Seahenge
презентация к уроку по английскому языку по теме

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Find Seahenge is a unique early Bronze Age timber circle with an upside down oak tree stump at its centre. The oak stump, with its roots in the air, was first spotted in spring 1998. As the sea eroded the land, a complete circle of timber posts gradually became visible around it. The findings were reported to the Castle Museum in Norwich, who passed the news to the Norfolk Archaeology Unit, who were fascinated to know what had been found.

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Location and geology The site is situated within the intertidal zone on the Norfolk coast to the north-east of the village of Holme-next-the-Sea. It covers an area of 7.5 m. The underlying geology of the site is Upper Chalk overlain by a series of Quaternary and Holocene deposits. A sequence of sands and gravels of marine and glacial/periglacial origin rest on the chalk. These are overlain by a variable distribution and thickness of forest bed deposits. Intertidal sand overlies these deposits.

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B uilding Tests carried out on the centrepiece, a massive oak stump with the roots exposed, have revealed that it was felled sometime between April and June 2050 BC. The Oak stump was also found to have pieces of rope attached to the buried end made of woven Honeysuckle, this rope was probably used to drag the stump into place and left attached when the stump base was buried. Archaeologists often find items buried upside down at Bronze age sites and it's certain that the central stump was buried upside down for a symbolic reason. The 55 Oak trees in the ring around the central stump are believed to have been felled the following Spring, 2049 BC.

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Destination It is believed that these timber circles were used by our prehistoric ancestors in a practise known as excarnation - exposing the dead to the elements, birds and wild animals. The belief being that allowing the flesh to rot from the bone in the open air would enable the person's spirit to be liberated. The outer ring was built of split young oak trunks and were set up in the manner of a stockade, a small opening just large enough for a person to slip through was allowed by using a section of a tree which was forked, the outer ring was probabley 8 feet tall. The lay out and sheer effort involved in moving the trees to this site all point to this being an extremely important ceremonial/religous site to our Bronze Age ancestors and many archeaologists consider this the Bronze Age discovery of the decade.