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Who Built The Stones? (Megalithic)
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aurelius



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Hatty wrote:
Durrington Walls is usually assumed to have housed the people who were working on the Stonehenge site. Could these 'short-term' postholes at Durrington indicate a large housing complex which was dismantled when the henge had been completed (say, fifty years)?


They indicate a large perimeter, certainly, but what about the dwellings themselves? These may have been indicated by previous archaeology; the midden remains - lumps of daub, large Grooved Ware sherds and vast quantities of animal bone - are testament to a village ("the largest known neolithic settlement in Britain"). The archaeologists believe it was abandoned by 2500-2460 BC, the bank completed 2480-2450 BC. The posts would have been put up and taken down between these two phases of activity. It is estimated that each post would weigh "between 1.5 and 3 tonnes". That's a lot of effort for such a short lived demarcation.

Such a post circle would have had a diameter of 440m. With a post about every 4m-5m that would be over 300 uprights. Only Hinderwell in Radnorshire, they say, would have been bigger, and by some margin.

Would there have been ropes of some kind linking the posts to make it difficult for livestock to escape?

I've now found a BBC news link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-37047010

Why was the village abandoned, and where did they all go? Perhaps there was a dramatic change in climate around this time.

3,200 -
2,900 BC: Piora Oscillation (Zoller, 1960), abrupt wet and cold period in the transition from the Atlantic to Sub-Boreal climate periods. Retreat of spruce forests and advance of European glaciers.
3,000 BC: Clube and Napier posit cometary impact as the cause of flooding, the retreat of tree lines and the encroachment of glaciers.
3,000 BC: Radio carbon dating of 'lesser wall' on Orkney's Ness of Brodgar; contemporary with Skara Brae etc. History of Ancient Britain: Orkney's Stone Age Temple BBC2 1/1/2012. Further dating suggests site systematically abandoned about 2,300 BC.
3,000 BC: Indo-Europeans tend to start supplanting Western Mediterranean’s in England?
2,807 BC: Bruce Masse, an environmental archaeologist at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico believes from analysing flood myths from around the world and reference to an eclipse that a comet or other body crashed into the Indian Ocean off the coast of Madagascar causing a tsunami and flooding. The resultant crater is known as Burckle.
2,800 -
2,500 BC: Gilgamesh, King of Uruk, Mesopotamia, lived between these dates (Oppenheim, p.398). Epic of Gilgamesh, the flood legend, relates to it.
2,600 BC: Cooling 'event' with relatively wet conditions in many parts of the world (Singer and Avery).
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aurelius



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Only Hinderwell in Radnorshire, they say, would have been bigger, and by some margin.


Actually I can't find any reference to this on the Internet, only Hinderwell in Yorkshire.

Any rate, the discovery of an arc of posts once more lends itself to Robert Langdon's theory about post-glacial flooding, specifically here the valleys of the Kennet and Avon. He envisages a concentration of trade in this part of Wiltshire with vessels visiting the natural harbour of Durrington Walls...which became redundant as the waters receded, a conclusion I came to independently when looking at the contours. The post would have served as mooring posts, and as tall as they were, could be seen from some distance.

Indeed he goes further and identifies Windmill Hill as the first destination, followed by Avebury, then encircled with a deep moat.

It's strange the posts were removed vertically rather than along the plane of their insertion, which surely would have been easier. Perhaps tilting would have put more stress on the logs, which the megalithics intended to use on another site.
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Mick Harper
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Yes, I wondered about Radnorshire. Keep looking. Possibly some Careful Ignoral going on. While AE does not ordinarily approve of "Gor blimey, it was quite different in the past, squire" theories, contours are good evidence if you can make it stick. I would guess your last two sentences point to the solution. Not that I quite know what you are talking about. I'm not good on vertical planes.
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aurelius



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When the weather has been generally wet for weeks on end our wooden gate swells up sufficiently to make unbolting it more difficult. This is due to water absorption causing the wood to expand slightly. The reverse also happens.

I'm no hydrologist but in the Durrington scenario, if the posts were set when the river reached into the contour 'cup', the water table would have been higher under the land surface, too, wouldn't it? Even if the footings of the posts did not reach standing water, I assume there would be capilliary action. But as the water levels receded, the posts would dry out and shrink, like my gate. They would be looser in the chalk fill, and easier to pull out, even after 'only' 50 years.

In the article, SHLP still assume a full, or nearly full circle of "over 200 posts". These would be more than enough for Woodhenge, currently dated to 1800 BC (radiocarbon dating of associated antler picks), which has six concentric circles of them totalling 156 posts. Woodhenge is estimated to be about 700 years 'younger' than Durrington Walls.

The Durrington posts are estimated to be 6-7 metres long and the Woodhenge ones "up to 7.5m" -

http://www.stone-circles.org.uk/stone/woodhenge.htm
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Mick Harper
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What about considering the following
1. Bang in a circle of very long wooden posts
2. Wait a bit
3. Withdraw wooden posts because
4. That would give you ...
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aurelius



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Lots of holes into which, say, stones could be placed into. But the point is, there was no circle of posts. There would be no sense erecting a circle on these contours. It is a C shape. The rest of the putative circle was, as Langdon explains, a ditch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWVzy8jhGfQ
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Mick Harper
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Thanks for putting me onto this Robert John Langdon dude, Aurelius. I am hoovering up his brilliant YouTubes. I don't buy his thesis yet (doubtless out of envy) but I like everything else.
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aurelius



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Borry knows about him.

Some of the best theories are borne out by subsequent discoveries, which I believe has happened in this case, with Durrington.

