The stone ring of Callanish, Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, Scotland
This dismantling of stone rings would have occurred most frequently in areas of greater population. Throughout the remote, today mostly uninhabited moors and hills of the British Isles, over 900 stone rings are known to exist. In more populated continental Europe, they are far fewer in number and those mentioned in 19th century Swiss and Italian antiquarian guidebooks no longer exist.
Stone Henge Aerial View
The most well known of the megalithic structures are certainly the stone rings, particularly Stonehenge and Avebury in England. Research conducted over the past thirty years, combining insights from archaeoastronomy, mythology and geophysical energy monitoring, has conclusively demonstrated that the stone rings functioned as both astronomical observation devices and ceremonial centers. Simply stated, many of the stone rings are situated at locations with measurable geophysical anomalies (so called 'earth energies'); these earth energies seem to fluctuate in radiant intensity according to the cyclic influences of different celestial bodies (primarily the sun and moon but also the planets and stars); the architecture of the stone rings was engineered to observationally determine (by horizon astronomy) those particular periods of increased energetic potency at the sites; and those periods were then used by people for a variety of therapeutic, spiritual and oracular purposes. The tradition of pilgrimage in megalithic times thereby consisted of people traveling long distances to visit sites known to have specific powers. Due to the absence of historical documentation from the megalithic age it is often assumed that we cannot know how different power places were used but this is a narrow view based solely on the mechanistic rationality of modern science. An enlargement of view to include an analysis of mythology will reveal that the legends and myths of sacred sites are in fact metaphors indicating the magical powers of the places. The ancient stories of the sacred sites and their deities and spirits will tell you how the places may still influence you today.
Only during the last 40 years have archaeologists begun to acknowledge the astronomical orientations of European megaliths and the extraordinary mathematical sophistication which allowed their construction. The early recognition of certain megalithic constructions as astronomical observatories is almost single-handedly the accomplishment of Dr. Alexander Thom, Professor Emeritus of Engineering Science at Oxford University. In 1934, Thom began meticulously surveying megalithic sites. By 1954, he had surveyed and analyzed over 600 sites in Britain and France and begun to publish his findings. Initially his discoveries were not well received. Professor Thom was not an archaeologist, but rather an engineer, and the archaeological community did not welcome what they considered to be heretical views of an "untrained" outsider.
Thom's evidence, however, could not be dismissed. Both overwhelming in quantity and painstakingly accurate in presentation, it undisputedly demonstrated the phenomenal astronomical knowledge, mathematical understanding, and engineering ability of ancient megalithic people. Indeed these abilities were so advanced that they were not equaled by another European culture for over 4000 years. Thom's excellent books, Megalithic Sites in Britain and Megalithic Lunar Observatories, show with eloquent certainty that megalithic astronomers knew the yearly cycle to be a quarter of a day longer than a round figure and that they recognized the precession of the equinoxes, the 9.3 year major and minor standstill cycles of the moon, and the lunar perturbation cycle of 173.3 days which allowed them to accurately predict eclipses. Furthermore, these megalithic builders were extraordinarily keen engineers and architects expert in advanced geometry 2000 years before Euclid recorded the Pythagorean triangle theorems and over 3000 years before the value of Pi (3.14) was 'discovered' by Indian mathematicians. Surveying sites with the accuracy of a modern theodolite, these ancient builders developed a unit of measure, the megalithic yard of 2.72 feet, which they used in stone monuments from northern Scotland to Spain with an accuracy of +/ - .003 feet or about 1/200th of an inch. Following the leadership established by Alexander Thom, the English scholars John Michell and Robin Heath have gone on to demonstrate even more of the brilliance of megalithic mathematicians and engineers.
Previous to Alexander Thom's site surveys and their indisputable proof of megalithic culture's advanced scientific knowledge and social cohesiveness, archaeologists had always assumed Europe's prehistoric inhabitants to be a rough gathering of ignorant barbarians. Thom's discoveries, in showing this belief to be completely untenable, had a revolutionary, albeit gradual, impact upon the orthodox archaeological community. During the same period that Thom was surveying the megalithic sites other scientists were having an equally revolutionary effect upon the European archaeological community, but from an entirely different direction. Like the engineer Thom, these scientists were not archaeologists, yet their contributions, coupled with the implications of Thom's site surveys, would instigate a complete rewriting of European pre-history.
