Daily Mail, By DAILY MAIL REPORTER, 22nd July 2010
A second ceremonial monument has been discovered at Stonehenge, scientists said today.
Archaeologists have found a circular ditch surrounding a smaller circle of deep pits that would have once contained wooden posts at the World Heritage site.
The discovery of the henge, which would have been built more than 4,200 years ago, has been hailed as the biggest find in 50 years.
A henge is a circular monument dating to Neolithic and Bronze Ages.
The circular ring would have been made up of large wooden posts
It is about half a mile from the world-famous stones on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire.
Birmingham University’s Professor Vince Gaffney, who is leading the survey, described the find as ‘exceptional’.
It would have been almost the same size as the circle of standing stones at Stonehenge itself and would have been visible from its more famous relative.
Images show it has two entrances on the north-east and south-west sides and inside the circle is a burial mound on top which appeared much later.
Professor Vince Gaffney, from the University of Birmingham, said: 'It will completely change the way we think about the landscape around Stonehenge.
'People have tended to think that as Stonehenge reached its peak, it was the paramount monument, existing in splendid isolation.
'This discovery is completely new and extremely important in how we understand Stonehenge and its landscape.'
The famous stone right at Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire
The new 'henge-like' late Neolithic structure would have stood within sight of Stonehenge and appears to have been built on the same orientation as the world-renowned monument.
It comprises a segmented ditch with entrances to the north east and south west, which are associated with internal pits up to three feet in diameter.
The international study forms part of the Stonehenge Hidden Landscapes Project and was led by the University of Birmingham and the Austria-based Ludwig Boltzmann Institute.
The project aims to map 5.5 square miles of the terrain around Stonehenge, in Wiltshire, using the latest geophysical imaging techniques.
Prof Gaffney added: 'Stonehenge is one of the most studied monuments on Earth, but this demonstrates that there is still much more to be found.
'To put this in context, we haven't found a major ceremonial site of this type, or of this significance, for probably 50 years or more within the area of Stonehenge.
'It fills in another gap in the landscape.
'The presumption was this was just an empty field - now we have got a major ceremonial monument, looking at Stonehenge.'
Archaeologists are using technology known as ‘ground-penetrating radar’ to collect more information so that they can discover what the site might have once looked like without digging.
From left, archaeologist Eamonn Baldwin, University of Birmingham with archaeological geophysicist Dr Chris Gaffney of University of Bradford with Professor Wolfgang Neubauer, director of the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Archaeological Prospection and Virtual Archaeology in Vienna
Professor Gaffney said that 90 per cent of the landscape around Stonehenge was unexplored.
It is unclear what the wooden henge was used for but scientists believe it may have been used as a cemetery at some point and certainly had ceremonial importance.
Last month archaeologists began major dig to unearth the hidden mysteries of a buried ancient stone circle site that is ten times bigger than Stonehenge.
The enormous 4,000 year old Marden Henge, in Wiltshire, is Britain's largest prehistoric structure stretching for 10.5 hectares, the equivalent of 10 football pitches.
English Heritage is carrying out a six-week dig hoping to reveal the secrets behind the giant henge which has baffled historians for centuries.
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