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The track, that eventually becomes Avebury High Street, begins to the east of the Circle on the Ridgeway; further down the track it becomes Green Street, and after the Red Lion Pub it becomes Avebury High Street. Finally, at the bottom of the High Street, the track takes a right turn and then a left to become the footpath that crosses the Winterbourne, leading uphill again to Avebury Trusloe. The stream, rising somewhere between the Ridgeway and Green Street, follows a parallel course to the track, flowing down the side of Green Street and the High Street but then, unlike the track, flowing straight on at the bottom of the High Street into the Winterbourne.

The Avebury Circle is situated centrally over the Green Stream's course; the stream itself disappearing at the top of Green Street before remerging just east of the post office. There's a well in the Red Lion pub (86' deep) and several other wells close by. In other words the Avebury circle is situated over a source of fresh water. Unless the Avebury Circle was used for purely 'religious' purposes it seems probable that a prehistoric settlement of considerable size and importance exists somewhere within it (or alternatively somewhere very close by).

Littlestone wrote:
The stream, rising somewhere between the Ridgeway and Green Street, follows a parallel course to the track, flowing down the side of Green Street and the High Street but then, unlike the track, flowing straight on at the bottom of the High Street into the Winterbourne.
Utter nonesense.
You are talking about the Avebury drainage system which starts at the triangle opposite the toilets.
There is no source of water between the Ridgeway and Green st...
It would have to flow Up Hill to get to the center of the village....
sigh

Littlestone wrote:
In other words the Avebury circle is situated over a source of fresh water
Mmm... I'd like that! :o)

think I have a mental image of the path you're taking this stream - do you have a diagram?

G x

Littlestone wrote:
There's a well in the Red Lion pub (86' deep)
Ah I remember that well (Do you see what I've done there? :-) )

It's been turned into a table in the pub, with a see-through top, which isn't as horrendous as it sounds. I quite liked seeing the entire depth of the well under my drink.

Fond memories too of sitting around it with much missed friends a few years back...

The Avebury ditch (specifically its depth) really does suggest a moat - it seems to be the only thing that makes any sense. The following may be of interest (even Burl couldn't help quoting it, although he doesn't agree with it).

"...by April fresh streams met at the Sambourne confluence, and new water sparkled in the moat. The monument at Avebury, or Aubury as it was known in the seventeenth century, was built to create New Water, and in the oldest European language, the Neolithic Basque tongue, Ureberri means New Water..."*

Avebury and the nearby Kennet (a word also of great antiquity and interest), the Swallowhead, Silbury and the Winterbourne all have one thing in common - water. But not just water, water that was born anew at certain times of the year.

* The Avebury Cycle by Michael Dames. ISBN 0-500-27886-5. Page 134.