3D scan of Stonehenge reveals hidden ax-head carvings

What do you all think of a group that made pilgrimages to the circle and marked particular stones each time they were in the area, perhaps traveling from further away. The marking stopped when they could no longer safely visit Stonehenge. It would be interesting to know if the marks were made with years between or all at once.

Axes were often a symbol for the tribal leader, held by their leader. A symbol of strength, wisdom and office. Perhaps certain groups marked their presence or pilgrimage made in honor of their leader, maybe even rewarded for it, evidence (carving) that the trip was actually made to be seen by future visitors. Perhaps a proved pilgrimage was prerequisite for acceptance of leadership. Proof of quest carried home could be an object that shows some previous marking plus the new mark. A small piece of stone also?

Originally posted by Noinden

Originally posted by Silcone Synapse
reply to post by Blackmarketeer

 

Could they be mushrooms by any chance?
Those Druids did love their mushrooms...
Yes,that sort of mushrooms.

Except Stonehenge had and other megalithic monuments had nothing to do with the Celts, and thus the Druids. Sorry to nitpick but I was under the assumption most now understood, Stonehenge is not Druidic, Celtic, in any way shape or form. Well Beyond the Masonic like groups which gather there, because they listened to some bad history.

I would have to disagree with you on the point of the Celtic peoples having nothing to do with the henges.
I agree with you that the megaliths in Britain predate the arrival of the Celtic people, but the definative proto Celtic " beaker cultural package" arrives during the first phases of stone standing.
It's clear from the archeological evidence that two distinct groups lived in Britain at the time, they can be identified by thier burial type and position, with one group showing influences from continental groups, those people would be the Celtic peoples.

I wonder if these shapes are actually representations of the Cygnus constellation.








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Originally posted by Atlantican
Axe heads or BULL skulls & horns!

dude,
You nailed my thoughts exactly,
They are bulls heads, the sheer number of cattle that were sacrificed/consumed at the henges shows an affinity towards cattle. They could have been a temporally fashionable way of keeping a tally of how many cattle a clan brought to the gathering.
In many primative pastoral societies there are yearly or semi yearly clan gatherings, to decide new marriages , trace stock or breed stock and or to reset the communal calendars, and trade regional goods.
I think the henges had a part in all of this.
At first they were highly ritualistic ceremonial centers that revolved around the solar calendar, as time passed the original group that started the ritual/festival spread out all over Britain. In the beginning people would gather at the two most prominent times the winter and summer solstices and the equinoxes, with the summer neo.g thw prominent one for a festival as travel would have been easier. Once you pin down the solstice, the village/clan shaman/priest/big kahuna only had to keep track of the days on a knotted cord to be able to time the planting and harvest and the breeding cycles of the stock.
Over time the gatherings became a major social function that served a whole host of functions.
The tribes/ clans would gather together their tradable goods and wares and make the treck to the henges.
Once their they would trade pottery, butter, cheese, bulls and cows or heifers and all sorts of stuff.
Cattle breeding could be also done between clans, thus insuring strong stock lines.
For those couple weeks they would be there, they would also likely engage in group activities such as butter making or the making of cordage or textiles .
Youngster would also be paired up for the inevitable arranged marriages.
I think that cattle drives were a very large part of the whole affair, the vernal equinox is a prime time to gather the cattle for breeding and you can cull the weak and infirm and they can be used to feed the gathering.

reply to post by punkinworks10


while the beaker package is regarded as proto-celtic, you cant actually call them celts. to even call the later ancient britons celts could be argued to be a bit of a stretch despite it being common coinage nowadays. as far as i am aware we have no idea where the beaker folk were linguistically - they may not even have spoken a form of brythonic/p-celtic (again, afaik - i dont really keep up on the latest arch developments and most of my books on this are over 15yrs old), and ofc the european tribal folk we today call the celts never saw them selves as a common grouping until they had a shared enemy in the romans. the "celtic" term regarding the uk is a fairly modern conception really, despite the term originating in ancient greece.

i thought your post re gathering and cattle drives was superb, btw

reply to post by NewtonDKC


The funny thing is there is very little evidence of the various Celtic groups having used these monuments. There is a little evidence the Anglo Saxons might have, but the Celts? Nothing credible. Just like we don't know if the "Druids" used shrooms or not, they wrote nothing down, so they could have, or anything else, but we can't say.

reply to post by skalla



ill just leave the big kids to discussion. i am slightly bemused and a little irritated to be blown off so politely. not really sure how to take it. imo, its as valid as a bunch of random questionable axes drawn in....n e ways, i gotta go change my diaper. carry on.

