"Thomas de Groot" <tDOTdegroot@interDOTnlANOTHERDOTnet> wrote in message 
news:4a5de425$1@news.povray.org...
>
> "TC" <do-not-reply@i-do get-enough-spam-already-2498.com> schreef in 
> bericht news:4a5dde83@news.povray.org...
>> This may be a bit off-topic, but I cannot help but wonder how stonehenge 
>> really did look when it was still "in use". I really doubt that there 
>> were just the stones and nothing else - there should have been huts or 
>> primitive tents and other things... even priests need to live somewhere.
>>
>> How did the surrounding landscape look like? Nowadays it is green lawn 
>> amid fields of wheat (or whatever corn). But was this so when the place 
>> was built? Or where there woods? Do you have any idea? Does anybody?
>>
> Yes, dwelling quarters have been found, even quite extensive iirc. 
> http://www.shef.ac.uk/archaeology/research/stonehenge shows recent work 
> done on the site and new ideas about the possible use of the monument.
>
> As far as I know, the landscape looked much different from today. More 
> woods certainly, but with open clearings for fields and meadows. However, 
> the wood extension is probably difficult to trace exactly. Some 
> conclusions can be drawn from pollen concentrations in ancient soils but 
> that does not always say much about the real extent, and much of the 
> landscape has been overhauled in later centuries of course.
>
> Thomas
>

I did a fair bit of reading yesterday prompted by this thread. Stonehenge is 
certainly just a small part of a big and complex set of structures in the 
area including areas of habitation, barrows for burying the dead and large 
enclosed areas that seem to be set aside for activities that nobody is quite 
sure about (though plenty of different theories are available).

If I picked up the right message from the work described on the site Thomas 
linked to it looks like the area may have supported a community of about 
2000 people, probably living off a mixture of hunting and both arable and 
livestock farming. There also seems to be evidence that people gathered 
there from far afield to celebrate important dates in the calendar. Even the 
Welsh guy who sold them the stones probably got an invite.

I've read that nobody is currently sure about the precise vegetation in this 
area that long ago and it seems likely Stonehenge was developed during a 
period of quite rapid transition from hunting in the woods to farming. The 
first phase of ditches and banks were being built when large parts of 
England were being deforested and it's quite possible that these earthworks 
were initially around the edges of clearings, surrounded by forest or 
woodland and early field systems.

In searching the Internet I came across an artists impression of what it 
might have looked like if the area had still been forested when the stones 
were built: 
http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/2009/06/30/stonehenge-as-a-woodland-site/

Pure conjecture of course, but it makes a pretty picture. Even if the 
woodlands were never quite that close to the stones it seems likely to me 
that there would have still been some nearby woodlands and that the 
landscape wouldn't have been anywhere near as devoid of plant life as it is 
today.

Regards,
Chris B.

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