Your Guide to Going to Stonehenge. How to get there and details of the available tours. Stonehenge Address Salisbury, Wiltshire SP4 7DE, A344 Road. www.Visit-Stonehenge.com The Comprehensive Guide for Stonehenge. We have listed all the main tour providers together with all the tours they provide to assist you in your choice.
Showing posts with label English Heritage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label English Heritage. Show all posts
Sunday, 9 April 2017
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Friday, 13 March 2015
English Heritage - Old Sarum, Wiltshire
Old Sarum, Wiltshire
This site of the original city of Salisbury and Salisbury Cathedral was founded in the Iron Age and occupied until the 16th century. Romans, Saxons and Normans have all left their mark.
Part of the Domesday Book was written here and on its completion it was to Sarum that King William I summoned all the landholders in England to swear their oath of allegiance.
Monday, 18 August 2014
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Monday, 30 September 2013
NEW STONEHENGE EXHIBITION AND VISITOR FACILITIES TO OPEN ON 18 DECEMBER
NEW STONEHENGE EXHIBITION AND VISITOR FACILITIES TO OPEN ON 18 DECEMBER
English
Heritage announced today (30th September) that the first phase
of the long-awaited improvements to the setting and visitor experience of Stonehenge will be launched to the public on Wednesday, 18 December 2013.
Visitors
will be welcomed at a new visitor building, located 2.1km (1.5 miles) to the
west of Stonehenge. For the first time ever
at the site, they will be able to learn more about this complex monument in a
stunning, museum-quality permanent exhibition curated by English Heritage
experts. A 360-degree virtual, immersive experience will let visitors ‘stand in
the stones’ before they enter a gallery presenting the facts and theories
surrounding the monument through various displays and nearly 300prehistoric
artefacts.
The
archaeological finds on display are on loan from the Salisbury and SouthWiltshire Museum, the Wiltshire Museum, and the Duckworth Collection, University ofCambridge.
All were found inside the World Heritage Site and many are on public display
for the first time.
Set in
Stone? How our ancestors saw Stonehenge, will be the first special temporary exhibition. It will chart over 800 years of ideas and
debate - from 12th-century legends to radiocarbon dating reports in
the 1950s - on who built Stonehenge and when, and features objects on loan from many national museums.
Simon
Thurley, Chief Executive of English Heritage, said: “This world famous
monument, perpetually described as a mystery, finally has a place in which to
tell its story. The exhibition will change the way people experience and think
about Stonehenge forever -
beyond the clichés and towards a meaningful inquiry into an extraordinary human
achievement in the distant past. It will put at its centre the individuals
associated with its creation and use, and I am very proud with what we have to
unveil to the world in December.”
Visitors
will have a heightened sense of anticipation when they arrive at the visitor
building as Stonehenge is not
immediately visible; it will only emerge slowly on the horizon during the
10-minute shuttle ride to the monument.
At the
stones, there will be opportunities to walk and explore the surroundings of the
monument including the Avenue, Stonehenge’s
ancient processional approach, guided by new interpretation panels specially
developed with the National Trust. The Avenue will have been reconnected to the
stone circle after being severed by the A344 road for centuries, the whole area
will be free of traffic, and newly sown grass will be establishing on the
former route of the road.
The new
visitor building, designed by leading practice Denton Corker Marshall, is
reaching the final stages of construction and interior fit out has started. It
is a low key structure featuring many enhancements over what is on offer now,
including
· an environmentally sensitive and
fully accessible building with a high BREEAM rating (the industry standard assessment system for
sustainable building design and construction). There
are a number of green features such as an open loop ground source heating
system, mixed mode ventilation and a treatment system for recycling grey water;
· dedicated education space;
· a bright and spacious café with
indoor and outdoor seating for up to 260;
· a bigger shop;
· a visitors carpark with space for 500
vehicles and 30 coaches;
· ample toilets, including disabled
toilets;
· a pre-booked timed ticket system to
help minimise queues and avoid over-crowdedness at peak times; and
· new, downloadable and hand held free
audio guides in 10 languages
In Easter
2014, visitors can look forward to the opening of a group of reconstructed
Neolithic houses. The Neolithic houses are the highlight of the outdoor gallery
and will be built from January 2014 onwards by volunteers based on houses where
the builders of Stonehenge may have
lived, complete with furniture and fittings.
The final
phase of the project – the restoration of the landscape aroundStonehenge – will be completed in the Summer of 2014. Work to demolish the existing
facilities and return the area to grass will begin immediately after the new
visitor centre has opened and will continue for a few months.