Originally posted by mactheaxe
reply to post by skalla

 

ill just leave the big kids to discussion. i am slightly bemused and a little irritated to be blown off so politely. not really sure how to take it. imo, its as valid as a bunch of random questionable axes drawn in....n e ways, i gotta go change my diaper. carry on.

i was not being rude, but tbf there was an archaeological paper in the OP that could have shed light on this if you had chosen to read it. considering that large numbers of these axe heads have been found in many burials throughout the area, and that bronze dagger shaped impressions are also on the stones, it's easily the best theory.
the bulls head/horns is a decent one too, though personally i dont agree with it. but taking the stretch to supposes that it's flying saucers and tractor beams is no more than fantasy, and very much less valid especially when there is evidence for one idea (the axes) and the other idea (aliens) actually has no evidence whatsoever, let alone there ability to "beam" things "up", sorry

did you read the linked pdf? it's really quite good

reply to post by skalla


The research has not changed its ideas much from 15 years back to be honest. The term "celt" can be used linguistically or culturally OR linguistically AND culturally. The common thought now is that the culture rather than the people spread, genetically the UK and Ireland has not changed much (Y chromosome ant mtDNA) since the neolithic. The culture certainly has however.

reply to post by Noinden


Absolutely, technological and cultural packages like the beakers and so-called celtic culture in britain were transmitted by by pioneering folk rather than large numbers of immigrating people. I just did not want to make broad statements about possible linguostic info on the beaker folk when I was not sure - especially as I have studied scots and irish gaelic and welsh at differing levels.

reply to post by Mclaneinc


Its a fleet of ships of the design built by "the ancients" from SG.U!!!

Those aren't axe blades, those are Thor Hammers, I'd know that design anywhere. Yes Thor's Hammer looks a lot like an axe head, the Vikings draw Thor's Hammer like an Axe, or perhaps their hammers looked like that, or perhaps it was originally Thor's Axe and changed later to a hammer yet the design remaining. This exact design was worn by the Vikings, now it may simply be a coincidence, the druids having a different meaning for it, but I'm surprised it hasn't been mentioned as a possibility as it looks exactly like the Viking rendition of Thor's Hammer or Mjölnir. One might say it's 'upside down' but just because a Mjölnir pendant is worn one way doesn't mean it couldn't be drawn another way. Does the timeline match up? I don't know just wanted to post the possibility.

Originally posted by Blackmarketeer
3D scan of Stonehenge reveals hidden ax-head carvings
news.cnet.com

New Light... negative images... Look at the stones shapes in the drawing; left a stone -- right a stone, look at the negative spaces of the "T" carvings; left a space -- right a space, the top of the "T" being either space or the header over the space between the stones. The carved shape could easily look like the sun or full moon rising (or setting) behind and between two upright stones being viewed at the solstices.

Perhaps when both moon & sun occurred close together the same day or during the same festival they were recorded in this way.

reply to post by Lydia


I don't really see it, I can't imagine ancient Britons thinking in terms of negative spaces representing sun/moon rises versus the carvings being axes, as thought. However, the illustration does show the unequal distribution of carvings - some of the stones are covered in them, and some hold only a handful. It makes me wonder if the individual stones belonged to a specific tribe who partook in creating Stonehenge, who perhaps marked it on every visit (festivals, equinox celebrations, etc.). There's a school of thought that Stonehenge's builders came from all over ancient Britain and were 'involved in a huge communal effort in which a large fraction of the population of the British Isles was involved.' (see this ATS post: Builders of Stonehenge Came from Afar) If so, then perhaps the various tribes continued meeting annually on special dates and marked those particular stones they helped place with an axe head carving as indicators. That might account for why some stones are covered in the carvings and some have just a small number.

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


Think about chipping an image in stone and that the stone will appear lighter where it is carved (not the suggestive black marks in the drawings) Visualize these carvings as highlighted making them white, a closer imitation to light.

Think of it this way. If you were given white chalk and asked to draw the sun or moon between two stones, how would it look?

reply to post by Lydia


The henge was also a gathering place to exchange ideas...

Could these marks have inspired the ax design?

Are these images on the inside looking out of the circle? If so this could be a map of locations when you leave through this door way. Sort of a map at the exit of what to expect when you travel in this direction.

The elder from this direction could use the map to tell of the area what type of events happened what they have discovered in different place in that direction.

I had a thought a thought the other day when I was reading on early European cultures.
The carvings look a lot like a hafted boat battle axe.
The "boat" battle axe was used by people of the corded ware culture in northern Europe, roughly around the time of the standing of the stones.
It was also used as a symbol of authority by elites of the culture.


Several skeletons found near the henges were of people from north central Germany, and the alps suggesting a solid connection with the people of the continent.
Could the axes actually be a representation of a boat style battle axe, some sort of recognition of such, instead of an odd representation of a ubiquitous object, their own axes.

So, maybe it's just me... but since Stonehenge is often associated with the stars, the first thing that came to my mind was a spiral galaxy.



I'm horrible at artistic things, so maybe someone can draw up what I'm visualizing. If you look at OP's image, you'll notice there's a distinct bare patch in the middle of the carvings on the right most structure, protruding from that bare spot are visible "arms" of axes, in a definite spiral pattern. The only issue I can see with this is from what I can tell, is that the arms of the Milky Way and the galaxy I'm picturing in my head are the arms spin opposite of each other, is that due to a mirror effect from the Hubble though?... Maybe the axe heads on the opposite stone are a map of a star within the galaxy, and each axe head on the right structure represents an inhabited solar system within the Milky Way?.. just a wild idea.

Could they just be stars of some significance to their lunar calendar that it maps within the galaxy maybe?..

Sorry if that's difficult to understand, haven't had much sleep!

reply to post by JBA2848


Perhaps the locations of Dolmen? The sizes also vary and their locations tend to run in lines.

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