to the Stonehenge site by the relentless forces of ice.

Geologists have long known that 42 of Stonehenge's smaller stones, known as 'bluestones', came from the Preseli hills in Pembrokeshire, west Wales. Now a new study published in Antiquity pinpoints the exact locations of two of these quarries and reveals when and how the stones were quarried... Professor Mike Parker Pearson (UCL Archaeology) and leader of the team, said: "What's really exciting about these discoveries is that they take us a step closer to unlocking Stonehenge's greatest mystery - why its stones came from so far away. Every other Neolithic monument in Europe was built of megaliths brought from no...

Last year, scientists from Newcastle University in the UK suggested that pig fat could have been used to move the stones to create Stonehenge. Archaeologists may have debunked the theory that stones for the world famous Stonehenge were sent via rafts from Wales to Salisbury Plain, a study published in the Journal of Archaeological Science says. The recent study using chemical analysis showed that the six-tonne sandstone from Stonehenge matches rocks in Abergavenny, just a few miles from the English border. Thus the study shows that the stones could have been carried overland, debunking the theory that they were taken...

The Preseli stones from Stonehenge are approximately double the weight as the experimental block, but it is possible that one huge stone could have been brought by a group of just 20 people. The community living in the area during the Neolithic would have numbered several thousand so the absence of just a few dozen people was unlikely to cause any hardship. Doctoral student Barney Harris, who conducted the trial in Gordon Square, London, a stone's throw from UCL's Institute of Archaeology, said he was surprised that so few people had been required to move the block. "We were expecting...

It's one of Stonehenge's greatest mysteries: How did Stone Age Britons move 45-ton slabs across dozens of miles to create the 4,500-year-old stone circle? ...A previous theory suggested that the builders used wooden rollers -- carved tree trunks laid side by side on a constructed hard surface. Another imagined huge wooden sleds atop greased wooden rails. But critics say the rollers' hard pathway would have left telltale gouges in the landscape, which have never been found. And the sled system, while plausible, would have required huge amounts of manpower -- hundreds of men at a time to move one of...

Stonehenge Didn't Stand Alone, Excavations Show James Owen for National Geographic News January 12, 2007 Recent excavations of Salisbury Plain in southern England have revealed at least two other large stone formations close by the world-famous prehistoric monument. One of the megalithic finds is a sandstone formation that marked a ritual burial mound; the other, a group of stones at the site of an ancient timber circle. The new discoveries suggest that many similar monuments may have been erected in the shadow of Stonehenge, possibly forming part of a much larger complex, experts say. The findings were part of the...

Great Riddles in ArchaeologyWednesday Evenings, October 2011 through June 2012 From the knights of King Arthur’s roundtable to the deepest depths of Atlantis, some of the world’s greatest archaeological riddles have eluded us for centuries. Discover and explore these mind-boggling riddles in the next season of the Penn Museum’s popular monthly lecture series presented by current archaeologists and scholars. Mark your calendars for Great Riddles in Archaeology, offered the first Wednesday of every month, October 2011 through June 2012. General Admission is $5 per event in advance or $10 at the door. Subscriptions to all nine events are available for...

Archaeologists figure out mystery of Stonehenge bluestones Jun 24 2005 Staff Reporter, Western Mail ARCHAEOLOGISTS have solved one of the greatest mysteries of Stonehenge - the exact spot from where its huge stones were quarried. A team has pinpointed the precise place in Wales from where the bluestones were removed in about 2500 BC. It found the small crag-edged enclosure at one of the highest points of the 1,008ft high Carn Menyn mountain in Pembrokeshire's Preseli Hills. The enclosure is just over one acre in size but, according to team leader Professor Tim Darvill, it provides a veritable "Aladdin's Cave"...