Julian Cope presents Head Heritage

We thought about that a lot, doing it the ancient way though, or at least the current interpretation of what that might have been. Our professional and expert advice swung it though... "Believe me, if the ancients had JCBs they would've used them"

I know boscawen un wasn't mentioned but it's a good example- standing stone with carving of stone axes on [ in relief ] so therefore stone age or neolithic, circle round the standing stone could be the same age or could be later [no later than the early bronze age] but possible cist is later [late bronze age], so yes the standing stone in the middle could have been there first, the postholes found in circles are often earlier than the stone circle [the sanctuary near avebury] , so not always the same people who put the stones up later- it really does suggest sacred sites over a long period and different sets of people. It seems to become a habit down here and other places in the late bronze age to start putting cairns inside [the always kept clear] stone circles, i've read that some of the ringcairns inside the recumbents are radio carbon dated quite a lot later than the stone circles - pretty sure one was loanhead of daviot. The recumbents themselves may even sometimes be older than the circle and what about the chance that there may have been recumbents without any stone circle, i can't remember where it was but at one they looked for the missing stoneholes and couldn't find any, i imagine the plough had destroyed them though.

I have some sympathy with Bladup's point of view, especially given his own was had a destruction order place on it. Hesitated to comment as a) I like what I know about you and b) it would be easy to just sound like a killjoy. I didn't like the commercialised 'perfume' aspect of the end result and thought the people going around sniffing the stones looked a bit gullible.

The question in my mind was how do you 'date' these contemporary stone circles for the future (given that one day the internet will probably disappear along with all the data held therein). I discussed it with a friend yesterday, whose views I respect, and who thinks 'new' stone circles are great. There is one at Pilton near Glastonbury and a few in the gardens of the wealthy around Wiltshire (Alton Barnes and East Kennett). On the issue of 'dating', my friend thought the builders would perhaps bury a coin near one of the stones. Was 'dating' considered in this case ... I may have missed it.

Quite , Boscawen Un wasn't mentioned because it hasn't been excavated (apart from a single trench in the 19th C . ) and hasn't been dated . The axes carvings cannot be dated and their presence does not date the monument to the Neolithic .
Timber circles are yet other examples of activity /”plenty left in them “ at various sites pre stone erection although that is not always the case , e.g. Croft Moraig where the timber circle post dated the stone circle and horseshoe .
Neolithic sherds were found at Loanhead of Daviot , one context in the socket of an fallen orthostat, thus showing earlier activity at the site .
In the case of recumbents , there are the remains of recumbents with other components maybe two flankers and some orthostats but in all cases they are the remains of a stone circle . There isn't a case of a recumbent that never had any other components . Furthermore at Tomnaverie the siting of the recumbent was the final act . Current thinking is that RSC 's commemorated the sites of cremations .The point is that stone circles throughout the country have evidence of varied earlier activity including artefacts refuting “Stone circles have nothing left in them “ .

Things that were probably added later, not by the builders! burl, barnett and lots of others [ i'm not spending my night going though 100's of books, sorry they're boxed up] both said as much and both have excavated places.

I have already mentioned that later insertions into stone circles were commonplace but in many cases there were aretfacts and activity prior to the erection of the stone circle and noted by Burl and Barnatt .

You think they are doing carvings of NEOLITHIC AXES after the neolithic [you're just been argumentative], they would have done carvings of metel axes later like at stonehenge, and you come across as knowing all there is to know on recumbents so therefore you have a closed mind [yes there is a recumbent where they couldn't find the stoneholes , it must have slipped past your massive intellect] and worst of all you just sound like a fucking archeologist , YOU have said a few times that most recumbents are for cremations - this isn't the case with true stone circles- therefore recumbents are more cremation cemeteries than true stone circles, sometimes you may have stone circles and cremation cemeteries almost side by side - what would be the point of that in your view? i imagine the circle was for some sort of ritual [maybe music involved], to do with the cremations, and because i'm not a archeologist i am allowed to imagine you know, things have to be imagined before they can be proved/ disproved and therefore become reality [which is often proved wrong later anyway], you come across like everything i say has to be proved academically-so because i'm not academic i can't have an opinion, i think this attitude is bollocks and hopefully outdated- my knowledge really comes from my own past live regressions, something you may think is bollocks, but people coming from different angles should really be a good thing, if people let it!

Yes but Probably by different sets of people, the wooden posts at the sanctuary were older than the stone circles which were built long after the posts had rotted away, so therefore some people may have liked to mark ancient wooden structures with circles of stone, as if to mark the spot, maybe to stop it getting lost from view [if the posts had rotted and there was nothing left to see].

Read what I said , “The axes carvings cannot be dated and their presence does not date the monument to the Neolithic .” The only thing that can be said is that obviously the carvings were done after Neolithic , when , we don't know . There is also the possibility that the carvings were done prior to the erection of the monument .
I didn't say anything about knowing all there is to know about recumbents ,you were the one who said “it's all about the recumbent at them- i've been to enough “ .
Where did I say that recumbents were “for “ cremations , cremations are found at recumbents hardly the same . What is more likely when considering the evidence and what I did say is that current thinking suggests that “ RSC 's commemorated the sites of cremations “ . There is no case where a recumbent is considered to have been without any accompanying orthostats/flankers . Recumbent stone circles as the name suggests and as any archaeologist will tell you are stone circles ,you mention Barnatt and Burl how do the describe them ? and where is the definition of a “ true “ stone circle ?
Nothing wrong with using imagination but because I can imagine something doesn't make it true or even likely . I might imagine that stone circles were sites where seers predicted the future by reading the entrails of otters whilst taking vows of abstinence after the ritual slaughter of an enemy , I hope you wouldn't just accept it simply because it was imagined and might be true but you couldn't disprove it whereas the comment “ “Stone circles have nothing left in them “ can actually be shown to be untrue even when confined to the period when the stones were erected and not including any later additions .

You should be a politician as well as an archeologist, the entrails of otters joke is probably the closest either of us has come to the truth [only joking], it really is a deeply held belief of mine that stone circles were meant to be kept clear- for whatever went on in them [even if that wasn't for people but the spirits/ancestors]