Overview

Who built Avebury and Stonehenge? Why and when were more than 600 stone circles, and thousands of barrows and cairns, erected in prehistoric Britain? What were they used for and what do they tell us about the beliefs and culture of their builders? Riddles in Stone is a history of the extraordinary variety of answers that have been given to these questions, by amateurs and professionals, archaeologists and astronomers, mystics and systems theorists. While modern excavation and radiocarbon dating has undoubtedly advanced our knowledge of the sequence and date of the monuments, their purpose and meaning is still hotly debated. Indeed no previous century has changed its mind so often as the twentieth - or provided such a welter of differing opinions. Each theory has as much to say about its own time as it has about prehistory. The stones have been used to enhance the authority of the Bible, to endorse the civilizing mission of the British Empire - and to argue that the Ancient Britons could work a computer. In a reaction to modern industrial society, they have been credited with spiritual powers and natural energies. Even the views of modern archaeologists often seem to reflect the latest academic fad, rather than a lasting solution. Riddles in Stone is an entertaining and instructive account of a debate on a subject of endless fascination.

Full Product Details

Author:   Richard Hayman
Publisher:   Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Imprint:   Hambledon Continuum
Edition:   New edition
Dimensions:   Width: 15.60cm , Height: 1.80cm , Length: 23.40cm
Weight:   0.570kg
ISBN:  

9781852855666

ISBN 10:   1852855665
Pages:   332
Publication Date:   15 November 2006
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.
Language:   English

Table of Contents

Illustrations Illustration Acknowledgements Preface 1 Monuments in the Landscape 2 Pagan Traditions 3 The Church and the Devil 4 In Medieval Literature 5 The Wonder of Britain 6 John Aubrey and Friends 7 William Stukeley 8 William Borlase 9 Romantic Druids and the Picturesque 10 Richard Colt Hoare and William Cunnington 11 The Barrow Diggers 12 Stone Age Circles and Stone Age Man 13 Diffusionism 14 Megalith Builders 15 Beaker Folk 16 Stonehenge and the Wessex Culture 17 The Sun and the Stars 18 Sir Norman Lockyer and his Followers 19 Stonehenge Decoded 20 Pi and Pythagorean Thoughts 21 Alfred Watkins and the Old Straight Track 22 John Michell and The View over Atlantis 23 Mysterious Britain 24 Earth Mysteries 25 Radiocarbon and other Revolutions 26 Sex and the Dead 27 Landscape, Culture, Society 28 Epilogue Gazetteer Notes Bibliography Index

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Author Information

Richard Hayman is an archaeologist and architectural historian who writes on the history of the British landscape. His other books include Riddles in Stone: Myths, Archaeology and the Ancient Britons.

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