Stonehenge is one of the world’s most iconic, and mysterious, prehistoric monuments, and it has intrigued people for thousands of years. Scholars are still unsure exactly who built it and why, though many believe it was a religious site. Its circular layout aligns with the movements of the sun. But did the equally mysterious druids — the ancient “mediators between humans and the gods” build Stonehenge?
The short answer is no, they probably didn’t. Archaeological work indicates that Stonehenge was constructed between roughly 4,000 and 5,000 years ago, while the earliest surviving written record of the druids dates back about 2,400 years. It’s possible that the druids may go back somewhat further, but experts doubt they were around when Stonehenge was being built.
“Druids only emerge in the last half of the 1st millennium B.C.,” long after Stonehenge was built, Caroline Malone, an emeritus professor of prehistory at Queen’s University Belfast’s School of Natural and Built Environment, told Live Science in an email. “No druidic evidence has ever been identified at Stonehenge, where instead, we have complex calendrical rituals associated with solstice, death, rebirth and community events,” Malone noted, adding that “The Druids did not apparently worship the sun or solstice, and none of the Iron Age ritual sites suggest such activity or ritual.”
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