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Stone Shifting 2
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nigelswift
8112 posts

Re: Which Method?
Aug 31, 2003, 10:22
He he he. One thing you ain't is a good little chippie!

I’ve been thinking some more about methods (I have leisure –can’t mow the lawn as it’s full of holes!)…

If there are several methods of raising stones, how can you hit on the one that’s going to seem most persuasive to archaeologists?

I think it needs to be one that incorporates two elements.
First, it should have some element of “hauling up” (it just looks like the simplest approach, and most monoliths, being irregular, would have been dealt with that way, as Mike Pitts is planning to demonstrate at Avebury).
Second, it should involve as few people as possible (on the grounds that it’s good sense to assume that if the ancients had several options they’d have chosen the most efficient. That neatly disposes of the archaeo-speculation about whether it was 50 or 250 people. Either way, they’d have gone for efficiency so your main idea would be vindicated).

So how about going for a hybrid solution? You hinted you were thinking a bit that way yourself. The BBC got the stone to 70 degrees, then hauled it up using hundreds of people. How about if we use your method to get it to, say, 85% degrees (or thereabouts - it wouldn't matter) then haul it up using just our small number of people?
Steve could use the computer model to determine what exact angle would be optimum for our particular workforce, and we’d have a system that was a lot more robust and bug-free, and we could get away with a lower tower. We might even avoid having to construct a second A frame for the hauling up process.

Who could argue that that it wasn’t the most efficient, and therefore most likely method? And of course, it would make a great show, as the same small team would have first rowed the stone to where it was needed.
In reply to:
Re: Which Method? (GordonP)		 Replies:
Re: Which Method? (Steve Gray)
Re: Which Method? (GordonP)
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