Stonehenge as Solar Calendar

Due to its alignment with the solstices, Stonehenge, the world’s most famous prehistoric monument, has long been thought to serve as an ancient solar calendar. A new study has discovered how the solar calendar might have functioned.

Overview

• Led by researchers from England’s Bournemouth University, this study was recently published in the journal, Antiquity.
• University of Bournemouth’s Professor Timothy Darvill, after new finds about the stone circle’s history were lately made, decided to take a fresh look at Stonehenge.
• According to Darvill’s analysis of other ancient calendar systems, Stonehenge was built as a solar calendar.

Stonehenge being a Tropical Solar Year Based Calendar
Recent finds indicate that the site was a calendar based on a365.25- day tropical solar year. According to a study conducted lately, Stonehenge’s sarsens were installed approximately in 2500 BC and were sourced from the same location as well as remained in the same formation which indicates that they worked as a single unit. Sarsen monuments are a form of silcrete rock that can be found throughout southern England. Stonehenge and other prehistoric monuments were built from sarsens. Darvill analyzed the stones and looked at the monuments’numerology and compared it to other known calendars from the time period.
Sarsens Stones Served as a Physical Representation of the Year
In the layout of the Sarsens, a solar calendar was linked. According to the study, the stones served as a physical definition of the year, allowing ancient Wiltshire residents to keep track of the days, weeks, and months.
The calendar is simple to use, with each of the 30 stones in the sarsen circle representing a day within a month, which is divided into three 10- day weeks. The start of each week is marked by distinctive stones in the circle.