tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post8206916857407467445..comments2024-03-28T00:46:01.084+00:00Comments on Stonehenge and the Ice Age: Field et al 2014: The Landscape and EarthworksBRIAN JOHNhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00413447032454568083noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-60015325940013440502018-01-22T14:14:45.857+00:002018-01-22T14:14:45.857+00:00Myris -- I am not going to accept your protestatio...Myris -- I am not going to accept your protestation that "I know a quarry when I see one" since you have not at any stage described which features cannot have been made by a natural sequence of shearing events and rockfalls such as we see on exposed rock surfaces all over the place. I have compared it with the rock face at Abermawr South -- check out the post on that. There are multiple surfaces here, and I do not understand your point about it "not being a natural planar shear surface." Too right it isn't -- because it is made up of many shear faces, some at least 1.5 m further out than others. There are multiple crossing or intersecting fractures. The rock face is a mess -- and there is nothing unnatural about it. We explained all this in our papers -- and you and Richard have ignored the points we made rather than entering into a proper academic debate about them.BRIAN JOHNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00413447032454568083noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-45958765016703458962018-01-22T10:20:08.927+00:002018-01-22T10:20:08.927+00:00I am unable to give any informed discussion on you...I am unable to give any informed discussion on your sedimentolgical work and so have refrained from doing so. <br />However I have worked in quarries since the first moon landings -my Ph.D ws built around Masson Hill Quarry and I have seen and worked in quarries in a number of countries. I know quarry faces very well and what the rock fall from them looks like.<br />CRyf is not a natural planar surface it is not a fault plane or master joint plane<br />your point about the surface being irregular is naïve, indeed the fact that there are joint blocks sticking out confirms this is not a natural planar shear surface.<br /><br />The proto-orthostat's orientation is just icing on the cake.<br /><br />There has been quarrying at CRyf on that quarry face. No amount of sedimentology is going to alter that.<br /><br />My earlier and far longer post has become attenuated in the aether it seems.<br /><br />MMyris of Alexandrianoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-52933360671267104832018-01-20T20:32:19.130+00:002018-01-20T20:32:19.130+00:00Solutional rills look more likely to me. I remembe...Solutional rills look more likely to me. I remember the arguments at the time. Must have been a while back though?<br /><br />The little mound: Anyone know why they assume it to be natural? Seems a bit of a stretch to make this assumption without any excavation.<br /><br />(The Geo-hyp sequence would ideally have a small pre-construction earthwork feature in this position for construction purposes.)Jon Morrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11264966739582178631noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-16384672144219598612018-01-20T15:37:19.012+00:002018-01-20T15:37:19.012+00:00But all the serious literature is peer reviewed, y...But all the serious literature is peer reviewed, your couple of papers, the Pet Rock boys dozens and the sundry archies scores.<br />All MPP papers are peer-reviewed often by the most learned and relevant archaeologists. Antiquity is difficult to publish in, they are very careful.<br />I know as much recent cryptography, scientology as you know Late Neolithic Early Bronze Age archaeology. That is why I have not nor cannot comment.<br />I have seen more quarries than you and more quarry faces including working faces and so am qualified to state that I consider that face to be unnatural and worked. The proto orthostat is evidence of that working.<br />I don't think I have ever seen a quarry face that is not stepped in the order of 2-3 metres as joint block fall or are removed.<br />Others on this block know far far far more about quarry faces than we.<br /><br />We have all had important papers sink like a stone - it happens - perhaps you could drum up some interest amongst the ice men. <br /><br />Much of the debitage is struck hence is debitage.<br /><br />M<br />Myris of Alexandrianoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-19976851574975598412018-01-20T13:42:13.547+00:002018-01-20T13:42:13.547+00:00Neil -- forgive me for saying so, but you are gett...Neil -- forgive me for saying so, but you are getting in a bit of a tangle here. The stripes have nothing to do with glaciation, as far as I can see, unless they have something to do with enhanced surface run-off associated with an ice edge. But then you would expect to find fluvioglacial gravels at the bottom ends of these runnels -- and as far as I am aware, none have been found.<br /><br />Glaciers do not need to "plough up" or remove embedded stones on the ground that is being overridden. Sometimes that happens, where bed erosion is going on (depends on bed temperatures, ice velocity and many other things) and sometimes ice will pass across terrain (including fragile "tors" as Adrian Hall has shown) which remain apparently unaffected. In those circumstances ice plays a protective role. I suspect that may happen where there are very cold conditions and where there are large accumulated snowfields prior to ice arrival -- the ice is then classified as having a "polar" regime rather than a temperate one.<br /><br />Can I gently suggest that you look up "entrainment" on this blog?<br />BRIAN JOHNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00413447032454568083noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-60955372032677206962018-01-20T13:31:26.555+00:002018-01-20T13:31:26.555+00:00Periglacial stripes? I have doe it to death alrea...Periglacial stripes? I have doe it to death already, Myris. Just use the search box. The "stripes" look like solutional rills and they probably are solutional rills, which may have evolved during temperate and periglacial climatic conditions. As I have said many times, their alignment and spacing may be influenced by bands of flint nodules or other irregularities in the chalk bedrock. this is what Field et al are also suggesting in thus paper.<br /><br />Debitage -- Myris, if you are not to be accused of pseudoscience, and want to be taken seriously as a scientist, you need to be careful about how you phrase things. I have taken you to task about this before, and will continue to do so..<br /><br />"Planar quarry face" -- there ain't no such thing. Just because you keep on using that expression does not make it any more true. When you have acknowledged and addressed (in print) the issues raised by Dyfed, John and me in our 2 peer-reviewed papers, I may take your assertions more seriously. Until then, we have a fracture-guided rockfall face characterised by multiple surfaces, some of which appear to be guided by foliations within the rhyolite bedrock. It's all here, on the blog, and in print. Until you acknowledge and address our work in print I fear you are solidly stuck in scientific misconduct territory, and I shall continue to say so.BRIAN JOHNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00413447032454568083noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-88476707479089798592018-01-20T12:55:26.661+00:002018-01-20T12:55:26.661+00:00Brian,
