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Stonehenge and its Environs
Re: The bluestone debate
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nigelswift wrote:
It's probably more revealing to assess these things in terms of distance x weight. On that basis, with the bluestones having a total weight of 260 tons and the sarsens having a total weight of 1,700 tons shifting the latter may well have been the greater feat. You'd never guess from the internet though.


The most difficult job regarding the building of Stonehenge is without doubt the transporting of the sarsen stones (although the dressing of the stones may have taken longer).

Standing up the sarsens is fairly easy, I stood up a small one in America last year just to test the theory, I reckon about a week for each one as there is a lot of carpentery involved. Placing the lintels is easy, the crib method as practised by the Stonehengineers at Crich in Derbyshire in 2005 under my directions using working platforms for the lever operators as the stone is raised would take no more than one day.

The bluestones are no problem if you have a real boat like the Ferriby boat which is a genuine sea going boat.

The problem is the transporting of the sarsen uprights. At 30 to 45-tons each these are the problem. No one in modern times as shown how this could have been done, no one!!! No one has ever picked up a stone of this size from the bare earth in order to load it onto rollers or a sledge without the use of a modern crane. And even after cheating in order to make the attempt no one as ever dragged a stone of this size more than a few yards in the course of one day and never up anything but the gentlest of slopes.

When the Stonehengineers proved it was possible to drag a 12-ton stone using wooden rollers that was all they proved!!! Even then the experiment lasted only 20 mins, anyone who was involved in the pulling who thinks they could have kept up that kind of effort for a full day is a fool. BTW Nigel the weight of the stone was just under 12-ton not 17 as you posted earlier.

The problem of transporting the sarsens grows expotentially with the size and weight of the stone and anyone who thinks that simply throwing more labour at the problem is the answer is simply wrong. As the labour force grows the efficiency of each man will decrease. (That is a fact and by as much as 50%) As will the efficiency of each man after just 5 mins of effort. (Another fact and if the effort is continued by as much as 100%). If it was possible to move a big stone by dragging it someone would have succeeded by now.

Stone-rowing to date remains the only credible solution, although next year I might have another possibility.

If it seems like I'm shouting my mouth off please forgive me but (without false modesty) I do know what I am talking about.


Reply | with quote		Posted by GordonP
17th November 2008ce
18:39

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Re: The bluestone debate (nigelswift)

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Re: The bluestone debate (nigelswift)

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