Tags: Salisbury Wiltshire
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Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, 3 km west of Amesbury. It consists of an outer ring of vertical sarsen standing stones, each around 4.0 m high, 2.1 m wide, and weighing around 25 tonnes, topped by connecting horizontal lintel stones. Inside is a ring of smaller bluestones. Inside these are free-standing trilithons, two bulkier vertical Sarsens joined by one lintel. The whole monument, now ruinous, is orientated towards the sunrise on the summer solstice. The stones are set within earthworks in the middle of the most dense complex of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred tumuli (burial mounds).
Archaeologists believe that Stonehenge was constructed from 3000 BC to 2000 BC. The surrounding circular earth bank and ditch, which constitute the earliest phase of the monument, have been dated to about 3100 BC. Radiocarbon dating suggests that the first bluestones were raised between 2400 and 2200 BC, although they may have been at the site as early as 3000 BC.
One of the most famous landmarks in the United Kingdom, Stonehenge is regarded as a British cultural icon. It has been a legally protected Scheduled Ancient Monument since 1882, when legislation to protect historic monuments was first successfully introduced in Britain. The site and its surroundings were added to UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites in 1986. Stonehenge is owned by the Crown and managed by English Heritage; the surrounding land is owned by the National Trust.
Stonehenge could have been a burial ground from its earliest beginnings. Deposits containing human bone date from as early as 3000 BC, when the ditch and bank were first dug, and continued for at least another 500 years.
Source: Wikipedia
Tags: Elements Stonehenge Amesbury henge
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St Mary Old Church, Wilton. St Mary's Church in the Market Place of Wilton, Wiltshire, England, was built in the 15th century. It has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade II* listed building, and is now a redundant church in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.
St Marys was built on the site of an earlier church at which Bishop Robert de Bingham was consecrated in 1229 before the completion of his cathedral church at Salisbury. His statue is still visible on the west gable. By the 9th century the Benedictine convent of Wilton Abbey was attached to the church. During the 14th and 15th centuries other medieval churches in Wilton closed and combined with St Mary's which was rebuilt and expanded to become, by the 16th century, the sole parish church. In 1441 parish records include the purchase of a great bell and around 1628 a carved pulpit was installed. In the early 19th century a parish rate was levied for the restoration of the church and a chandelier and pulpit sconces were bought to enable evening services.
In 1845 a new Church of England parish church of St Mary and St Nicholas (see pictures in this photostream) was built at the instigation of the Countess of Pembroke and her younger son Baron Herbert of Lea, designed by the architect Thomas Henry Wyatt and D. Brandon in the Italianate Romanesque style, with considerable Byzantine influences. The bells and many memorials from the old church were transferred to the new.
As a result the old church was partially demolished, apart from the chancel and one bay of the nave. The ruins consist of the three arches of the south arcade, fragments of the north arcade and the altered eastern arch of the west tower or west window within the churchyard.
Restoration was undertaken between 1933 and 1939, by Robert Worth Bingham, who was the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom from 1933 to 1937, who claimed descent from Robert de Bingham. The church was declared redundant on 30 May 1972, and was vested in the Trust on 15 November 1977.
Source: Wikipedia
Tags: listed building Wiltshire church
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Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England, two miles (3 km) west of Amesbury. It consists of an outer ring of vertical sarsen standing stones, each around 13 feet (4.0 m) high, seven feet (2.1 m) wide, and weighing around 25 tons, topped by connecting horizontal lintel stones. Inside is a ring of smaller bluestones. Inside these are free-standing trilithons, two bulkier vertical sarsens joined by one lintel. The whole monument, now ruinous, is aligned towards the sunrise on the summer solstice. The stones are set within earthworks in the middle of the densest complex of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred tumuli (burial mounds).
Archaeologists believe that Stonehenge was constructed from around 3000 BC to 2000 BC. The surrounding circular earth bank and ditch, which constitute the earliest phase of the monument, have been dated to about 3100 BC. Radiocarbon dating suggests that the first bluestones were raised between 2400 and 2200 BC, although they may have been at the site as early as 3000 BC.
One of the most famous landmarks in the United Kingdom, Stonehenge is regarded as a British cultural icon. It has been a legally protected scheduled monument since 1882, when legislation to protect historic monuments was first successfully introduced in Britain. The site and its surroundings were added to UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites in 1986. Stonehenge is owned by the Crown and managed by English Heritage; the surrounding land is owned by the National Trust.
Stonehenge could have been a burial ground from its earliest beginnings. Deposits containing human bone date from as early as 3000 BC, when the ditch and bank were first dug, and continued for at least another 500 years.
Source: Wikipedia (downloaded 18.2.23)
Tags: Stonehenge Amesbury Wiltshire England prehistoric monument scheduled monument
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Tags: Salisbury Wiltshire
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