The
£27-million Stonehenge Environmental Improvements Programme is the largest
capital project ever undertaken by English Heritage. It is financed almost
entirely by Heritage Lottery Fund money (£10m), English Heritage commercial
income and philanthropic donations including significant gifts from the
Garfield Weston Foundation, the Linbury Trust and the Wolfson Foundation.
Saturday, 3 September 2011
WOODHENGE
Woodhenge is a Late Neolithic monument originally made up of a series of concentric circles of wooden posts within a circular bank and ditch. It is of similar size to Stonehenge and lies between Larkhill and Amesbury, about 2km (1.2miles) north east of Stonehenge itself.
Woodhenge was the first archaeological site to be discovered through aerial photography, when a photograph taken in 1925 revealed rings of dark spots in a crop of wheat within a monument that had been previously assumed to be a disc barrow. Excavation of the site by Maud Cunnington in 1926 and 1927 showed that the dark spots were holes for wooden posts.
A WOOD AND STONE MONUMENT
The site originally consisted of 6 rings of wooden posts radiating out from a central point. They were enclosed within an earthen bank and ditch with a north east entrance. Although the timber monument may be earlier, the construction of the ditch has been dated to between 2470 and 2000BC, making it contemporary with or slightly later than the building of the stone circle of Stonehenge.
Recent excavations at Woodhenge as part of the Stonehenge Riverside Project have shown that there was a substantial stone element to the structure - at least five standing stones were also set up at the site, probably in two phases.
A MYSTERY UNCOVERED
The 1920s excavations at Woodhenge led to the discovery of a young child skeleton, buried near the centre of the monument. Another burial was found within the outer ditch during excavations in the 1970s. Finds included large amounts of Grooved Ware pottery, carved chalk objects and flint tools.
We do not know the purpose of Woodhenge, but it was likely to have been a free-standing setting of posts rather than a roofed building. The burials may have been sacrifices or offerings to mark the use of the monument. The posts and entrance appear to have a similar alignment to that at Stonehenge.
WINTERBOURNE STOKE BARROWS
This is one of the most impressive barrow cemeteries in Wiltshire. This group of burial mounds includes an early Neolithic long barrow and several Bronze Age round barrows of various shape.
THE EARLY NEOLITHIC LONG BARROW
The earliest burial mound in the group is the long barrow, which even today is 84 metres long and some 3 metres high, with clearly visible side ditches. It would have been built between 3750 and 3400BC, making it earlier than the ditch and bank at Stonehenge.
The barrow was excavated in 1863 by John Thurnam, who found a male burial at the north-east end. Three further burials, a male adult and two children, were found higher up in the mound. These were probably secondary burials, dating to the Early Bronze Age, inserted into the mound over one thousand years later.
BRONZE AGE BURIAL MOUNDS
This cemetery includes all the main types of round barrow found in Wessex. The first barrows were built around 2000BC. Two lines of round barrows run in a north-easterly direction from the long barrow. This remarkable group includes pairs of bell, pond and disc barrows as well as 19 bowl barrows. A further cluster of barrows, slightly to the north of the main group, is made up of 5 bowl barrows and a pair of saucer barrows.
GRAVE GOODS
Objects were frequently placed with the remains. These grave goods often included bronze daggers and battle-axes, beads and other ornaments. We believe that they indicate the status of the dead, although it is not clear whether the different types of grave goods indicate gender, age or role - some with special types of equipment may have been shaman's graves.
Most prehistoric barrows in the Stonehenge landscape were excavated in the 19th century. Many of the objects found can be seen in the Wiltshire Heritage Museum, Devizes and Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum, Salisbury.
VESPASIAN'S CAMP
Built on a spur of land bordered by the River Avon, Vespasian's Camp hillfort offered a strongly defensive position, a place of safety in times of trouble.
Despite its name, Vespasian's Camp has no connection with Roman history. In Elizabethan times, William Camden, one of the first people to tour and describe ancient sites, gave the hillfort its name after the emperor Vespasian who subjugated the south-west of England during the Roman invasion of Britain in AD 43.
LIVING IN THE HILLFORT
There are suggestions that this riverside location was important before the Iron Age. Excavations have found Neolithic pits, and in the early Bronze Age, some barrows were built on the hill. Recent excavations have led to the discovery of an ancient spring within the hillfort and to suggestions that this location may have been an important part of the Stonehenge ritual landscape.
The Iron Age hillfort has massive earthen ramparts with an entrance at the north end, and possibly one at the south. It was constructed in about 500 BC. A metre-thick layer of domestic waste demonstrates that it was intensively occupied following the construction of the ramparts.
IN LATER TIMES
In the 18th century the hillfort became part of the landscaped gardens of the Marquess of Queensberry's house at Amesbury Abbey, later known as the Antrobus Estate. This new phase included landscaping the hillfort with tree planting, ornamental walks, vistas and a grotto.