Far be it for me to presume complete knowl...Brian,<br /><br />Far be it for me to presume complete knowledge on this aspect, but having said that: what, in your view, caused the stripes?<br />Glacier? If so, the stripes infer scraping, which infers entrainment, which infers a moraine? Where's the moraine?<br /><br />If this glacier chugged all the way from Wales carrying bluestones, why did it not also scrape up existing deposits of stone we know were in the vicinity?<br />The many beds of sarsen north of the Pewsey Vale don't appear to have been disturbed by a glacial event. (When one is lifted, there's chalk under it.) The same is true for the far fewer deposits of sarsen south of the Vale.<br /><br />The stripes were initially detected by GPS, and the entire landscape around Stonehenge has been investigated with this technique. This slope is really the only place in the area where they seem to exist. Is this not inconsistent with glacial entrainment?<br /><br />These remarks are not intended to be incendiary, but I'd really like to know the answer to some of them.<br /><br />NeilND Wisemanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11925248433335448747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-82559407716419072742018-01-20T12:34:52.543+00:002018-01-20T12:34:52.543+00:00Yes some good thoughts/gloss but some sleight of h...Yes some good thoughts/gloss but some sleight of hand too.<br /><br />I think it would very useful were you to do a post outlining periglacial striping, a post that can be used and cited.<br /><br />Just a text-book explanation no reference to any Wessexellian localities.<br /><br />I agree that all debitage is based on the investigated debitage. How else can you do it.<br /><br />Yes the un-excavated parts of SH may contain kilos of emerald-veined kryptonite (and of course the 'lost' sarsens that completed the circle) even and, I agree this is pushing it, the Lost kingdom of Mu.<br /><br />What can be said is that the debitage sample and the ratios of the lithologies found in that debitage are remarkably uniform throughout the SH Landscape.<br />That the extant non-dolerite orthostats do not seem to be part of that debitage <<1%<br />That almost ALL >95% of the rhyolitic debitage is from CRyf and much from the planar quarry face.<br /><br />Incidentally it rather suggests that the debitage is not dressing but destruction.<br /><br />You cannot have your cake and eat it. All discussion is based on present knowledge to dismiss that because it is not 100% leads us to chav'sville pseudoscience.<br /><br />Great New Year to you too 'Agios Kostas, will be in touch. I am sure Bran misses you here, I know that I do. Perhaps this year will be kiss and make up and your return.<br /><br />Clap hands boys and girls if you want Kostas back. Panto season really is the best of British theatre (pace Swans).<br />M<br /><br /><br />Myris of Alexandrianoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-32832917606912175422018-01-20T11:24:45.954+00:002018-01-20T11:24:45.954+00:00Neil -- the periodic melting of permafrost does no...Neil -- the periodic melting of permafrost does not cause stripes. Nobody has ever shown me any reason why those "stripes" have anything to do with permafrost or any reason why the word "periglacial" needs to be used at all. I reckon one of MPP's mates came up with the word because it sounded learned, and it just stuck! Periglacial striped ground involves the lateral sorting of sediments on a gentle slope where previously the sediments were unsorted. I see no evidence for that process ever having happened in this context.BRIAN JOHNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00413447032454568083noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1228690739485734684.post-5525629555674169252018-01-20T01:36:19.805+00:002018-01-20T01:36:19.805+00:00Hi Brian,
1) The so-called Periglacial Stripes ar...Hi Brian,<br /><br />1) The so-called Periglacial Stripes are caused, in my view, by the periodic melting of permafrost. They happen to align with Solstice Sunrise because that's the direction to which the grade slopes. They continue on past the Elbow.<br />It should also be noted that two of the runnels on the Avenue's west side are definitely wagon tracks. These sweep into the henge through the northeast causeway and continue around the west side till they merge with the original Byway-12. This is clearly seen in 2nd Lt. Phillip Sharpe's aerial pictures of 1906. I have little doubt it was a farm-to-market route used for years by vendors trading between Larkhill and Normanton. Pretty convenient shortcut!<br /><br />2) I'm sure some of the Sarsens at the Pile are local, and there's no reason to assume they're not. The Heelstone is almost certainly one of them and is, in my view, the first one erected, long before the Stone Circle was envisioned. Some suggest that the nearby Stone-97 hole is actually its solutional pit, but I very much doubt it for a variety of reasons.<br />The Slaughter Stone and its missing twin, Stone-E, are also candidates. Those were most likely Stones -B and -C, used during the earlier incarnation, eventually moved when the alignment changed.<br />On the other hand -- for what it's worth -- I do believe all the Trilithons came from 'away'.<br /><br />3) It's now widely accepted that the North Barrow is the oldest feature at Stonehenge; predating the Ditch and Bank by quite a while. There's no way of knowing how or when the bluestone chips were introduced, but as the Barrow was significantly altered from its original state this suggests that the chips could have been deposited at the time the blues showed up for use in the Aubreys. It would be valuable to pursue that research.<br /><br />Best Wishes,<br />NeilND Wisemanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11925248433335448747noreply@blogger.com