Stonehenge
How It Was Built, and the Arguments About Why
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Chapters examine the site’s relationship to nearby Neolithic settlements like Durrington Walls, and discuss how Stonehenge changed through centuries of use. The book looks at Roman influence, 19th-century excavations, and modern debates over its function. It includes discussions of astronomical alignments, Arthurian legends, and the rise of neopagan worship at the site.
Whether you're interested in ancient engineering or the ongoing mystery of how people built it without modern tools, this audiobook offers a clear, detailed journey through Stonehenge’s history.
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The name Stonehenge comes from Old English, as noted by the Oxford English Dictionary, which cites Ælfric’s 10th-century glossary. In it, henge-cliff is defined as “precipice” or “stone,” and the stanenges or Stanheng near Salisbury are described as “stones supported in the air.” By 11th-century writers, these were already known by that name. In 1740, William Stukeley observed that “pendulous rocks” were called henges in Yorkshire and suggested that Stonehenge in Saxon meant “the hanging stones.” Christopher Chippindale’s Stonehenge Complete supports this, saying the name derives from stān ‘stone’ and either hencg ‘hinge’—because lintels hinge on upright stones—or hen(c)en ‘to hang’ or ‘gallows’ or ‘instrument of torture,’ though elsewhere he mentions the “suspended stones” etymology.
The word "henge" comes from Stonehenge, and it's given its name to a certain kind of ancient monument. Archaeologists use the term to describe earthworks that have a circular shape with a raised bank and an inner ditch. This naming comes from how people used to talk about these sites long before modern science did. It’s a word that stuck, even though the term itself was borrowed from earlier ways of describing them.
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Mike Parker Pearson, who leads the Stonehenge Riverside Project centered on Durrington Walls, observed that burial practices were linked to Stonehenge from the very beginning of its existence.
From the very start, Stonehenge served as a burial site, remaining so through its peak use in the mid third millennium B.C. A cremation burial from the sarsen stones phase is likely only one of many such burials that took place during this later stage of the monument’s existence. This shows that even at its height, the site retained its deep connection to the dead.
Stonehenge didn’t appear all at once—it grew over many centuries, with construction happening in stages across at least fifteen hundred years. Some evidence suggests the area around the monument may have been used for thousands of years, possibly as long as six thousand five hundred. But figuring out exactly when each part was built is tricky. The natural chalk has shifted and mixed over time due to freezing and animal digging, early excavations left poor records, and many of the old dates aren’t reliable. Today, archaeologists agree on a general sequence of events, though details are still debated. The plan shows numbered features that help track these changes.
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Archaeologists have found four, or possibly five, large Mesolithic postholes from around 8000 BC beneath the old tourist car park at Stonehenge. These held pine posts roughly two feet six inches across, which were put up and later rotted in place. Three, or possibly four, of the posts ran east–west, a direction that may have carried ritual meaning. Not far away, in Aberdeenshire, there's another site called Warren Field, which is thought to be the world’s oldest lunisolar calendar. It was adjusted each year by watching the midwinter solstice. Sites like it have been found later in Scandinavia. At the same time, a settlement has been discovered at Blick Mead, a steady spring one mile from Stonehenge.
Salisbury Plain was still covered in trees when people first began building there, but by 4,000 years later, during the early Neolithic period, they had constructed a causewayed enclosure at Robin Hood's Ball and long barrow tombs nearby. Around 3500 BC, as farming communities started clearing the land, they built the Stonehenge Cursus about 2,300 feet north of where Stonehenge would later stand. Earlier still, possibly as far back as 4000 BC, other stone or wooden structures and burial mounds may have existed, with charcoal from the Blick Mead camp dating to that time. The University of Buckingham's Humanities Research Institute suggests that whoever built Stonehenge lived in the area for many generations, making it one of the most important places in the landscape’s history.
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The very first Stonehenge was built around 3100 BC, a circular structure made from chalk quarried from the nearby Seaford bedrock, standing in open grassland on a gentle slope. It had a large northern entrance and a smaller southern one, surrounded by a ditch and bank, with bones of deer and oxen buried in the ditch along with flint tools. These bones were older than the digging implements, suggesting care and significance in their placement. The ditch was dug in sections like earlier monuments nearby, and the chalk was piled to form the bank. Inside the enclosure, 56 pits—later called the Aubrey holes after John Aubrey—were placed in a circle, possibly once holding standing timber, though no remains of that have been found. A recent excavation suggests these pits may have originally held bluestones, pushing back the earliest stone use at the site by around 500 years.
In 2013, a team led by Parker Pearson dug up over 50,000 burnt bone pieces from 63 people at Stonehenge. Originally, these remains were spread across the Aubrey holes, but in 1920, William Hawley had taken them out, thinking they weren’t important. He reburied them all together in Aubrey Hole 7 in 1935. Scientists later found that the bones belonged to nearly equal numbers of men and women, with some children included. The ground beneath the graves was crushed, leading researchers to believe the first bluestones from Wales might have been used as markers for the dead. Carbon dating placed the site at around 3000 BC—500 years earlier than before. A 2018 study of strontium in the bones showed that many of those buried during this time probably came from near the bluestone source in Wales, where they hadn’t lived before their deaths.