This other revolution in the European archaeological community was caused by the discovery of carbon-14 dating by Willard F. Libby in 1949 and the dendrochronological recalibration of this method by Hans E. Suess in 1967. Basically, carbon-14 testing, in conjunction with dendrochronology, or tree ring dating, is an absolutely accurate method of dating ancient organic matter and, by extension, the archaeological sites where that matter was found. To understand why these dating methods caused such a revolution in archaeological thinking it is helpful to know how the archaeological community viewed the subject of European pre-history prior to Libby's carbon-14 discovery in 1949.
Archaeology is a relatively recent scientific endeavor. During the entire course of its academic development, it has been powerfully influenced by the assumption that world wide cultures "diffused" from a few primary centers of original civilization. For more than a century, Pre-historians had assumed that most of the major cultural advances in ancient Europe were the result of a diffusion of influences from the great early civilizations of Egypt and Mesopotamia. These cultures could be dated by actual historic records, for both the Sumerians and the Egyptians had left lists of kings and dynasties going back to 2000 and 3000 BC respectively. Given these dates, and assuming an appropriate period of time for the diffusion of ideas from Egypt and Mesopotamia to northern Europe, it was calculated that Europe's megalithic structures could have been built no earlier than 1000 to 500 BC. Imagine the surprise and, at first, strident disbelief of the archaeological community when megalithic construction dates of 4000-2000 BC were factually established. The stone monuments of Europe were suddenly a thousand years older than those previously believed "world's oldest stone monuments," the Egyptian pyramids.
Carbon-14 dating had thus effectively and totally undermined the diffusionist theories as suitable explanations for the development of Europe's megalithic culture. This accurate archaeological dating technique, in conjunction with Thom's site surveys, demonstrated with irrefutable certainty that megalithic culture was indigenous to Europe, that it had developed wholly on its own (though perhaps with a mysterious Antlantean influence), and that it was the most scientifically advanced culture in the world during the long ago time of 4000 to 2000 BC.
As mentioned previously, each specific power place is unique by virtue of both its location and its energetic emanation. Certain power places were noted by ancient people as having energetic emanations which were influenced by particular astronomical cycles. The astronomical observatories erected at these power places were designed in such a manner as to be oriented toward the celestial body or bodies which influenced their power place emanations. While there were similarities in astronomical orientations between various observatories, there were no constant alignment patterns used, as each power place was unique in both its Earth surface location and its astronomical correspondence point. The energy link between these two unique points, planetary and celestial, produced a subtle energy emanation unlike any other place upon the Earth. As these energy emanations varied from place to place, so also did the type of structures that were erected to study the periodic changes in emanation of the earth energies.
Another reason for the megalithic astronomical observatories' diversity in structural size and complexity is human innovation and the effect it may have upon the development of scientific endeavors. As previously stated, the earliest megalithic structures at the power places were the more simple energy harnessing devices. These were followed by the observatories which megalithic people utilized to predict the periodic increases of subtle energy emanations at the power places. It is known from extensive archaeological evidence that the first rings and ellipses were constructed of wooden poles and only later, often after periods of a thousand or more years, reconstructed with stones. It also known (and for this Stonehenge is the primary example) that the stone rings themselves went through stages of development in both size and structural complexity. These size and structural changes certainly indicate a greater understanding of planetary and celestial energy correspondences as they relate to the power places, yet they also seem to indicate the increasingly scientific use of the rings as contrasted to their initial sacred use. Contemporary astronomers seek to build ever more powerful optical and radio telescopes. Is there any reason to doubt that ancient astronomers felt these same desires for more precise observational tools and thus developed their design?
Another vitally important, though currently little understood, function of the megalithic astronomical observatories, in particular the stone rings, was to predict, in advance of their occurrence, the arrival of and impact by cometary and meteoric objects, such as had occurred in 9600 BC and 7640 BC. As explained in Uriel's Machine, the stone rings found in different parts of northern Europe have different arrangements and alignments of stones, dependant upon the latitude and longitude of the site, which allow them to precisely observe the movements of celestial bodies along the horizon and thereby gauge the long-term passage of time. Myths and legends traceable to periods of the early Neolithic seem to indicate that a mysterious group of 'astronomer-sages' knew of the periodicity of cometary objects and their potentially lethal effect upon the planet. Authors Knight and Lomas in Uriel's Machine make a convincing case that the stone rings of megalithic times were used as both calendrical indicators and cometary prediction devices in service to mankind.