Today, trees and shrubs cover Vespasian's Camp. This legacy from the garden phase of its history is now a listed Grade II* park and garden.
THE CURSUS stonehenge
The Stonehenge Cursus, also known as the Greater Cursus as a smaller example lies to the west, is a long rectangular earthwork that runs for about 3km (1.8 miles) on an east-west alignment. Its width varies from 100 to 130 metres (109 to 142 yards) and it consists of a bank with an external ditch.
Although similar cursus monuments exist in England and many theories have been put forward, we do not know the purpose of these mysterious monuments. They generally survive only as shallow banks and ditches, or cropmarks visible only from the air.
A SPORTING ARENA?
The antiquarian William Stukeley, who first recorded the Stonehenge Cursus, believed it had been used for chariot racing by the ancient Britons and gave it the name of 'cursus' from the Latin term for race course. Looking at the outline of the site in the landscape, it does indeed look like a circuit of some sort, although the rounded ends that Stukeley recorded did not exist.
A PATH FOR THE DEAD?
One theory suggests that cursus monuments may have served as a processional ways, making permanent a route across the landscape. Others have suggested that it was a barrier to movement, dividing different parts of the land.
The Stonehenge Cursus is aligned on an early Neolithic long barrow at its eastern end. The ditches were dug out again up to a 1,000 years after they were first constructed, between 2800-2400 BC. Later, early Bronze Age barrows were built in a linear cemetery alongside the Cursus.
This shows that the Cursus remained important over a long time span, from the early Neolithic to the early Bronze Age.
THE AVENUE Stonehenge
The Avenue dates from between 2600 and 2200BC, shortly after the construction of the sarsen stone settings.
Theories about its purpose vary. The final section, on the approach to Stonehenge is aligned on the midsummer sunrise. Was it a ceremonial processional way to Stonehenge? Other researchers think that it was the route used to transport the bluestones of Stonehenge from the river to their final destination.
A CEREMONIAL ROUTE
A low bank defines the 'route' of the Avenue with outer ditches on both sides.
Much of the monument can only be clearly seen from the air as ploughing has reduced the height of the features. Near Stonehenge, however, the bank and ditch are still visible on the ground.
Unlike the stone-lined avenues at Avebury, no evidence has been found that stones or posts marked the Avenue's length.
THE HEEL STONE
The Avenue formalises the earlier north-eastern entrance into Stonehenge.
Outside the ditch, the Heel Stone stands near the middle of the Avenue, just before it enters Stonehenge. When viewed from the centre of the stone circle, it shows the direction of the midsummer sunrise. Excavations in 1979 suggest that the Heel Stone may have been one of a pair, or perhaps that the Heel Stone was moved in the past.
Immediately within the bank, the entrance was marked by three standing stones, one of which remains lying on the ground (now known as the Slaughter Stone).
NORMANTON DOWN BARROWS
This barrow cemetery lies to the south of Stonehenge. It contains Bronze Age round barrows of several types, as well as an earlier Neolithic long barrow and an oval barrow. There is a clear line of sight from these barrows to Stonehenge, about a kilometre (0.5 miles) away to the north.
BURIAL RITES IN THE EARLY NEOLITHIC PERIOD
The earliest ritual use of this site is most likely to have been the construction of the two small long barrows, some time between 3650 and 3400 BC. Nearby to one of them and dating from roughly the same time is a rectangular ditched enclosure, known as the Normanton Down mortuary enclosure.
This enclosure, defined by a discontinuous ditch with an internal bank, was excavated in 1959 by Faith de Mallet Vatcher and antlers from the ditch have been dated to 3500-2900 BC.
It was originally identified as a 'mortuary enclosure', an area for exposing corpses to be cleaned of flesh in a process known as 'excarnation', before the bones were placed in the chamber of a long barrow. However, no human bones have been found here and it is perhaps an open-air gathering place for ceremonies.
A PLACE OF HIGH STATUS
The Normanton Down barrow cemetery is famous for the rich and varied burial objects found within some of the barrows. Most were excavated by Sir Richard Colt Hoare and William Cunnington at the turn of the 19th century.
Perhaps their most famous discovery was in 1808; the richly furnished Bush Barrow burial. This is the one of the richest and most important examples of an early Bronze Age burial in Britain. Two adjacent barrows nearby contained similarly lavish objects and this may indicate a family group.
The cemetery has an unusually high number of disc barrows, eight in all, as well as several bell barrows. The range and richness of grave goods placed in these barrows and their location, within clear sight of Stonehenge, suggests that it was a burial ground for important people.
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