Continuing the previous article. Recall that some experiments have proved that the construction of Stonehenge is technically possible.
It was much easier to erect a huge stone slab. A pit was dug in advance at the site and the stone block was then dragged to the very edge of the pit so that it overhanged slightly. A small cart loaded with stones was placed on top of the concrete block. Then it was slowly pulled up to the pit; little by little the center of gravity shifted, and the large block slipped into the pit. It took a little more effort to put it upright, but in the end it was done with a triangular wooden frame and a team of volunteers pulling the ropes.
The last operation - laying a horizontal cofferdam on two standing stones to create a complete trilithon - was done with a wooden deck. However, engineers and archaeologists agreed that the more likely method was to gradually climb to the desired height with the use of levers and wooden support, when people simultaneously lay on the levers on both sides, lifting the stone, and then under it quickly placed another log. This method was not tried for lack of time, but a small experiment proved its effectiveness.
Now we know the age of Stonehenge, where the stones came from and how it was built, but this does not answer the question of who its builders were.
Early theories that included Saxons, Danes, Romans, Phoenicians and even Druids (see Appendix Druids) were excluded because of the new date of the monument. None of these peoples inhabited Britain in the Neolithic or Bronze Age.
A more acceptable candidate appeared in July 1953. Richard Atkinson photographed an inscription dating back to the 17th century on one of the sarsens in the horseshoe structure, when he noticed the weak outlines of the carved dagger on the stone. On closer examination, Atkinson's discovery excited him greatly. The carved image seemed to him not like a prehistoric British dagger, but rather like an instrument of the Mycenaean civilization of the ancient Mediterranean; similar daggers were dated by archaeologists around the 15th century BC. Atkinson started to argue that Stonehenge itself could be built under the influence of the Mycenaean culture, as the methods used in its construction allegedly exceeded the possibilities of prehistoric Britons:
"It is much more logical to consider them as a product of a relatively developed Mycenaean culture, and not essentially barbaric, even if prosperous, Briton aristocracy.
Other archaeologists disdained this hypothesis, pointing out that the Mycenae themselves did not build anything, even remotely reminiscent of Stonehenge, and to accurately determine the type of dagger from the poorly preserved carving on weathered stone can only be very biased gaze. Even if we leave aside the complete implausibility of this theory, the modern program of radiocarbon dating shows that the sarsen with the carved daggers was erected before 2000 B.C. Thus, the Mycenaeans could not be builders of Stonehenge.
The most modern hypothesis of continental influence was put forward by Aubrey Barl, the main authority in the study of stone circles in Britain. He argued that the horseshoe-shaped arrangement of stones in Stonehenge is extremely rare in Britain, but it can be seen more often in Brittany in north-western France. The links between Britons and Bretons in the Bronze Age have already been proven, along with significant similarities in ceramics, gold ornaments and flint tools. According to Barda himself, the megaliths in Brittany are later than Stonehenge, but perhaps one analogy can take us back to the Neolithic Age. One of the stones has the contours of a rectangular area, which Atkinson and others compare with the carved geometric patterns found in the megalithic tombs of Brittany. But this analogy can not be considered clearly established, as scientists from the group of Ross Clell suggested that the rectangle was carved after the fall of the stone in 1797: it was the preparation of a panel on which a certain ambitious Englishman hoped to carve his name later. Bart rejects this argument on the grounds that the processing of the panel with a hammer and chisel should have taken several weeks.
The reaction of the archaeological community to Barla's theory was generally unfavourable. The main obstacle is again the dating of Stonehenge, this time not too early, but too late. Horseshoe structures and stone carvings in Brittany appeared more than 1,000 years after this phase of construction of Stonehenge, and we can only wonder why the "aggressive and powerful Breton leaders" were so late. We have no reason to doubt the conclusion first made by John Aubrey in 1666: the builders of Stonehenge were ancient Britons.