Between 2017 and 2021, Parker Pearson and his team suggested that the bluestones at Stonehenge came from a circle at Waun Mawn in the Preseli Hills, a site that was about 110 meters in diameter, similar to the first Stonehenge circle. That circle, dated between 3400 and 3200 BC, was dismantled around 300 to 400 years later, which matches the time when Stonehenge was built. One of the bluestones showed signs of reuse, identified by its unusual pentagonal shape and luminescence soil dating from the filled-in sockets. The area around Waun Mawn saw a halt in human activity at that time, leading to theories about migration as a reason, though other stones may have come from different places.
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Around 2900 BC, construction began on what would become the second phase of Stonehenge. During this time, which lasted until about 2600 BC, people built some kind of timber structure inside the enclosure. They placed standing timbers at the northeast entrance and added a line of posts coming in from the southern entrance. These postholes were smaller than the earlier Aubrey Holes, only about sixteen inches across, and weren’t spaced evenly. The bank around the site was deliberately lowered, and the ditch kept filling up with silt.
At least twenty-five of the Aubrey Holes, originally built during Phase one, later held cremation burials from the two centuries after the monument began. Whatever their initial purpose, these holes took on a funerary role in Phase two. An additional thirty cremations were placed inside the enclosure’s ditch and other parts of the site, mostly in the eastern section. Stonehenge thus functioned as an enclosed cremation cemetery during this time—the earliest known such cemetery in the British Isles. Fragments of human bone that had not been burned were also discovered in the ditch-fill. The dating of this phase is supported by late Neolithic grooved ware pottery found alongside the monument’s features.
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Around 2600 BC, the people building Stonehenge stopped using timber and began working with stone instead. They dug two circular groups of holes in the center of the site—called the Q and R Holes—and these may have supported a double ring. Only some of the stone sockets are fully known, so they’re sometimes described as forming crescents. At least 80 standing stones were placed there, though today only 43 can be traced. Most agree that the bluestones came from the Preseli Hills in Wales, over 150 miles away. One idea is that these were moved by glacial action, but there’s no evidence of glaciers depositing stones in southern England. A 2019 report said that quarries in Wales show signs of human quarrying, suggesting the bluestones were cut and transported by people, not glaciers.
In 2011, a key discovery helped support the idea that the bluestones at Stonehenge came from far away, with a quarry found at Craig Rhos-y-felin in Pembrokeshire. Some of the stones weighed about two tons and may have been carried using methods like lifting and dragging on poles, techniques seen in China, Japan, and India. It’s unclear if the stones were moved directly from the quarry to Salisbury Plain or if they came from a circle at Waun Mawn near Preseli. That site had a stone circle that could have held some of the same bluestones found at Stonehenge, with one hole matching the unusual shape of a Stonehenge bluestone "like a key in a lock." Each monolith was around 2 meters high and roughly 1 to 1.5 meters wide.
A stone now known as the Altar Stone was likely quarried from the Senni Beds, possibly within 50 miles of the Preseli Hills in the Brecon Beacons. In 2024, researchers from Curtin University revealed findings based on chemical analysis of fragments from the stone itself, determining that its composition most closely matched rocks found in the Orcadian Basin—covering areas like Caithness, Orkney, and the Moray Firth in northern Scotland. The study suggested the stone traveled roughly 430 miles to its final location, highlighting unexpected cultural connections between southern England and northern Scotland.
At around 2600 BC, during what’s called Stonehenge 3 I, the north-eastern entrance was widened to align perfectly with the midsummer sunrise and midwinter sunset. This phase of construction was left unfinished, but the small standing stones were taken out, and the Q and R holes were deliberately filled in.
During phase 3, around 2600 BC, the Heel Stone—a Tertiary sandstone—was likely placed outside the north-eastern entrance, though its exact date remains uncertain and it could have been set up at any time during this phase. It was originally accompanied by a second stone that has since vanished. Just inside the same entrance, two or possibly three large portal stones were erected, only one of which, the fallen Slaughter Stone, still stands today, measuring 16 feet long. Other features from this period include the four Station Stones, two of which were positioned atop mounds known as barrows, though these contain no burials. Additionally, Stonehenge Avenue was constructed during this time—a pair of ditches and banks stretching two miles to the River Avon.
