Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

Megalithic and Prehistoric Sites

hipipol said:


Proto oppressor?
Click to expand...


Personally I think the interpretation is to tight. It’s a very rigid interpretation of the burial through the lens of how we interpret power. Alternative theories are possible and chiefdom is a sliding scale.

Each of those objects could have been placed by a community who respected and revered this man for a variety of reasons, chiefdom being just one of them. He didn’t place them there himself. The dynastic thing is also a reach, those burials are a couple of hundred years apart. The landscape was important and revered and barrows have been reused over the millennia before.

Given the time of discovery I’m also assuming we don’t have the bones or any trace of the man in the burial so… was it a man?
 
Artaxerxes said:
Personally I think the interpretation is to tight. It’s a very rigid interpretation of the burial through the lens of how we interpret power. Alternative theories are possible and chiefdom is a sliding scale.

Each of those objects could have been placed by a community who respected and revered this man for a variety of reasons, chiefdom being just one of them. He didn’t place them there himself. The dynastic thing is also a reach, those burials are a couple of hundred years apart. The landscape was important and revered and barrows have been reused over the millennia before.

Given the time of discovery I’m also assuming we don’t have the bones or any trace of the man in the burial so… was it a man?
Click to expand...
Bernard Cornwall uses the death (murder) of this man as the starting point for his rollicking Stonehenge stand alone novel. Which is well worth a read if you haven't read it.
 
Artaxerxes said:
Personally I think the interpretation is to tight. It’s a very rigid interpretation of the burial through the lens of how we interpret power. Alternative theories are possible and chiefdom is a sliding scale.

Each of those objects could have been placed by a community who respected and revered this man for a variety of reasons, chiefdom being just one of them. He didn’t place them there himself. The dynastic thing is also a reach, those burials are a couple of hundred years apart. The landscape was important and revered and barrows have been reused over the millennia before.

Given the time of discovery I’m also assuming we don’t have the bones or any trace of the man in the burial so… was it a man?
Click to expand...
Yep deffo a bloke - Bush Barrow - Wikipedia - the Wessex site - Bush Barrow lozenge - Wessex Museums - gives a number of possible roles for the "Chief" - " He must have been important – perhaps a priest, warrior or chief"
 
Read about this find the other day, wasn't aware of the three famous earlier examples found late 19th century, reading around one theory is they were measuring devices that helped with the construction of the megaliths - you wound rope round them to get a standardised length:
phys.org

Prehistoric drum is top ancient find: British Museum

A carved stone drum unearthed in England is one of the most significant pieces of prehistoric art ever found in the country, the British Museum said Thursday.
phys.org phys.org
 
hipipol said:
Yep deffo a bloke - Bush Barrow - Wikipedia - the Wessex site - Bush Barrow lozenge - Wessex Museums - gives a number of possible roles for the "Chief" - " He must have been important – perhaps a priest, warrior or chief"
Click to expand...

Time and again we’ve seen skeletons originally defined as male turning out not to be so.

Early archaeologists especially saw what they wanted to see though the discoverer of BB was very much ahead of his time in some respects and quite thorough so I’m more likely to think he was right but there’s still not 100% certainty there.

I’ll try and dig out a decent quote of his I found the other day when I’ve access to a computer - essentially saying “mate we don’t know shit about that far back”

Edit:

And that quotation:

In this group of barrows [the Lake group] our discoveries are in opposition to all systems because these systems are formed from ideas gathered from the limited knowledge we have of past events, and what we in this day consider is consistent with order and the nature of things. But the period in which the Britons raised these sepulchres is so very remote, and our manners and customs so dissimilar that at this day we have few documents to guide us. Therefore almost all our discoveries are at war against preconceived opinions gathered from books, etc.
 
Last edited:
Artaxerxes said:
Time and again we’ve seen skeletons originally defined as male turning out not to be so.

Early archaeologists especially saw what they wanted to see though the discoverer of BB was very much ahead of his time in some respects and quite thorough so I’m more likely to think he was right but there’s still not 100% certainty there.

