from 2 years ago...

PEAK temperatures may rise twice as fast as average temperatures as climate change hots up. By 2100 Australia and north-east India can expect peak temperatures of 50 °C, while southern Europe and the US Midwest could exceed 40 °C.

So say Andreas Sterl at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute and his colleagues. They used an ensemble of climate models to calculate the peak temperatures the world can expect until 2100, given plausible future greenhouse gas emissions.

The team conclude that peak temperatures will rise twice as fast as average temperatures, resulting in increasingly frequent heatwaves. In particular, they say that by 2100, any point within 40° latitude of the equator will have a 10 per cent chance of peaking at over 48°C each decade (Geophysical Research Letters, DOI: 10.1029/2008GL034071).

Besides agricultural and environmental consequences, such heat will have serious health implications, especially for elderly people and those with cardiovascular disease.

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June in Sydney has gone mildly bezerk... Not cold enough and too wet... Meanwhile some research in Antarctica has pinpointed a climatic resonance between the increasing drought of south west Australia and the "over-wetting" of a part of Antarctica for the last 30 years. As I have mentioned before, the weather (climatic conditions) is "contracting" southwards... Yet portion of South West Western Australia such as the Margaret River area are still breaming in humidity come winter or summer... 2012/13 will be telling of what's to come for 2100.

LONDON - Druids have been worshipping the sun and earth for thousands of years in Europe, but now they can say they're practicing an officially recognized religion.

The ancient pagan tradition best known for gatherings at Stonehenge every summer solstice has been formally classed as a religion under charity law for the first time in Britain, the national charity regulator said Saturday. That means Druids can receive exemptions from taxes on donations - and now have the same status as such mainstream religions as the Church of England.

The move gives an old practice new validity, said Phil Ryder, the chairman of the 350-member Druid Network.

"It will go a long way to make Druidry a lot more accessible," he said.

Druids have practiced for thousands of years in Britain and in Celtic societies elsewhere in Europe. They worship natural forces such as thunder and the sun, and spirits they believe arise from places such as mountains and rivers. They do not worship a single god or creator, but seek to cultivate a sacred relationship with the natural world.

http://thetandd.com/lifestyles/faith-and-values/article_4d1eb57a-d251-11df-96aa-001cc4c002e0.html

As some of us worship the sun, some of us worship CO2... We're loopy. See Gus' picture at top...

from Gus' collection of odd things...

 

picture by Gus.

Work is beginning to transform the area around Stonehenge from a "national embarrassment" into a tranquil setting for one of the world's great prehistoric monuments.

English Heritage said that the £27m project to build a new visitor centre out of sight of the stone circle to replace the shabby collection of buildings beside the monument and to close a nearby A road was under way.

Contractor VINCI Construction UK has taken possession of the site at Airman's Corner, 1.5 miles west of the stones, to start work on the new exhibition and visitor building. In September, the Highways Agency will begin preliminary work that will lead to the closure of the A344 atStonehenge.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2012/jul/11/stonehenge-facelift-a344-english-heritage

 

For part of its existence as an ancient temple, Stonehenge doubled as a substantial prehistoric art gallery, according to new evidence revealed yesterday.

A detailed laser-scan survey of the entire monument has discovered 72 previously unknown Early Bronze Age carvings chipped into five of the giant stones.

All of the newly discovered prehistoric art works are invisible to the naked eye – and have only come to light following a laser-scan survey which recorded literally billions of points micro-topographically on the surfaces of the monument’s 83 surviving stones. In total, some 850 gigabytes of information was collected.

Detailed analysis of that data – carried out on behalf of English Heritage - found that images had been engraved on the stones, normally by removing the top 1-3 millimetres of weathered (darker coloured) rock, to produce different sized shapes. Of the 72 newly discovered images revealed through the data analysis, 71 portray Bronze Age axe-heads and one portrays a Bronze Age dagger.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/archaeology/revealed-early-bronze-age-carvings-suggest-stonehenge-was-a-huge-prehistoric-art-gallery-8202812.html

 

See pictures here and there in this column...

Archaeologists have unveiled the most detailed map ever produced of the earth beneath Stonehenge and its surrounds.

They combined different instruments to scan the area to a depth of three metres, with unprecedented resolution.

Early results suggest that the iconic monument did not stand alone, but was accompanied by 17 neighbouring shrines.

Future, detailed analysis of this vast collection of data will produce a brand new account of how Stonehenge's landscape evolved over time.