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From a quarry roughly sixteen miles north of Stonehenge, in West Woods, Wiltshire, came thirty massive Oligocene–Miocene sarsen stones. These were shaped with mortise and tenon joints before being erected into a circle about ninety-eight feet across. Thirty lintel stones were placed on top using tongue and groove joints, a technique from woodworking. Each of the standing stones was around thirteen and a half feet high, seven feet wide, and three and a half feet deep, weighing roughly twenty-six tons. The stones were carefully worked so that they gradually widen toward the top, keeping their visual alignment steady when viewed from below. The lintel stones also curve slightly, helping to maintain the structure’s circular look.
In the period between 2600 BC and 2400 BC, the third phase of Stonehenge saw the construction of a more refined circle, with inward-facing stone surfaces that were smoother and more carefully shaped than the outer sides. The stones averaged 3.6 feet in thickness, with about 3.3 feet between them. A total of 75 stones would have been needed to finish the structure—60 for the main ring and 15 for the trilithon horseshoe. At one point, it was believed the ring had been left unfinished, but an exceptionally dry summer in 2013 revealed patches of dried grass that may mark where the missing sarsens once stood. Each lintel stone was around 10 feet long, 3.3 feet wide, and 2.6 feet thick, with their tops reaching 16 feet above the ground.
In the center of Stonehenge’s great circle stood five massive trilithons made from dressed sarsen stone, arranged in a horseshoe shape with an opening facing northeast. These enormous stones—ten uprights and five lintels—each weighed up to fifty tons and were carefully fitted together using complex joints. The trilithons were aligned symmetrically, with the smallest pair around twenty feet tall, the next pair slightly taller, and the largest one in the southwest corner reaching nearly twenty-five feet. Only one upright from the Great Trilithon remains standing, showing about twenty-two feet above ground, with nearly eight more feet buried beneath. On stone 53, a dagger and fourteen axeheads have been carved; similar markings appear on stones 3, 4, and 5. Though hard to date, these carvings resemble late Bronze Age weapons, confirmed by early 21st-century laser scanning.
Between 2600 and 2400 BC, during a major phase of construction, people gathered at Stonehenge for celebrations, with evidence suggesting as many as 4,000 individuals were present for mid-winter and mid-summer festivals. Animal teeth found two miles away at Durrington Walls, thought to be a "builders camp" by Parker Pearson, show the animals were slaughtered around nine to fifteen months after birth. Strontium isotope analysis revealed some of these animals had been brought from as far as the Scottish Highlands for the events. The Stonehenge Archer, discovered in the outer ditch in 1978, dates to slightly later than this period, and the Amesbury Archer and Boscombe Bowmen burials were found three miles to the west.
While Stonehenge was taking shape, another monumental site was rising at Durrington Walls, overlooking the River Avon. There, a massive timber circle was erected with its orientation toward the sun at midwinter sunrise—opposing the solar alignments at Stonehenge. An avenue aligned with the summer solstice sunset led from the river to this timber circle. Burn marks along the Avon’s banks suggest these structures were connected, perhaps serving as a route for ceremonial processions on the longest and shortest days of the year. Parker Pearson has suggested that the wooden circle at Durrington Walls may have represented a “land of the living,” while the stone circle stood for a “land of the dead,” with the river acting as a threshold between them.
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Stonehenge was built by a culture that left no written records, so we don’t know exactly how or why it was made. Many ideas about its purpose and construction are still debated. Some myths have grown around the stones. The site is aligned to the sunset of the winter solstice and the sunrise of the summer solstice. A natural landform at the location followed that line, possibly inspiring the design. The arrangement of the great trilithon, the horseshoe of five central trilithons, the heel stone, and the embanked avenue may have served as a celestial observatory. This could have allowed the builders to predict eclipses, solstices, equinoxes, and other important events. Excavated animal bones suggest people gathered there during the winter rather than summer.
There’s little direct evidence showing how the people who built Stonehenge actually moved the massive stones. Over time, some writers have claimed that supernatural or even futuristic methods were needed, arguing the stones were too big to shift using only Neolithic tools. But experiments show that basic techniques—like using shear legs—could work. One widely accepted idea is that they rolled the stones along a track made of logs. Another theory suggests using a sleigh on a greased track, with animal fat as lubricant. In 1995, a team of over 100 workers successfully moved a 40-ton stone slab using such a sleigh, pulling it across an 18-mile journey from the Marlborough Downs to near Stonehenge.
The site has been proposed to serve as an astronomical observatory or a religious place. In the 1960s, Gerald Hawkins described how the structure seemed designed to track the Sun and Moon over a 56-year cycle. More recently, two researchers have offered new ideas. Geoffrey Wainwright and Timothy Darvill suggested that Stonehenge functioned as a healing site—like Lourdes in prehistoric times. They argue this accounts for the many burials nearby and evidence of trauma found on some remains. Still, they acknowledge the site likely had multiple uses, including ancestor worship. Isotope analysis shows some buried individuals came from far away: a teenage boy from around 1550 BC was raised near the Mediterranean; a metalworker from 2300 BC known as the “Amesbury Archer” grew up in the Alps; and the “Boscombe Bowmen” probably arrived from Wales or Brittany.
