Novel scientific method proves pit circle near Stonehenge was man-made, say researchers | Archaeology
The existence of a remarkable ring of flexure pits created by Neolithic people near Stonehenge has been proven thanks to a new combination of scientific techniques, a team of archaeologists claim.
The architects of Stonehenge had the skies in mind when they built the great stone monument in Wiltshire; The team believes the builders of the Durrington pit circle may have been more interested in the underworld.
The Durrington circle is thought to be an area of approximately 20 pits more than a mile wide, centered around the Neolithic Durrington Walls and Woodhenge sites.
Some of the pits are thought to be 10 m wide and 5 m deep, and digging them from calcareous land would require determination and engineering skill.
The apparent existence of the pit circle was first revealed in 2020, with some describing it as the largest prehistoric structure ever found in Britain.
Its discovery was heralded as the first possible evidence of numerical counting, as the large size of the circle meant that those who made it had to somehow keep track of their position; The structure is too large to be seen with the naked eye.
But there was also skepticism, with some experts suggesting the pits may have been natural features rather than carved by humans more than 4,000 years ago.
An article published in the journal Internet Archeology Dangers of Potholes It details the studies that have been done since then and concludes that they were made by humans.
Prof Vincent Gaffney, School of Archeology and Forensic Sciences University of BradfordThe Dr who conducted the analysis said he believed the new research showed that the pits formed an “extraordinary structure”.
Gaffney said they used a combination of methods that had never been used this way before. “The extraordinary size of the pits required a new strategy to explore them without the need for a large and very expensive excavation,” he said.
“Since no single technology can answer all questions, multiple types of geophysical equipment were used to determine the size and shape of the pits.”
Electrical resistivity tomography evaluated the depth of the pits, radar, and their shape with magnetometry. But this did not prove they were man-made, so sediment cores were extracted and a range of techniques were used on them, including optically stimulated luminescence, which dates the soil from when it was last exposed directly to the sun, and ‘sedDNA’, which recovers animal and plant DNA from soil.
Researchers found repeating patterns in the soil in different parts of the large area, and they believe these patterns prove that humans were involved. “They couldn’t have occurred naturally. That couldn’t happen,” Gaffney said. “We think we accomplished that.”
The team believes the pits may have been dug during the late Neolithic period. The reason will probably never be known, but Gaffney suggested it may be linked to belief in the underworld.
He said: “We are now confident that the pits are a structure and we have a huge monument that writes the cosmology of the people of that time onto the land in a way we have not seen before. If it is going to happen anywhere in Britain, it will be at Stonehenge.”
