Eden House Country Guest House B & B Accommodation - Bluestone & Wales Geology
The term Bluestone is used to describe all of the non-indigenous stones found at Stonehenge. Bluestone is a generic, rather than a geological term, since at least 20 different rock types are represented. One of the most common rocks at Stonehenge is known as Preseli Spotted Dolerite - a chemically altered igneous rock containing spots or clusters of Plagioclase Feldspar. It is medium grained dark and heavy rock, and is harder than granite. Preseli Bluestone tools, such as axes, have been discovered all over the United Kingdom, many of which appear to have been made in or near to Stonehenge, since there are similarities with some of the spotted dolerites found there.
It's been confirmed that the Bluestones which form the inner circle of Stonehenge were transported to Salisbury Plain from a site in the Preseli Hills some 240km or 150 miles distant; quite a feat without any of today’s modern equipment! From the bones and other evidence found during a rare dig in 2008, it has been suggested that ancient people believed the stones had great healing properties. Professors Darvill and Wainwright found evidence suggesting Stonehenge was actually a centre of healing. This purpose joins the other ideas that the monument was a shrine for worshiping the ancestors, or a calendar with which to mark the solstices. From the dig, pieces of the stones were sent to Oxford University for carbon dating and 2300BC (300 years earlier than previously thought) is the most reliable date yet for the erection of the first bluestones.
It is assumed that there were about 80 stones on site originally, but this has never been proven since only 43 remain. Each of the stones weigh between 2 and 4 tons, and the majority are believed to have been transported from the Preseli Hills either through glaciation, or by people organising their transportation. If a glacier was responsible, then it must have been the Irish Sea Glacier. Recently an archaeological find has been cited in support of the human transport theory, while new glacier modelling supports the ‘natural’ theory.
The discovery of Preseli dolerite axe heads indicates that there was once a local (West Wales) population who knew how to work with the stone. For many centuries, Stonehenge has fascinated the peoples of the world and even today, with all our modern wonders, it receives almost a million visitors each year, just to spend some time basking in its magic. When thinking of Stonehenge many tourists bring to mind the huge trilithons made of Sarsen stone, (from the Marlborough Hills in Wiltshire), but the real magic is to be found in the inner horseshoe made up of the Preseli Bluestones. Stonehenge appears to have been in frequent use until around 2600BC when it was abandoned for almost 500 years. Around 2100 BC the Preseli Bluestones were brought from what is now Pembrokeshire, and erected in a circle aligned to the summer solstice.
About 100 years later, this first Bluestone circle was taken apart and work began on the final stage of the site, with the Bluestones rearranged in the horseshoe and circle that we can still see today. The next phase saw the arrival of the Sarsen stones, which became the outer circle with a continuous circle of lintels. On the inside of this, five trilithons were placed in a horseshoe arrangement, part of which we can still see today. Since that time, Stonehenge has been systematically destroyed and recreated by various peoples throughout history.
The most recent reconstruction took place as late as the 1960s. Although we now believe that we know how the stones were erected, the reason why the Bluestones were brought from over 250 miles away from the Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire, West Wales has remained a mystery. One theory speculates that the stones were dragged by roller and sledge to the sea at Milford Haven, thence sailed along the Welsh coast to Bristol and up the River Avon to a point near what is now Frome in Somerset. From there the stones were probably pulled overland to a place near to what is now Warminster and then floated down River Wylye to Salisbury, up the Salisbury part of the Avon to West Amesbury, near Stonehenge.
However, as part of a Millennium Project in 2000, a group of local volunteers from Pembrokeshire attempted to re-enact the journey by moving just a single three-ton Bluestone block from its source in the Preseli Hills to Stonehenge, using wooden rollers for the land routes and a curach raft for the sea and river routes. Unfortunately the design of the raft failed, the stone was lost at sea and the project was abandoned through lack of funds.
The mystery remains!
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Eden House Country Guest House B & B Accommodation - Bluestone & Wales Geology