Mike Parker Pearson from Sheffield University believes Stonehenge was part of a larger ritual landscape, connected to Durrington Walls by matching avenues and the River Avon. He sees the area around Durrington Walls as a place for the living, while Stonehenge functioned as a domain of the dead. Traveling along the Avon to reach Stonehenge may have been a symbolic journey from life to death, honoring both ancestors and the recently deceased. These ideas were first proposed in the twelfth century by Geoffrey of Monmouth, who also claimed the stones had healing powers and were built as a funerary monument.
There are other ideas about what Stonehenge was meant to be. A group of researchers from Britain, led by Mike Parker Pearson from the University of Sheffield, believe it might have been built to represent peace and unity. They point out that during the time it was constructed, the Neolithic people in Britain were going through a period when their cultures were coming together.
The stones at Stonehenge fall into two main groups: the smaller bluestones and the larger sarsens, which are silicified sandstone boulders from the chalk downs of southern England. Among the bluestones are materials such as dolerite, tuff, rhyolite, or sandstone, and they appear to have been brought from the Preseli hills in southwestern Wales—about 140 miles away. One stone, called the Altar Stone, may have come from east Wales instead. In 2020, analysis determined that the sarsens originated from West Woods, a site some 16 miles from the monument.
Researchers from the Royal College of Art in London found that the igneous bluestones at Stonehenge have "unusual acoustic properties," producing a "loud clanging noise" when struck. These same rocks are common in the Carn Melyn ridge of Presili, where the village of Maenclochog—meaning bell or ringing stones—used local bluestones as church bells until the 18th century. The team suggests these acoustic qualities may explain why the bluestones were transported such a great distance, a major feat for the time. In some ancient cultures, lithophonic rocks were thought to have mystical or healing powers. This idea supports the theory that Stonehenge was a "place for healing," a hypothesis put forward by Darvill, who consulted with the researchers.
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DNA studies of Neolithic remains across Britain reveal that the builders of Stonehenge I and II shared close genetic ties with populations from Iberia and Central Europe. About 75% of their ancestry came from Early European Farmers who migrated from the Eastern Mediterranean, while the remaining 25% originated from Western Hunter-Gatherers already living in western Europe. These farmers first reached Iberia before moving northward, arriving in Britain around 4,000 BC. The majority of the British Neolithic population stemmed from this group, although a smaller portion derived from those who traveled along the Danube into Central and Western Europe. Their agricultural practices originated in Anatolia, and their mixed heritage was largely formed on the continent before they migrated to Britain.
Britain was home to hunter-gatherer groups when the first farmers arrived, people who had been living on the island since the end of the last Ice Age about 11,700 years ago. These early inhabitants were replaced by the newcomers without much mixing between the populations. The farmers moved into the region and took over, leaving behind the hunter-gatherer way of life. This transition happened without much intermarriage or cultural blending between the two groups.
The people who built Stonehenge and other megaliths in northwest Europe had a mixed ancestry, with most of their farming genes coming from the Aegean, but their paternal lines—passed down through fathers—were almost entirely from Western Hunter-Gatherers. This pattern was also seen among Neolithic farmers in Britain. It appears that these populations were made up of hunter-gatherer males and farmer females. A broader shift in ancestry across western and central Europe during the Middle Neolithic shows a resurgence of hunter-gatherer influence, mostly from male lines.
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In 1979, Richard J. C. Atkinson used new stratigraphical methods to challenge the idea that the Roman army had tried to destroy Stonehenge because it was a center of druidic resistance. He reclassified stone fragments he once thought were from the fourth or fifth century as being from the original builders or from Middle Bronze Age quarrying. An excavation in 2008, combined with earlier work, showed that during the Roman era, the site saw serious activity beyond just casual use. Coins from the late fourth century, lots of Roman pottery, and animal bones buried in pits suggested it was a significant ritual or ceremonial place. A square-cut trench ending in a bluestone slab with a Roman coin inside was seen as a grave.
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Since ancient times, people have been curious about Stonehenge and the monuments around it. Inigo Jones thought the site was built during Roman times. Then in 1666, John Aubrey began studying it more carefully. He mapped out the pits now known as the Aubrey holes. A century later, William Stukeley continued Aubrey’s work. He explored the area around Stonehenge and identified some of the nearby features, though he got a few wrong. He also started digging up burial mounds in the region. Stukeley believed the whole landscape connected to the Druids. So fascinated was he by them that he originally called the barrows "Druids’ Barrows."
The most accurate early plan of Stonehenge came from John Wood, the Elder, a Bath architect, who made his survey in 1740. That original drawing has since been redrawn using computer technology and published again. It’s important to note that Wood’s plan was created before the southwest trilithon collapsed in 1797, and it wasn’t until 1958 that the structure was restored.