I’ll try and dig out a decent quote of his I found the other day when I’ve access to a computer - essentially saying “mate we don’t know shit about that far back”

Edit:

And that quotation:

In this group of barrows [the Lake group] our discoveries are in opposition to all systems because these systems are formed from ideas gathered from the limited knowledge we have of past events, and what we in this day consider is consistent with order and the nature of things. But the period in which the Britons raised these sepulchres is so very remote, and our manners and customs so dissimilar that at this day we have few documents to guide us. Therefore almost all our discoveries are at war against preconceived opinions gathered from books, etc.
Click to expand...
Where's the quotation from?
 
Went to the Stonehenge exhibition at the British Museum today. It’s very good, it’s not really about Stonehenge specifically but instead looks at the wider civilisations and cultures just before, during and after it’s construction. Lots of artefacts from all over the British Isles and wider Europe, some of which are stunning. One of the points it consistently made was how much trade, contact and migration there was.

The only problem was they seemed to have oversold it as it was very crowded.

It’s £20 for adults but I would recommend it.
 
Sasaferrato said:
Aye. :) I was trying to think of somewhere close. Rumbling Bridge would be closer.
Click to expand...
Ha, interesting that your minds eye picture seems to ignore the Ochils. I mean, you’re right, but in my minds eye Dunning is in Lower Strathearn on the way to Perth, whereas Rumbling Bridge is on the way out of Clackmannanshire to Glenrothes.
 
A380 said:
Went to the Stonehenge exhibition at the British Museum today. It’s very good, it’s not really about Stonehenge specifically but instead looks at the wider civilisations and cultures just before, during and after it’s construction. Lots of artefacts from all over the British Isles and wider Europe, some of which are stunning. One of the points it consistently made was how much trade, contact and migration there was.

The only problem was they seemed to have oversold it as it was very crowded.

It’s £20 for adults but I would recommend it.
Click to expand...

This is a consistent problem with the museum exhibits, they are always absolutely fucking rammed. The Viking one put me right off going for like a year.

If I go it's to the ten am opening slots if possible just because otherwise your certain or miss something or feel harried.

Anyway, the book of the exhibit is also very good and worth picking up. The museum also recently updated Collection Online so you should be able to get good views of most of the exhibits (not sure about the borrowed ones)

I was really happy to see the Sky Disc, didn't expect to see it outside of an imaginary trip to Germany.
 
Artaxerxes said:
This is a consistent problem with the museum exhibits, they are always absolutely fucking rammed. The Viking one put me right off going for like a year.

If I go it's to the ten am opening slots if possible just because otherwise your certain or miss something or feel harried.

Anyway, the book of the exhibit is also very good and worth picking up. The museum also recently updated Collection Online so you should be able to get good views of most of the exhibits (not sure about the borrowed ones)

I was really happy to see the Sky Disc, didn't expect to see it outside of an imaginary trip to Germany.
Click to expand...
I won’t be in London to see the exhibition but I’d be interested in the book you mention. Is it obtainable from the British Museum shop?
 
i watch a lot of John Rogers walking videos - theyre mainly on London but I like it when he goes to the home counties
a few days ago he went to North Kent Downs to visitColdrum Long Barrow & the Lost Village of Dode
Long Barrow really old - 6,000 years old in fact -
have never set foot in that little area of Kent, going to do that soon
another ancient chalk ridgeway?


Coldrum-Stone.png



723px-Coldrum_Long_Barrow_Plan.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

hitmouse
Best UK radical history sights/sites
Replies
28
Views
1K
A380
A380
Yugoslav
The Left Failing Young Men (and how to reclaim the Left from liberals)
5 6 7 8 9
Replies
256
Views
4K
Elpenor
Elpenor
danny la rouge
Scottish velar fricative change by age, gender and class in Glasgow - hypothesis
2
Replies
59
Views
1K
maomao
maomao
Humberto
Medieval British Tortures at the Hands of the State - Victims and Their Stories
2
Replies
33
Views
1K
Humberto
Humberto
K
Any members of the Order of Bards Ovates and Druids?
2
Replies
43
Views
2K
dessiato
dessiato
Back
Top Bottom