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Stonehenge and its Environs
Re: The bluestone debate
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"Even allowing for a conservative 3:1 rest/work ratio, draggin is still at least seven times more efficient.”

I actually don’t see why a 3:1 rest/work ratio should be applied to dragging and not rowing. Gordon has always maintained that pullers would get exhausted after a very short time but I don’t accept that as inevitable or likely. If they do it’s a sign they’re having to pull too hard and they’re undermanned, nothing else. Work’s work, however it’s performed. Treble them up, work them less hard and they won’t get so exhausted. Once that’s done there’s no reason to postulate draggers would take any more breaks than rowers. And maybe less if all they have to do is plod along gently. Oxen manage.

Gordon, it's not a matter of "begging to differ" or even being anti-your idea (why would your two previous staunchest supporters do that?) It's purely a matter of having to accept the evidence of our own eyes at Foamhenge that dragging is easier and more efficient per person than rowing - and not by a bit but by an absolutely huge margin. None of us realised that on paper but now we do. On that basis the only reason for postulating that rowing was the method of choice would be if they were forced into it because of lack of a large workforce for efficient dragging. But there's no evidence they had that problem, in fact quite the reverse. Stonehenge itself hardly looks like there was a labour shortage. And of course, in suggesting stonerowing may have involved ten small teams acting at the same time, you're acknowledging they did indeed have a large total workforce available. If they did then on the basis of Steve's calculations being only half right they could deliver a stone to Stonehenge every few days so I don't know where this 20 year process idea came from.


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nigelswift
Posted by nigelswift
20th November 2008ce
07:23

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Re: The bluestone debate (Steve Gray)

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