Thanks to Dave and Tony for drawing to my attention an extremely silly letter just published in British Archaeology. It's written by one Tony Lucas. He correctly points out that the "bluestone quarrying" thesis is now effectively falsified as a result of those extremely inconvenient radiocarbon dates from Rhosyfelin that didn't fit with anything at all.......
However, the writer seems to believe the MPP's assertion that there is a "smoking gun" somewhere or other in the form of a mysterious proto-Stonehenge. A little more scepticism might have come in handy. How many more digging seasons do we all have to endure while the smoking gun search goes on?
Then we have the wondrous idea that the timber posts used to make the rafts for floating the bluestones were somehow invested with magic as a consequence of being used for such a noble purpose. Having become magical and precious, these waterlogged massive logs were then dragged all the way to Durrington Walls and used for "a brief celebratory monument". What this has to do with the "missing 500 years" I am not sure.....
Nice to see that fairy tales are still coming off the production line.
Dave Lucas tries to shine his lamp on All Things Greater Stonehenge but I fear his battery is faulty. According to him, the bluestones [not forgetting the posts from the rafts that brought the bluestones all the way round the South West Peninsula via Cornwall, ending up at Christchurch and the mouth of the Hampshire Avon] were taken up the CURSUS and thence to Stonehenge/ Durrington.
ReplyDeleteAs MPP would say, "Oh dear".