Summary of Michael Parker Pearson's Stonehenge - A New Understanding

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview:

#1 The Stonehenge documentary I was involved in in 1998 brought in Malagasy archaeologist Ramilisonina to explain the significance of stone monuments to the locals. He explained that stone is an everlasting material with which one honors and commemorates the dead.

#2 An analogy is a comparison that implies an equivalence or a parallel between two things. We use analogies all the time, even at the most basic level of identification. When we decide to call an ancient stone or metal object with a particular type of sharp edge an ax, we are employing the simplest sort of analogy.

#3 The use of physical materials to express intangible meanings is not a new phenomenon. Stone has no inherent meaning that associates it with the eternal, the dead, or the ancestors, but its meanings are always historically contingent and subject to change according to social context.

#4 The meanings of the materials used to build Stonehenge were not always obvious to the people who built it. Stonehenge was built as a place of the ancestors, but some scholars thought it was just a monument to the establishment of peace and unity.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: May 21, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822502918

IRB Media

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Insights on Michael Parker Pearson's Stonehenge A New Understanding

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 7

Insights from Chapter 8

Insights from Chapter 9

Insights from Chapter 10

Insights from Chapter 11

Insights from Chapter 12

Insights from Chapter 13

Insights from Chapter 14

Insights from Chapter 15

Insights from Chapter 16

Insights from Chapter 17

Insights from Chapter 18

Insights from Chapter 19

Insights from Chapter 20

Insights from Chapter 21

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The Stonehenge documentary I was involved in in 1998 brought in Malagasy archaeologist Ramilisonina to explain the significance of stone monuments to the locals. He explained that stone is an everlasting material with which one honors and commemorates the dead.

#2

An analogy is a comparison that implies an equivalence or a parallel between two things. We use analogies all the time, even at the most basic level of identification. When we decide to call an ancient stone or metal object with a particular type of sharp edge an ax, we are employing the simplest sort of analogy.

#3

The use of physical materials to express intangible meanings is not a new phenomenon. Stone has no inherent meaning that associates it with the eternal, the dead, or the ancestors, but its meanings are always historically contingent and subject to change according to social context.

#4

The meanings of the materials used to build Stonehenge were not always obvious to the people who built it. Stonehenge was built as a place of the ancestors, but some scholars thought it was just a monument to the establishment of peace and unity.

#5

The debate about whether Stonehenge was used for burial or ritual continued throughout the 1970s. It was all about theory. No one was interested in collecting new evidence to see if our predictions could be challenged and rejected.

#6

The first metal tools appeared in northwest Europe around 2500 BC. The first Neolithic people lived in single farmsteads or hamlets, while the builders of large, communal tombs and causewayed enclosures congregated periodically.

#7

The first farmers in Britain exploited the forests around them. There were edible roots and tubers, stems, shoots, and greens, as well as seeds, nuts, and fruits. The burned remains of hazelnuts, crab apples, and blackberries are regularly found in Neolithic pits.

#8

The first farmers in Britain were most likely ethnically diverse, originating in different parts of Europe’s Atlantic zone. They were not necessarily long-term residents in Britain, but they may have converted to farming and then crossed the English Channel to settle.

#9

The first stone monuments in Britain are called closed chamber tombs and simple passage tombs, which were built in stone and date to between 4300 and 4000 BC. They were probably erected soon after the arrival of farming in Britain, around 4000 BC.

#10

The answer to where these extraordinary axes have been found in Britain is that they were brought over from Europe very early, and were most likely used by Neolithic farmers.

#11

There are few traces of the earliest farmers in the Stonehenge area, but there is evidence that they used the Avon valley for their campsites up to the fifth millennium BC. The oldest suspected cow bone from Britain dates to within the period 4360–3990 BC.

#12

The Coneybury feast shows us how the early farmers were able