In the early nineteenth century, William Cunnington began the first formal archaeological work at Stonehenge, digging through 24 barrows and then focusing on the stones themselves, where he found charred wood, bones, pottery, and urns. He also located the original hole of the Slaughter Stone. Richard Colt Hoare continued this effort, excavating nearly 380 barrows across Salisbury Plain, including about 200 near the Stones, sometimes working with William Coxe. To mark their findings for future researchers, they left initialled metal tokens in each barrow they opened. Cunnington’s discoveries are now held at the Wiltshire Museum. In 1877, Charles Darwin visited the site briefly, using it for experiments on how quickly organic remains sink into the earth, a study he included in his book The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms.
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In 1901, William Gowland led the first major restoration of Stonehenge, straightening and concreting sarsen stone number 56, which was at risk of falling. In doing so, he moved the stone about half a metre from where it had originally stood. That same year, Gowland also conducted what became the most scientific excavation yet, uncovering new details about how the stones were erected—information that surpassed what had been learned in the previous century. Then, during the 1920s, William Hawley, who had previously excavated nearby Old Sarum, dug at the base of six stones and the outer ditch. He also found a bottle of port wine left behind by Cunnington inside the Slaughter Stone socket, helped rediscover Aubrey’s pits within the bank, and located the circular Y and Z Holes outside the Sarsen Circle.
In the decades following the 1940s, Richard J. C. Atkinson, Stuart Piggott, and J. F. S. Stone returned to Stonehenge to re-examine the earlier efforts of Hawley. During this work, they uncovered carved axes and daggers embedded in the sarsen stones. Atkinson’s research played a key role in identifying the monument’s three main stages of construction.
In 1958, work began on restoring the stones, re-erecting three of the standing sarsens and setting them in concrete bases. Then, in 1963, after stone 23 of the Sarsen Circle fell, the site was restored again. That effort included re-erecting the fallen stone and adding concrete to three more. Later, archaeologists Christopher Chippindale from the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Cambridge and Brian Edwards of the University of the West of England pushed for greater public awareness of these restorations. In 2004, English Heritage honored that effort by including photographs of the work in progress in its book Stonehenge: A History in Photographs.
In 1966 and 1967, before a new car park was built at the site, Faith and Lance Vatcher dug up land northwest of the stones. They found postholes from the Mesolithic period, between 7000 and 8000 BC, along with a 10-meter palisade ditch. That ditch, shaped like a "V," held timber posts that rotted away over time. Later aerial surveys suggested this ditch stretches from the west toward the north of Stonehenge, close to the avenue.
In 1978, Atkinson and John Evans conducted excavations at Stonehenge, where they found the remains of a man later called the Stonehenge Archer, buried in the outer ditch. The following year, in 1979, more work was needed when a cable-laying project accidentally dug a ditch near the Heel Stone. That mistake uncovered a new stone hole right next to the Heel Stone.
In the early 1980s, Julian C. Richards launched the Stonehenge Environs Project, a thorough investigation into the area around Stonehenge. His team carefully dated several features in the landscape, including the Lesser Cursus, Coneybury Henge, and a number of smaller sites. The work brought new clarity to how the monuments related to one another across the surrounding terrain.
In 1993, the public presentation of Stonehenge was condemned by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee as 'a national disgrace.' In response, English Heritage commissioned a two-year research effort to gather and summarize all the archaeological work done at the site up to that point. The project concluded with the 1995 publication of a monograph titled Stonehenge in its landscape, the first to fully present the site’s complex layers and artifacts. That work also introduced a new interpretation of how the monument was built.
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Between 2003 and 2008, a team led by Mike Parker Pearson conducted a series of excavations known as the Stonehenge Riverside Project. The work focused on other monuments in the area and how they related to the stones, especially Durrington Walls, where another "Avenue" leading to the River Avon was found. At the point where Stonehenge Avenue meets the river, archaeologists uncovered a circular area previously unknown, likely containing four more stones that may have marked the start of the avenue.
In April 2008, Tim Darvill of the University of Bournemouth and Geoff Wainwright of the Society of Antiquaries began a new excavation inside the stone circle, searching for pieces of the original bluestone pillars. They dated the erection of some bluestones to 2300 BC, though that may not mark the first time stones were placed at Stonehenge. Organic material dating to 7000 BC was also found, along with Mesolithic postholes, showing the site was used at least 4,000 years before construction began. Later, in August and September 2008, as part of the Riverside Project, Julian C. Richards and Mike Pitts excavated Aubrey Hole 7. They removed cremated remains from several Aubrey Holes originally dug up by Hawley in the 1920s and re-interred in 1935. A licence for removing human remains had been granted by the Ministry of Justice in May 2008, following the Statement on burial law and archaeology issued that same month. One condition was that the remains be reinterred within two years and kept safely, privately, and decently during the interim.
