Editing Stonehenge (section)

===Stonehenge 1 (c. 3100 BC)===
[[File:Stonehenge phase one.jpg|thumb|Stonehenge 1. After Cleal ''et al.'']]

The first monument consisted of a circular bank and ditch [[Enclosure (archaeology)|enclosure]] made of [[Late Cretaceous]] ([[Santonian]] Age) Seaford [[chalk]], measuring about {{convert|110|m|order=flip}} in diameter, with a large entrance to the north east and a smaller one to the south. It stood in open [[grassland]] on a slightly sloping spot.<ref name="field2010" /> The builders placed the bones of [[deer]] and [[ox]]en in the bottom of the ditch, as well as some worked [[flint]] tools. The bones were considerably older than the antler picks used to dig the ditch, and the people who buried them had looked after them for some time prior to burial. The ditch was continuous but had been dug in sections, like the ditches of the earlier causewayed enclosures in the area. The chalk dug from the ditch was piled up to form the bank. This first stage is dated to around 3100 BC, after which the ditch began to silt up naturally. Within the outer edge of the enclosed area is a circle of 56 pits, each about {{convert|1|m|ft|order=flip}} in diameter, known as the [[Aubrey holes]] after [[John Aubrey]], the 17th-century [[antiquarian]] who was thought to have first identified them. These pits and the bank and ditch together are known as the Palisade or Gate Ditch.<ref>Cleal et al, 1996. Antiquity, 1996 Jun, Vol.70(268), pp.463–465</ref> The pits may have contained standing timbers creating a [[timber circle]], although there is no excavated evidence of them. A recent excavation has suggested that the Aubrey Holes may have originally been used to erect a [[bluestone]] circle.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Parker Pearson |first1=Mike |first2=Julian |last2=Richards |first3=Mike |last3=Pitts |title=Stonehenge 'older than believed' |work=BBC News |date=9 October 2008 |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/wiltshire/7660860.stm |access-date=14 October 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081012100802/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/wiltshire/7660860.stm |archive-date=12 October 2008 |url-status=live}}</ref> If this were the case, it would advance the earliest known stone structure at the monument by some 500 years.

In 2013, a team of archaeologists, led by [[Mike Parker Pearson]], excavated more than 50,000 cremated bone fragments, from 63 individuals, buried at Stonehenge.<ref name="Guardian">{{cite news |first=Maev |last=Kennedy |title=Stonehenge may have been burial site for Stone Age elite, say archaeologists |date=9 March 2013 |url=https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/mar/09/archaeology-stonehenge-bones-burial-ground |work=[[The Guardian]] |access-date = 11 March 2013 |location=London |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130909210109/http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/mar/09/archaeology-stonehenge-bones-burial-ground |archive-date = 9 September 2013 |url-status = live}}</ref><ref name="Independent">{{cite news |first=James |last=Legge |title=Stonehenge: new study suggests landmark started life as a graveyard for the 'prehistoric elite' |date=9 March 2012 |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/stonehenge-new-study-suggests-landmark-started-life-as-a-graveyard-for-the-prehistoric-elite-8527686.html |work=[[The Independent]] |access-date = 11 March 2013 |location=London |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130312031243/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/stonehenge-new-study-suggests-landmark-started-life-as-a-graveyard-for-the-prehistoric-elite-8527686.html |archive-date = 12 March 2013 |url-status = live}}</ref> These remains were originally buried individually in the Aubrey holes, but were exhumed in 1920 during an excavation by [[William Hawley]], who considered them unimportant and in 1935 re-buried them together in one hole, Aubrey Hole 7.<ref name="Sheffield Uni">{{cite web |author=Mike Parker Pearson |title=The Stonehenge Riverside Project |publisher=Sheffield University |date=20 August 2008 |url=http://www.shef.ac.uk/archaeology/research/stonehenge |access-date=22 September 2008 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20081026122920/http://www.shef.ac.uk/archaeology/research/stonehenge |archive-date= 26 October 2008}}</ref> Physical and chemical analysis of the remains has shown that the cremated were almost equally men and women, and included some children.<ref name="Guardian"/><ref name="Independent"/> There is evidence that the underlying chalk beneath the graves was crushed by substantial weight, so the team concluded that the first bluestones brought from Wales were probably used as grave markers.<ref name="Guardian"/><ref name="Independent"/> [[Radiocarbon dating]] of the remains has put the date of the site 500 years earlier than previously estimated, to around 3000 BC.<ref name="Guardian"/><ref name="Independent"/> A 2018 study of the [[strontium]] content of the bones found that many of the individuals buried there around the time of construction had probably come from near the source of the bluestone in Wales and had not extensively lived in the area of Stonehenge before death.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Strontium isotope analysis on cremated human remains from Stonehenge support links with west Wales |author=Christophe Snoeck|display-authors=etal |journal=Scientific Reports |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=10790 |date=2 August 2018 |doi=10.1038/s41598-018-28969-8 |pmid=30072719 |pmc=6072783 |bibcode=2018NatSR...810790S | issn = 2045-2322 }}</ref>

Between 2017 and 2021, studies by Professor Parker Pearson (UCL) and his team [[#Origin of sarsens and bluestones|suggested]] that the [[bluestone]]s used in Stonehenge had been moved there following dismantling of a stone circle of identical size to the first known Stonehenge circle (110m) at the Welsh site of [[Waun Mawn]] in the [[Preseli Hills]].<ref name=Pearson-Pollard-etal-2021-02-12/><ref name=Curry-2021-02-11/> It had contained bluestones, one of which showed evidence of having been reused in Stonehenge. The stone was identified by its unusual pentagonal shape and by [[Luminescence dating|luminescence soil dating]] from the filled-in sockets which showed the circle had been erected around 3400–3200 BC, and dismantled around 300–400 years later, consistent with the dates attributed to the creation of Stonehenge.<ref name=Pearson-Pollard-etal-2021-02-12/><ref name=Curry-2021-02-11/> The cessation of human activity in that area at the same time suggested migration as a reason, but it is believed that other stones may have come from other sources.<ref name=Pearson-Pollard-etal-2021-02-12/><ref name=Curry-2021-02-11/>