Few places in the world elicit the mystery
and wonder that Stonehenge does. For hundreds of years archaeologists and historians
have puzzled over the ancient ruins, trying to piece together the truth behind its origin. At last though modern science has caught up
with the ancient mystery, and we finally have a pretty good idea as to who created this
wonder of the ancient world. For anyone living under a very large rock
for the last five hundred years and doesn’t know, Stonehenge is an ancient site in the
UK made up of pillars of rock laid out in a circle. The remains show that the entire site was
once ringed with the massive stone columns, which were themselves topped with slabs of
stone that completely encircled the monument. Inside, scientists suspect that there was
once a smaller circle of stones, of which only a few pillars remain, also topped by
a massive stone slab. While the site is relatively simple in its
construction and certainly pales in comparison with wonders such as the pyramids of egypt,
what is impressive is that Stonehenge is estimated to have been built over five thousand years
ago, when humans were thought to have been largely using nothing more than simple bone
and antler tools. The neolithic monument is also thought to
have taken 1500 years to complete, with construction being taken up by various groups of people
who continually added to the original site. The first stage was a massive circular ditch
and bank dug on the Salisbury Plain by neolithic Britons using deer antlers for tools. They also included deep pits inside of that
circular construction, now known as Aubrey holes after John Aubrey, the 17th century
antiquarian who discovered them. It's believed that the holes once held up
a ring of timber posts standing upright, creating a circle of timber within the larger circular
ditch. This site remained standing until a few hundred
years later, when more builders arrived and decided to remodel. Rather than use timbers for their construction,
they hauled eighty bluestones, of which forty three remain standing, and laid them out in
either a horseshoe or circular formation around the site. Lastly, during the third and final phase of
construction which took place around 2000 BC, sandstone slabs were arranged into a ring
formation around the entire site, with some being assembled into the iconic three-pieced
structures called trilithons. A few trilithons remain standing inside the
formation today, and it's these structures that have become a visual representation of
Stonehenge for millions of people around the world today. Work would continue for the next four hundred
years, with the large stones being repositioned as new people modified the original site. What's particularly impressive about Stonehenge
is that the majority of the construction took place well before the invention of the wheel. That means that the sandstone blocks weighing
over forty tons had to be transported from over twenty five miles away (40 km), while
the smaller bluestones which weighed up to four tons each, where originally sourced over
two hundred miles (322 km) away. How in the world did neolithic builders get
these giant stones into position without even the use of the wheel? The longest standing theory is that the stones
were transported using sledges and rollers made out of fallen tree trunks, with each
stone riding atop a bunch of greased logs, which would be moved in front of the stone
as it traveled over and past a section of logs. This would have allowed the builders to simply
push or drag the huge stones over long distances, though it would certainly have been incredibly
labor intensive. They then could have transferred the stones
onto huge rafts and floated them along the Welsh coast and up the River Avon towards
the construction site. More modern refinements to the theory has
the builders using teams of oxen to drag the stones along grooved planks or transporting
them in giant wicker baskets or on kinds of ball bearings. However in the 1970s geologists began to get
in on the debate of how the mighty stones were transported. They suggested that it wasn't humans who lugged
these stones dozens or hundreds of miles, but rather that it was ancient glaciers. Well known to uplift rocks and transport them
hundreds of miles, these glacial erratics as they are known pop up all over the world
and are remnants from the last Ice Age. They propose that perhaps glaciers had deposited
a large number of the raw stones required to build Stonehenge, though the theory isn't
particularly popular amongst mainstream geologists. Nevermind how it was built though, who were
the people that actually built Stonehenge? Back when mythology was considered history,
it was believed that Stonehenge was the handiwork of King Arthur's friend and confidant, the
wizard Merlin. Sometime in the mid-fifth century hundreds
of British nobles were killed by Saxon barbarians and buried on the Salisbury plain, which was
at the time made out of steaks, and in order to honor the fallen men King Aureoles Ambrosias,
the uncle of King Arthur, ordered that a memorial be built on the site to honor their deaths. The King thus sent an army to Ireland to fetch
a stone circle known as the Giants' Ring, which ancient giants had built from magical
African bluestones. The Irish defending the ring were defeated,
but the men could not move the massive stones. Thus Merlin used his magic to move the giant
stones across the sea and onto the site they stand on today. According to the legend, King Ambrosias and
King Arthur's father, Uther, remain buried there to this day. When people started believing in myths less
and science more, the monument was attributed to the Saxons, the Danes, the Romans, the
Greeks, and even the Egyptians. Eventually in the 17th century, archaeologist
John Aubrey claimed that the monument was the work of Celtic high priests known as Druids,
and the theory largely stuck for hundreds of years. Even today many individuals who identify as
modern druids gather at the site to hold rituals- yet sadly for them, modern science has at
last determined that it was definitely not the druids who built Stonehenge. Stonehenge it turns out has an origin as complicated
as its construction, and after the careful observation and dating of bones, tools, and
other artifacts discovered on the site, archaeologists now believe that there was actually no one
people who are responsible for building Stonehenge, but that rather the monument was a community
project of sorts, with various groups of people working on it at different times. First were neolithic agrarian humans, likely
the original inhabitants of the British Isles, though some genetic research hints that these
original inhabitants were actually displaced by invaders from the mainland. Then the descendants of the original Britons
likely added to the site, followed by immigrants from the European continent, with some hypothesized
to have come from as far as modern day Turkey. Stonehenge it turns out has no one source,
but rather is a hodgepodge of different cultures who likely all appropriated it to suit their
own needs. We might never know why it was originally
built, but it's clear that as new groups of people came across the site, they were quick
to modify or add to the construction in order to suit their own needs. The site is thought to have served purposes
related to astronomy, calendar-keeping, religious ceremonies, and even as a royal monument,
with its function throughout the years as varied as its original builders, while today
it serves as a tourist destination for people who come from all over the world to marvel
at the ingenuity of our ancestors. This is of course, the official story, and
other sources claim that Stonehenge is- you guessed it- alien in origin. Some believe that Stonehenge is part of a
global navigation network used by alien ships, with sites that include the Pyramids and the
Nazca Lines in South America. Apparently ancient aliens needed visual signals
by which to navigate the spacecraft they traversed the galaxy with because they never quite developed
GPS technology- a very curious technological misstep. Yet others believe that Stonehenge is the
site of a major vortex which spews out... some kind of... energy from the earth. These believers claim that ancient humans
could identify and tap into these magical vortexes, yet somehow for some reason despite
being able to land spacecraft on Mars, modern humanity is apparently unable to discover
the same magical vortices that primitive humans did. For our part, after careful examination by
our team of leading researchers, archaeologists, and historians, we here at The Infographics
Show have deduced that Stonehenge is an interdimensional aperture through which space aliens from the
Zeti Reticuli nebula will one day invade in order to feed on our delicious brains. And seriously, who are you going to listen
to- leading researchers and scientists, or the internet? We thought so. Who do you think really built Stonehenge? Is a brain-eating alien apocalypse imminent? Let us know in the comments! And as always if you enjoyed this video don't
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