New analyses indicate that this weighty piece of the site’s architecture, once thought to come from Wales, was somehow moved at least 750 kilometers.
The ancient site’s central stone, a large slab known as the Altar Stone, consists of rock transported at least 750 kilometers from northeastern Scotland to southern England, say geoscientist Anthony Clarke of Curtin University in Perth, Australia, and colleagues.
A combination of estimated ages for the three minerals in the Altar Stone — which ranged from several hundred million to 3 billion years old — provided a gauge for identifying which existing rock source represented the most likely source for the Stonehenge stone. Decay of small amounts of radioactive elements in crystallized minerals — such as the breakdown of uranium into lead in zircon crystals — occurs at known rates, which enabled Clarke’s team to calculate the age estimates.
The sandstone slab may have been placed among the bluestones during a second construction phase between 2620 B.C. and 2150 B.C., the researchers suspect.
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Stonehenge's 13,200-pound Altar Stone originated in northeastern Scotland, more than 450 miles awayJennifer Nalewicki is a Salt Lake City-based journalist whose work has been featured in The New York Times, Smithsonian Magazine, Scientific American, Popular Mechanics and more. She covers several science topics from planet Earth to paleontology and archaeology to health and culture. Prior to freelancing, Jennifer held an Editor role at Time Inc.
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