Stonehenge 181
Image by Vicster

No, stones and cattle have different qualities entirely. With a lump of stone you'd take it in a straight line, grimly, in the shortest possible time. It'd be dangerous as there's be permanent risk of severe injury. With cattle it's different. They'd wander about and refuse to budge sometimes and race to a patch of lush grazing at others. The risks of droving would be of being robbed of the beasts by local people, rather than of being crushed by a hefty piece of stone. The model of droving depends on a centralised pre-industrial landscape rather than a dispersed agricultural landscape as in prehistoric times. See also the film Fitzcarraldo recalling that the actual boats in the Amazon were moved in a dismantled state.

[quote="StoneGloves"]No, stones and cattle have different qualities entirely. With a lump of stone you'd take it in a straight line, grimly, in the shortest possible time. It'd be dangerous as there's be permanent risk of severe injury. quote]

Sorry but I don't buy that..

It takes no concideration of terrain and ground conditions..

I just don't see them dragging a stone up a 30% hill if they could go around it. Nor working their way through swampy condition if there was a dry path. Whatever the method used, they still needed to work with the prevailing weather and ground conditions and alter the route to their best advantage..

Tony