In very broad brush strokes for starters, in my view his theory requires either that the ancient remains in this part of the world are much older than orthodoxly believed, to tie them in with the immediate aftermath of the end of the Ice Age, or that the Ice Age only lifted about five thousand years ago, not ten-twelve.

We also have to be sure that his landscape analysis around Stonehenge is not exaggerated or inaccurate. I have his first book, and he really needs a proof reader as some of his writing is not well expressed. This also applies, unfortunately, to his website.

Nevertheless his is a fascinating and revolutionary theory/ interpretation which I hope will eventually overturn the current one.
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Boreades


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Yes, this was the original material for the "Keeping your feet dry, 8,000BC" topic, about three years ago over on TME.

See here:
http://www.themegalithicempire.nl/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1958
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aurelius



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In TME there are references to the 'talking signposts' (=hermits) of Hermes, Men-hirs/Hir-men (=Hermes) and the Hermai, "stone pillars...often with a heap of small stones at the base", but it is asserted here that:

In Greek, ‘herma‘ means ‘pile of stones’, ‘prop’ or ‘boundary marker’, and this was the original form by which the god’s numinous presence was imagined in rural districts during and before the Greek ‘Archaic’ period, when gods were frequently depicted such by simple formless objects (such as the wooden ‘xoana’ images etc). The name ‘Hermes’ also resonates with the later Arabic word Emir, meaning ‘prince’ or ‘commander’ of a territory. From the classical period onwards (after the 7thC BCE) depictions of Greek gods increasingly became more figurative, and the word hermai came to be applied to those monuments associated with Hermes.


https://atlanticreligion.com/2015/09/24/the-daemon-prince-some-musings-on-hermes-mercury/

Actually means, (and see http://www.behindthename.com/name/hermes)so what first appears as circularity actually means the god's name could itself have derived from Megalithia.
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Mick Harper
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It seems to me that it is now impossible to tell whether emirs are leaders who built stones that were therefore named emirates after them or you got to be an emir because you understood emirs (ie stones) or all the various other combinations. In AE it is much better to use the general etymology to guide you forward rather than do what academia does and insist on knowing the unknowable before deciding it's safe to venture outdoors.
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Mick Harper
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Our old friend Sven has sent me this link

https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/25000-year-old-buildings-found-russia-006215?utm_source=sumome&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=sumome_share

which raises two points.
1. Dolmens are not only profuse in Russia but, by the look of these, are in a much better state of preservation than our own
2. They clearly chime with TME's contention that dolmens' primary use was as secure storage of trade goods.

The significance of this last is that no dolmen I ever saw actually looked as though it was for this purpose. I advanced the theory purely by joining up 'What is logically required by te Megalithic System?' and 'Is there anything out there that might fit the specs?' So, right or wrong, I can at least claim to have made an auspicious guess so far as Russia goes.
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Ishmael


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From this I surmise that Russia was more-recently conquered. I'm willing to bet the best-reserved dolmens are in the eastern portion of the country.

It is my contention that there is no "Megalithic Empire." What there is is a logistics, supply train for a military. That supply train utilized simple devices and retired personnel on pensions to maintain the system. Post-conquest, the system was used to support the occupation force. Traders and troubadours piggy-backed upon its network.
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Boreades


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By overwhelming popular demand (from one person), reposting something I posted over on TME.

Not sure if I've ever mentioned this before, but a while ago I had the chance to talk to a geologist attached to English Heritage, looking after Avebury Stone Circle.

I asked what kind of stones were used at Avebury. The first answer was “Oh, they’re sarsen stones”.

Yes, but what are the sarsen stones made of? “Oh, these are concreted alluvial deposits”.

I asked “Oh, you mean they’re made of concrete, like some of the Egyptian pyramid stones?”.

At this point the English Heritage geologist was starting to look a bit scared, so I stopped asking awkward questions. And yet : some other geologists like Steve Marshall are more enquiring. They’ve noted many curious things about the sarsens at Avebury:

'Silica Glaze' - smooth, shiny patches of silica are found on some stones, resembling a thick, transparent pottery glaze.
'Sticky areas' are rough, with sharp peaks like cake icing. The sarsen appears to have become sticky before it set hard.

For more details, see http://exploringavebury.com/geology

They have even made their own geopolymer sarsen stones. For the recipe, see: http://exploringavebury.com/assets/uploads/files/Making%20Sarsen%20Stone.pdf

After three years:
it resembled mortar made with Portland cement but seemed to be even harder.


If you want to make Egyptian-style limestone geopolymer, there are some good videos online.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znQk_yBHre4#action=share

Their recipe?
they use old disaggregated (rotted) limestone rubble as their major material at 95% of solids. The binder is made from a mixture of kaolin clay, natron (sodium carbonate aka washing soda) and lime in water. The natural limestone in Egypt contains the kaolin already, but their source in the video didn’t have it, so it was added. Natron is found in the Egyptian desert, and lime is made by burning limestone. The water (12-17% of solid volume), natron, clay and lime are mixed in a large tub, then the limestone aggregate is added. As a damp squishable material like wet beach sand, it is dumped in layers into a wooden mold and tamped. In 4 hours it sets up and in a few days it is fully hardened. It looks like real limestone.

Other recipes are available.

And then (of course) there are the Tiwanaku / Pumapunku "Megaliths"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf9qK9QTlq0
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Boreades


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The Egyptians' use of concrete also neatly solves another riddle.

How were they able to precision drill deep holes through hard rock, and we cannot replicate what they did, or even figure out how they did it?


The simple and bleeding obvious answer is that the Egyptians didn't drill through “solid stone”, they drilled through geopolymer concrete after it had been molded, but while it was still soft, *before* it had set hard.
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