Among the surprises yielded by the research are traces of up to 60 huge stones or pillars which formed part of the 1.5km-wide "super henge" previously identified at nearby Durrington Walls.

"For the past four years we have been looking at this amazing monument to try and see what was around it," Prof Vincent Gaffney, from the University of Birmingham, said at the British Science Festival.

"What was within its landscape?"

Most of the land surrounding Stonehenge had not been surveyed in this manner before and Prof Gaffney, the project's lead researcher, said one key question always remained: "Was it really an excluded place, where only special people would come?"

The team's new three-dimensional map, which covers an area of 12 sq km or 1,250 football fields, shows that this was not the case.

read more: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29126854

 

See pictures and read stories from top...

Inside the Arctic Circle, which passes through Scandinavia, Russia, Greenland and Alaska, the sun never sets during the night of the summer solstice. At the other end of the earth, within the Antarctic Circle, it never rises.

What are the origins of the summer solstice festivals?
A diverse array of cultures and religions have celebrated the summer solstice as a symbol of the sun, the earth and the life that both sustain.

In the West, summer solstice festivals are associated with the Pagans, for whom the longest day had both practical and religious significance. It was a fixed point around which the planting and harvesting of their crops could be planned, but it also marked the spiritual side of the shifting of the seasons.  

The summer solstice was also celebrated in ancient China, in which it was associated with the earth, femininity and Li, the Chinese goddess of light. For the Romans it formed part of the Vestalia festival, which honoured the goddess of the earth.

How is it celebrated today?
The spiritual element of the summer solstice has survived in many parts of Europe, where singing and dancing still herald the arrival of summer.

Stonehenge is the focal point for British celebrations. The BBC reports that people gather at the monument before dawn and watch as "the Heel Stone and Slaughter Stone, set outside the main circle, align with the rising sun". An estimated 37,000 druids, pagans and other revellers attended last year's celebrations.

Read more: http://www.theweek.co.uk/arts-life/59039/summer-solstice-where-ancient-china-meets-the-new-age#ixzz3dgWpwU99

 

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Evidence of quarrying for Stonehenge’s bluestones is among the dramatic discoveries leading archeologists to theorise that England’s greatest prehistoric monument may have first been erected in Wales.

It has long been known that the bluestones that form Stonehenge’s inner horseshoe came from the Preseli hills in Pembrokeshire, around 140 miles from Salisbury Plain.

Now archaeologists have discovered a series of recesses in the rocky outcrops of Carn Goedog and Craig Rhos-y-felin, to the north of those hills, that match Stonehenge’s bluestones in size and shape. They have also found similar stones that the prehistoric builders extracted but left behind, and “a loading bay” from where the huge stones could be dragged away.

Carbonised hazelnut shells and charcoal from the quarry workers’ campfires have been radiocarbon-dated to reveal when the stones would have been extracted.

Prof Mike Parker Pearson, director of the project and professor of British later prehistory at University College London (UCL), said the finds were “amazing”.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/dec/07/stonehenge-first-erected-in-wales-secondhand-monument

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Most likely that the quarry for Stonehenge is like the quarry of the marble used by Michelangelo...

 

 

Some 3,400 years before the roaring torrent of the A303 road sliced the Stonehenge landscape in half, some people cut a beautiful pit a metre deep into the chalk with no tools except picks made of red deer antlers. 

They may have had primitive tools, but there was nothing primitive about their skills: the bottom of the pit was so neatly levelled that you could balance a beaker of mead on it without spilling a drop.

As druids and tourists head towards Stonehenge for the winter solstice, which falls this year on 22 December, when the midwinter sun should set framed perfectly by the giant stones, Historic England archaeologists are hard at work teasing ancient secrets out of the landscape.

The newly discovered pit was immaculately cut to hold a huge wooden post. A neat trench links to a second equally impressive pit for another massive post: in the rolling chalk downland, they would have been visible for miles. The line of the trench seems to lead on towards the neighbouring field full of curious Waitrose pigs, under a later bank but carefully jinking to avoid an earlier long barrow.

But what is it? Phil McMahon, Historic England archaeologist, and his opposite number at the National Trust, Nick Snashall, laughed and shrugged.

“A gateway? A boundary marker? A palisade? The truth is we just don’t know,” Snashall said. “We won’t even have a date [that it was created] until we get the lab results back.”

“This is keyhole surgery,” McMahon said. “We’re throwing up as many questions as we answer.”

