Devil's Arrows: Ancient builders hauled 55k-lb stones 11 miles for UK stone row

 (sciencedaily.com)

45 points | by bookofjoe 3 days ago

11 comments

  • cjs_ac 5 hours ago
    Also, Stonehenge was built (partially) from parts of other stone circles, from as far away as Wales: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-56029203
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  • chrisweekly 52 minutes ago
    Ken Follett (of "Pillars of the Earth" fame) wrote a terrific semi-historical* novel called "Circle of Days" that portrays a vivid picture of the people and circumstances that could've led to the creation of Stonehenge.

    *"semi" qualifier bc there's so little known for sure -- but it's at least plausible, and his extensive research doesn't contradict things that can be verified.

  • dmichulke 5 hours ago
    25-tonne stones for 18km in case you wondered
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  • ChrisRR 5 hours ago
    Imperial is confusing at the best of times, but couldn't they have said 24.5 tons instead of 55,000 lbs?
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    • Xmd5a 3 hours ago
      Sir ...

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_ton

      > he long ton,[1] also known as the imperial ton, displacement ton,[1][2] or British ton,[3] is a measurement unit equal to 2,240 pounds

    • guenthert 5 hours ago
      They could have said 3300 stones stones ...
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    • masfuerte 5 hours ago
      That's the way they like it. American road signs have mad shit like "No trucks over 15,000 lbs".
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      • hamdingers 1 hour ago
        This is an is-ought inference. Americans have not been given an option and use the units they're provided with, which is a frustrating mix of everything depending on context.

        Nobody seems to like it this way.

      • walthamstow 4 hours ago
        Surely they don't actually like drill bits measured in fractions of an inch, do they?
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        • edoceo 3 hours ago
          Yes, in USA the bits are in fractions and stuff you purchase will have instructions like, drill 3/8 hole for a wall anchor, or 2+1/4 hole for a door-bolt set.
      • dboreham 2 hours ago
        The American thousands of pounds thing is even more weird than that: I buy gravel from the gravel pit. They weigh my truck and dump trailer in lbs and then charge me per ton. Everyone talks about tons: e.g. I'd call a dump truck operator and ask him to deliver 18 tons of rock, not 36,000lbs. But the weighbridge and road signs and regulations about vehicle and axle weight are always in lbs. If you only read things and never talked to other people you'd never know tons existed.
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        • cucumber3732842 1 hour ago
          A lot of the older "no vehicles over X" signage is denominated in tons.
      • thechao 4 hours ago
        That's because we measure weight in tonnage.
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  • JKFSOM 22 minutes ago
    Meanwhile, in Egypt...
  • spikels 3 hours ago
    Strange they don't mention how many stones. Image shows two. There are three today and four, maybe five, originally.
  • hashim 4 hours ago
    The word for this structure is apparently a menhir: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menhir. The article calls it the tallest in the UK but its Wikipedia page calls it the second-tallest. This is the actual tallest, interestingly also in Yorkshire: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudston_Monolith.
  • ButlerianJihad 5 hours ago
    This must be the origin of the saying, “People who start stone rows shouldn’t build glass houses”.
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  • airin_stories 1 hour ago
    [dead]
  • surfingdino 2 hours ago
    Must have been a contractor. The permies would wait for the procurement process to pick someone to move those stones for them. /s
  • dgan 3 hours ago
    Need 7 more paragraphes telling us that the stones, weren't in fact, chosen from the nearest location, but were chosen from a distant location.

    Without ever telling *how" they were moved of course, that would give out too much

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