[Sca-cooks] Circles (was Period gifts in jars + question)

[Chris Stanifer]

--- "Martin G. Diehl" <mdiehl at nac.net> wrote:
> Some other points to consider at the estimated time of
> constructing those sites ... 
> 
> (1) Metallurgy ... 
> 
> At the time of erecting those 2 sites, they probably had 
> only stone and antler tools. 


I don't know the composition of the stones in the Stennes structure, but I want to say the outer
wall was made mostly of quartz stone(???).  Do we know if there was a nearby granite deposit, from
whence the locals could have retrieved harder rocks with which to whittle away?

I have long had a (completely) unsubstantiated theory that the Standing Stones in many Neolithic
or pre-historic sites were dragged/leveraged into place, and then shaped/carved over the following
decades. Stonehenge *may* be one of the foils for this theory, but, like I said, it's wholly
unsubstantiated.



 > (2) Lifting tools ... 
> 
> The actual tools are unknown; e.g. use of "Block and Tackle" 
> is very unlikely at that time. 

Give me a lever long enough, and I will move the world...
Your 'trench and hole' theory sounds good, and would require much fewer workers than, say, lifting
the stone into an erect position with a lever and push-poles.  Still, it wouldn't take that many
workers very long to get these bad boys into position.  Weren't there only something on the order
of 14 large stones at Stennes?

> (3) Transportation ... 
> 
> In the worst case scenario, they would have had to drag the 
> stones from where they occurred naturally -- the stones used 
> for the Stones of Stenness and Ring of Brodgar could have 
> come from a site near the Ring of Bookan or possibly 6 miles 
> away from Vestra Fiold. 


Horses???  Ropes and really strong guys??


 
> 
> (4) Food gathering ... 
> 
> While working, I think some time might have been related to 
> food gathering -- even without that being a primary activity.  

This was probably done by the rest of the clan/tribe/whathaveyou while the work was being done.

> 
> (5) Work time ... 
> 
> 12 hours per day seems a bit long -- using stone tools to 
> break bedrock during dawn, twilight, fog, or rain would 
> produce far more broken fingers that broken rocks. 


I think that if we were to take a little trip back to Neolithic times, we'd find these folks
toiling away well into the evening, even during those times when they *weren't* building huge
stone edifices.  12 hours sounds like a long time by today's standards, when the average workday
is 6 to 8 hours long.... but when you have to do everything 'from scratch' just to survive, you'd
probably find the workday is a wee bit longer.  Injuries were probably quite common, as well.
 
> 
> (6) Population ... 
> 
> In Burl, Aubrey; "A Guide to the Stone Circles of Britain, 
> ...", the author proposes a methodology to estimate the 
> population associated with a neolithic site.  
> 
> The upper population bound could be estimated by the number 
> of people who could be comfortably accommodated within the 
> stone ring.  


What??  Where did the author come up with this number??  This is assuming that the entire social
unit lived within the confines of the ring/structure, which is highly unlikely, since most of
these edifices were constructed (apparently) for religious purposes.  These weren't 'houses', or
'castle walls', meant to contain the clan or provide protection against attackers.  These were,
mostly, rings of stones with some kind of socio-religious importance. By this author's standard,
we could assume that the population of Los Angeles in 2003 was roughly the same as the number of
people who could fit into the main hall of  the Bethesda Church on South Westmoreland.


> 
> The lower population bound could be estimated by the number 
> of workers needed to erect the largest (heaviest) stone at 
> the site. 


No problem with this one.... there had to be at least enough people to lift the heaviest stone.

> You should see the web page, "Rethinking the great stone 
> circles of Northwest Britain" (nearly the last web page I 
> found for this topic) -- The author notes some of the same 
> issues you raised about construction time and also notes a 
> very different interpretation of the construction process.


Yeah, I have my doubts about the alleged length of time it took to build a lot of these neolithic
and prehistoric monuments.  I'm no engineer, by any means, but it just seems to me that, if I
could do it, they could do it.  People, in general, seem to rally around an idea, if it seems like
it might benefit them in some way.  I'd wager folks came from miles away to get a piece of this
Stone Standing action...

WdG



  


=====
She was freezer burn...... all else is only icing.


		
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