TALK: Tracing the sources of the Stonehenge bluestones: applying modern analytical techniques to an old problem
- Adults £8, Children £6, Under Five's Free
- 22 Jan 26
- The Salisbury Museum, The King's House, 65 The Close, Salisbury, Wiltshire.
- 19:30
Over a century ago, geologist H.H. Thomas suggested the bluestones of Stonehenge came from the Mynydd Preseli area of west Wales. Using advanced petrological, mineralogical, and geochemical techniques unavailable to Thomas, we have now pinpointed the precise outcrops for several of these stones. One ‘bluestone’, however, differs markedly and may instead originate from the Orcadian Basin in northeast Scotland - a finding that reshapes our understanding of the connectivity between Neolithic communities across Britain and Ireland, as well as the monument’s wider significance. These results are also relevant to the long-debated question of how the non-sarsen Stonehenge stones were transported to Salisbury Plain.
Professor Richard Bevins is Honorary Professor in the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences at Aberystwyth University.