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tiompan T
tiompan Dec 11, 2008 08:00:07
Replying to FourWinds

FourWinds wrote:
nigelswift wrote:
I wonder if anyone has investigated whether at the other end, close to The Sanctuary, the route of the Avenue equates with the easiest route down the slope?
That would be the single most useful study in my eyes. If that were true then everything is blown out. It just goes from A-B the easy way.

Anything that snakes can have tangents drawn to provide alignments. What is needed is horizon features. The presence of a barrow mentioned above as possibly fortuitous is a prime example. The avenue could align on it or it could have been built there to align with the avenue at a later date. If the barrow came first then the solar/lunar alignment is either significant or just a really nice effect to be seen from the avenue.

It's all fascinating stuff!

Totally disagree about horizon features , all the calssic cases of astro alignmnets dont't have them e.g. Stonehenge , Newgrange etc . most horizon features that get mentioned are usually the lest lekiely alignments ,notches etc relating to single stones .
Remember that the straight sections are 100 metres plus which is a long alignment with lots of intentionality .

M moss
moss Dec 11, 2008 08:48:28
Replying to tiompan

"intentionality" is of course the keyword, all we are left with at this time are a disparate set of monuments, with different time zones, the Sanctuary sits near the Ridgeway, making it 'convenient' for those travelling along.. the stones presumed to be leading from it, joining it to the WK Avenue are no longer there (did'nt Isobel Smith plot them somehow). These stones could have been the first avenue to the 'cove/circle' that no longer exists....
I suspect that if more work was done on Stanton Drew Stone circles and Cove more answers would come to light... perhaps SD was an imitation of Avebury, the part of the pattern that is missing at SD are barrows for sightings......