172 List of Prehistoric, Roman, and Pagan Saxon Antiquities. 



or imposts. Each upright had 2 projecting tenons at the top fitting 

 into mortice holes at each end of the imposts. The ends of the im- 

 posts were also morticed so as to form a kind of toggle joint with 

 each other. Inside this outer circle was an inner circle of smaller 

 " bluestones " composed of primary rocks foreign to Wiltshire. A 

 single impost now prostrate suggests that this inner circle may also 

 have had imposts. Inside this inner circle five great trilithons of 

 two uprights and an impost, arranged in horseshoe fashion facing the 

 N.E., the central trilithon being the highest. Inside this a series of 

 " bluestones " about 8ft. high arranged also horseshoe fashion. In 

 front of the central trilithon a flat recumbent stone, the altar stone. 

 The axis of the structure ran through the opening of the great 

 trilithon across the altar stone N.E.down the centre of the " avenue " 

 over the recumbent " slaughter stone," lying in the centre of the 

 avenue, and the point of the upright " Hele Stone " or " Friars Heel" 

 standing in the avenue near the road. The avenue itself, formed by 

 two parallel banks and ditches, runs N.E. for about 600 yards, and 

 then divides into two branches, one running N. to the " Cursus " the 

 other eastwards. Of the original 30 uprights and 28 lintels of the 

 outer circle of sarsen stones, 17 uprights and 6 lintels remain in situ. 

 Of the inner circle of " Bluestones "11 remain. Of the 5 trilithons 2 

 are perfect, one stone (formerly the " Leaning Stone " but set upright 

 in 1901) of the great central trilithon, and one of the northernmost 

 trilithon, are standing. 

 The altar stone is of micaceous sandstone, 2 of the "bluestones" of 

 argillaceous sandstone, the rest chiefly of Porphyritic Diabase. It 

 has been suggested that these are erratic blocks from glacial drift on 

 Salisbury Plain, but no such erratic blocks have ever been found in 

 Wilts, and these stones must have come from a distance, from Wales, 

 Cornwall, or N. Devon possibly. The sarsens came probably from 

 the Marlborough Downs, as sarsens in any number could never have 

 existed on the Plain. During the excavations round the base of the 

 Leaning Stone, 1901, chippings of both sarsen and bluestones were 

 found together at the base of the stones, and it was found that the 

 uprights of the trilithons had been set up from the inside of the 

 circle. Hence sarsens and bluestones must have been erected at the 

 same time, and the whole building is contemporaneous. About 100 

 very rough flint implements and flint and sarsen hammerstones were, 

 found, together with several large mauls of sarsen weighing from 44 ( 

 to 64 lbs., used as packing round the base of the uprights. These 

 were used, Dr. Gowland believes, the mauls in pounding the surface 

 of the sarsens into grooves, the sarsen hammers in working down 

 the surface of the sarsens, and the flints possibly in working the 

 softer bluestones to a face. The whole face of the " leaning-stone " 

 underground was pitted with small holes. A single stain of copper 

 or bronze was found. Dr. Gowland believed that this points to the 

 conclusion that the building was erected about the time of the in- 

 troduction of bronze, or the end of the Neolithic period, i.e., cir. 

 1800 B.C. Sir Norman Lockyer on astronomical grounds puts the 



