Beautifully illustrated, this book discusses the development and active phases of Stonehenge in the light of most recent archaeological knowledge. ( )

Tina's Reviews > Stonehenge: The Story of a Sacred Landscape
Stonehenge by Francis Pryor
Stonehenge: The Story of a Sacred Landscape
by Francis Pryor
13328947
Tina's reviewJan 10, 2022 · edit
really liked it
bookshelves: british-irish-authors, non-fiction

This book about Stonehenge caught my attention at the library and it's been an interesting narrative overall. I won't lie, there are some dry parts to this book but the stories I found interesting are the discoveries of grave sites, historical excavations and carbon dating.

Stonehenge has been a fascination of mine since I was a teen. My husband, son and I were fortunate enough to take a vacation over a decade ago and visited Stonehenge twice. Highlight of the trip!

The fact that the stones come from Wales and other areas in England show that the stone was not constructed for practical purposes with straightforward business motives. If that were the case, stones would have been sourced as locally as possible. It was far more complex and a place of gatherings for many "tribes" and communities from all over England.

Near Stonehenge at Amesbury Archer a discovery of three males, apparently related, were buried in nearby graves. Human teeth do most of the growing during childhood, therefore the composition of the enamel will reflect the water a child drinks. Experts were able to find where they came from through their teeth. The oldest male came from Germany but a younger male's teeth revealed he grew up in Southern England - his teeth showed he drank water from the chalklands.

In 1978 during an excavation they came upon burial mounds. They found the body of a man with his legs bent and one arm across the chest. The time period could be estimated because of the distinctively shaped arrowheads found. These arrows entered his chest from three different sides of his body. This would seem to imply someone protecting Stonehenge and shooting at the intruder. I think it’s also amazing they can do radiocarbon dates and therefore knew this body was buried somewhere between 2400 and 2140 BC.

These are just a few interesting facts I read in this book by Francis Pryor. If Mike Biles, who writes at A Bit About Britain, wrote a book about Stonehenge I would be very interested to read that book. Historical narratives can be very engaging depending on the author and style. ( )

From the Stonehenge reading program, along with Stonehenge, Hengeworld, and some others that I never got around to reviewing. Francis Pryor’s Stonehenge can’t seem to make up its mind if it’s a coffee table book with pretty pictures or a serious scientific study; still, it’s an enjoyable read. Pryor is apparently a television personality in the UK, presenting on archaeological (that’s archeological in American) subjects; perhaps this gives the book its chatty style. He emphasizes that Stonehenge was part of a landscape of Mesolithic to Bronze Age monuments – round barrows, long barrows, “avenues”, post holes, etc., and backs a theory that Stonehenge and the nearby Durrington Walls were connected with funeral rituals – Durrington Walls was for the living to meet and feast; Stonehenge was for the dead. I’m not an archeologist; the idea seems plausible but I’m not sure how you would test it.

Pryor’s maps of the Stonehenge area and of the construction stages of Stonehenge are excellent, I think the best I’ve seen; the other illustrations are “pretty pictures”, including paintings by Constable and Turner. No bibliography but you can pick references out of the footnotes. I think this would be a good introduction to Stonehenge but you might want to continue with some books with more technical details. ( )

Stonehenge. Just the name can conjure up that iconic image of the standing stones and sarsens against the background of the Salisbury Plain. Rightly so, it is a World Heritage site, but it is an enigma as it actual purpose can still only be speculated about. Was it a celestial calendar? Or a ritual site? Perhaps it was used for sacrifices, or used as a focus for the Neolithic peoples who built it. Whatever its purpose, we know that the area has been used for millennia as a place of significance with the first man made changes being made around 3000 BC.

Pryor is an expert in the Bronze and Iron Ages, but his particular speciality is Flag Fen, a huge site in Cambridgeshire that was used extensively for ritual purposes. Whilst he is not an expert on Stonehenge, he does have a gift for seeing the landscape as those people would have done. In this book he draws on the very latest in archaeology and research to give us a broad history of the monument, explores how a range of people have seen and used the site ove the years and considers the context of the site in the wider landscape.

Pryor’s ability to immerse himself in the age and the ability of see the landscape through their eyes, means that we get an expert view of the way that it evolved and changes, without descending into dry academic speak. As well as the rigorous writing, the book is full of excellent photos, high quality plans and beautiful pictures of Stonehenge. It is comprehensive without being complicated and well worth reading. ( )

An engaging and very readable overview of archaeologists' current understanding of the Stonehenge monuments, that does well to describe the successive stages of use and discuss the possible engagement of those who "built" it.
The hardback book itself is beautifully illustrated with photos, paintings, plans and maps, although it was smaller in size than I had expected, about 7.5 inches square. ( )