>Very fair point, but extending the speculations to big showy places like Avebury is a step too far IMHO. If I didn't know you better I might think you had your tongue in your cheek and were enjoying stirring the pot! ;) Such effort, such aesthetics, such longevity - for a simple non-ritual function that could have been achieved by a wooden fence!<

Yes I agree :-) Avebury is <i>much</i> more than a big pigpen, in fact I'd go as far as to say it was probably the 'capital' of Neolithic Britain.

Perhaps what is of value here, when looking at Avebury, is taking a perspective shift away from some of the entrenched New Age/Druid/Pagan/Astronomical labels it is so stuck with and seeing it as a hive of activity where markets, ceremonies, people and animals, moved in a great buzz of interaction; looked at in that way it begins to make a bit more sense. Folks, some with livestock to trade, coming along the Ridgeway or in from other directions to the 'big city' to see the sights, to see for the first time perhaps the greatest wonder of the Neolithic - Silbury; to visit the sacred sites and pay homage at the old burial grounds; meet friends and relatives again, find a wife or a husband, seek council, seek healing (and of course party on an endless supply of bacon butties ;-)

There's something about Avebury that has a <i>zing</i> to it; I can never go there without feeling this was once a very happy vibrant place - a place were people came because they <i>so</i> wanted to.