In April 2009, a new investigation of the landscape around Stonehenge revealed a shallow mound about forty centimetres high between stones 54 and 10, clearly separate from the natural slope. It hasn’t been dated, but the idea that it’s just careless backfill from past excavations seems unlikely, given that it appears in drawings from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Some suggest it may have been part of the original design, since it’s a rare geological feature. Nearby, a low circular bank just ten centimetres high was found between the Y and Z hole circles, with another inside the "Z" circle. These are thought to be spoil from the original holes, or possibly deliberate hedge banks meant to screen activities within.
In 2010, researchers working on the Stonehenge Hidden Landscape Project found a monument that resembled a henge, just under a kilometer away from the main Stonehenge site. This newly discovered structure turned out to be located at a place called Amesbury 50, which sits within a group of barrows known as the Cursus Barrows. The finding added another layer to the understanding of the ancient landscape around Stonehenge.
In November 2011, archaeologists from the University of Birmingham revealed findings from the Stonehenge Hidden Landscape Project, which began in 2010. Using non-invasive geophysical imaging, they discovered two large pits within the Stonehenge Cursus pathway. These pits align with the positions of midsummer sunrise and sunset as seen from the Heel Stone. Team leader Vince Gaffney suggested this could connect rituals at Stonehenge to celestial events happening in the Cursus.
In December 2011, researchers from the University of Leicester and the National Museum of Wales revealed that they had pinpointed the origin of certain rhyolite fragments at Stonehenge. These pieces did not correspond to any of the existing stones or bluestone stumps. The team identified the source as a 230-foot-long rock outcrop named Craig Rhos-y-felin, located near Pont Saeson in north Pembrokeshire. This site lies 140 miles from Stonehenge.
In 2014, researchers from the University of Birmingham revealed new findings near Durrington, Wiltshire, where they discovered stone and wooden structures and burial mounds previously overlooked, possibly dating back to 4000 BC. Using ground-penetrating radar, they surveyed an area of 4.6 square miles to a depth of three meters and found as many as 17 new monuments that may be Late Neolithic and similar to Stonehenge. The site includes a cursus track ending in two deep pits, five meters wide, whose purpose remains unknown.
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In July 2020, a study led by David Nash of the University of Brighton concluded that the large sarsen stones were "a direct chemical match" to those found at West Woods near Marlborough, Wiltshire, some 15 miles (25 km) north of Stonehenge. A core sample, originally extracted in 1958, had recently been returned. First, the fifty-two sarsens were analysed using methods including x-ray fluorescence spectrometry to determine their chemical composition, which revealed they were mostly similar. The core was then destructively analysed and compared with stone samples from various locations in southern Britain. Fifty of the fifty-two megaliths were found to match sarsens in West Woods, thereby identifying the probable origin of the stones.
In 2017 and 2018, professor Parker Pearson's team excavated Waun Mawn, a large stone circle in the Preseli Hills. The work suggested the site had once held a stone circle 110 metres across, about the same size as Stonehenge’s original bluestone ring. That circle was also aligned to the midsummer solstice.
At Waun Mawn, archaeologists found a stone hole shaped like a pentagon, matching the unique pentagonal stone at Stonehenge—stone 62. The missing stone from Waun Mawn, stonehole 91, was dated to around 3400–3200 BC, and it was removed roughly 300 to 400 years later. This timing supports the idea that these stones were later transported and reused at Stonehenge, where they were eventually repositioned and combined with local sarsens. Around the same time, human activity at Waun Mawn stopped, possibly indicating a migration to Stonehenge. Some researchers have suggested that more stones may have been added from other nearby dismantled stone circles.
In 2021, a team led by Parker Pearson returned to Waun Mawn and found that the circle was never finished. Of the stones that may have originally stood at the site, no more than 13 were taken away in ancient times.
In February 2021, archaeologists revealed the discovery of "vast troves of Neolithic and Bronze Age artifacts" during excavations for a proposed highway tunnel near Stonehenge. Among the findings were Bronze Age graves, late Neolithic pottery, and a C-shaped enclosure located on the planned route of the Stonehenge road tunnel. One of the graves held a shale object, while the C-shaped enclosure contained burnt flint, and among the remains was the final resting place of a baby.
In January 2022, archaeologists shared findings from an electromagnetic induction survey that uncovered thousands of prehistoric pits near Stonehenge. The lead author of the study, Philippe De Smedt, determined that early humans were responsible for excavating six of the nine large pits. One of these, dating back around 10,000 years, contained hunting tools.
In August 2024, a team at Curtin University in Australia published findings in the journal Nature identifying the origin of the Altar Stone. They determined it came from the Orcadian Basin in northeast Scotland, a distance of about 700 kilometers away. The stone is partially buried beneath a collapsed sarsen stone at Stonehenge.
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The Heel Stone stands northeast of the main sarsen circle, right at the end of Stonehenge Avenue. It's a rough, tall stone, about sixteen feet high, leaning slightly toward the circle. Over the years, people have given it different names—sometimes "Friar's Heel," and other times "Sun-stone." At the Summer solstice, if you're inside the stone circle looking northeast through the entrance, the sun rises in that direction. The sun has often been seen rising over the Heel Stone, and photographs show just that.
