Stonehenge: The Ancient Alien Theory

How was Stonehenge built? Was there some kind of advanced engineering that has been long lost through the years? It wasn't built over night. Archaeologists believe it was constructed from 3000 BC to 2000 BC and it evolved in several construction phases spanning at least 1500 years. More after the jump.


The following is a blog by sarahhun:

After reading the construction of Stonehenge, I was hung up, wondering how the prehistoric monument was built without advanced engineering knowledge nor sophisticated tools. This same question has been baffling historians and archaeologists alike for centuries. Stonehenge took nearly 1,500 years to build and was believed to be constructed between 3000 and 2000 BC. The construction of Stonehenge begins with the outer ring consisting of sarsen sandstone slabs excavated from local quarries in England’s Salisbury Plain, while the inner ring being built with smaller bluestone rocks that scientists have tracked back to Preseli Hills in Wales, nearly 200 miles away from the construction site of Stonehenge. How were these neolithic peoples able to transport boulders weighing 4-tons over such a vast distance? While also taking into consideration that it’s construction was nearly 5000 years ago.

Seeing as there is no definitive answer to how Stonehenge was engineered by these neolithic peoples, I wondered were they really solely responsible for it’s creation. Discerning that anything is possible I took into account the possibility of Ancient Aliens, proponents such as author Erich von Daniken among others developed a modern take on the Merlin hypothesis. This modernized hypothesis was developed by advocates of the ancient alien theory, other known as the ancient astronaut theory, considering that extraterrestrial beings with superior knowledge of science and engineering arrived on Earth thousands of years ago, sharing their expertise with early neolithic civilizations. 

Author Erich von Daniken, considered the primary proponent of the ancient alien theory, suggested the creation of Stonehenge in the neolithic period was a model of our solar system, serving as the solar and lunar calendar. Bear in mind supporting evidence has found upon observing the circularly positioned surrounding trench of Stonehenge, connecting at a point, that then extends hundreds of meters away from the site, with an extending pathway pointing directly upon the position the sun would lie during the summer solstice. In turn representing a believed model of the neolithic Solar System, they believed consisted of 9 planets. From this early representation of our Solar System, Daniken purposed that the stone circle served as a landing pad for spaceships or as an observatory for extraterrestrial activity amongst the skies. It was also believed that the excavation of the trenches directed outward pointed towards ancient historic sites, another stretch of this belief advocates the idea that they served as identifiers for extraterrestrial beings acknowledging that the planet is inhabited with advanced life. Daniken further claimed that ancient art and iconography throughout the world depicted air and space vehicles, non-human intelligent creatures, along with artifacts of advanced technology that weren’t seen to fit amongst the neolithic period. 

The question then appears as to how these anachronistically objects found amongst periods preceding the technology of the period. Were ancient aliens the helping hand that guided civilizations to advance technologically and intellectually, pushing the development of our known world slowly over thousands of years? Modern scientific explanations cannot yet give an explanation as to how boulders weighing nearly 4-tons were transported over such great distance to Stonehenge without adequate technology. Therefore, until proven wrong the speculation around Stonehenge is to be consumed with endless possibilities of it’s mystifying construction along with the role it played in the neolithic period in which it arose.