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/dec/21/stonehenge-tunnel-survey-reveals-new-sites-and-mysteries

 

Read from top especially: nothing new...

 

 

Thousands of people gathered at Stonehenge for the summer solstice, as the sun rose amid clear skies.

About 9,500 people were at the Neolithic monument to greet the start of the longest day of the year, according to Wiltshire Police.

The sun appeared behind the Heel Stone at 04:52 BST to cheering and applause from the crowd.

The summer solstice is one of the rare occasions that English Heritage opens up the stones for public access. 

As with last year's event, Wiltshire Police confirmed it had stepped up security with armed police on patrol.

 

Read more:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-wiltshire-44558588

 

Read from top... Pictures by Gus leonisky

Scientists say that cremated remains may hold the key to unlocking the truth behind England’s greatest mystery: who built Stonehenge?

New studies on the cremated remains of 25 Neolithic people buried at the site show that nearly half of them lived nowhere near the now world-famous monument.

A team from University of Oxford analysed the 25 skull bones, discovering that ten of those cremated originated from western Britain. Five of the ten were potentially from southwest Wales; the same area from which the bluestones that made the monument’s original structure originated from.

The other 15 people appear to be local to the Wiltshire and Stonehenge area.

The new discovery is thanks to groundbreaking research led by Belgian scientist Dr Christophe Snoeck. Previously, it was thought that place-of-origin tests on burned bone was not possible - but Snoeck’s research proves otherwise.

“The recent discovery that some biological information survives the high temperatures reached during cremation (up to 1000 degrees Celsius) offered us the exciting possibility to finally study the origin of those buried at Stonehenge,” he said.

The Belgian scientist’s research shows that cremation actually crystallises bone structures, preventing the crucial isotope that indicates origin from external contamination.

The findings, revealed in Thursday’s Scientific Reports, do not reveal how the bluestones that make the original Stonehenge structure stones travelled more than 200km from Western Wales to the site near modern day Amesbury. Snoeck’s research team does believe that the remains of nonlocal people were cremated before being transported to the ancient site, due to two forms of carbon absorbed into the bones during cremation that indicate that funeral pyres consisted of trees from dense woods - like as those in Wales.

Read more:

https://www.rt.com/uk/434932-scientists-reveal-origins-stonehenge/

 

 

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For thousands of years people have made the pilgrimage to Stonehenge to gaze in wonder at the interplay with the monument of the sun, moon and stars, but from Friday a virtual version of the looming sky above the circle will be available to people from around the world.

A live feed from a camera set up close to the stones is being set up – appropriately enough on the summer solstice – to allow people to tune in to the monument whenever they want.

After dark, the live feed is replaced by a computer-generated image of the night sky as it would be at the moment a viewer clicks on the link to the website.

Read more:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jun/21/sunrise-stonehenge-visib...

 

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The origin of the ring of standing prehistoric stones known as the Stonehenge monument in Wiltshire, England, has been a mystery for visitors and scientists, as it is still unclear how the giant stones, the weight of which vary between 30 and 25 tons, appeared in their present location. A recent study offers a partial answer.

A new study by UK scientists, published on Wednesday in the journal Science Advances, reveals the origin of the world-famous Stonehenge megaliths that form the main 'architecture' of the monument, ending a longstanding mystery.

The scientists uncovered the secret of the giant stones, which are said to date back some 4,500 years, through conducting geochemical tests of a core sample of one of the pale-gray sandstone megaliths received from the United States where it had been stored for decades.

Comparing geochemical testing results of the pale-gray sandstone megaliths, known as sarsens, the study found that 50 out of the 52 stones forming the monument match the nature of stones at a site called West Woods on the edge of Wiltshire’s Marlborough Downs about 15 miles (25 km) away.

“The sarsen stones make up the iconic outer circle and central trilithon (two vertical stones supporting a horizontal stone) horseshoe at Stonehenge. They are enormous,” said leader of the study geomorphologist David Nash of the University of Brighton, cited by Reuters.

Although the research answered one of the key questions about the origin of the Stonehenge megaliths, Nash admitted that the team did not succeed in discovering how the huge sarsens, which vary between 3.9 and 9.1 metres in height and between 25 and 30 tons in weight, were transported to their current location in Wiltshire.

 

Read more:

https://sputniknews.com/science/202007301080012623-scientists-identify-origin-of-stonehenge-megaliths-thanks-to-missing-piece-returned-after-6-decades/

 

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