A tale says the Devil brought the stones to Salisbury plain from a woman in Ireland, wrapping them up for the journey. One stone dropped into the Avon, but the others made it to the plain. Then the Devil shouted, “No-one will ever find out how these stones came here!” A friar answered, “That’s what you think!” and the Devil threw a stone at him, hitting him on the heel. The stone lodged in the ground and has remained there ever since.
Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable links the story to Geoffrey of Monmouth, who wrote about Stonehenge in book eight of his Historia Regum Britanniae. But even though that work includes a tale about how the monument was built, it tells a story that’s completely different from the one attributed to him in Brewer’s Dictionary.
A second stone bearing the same name was noted in the nineteenth century by antiquarian Charles Warne, who found it at Long Bredy in Dorset.
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In the twelfth century, a man named Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote a book called Historia Regum Britanniae, which tells the story of how Stonehenge was built. According to his tale, the stones were moved from Ireland with the help of a wizard named Merlin. This legend became popular and was later told in many different versions, including works by Wace, Layamon, and the Welsh Brut y Brenhinedd.
In the story, Stonehenge's stones were healing stones brought by giants from Africa to Ireland, set up on Mount Killaraus in a circle called the Giant's Ring. In the fifth century, King Aurelius Ambrosius wanted to honor Celtic nobles killed by Saxons at Salisbury, so Merlin suggested using that ring. The king sent Merlin and Uther Pendragon—King Arthur's father—with 15,000 men to move it from Ireland. They beat an Irish force led by Gillomanius but couldn't shift the stones themselves. With Merlin's help, they eventually transported them to Britain and rebuilt them in their original form. Mount Killaraus may point to the Hill of Uisneach, and while the tale is fictional, archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson believes it might contain a "grain of truth," since the bluestones at Stonehenge likely came from the Waun Mawn circle on Wales's Irish Sea coast.
Another story says that Hengist, a Saxon king who had come to Britain, invited some British Celtic fighters to a meal but then betrayed them, ordering his soldiers to kill 420 of them. Afterward, he built Stonehenge on that spot as a sign of regret.
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The land that Chubb bought and gave to the country was just thirty acres, about twelve hectares. Right in view of the stones stood a building called Stonehenge Aerodrome. It was located roughly three hundred meters away, nearly a thousand feet distant. The aerodrome had been constructed during the First World War for the Royal Flying Corps. Its big stone and brick hangars rose high enough to dominate the surrounding skyline.
At Stonehenge Bottom, where the landscape has held the monument for millennia, a modern road junction now stands between the A303 and A344 routes. The area also includes several cottages and a cafe. This development marks the intersection of ancient history and contemporary use, as the site continues to be shaped by both preservation efforts and modern infrastructure needs. The location remains central to how the monument is accessed and protected today.
In 1927, the area around Stonehenge was put up for auction in three separate plots. One plot, called A, sat right west of the monument and included the old Stonehenge Aerodrome, which by that time had stopped being used. Another plot, B, was located to the south, on the opposite side of the main road. The third plot, C, was positioned to the north and contained part of the Stonehenge Cursus.
In August 1927, worries arose about developer interest, prompting a fund to "save the skyline" of the monument. George V led the effort, and by October that year, £8,000 had been raised. That was enough to purchase Plot A and start tearing down the aerodrome. The campaign kept going for several years, buying up the rest of the surrounding area to preserve it for the public, with support still being gathered for Plot C as late as 1929.
The National Trust took control of the land with the goal of preserving it. In 1930, the final large hangar was taken down, and by the mid-1930s, the entire aerodrome area had been cleared.
The land around Stonehenge has been part of a grassland reversion project, bringing the area back to native chalk grassland. In 2022, the National Heritage Memorial Fund provided a grant to the National Trust to purchase another 170 hectares of the Stonehenge Landscape.
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During the twentieth century, Stonehenge began to take on new religious meaning, this time through Neopagan and New Age movements, especially the Neo-druids. The historian Ronald Hutton later noted that “it was a great, and potentially uncomfortable, irony that modern Druids had arrived at Stonehenge just as archaeologists were evicting the ancient Druids from it.” The first group to use the site in this way was the Ancient Order of Druids, who held a mass initiation ceremony there in August 1905. They admitted 259 new members into their organization. The event drew ridicule from the press, which mocked how the Neo-druids had dressed in white robes and fake beards.
The Stonehenge Free Festival, loosely organised by the Polytantric Circle, took place between 1972 and 1984, drawing around 30,000 visitors during midsummer. In 1985, a High Court injunction closed the site to festivalgoers. That same year, tensions erupted into what became known as the Battle of the Beanfield, when police blocked a convoy of New Age travellers trying to reach Stonehenge. Following the confrontation, no access was allowed to the stones for any religious purpose. This exclusion-zone policy lasted nearly fifteen years, stopping just before the twenty-first century began, meaning visitors were barred from entering the stones during winter and summer solstices, and the vernal and autumnal equinoxes.
