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A Stone Age circular repository in England is even old thanStonehenge , raising the hypothesis that Stonehenge ’s creators used it as inspiration , a new study finds .
When researchersradiocarbon - datedartifacts from the tumid monument , cognize as Flagstones , they establish that it date stamp to about 3200 B.C. — meaning it ’s about 200 years old than Stonehenge . Previously , archeologist thought Flagstones was the same age as the early leg of Stonehenge , which was built and reconfigured over the centuries . The researchers published their determination March 6 in the journalAntiquity .
An illustration of the Flagstones enclosure shortly after its construction in the middle Neolithic period.
The discovery " makes Flagstones the earliest large circular enclosure get it on in Britain , " order study first authorSusan Greaney , a reader in archeology at the University of Exeter in the U.K. " It might be that Flagstones was imitate at Stonehenge , or it might be that we need to go back to our dates of Stonehenge and think again , " she told Live Science in an e-mail .
flag , an ancient monument and burial website , was found in the 1980s during mental synthesis of the Dorchester bypass in Dorset , a county in southwesterly England . Excavations excavate a 330 - foot - wide ( 100 meters ) circular ditch that was made with intersecting pits . The pits have at least four set of human remains : a cremate adult and three tiddler whose bodies were swallow up there . The partially cremate remains of three other grownup are situate elsewhere at the site , accord to astatementfrom the University of Exeter .
Now , one-half of the monument is under the shunt , while the other one-half is under a historic home manage by the National Trust , a preservation organization . The land site ’s artifact are housed at the Dorset Museum .
(Image credit: Courtesy of the Dorset Museum)
touch on : Why was Stonehenge built ?
Flagstones is about 37 miles ( 60 km ) southwest of Stonehenge . Its similarity to the former stages of Stonehenge , which also includescremated burialsand a similarly sized envelopment made of intersectant pits , led archaeologists to believe the two were built at the same time , around 2900 B.C. But as part of her doctoral enquiry , Greaney put together a more elaborated timeline of a bunch of Neolithic monuments in the Dorchester area whose artifacts are kept at the Dorset Museum .
" With raw technique for obtaining precise radiocarbon date , and in advance statistical methods , we can now obtain really precise estimates for when upshot like monument mental synthesis ingest place , " Greaney enounce .
(Image credit: Courtesy of the Dorset Museum)
To more accurately appointment Flagstones , Greaney and her colleague radiocarbon - date human remains , red cervid antlers and wood coal find at the land site . By combining these dates with those of archaeologic finds from the site , Greaney and her colleagues estimated that the pits were dig around 3650 B.C. but that the circular enclosure was n’t formed until 3200 B.C. and the entombment were placed there soon after . A young adult male who was buried under a expectant sarsen stone at the shopping centre of the Flagstones ' enclosure was placed there much later on — around 1,000 years after the monument was first used .
The ancient antler of a red cervid that was found at Flagstones .
A bird’s - eye scene of excavation at the Flagstones monument in Dorset , England .
A new type of monument
At 5,200 geezerhood one-time , Flagstones is the oldest recognize large , circular natural enclosure of its kind in Britain . After its construction , circular monuments were built in legion other position .
" It is part of a shift from predominantly orthogonal or linear monuments ( cursus monuments , foresightful barrows ) or irregular enclosures ( causewayed enclosures ) towards circular forms , " Greaney suppose .
The unexampled bailiwick suggests that rotary monument like Flagstones " may have been influenced by practices in Ireland , where people were burying their cremated deadened in circular passage tombs at this meter , " she articulate .
Although the new engagement suggest that Flagstones is older than Stonehenge , Greaney cogitate that scientist should reassess and redate Stonehenge . After all , some of Stonehenge ’s artifacts are thought to be older than the site itself .
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" There are some ' curated ' animal bones from near the entrances to the enclosure at Stonehenge , which do date from around 3200 BC , " Greaney said . " It ’s been presume that these deer finger cymbals and cattle skulls had been kept for some prison term before being deposited in the ditch .
" With the new dates from Flagstones , it ’s now possible to look at these deposits , which were in slightly abstruse parts of the ditch , and ask whether there was an earlier enclosure made up of intercutting cavity which only by and by people joined together to form the more uninterrupted ditch , which bump in c. [ circa ] 2900 BC , " Greaney add .
Stonehenge quiz: What do you know about the ancient monument?
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