Following a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, which was helped along by campaigners like Arthur Uther Pendragon, restrictions on worship at Stonehenge were lifted. The court acknowledged that people practicing any real religion have the right to pray in their own sacred space, and recognized Stonehenge as a place of worship for Neo-Druids, Pagans, and others who follow "Earth-based" or "old" traditions. The National Trust and others organized meetings to plan access. In 1998, 100 people were allowed in, including astronomers, archaeologists, Druids, locals, pagans, and travelers. Then in 2000, an open summer solstice event drew about seven thousand attendees, and by 2001, the crowd had grown to roughly 10,000.
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When Stonehenge first opened to the public, people could walk among the stones and even climb on them, but in 1977 they were roped off because of serious erosion. Today, visitors can't touch the stones, though they are allowed to walk around the monument from a short distance away. English Heritage does make special arrangements for access during the summer and winter solstice, as well as the spring and autumn equinox. Those times offer opportunities for people to visit the site and get closer to the stones. Visitors can also make special bookings throughout the year to access the stones. In 1921, an agreement was made that gives about 30,000 local residents free admission.
As cars became more common, the area around Stonehenge started to change because of the nearby roads. The A344 ran just three meters from the Heel Stone, and the A303 passed close by to the south. In 1979, the Department of the Environment suggested moving visitor facilities into a dip at Stonehenge Bottom. Then in 1985, a commission set up by English Heritage recommended shutting down the A344 and building a new visitor centre on Army land north of the site. They said the old facilities were "woefully inadequate" and needed to handle about a million visitors each year.
The access situation and the closeness of the two roads kept drawing criticism, especially after a 2006 National Geographic survey. In that survey, 400 conservation and tourism experts ranked Stonehenge 75th out of 94 World Heritage Sites, calling it "in moderate trouble." The debate over rerouting the roads led to the plan being cancelled more than once. Then, in December 2007, the government announced that proposals to build a tunnel under the site and construct a permanent visitors’ centre had been dropped due to costs.
In 2009, the government approved a £25 million plan to build a smaller visitors’ centre and close the A344, but only if funding and local planning consent were secured. Wiltshire Council gave the go-ahead in 2010 for a new centre located 1.5 miles west of the site, and English Heritage confirmed that funds would be available, backed by a £10 million grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund. By June 2013, the A344 was shut down so workers could remove the road and replace it with grass. The new visitors’ centre, designed by Denton Corker Marshall, opened in December 2013.
In November 2020, approval was given for a plan to build a four-lane tunnel beneath Stonehenge, aiming to take the A303 road away from the site. The idea faced resistance from archaeologists, environmentalists, and modern-day druids, yet gained support from those wanting to restore the landscape and boost visitor experience. Opponents warned that digging could damage buried artifacts or cause the stones to shift or fall. In July 2023, the Department for Transport revealed that Transport Secretary Mark Harper had backed the project, despite a High Court decision in 2021 overturning the original plan. Campaigners tried again in February 2024, but the High Court ruled against them. A fresh challenge in July 2024 was dismissed in October. Even so, the incoming Labour government had already said in July that the tunnel would not go ahead. On 17 March 2026, the Department of Transport formally canceled the Development Consent Order, after £179.2 million had been spent. Secretary of State Heidi Alexander stated it no longer matched strategic goals and would clear up long-standing planning uncertainty, opening space for new ideas.
In March 2025, English Heritage revealed that construction had been approved for two new buildings near Stonehenge’s visitor area. One is a 'Learning Centre' set to open in the autumn of 2026, located to the east of the shuttle bus turning circle. The other is a 'Neolithic classroom,' also due to open that same autumn, situated close to the existing recreated Neolithic village. Both facilities are part of ongoing efforts to enhance visitor experience and education at the site.
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The site has faced damage over the centuries. Until the 17th century, stones were taken from the site to be used in local construction. Then, in the 19th century, visitors began carving rock chips from the megaliths as souvenirs.
The first years of the Free Festival, which began annually in 1975, saw very little vandalism at Stonehenge. But from 1978 onward, the site was fenced off. Vandalism increased in the 1980s and 1990s, prompting authorities to bring in hundreds of police, put up barriers, and create exclusion zones up to six kilometers away. In 1984, the monument was defaced with purple spray paint. The government tried to close Stonehenge to protect it, but after public outcry, they decided to reopen it.
In the year 2008, a pair of individuals attacked the Heel Stone with a hammer and screwdriver, removing a fragment roughly the size of a 10p coin. Authorities labeled this act as "the first vandalism in decades," marking a significant moment in the monument's troubled history.
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