Marden Henge Dig Open Day (Saturday 18 July 2015)

Marden Henge earthwork in the Pewsey Vale is the largest henge monument in Britain, its oval shape enclosing 35 acres. Sited with the River Avon at its south-eastern perimeter and dating from 2,400 BC it originated as a Neolithic settlement but was also used for ritual purposes, and later became a henge. It linked the people of Stonehenge and Durrington to Avebury. Inside the henge stood the impressive Neolithic Hatfield Barrow. It was said to be well over 400 feet in diameter and 22ft high. According to legend, it concealed treasure, and this proved its undoing for following extensive but inept excavations by Sir Richard Colt Hoare and William Cunnington in 1809, it tragically collapsed, without anything of consequence having being found.

There is a dig underway at Marden Henge at the moment, conducted by the students at Reading University, under the leadership of Dr Jim Leary, pictured above standing in front of a neolithic sweat house, from their department of archaeology. He told the Gazette and Herald, “This excavation is the beginning of a new chapter in the story of Stonehenge and its surrounds. The Vale of Pewsey is a relatively untouched archaeological treasure-chest under the shadow of one of the wonders of the world.

“Why Stonehenge was built remains a mystery. How the giant stones were transported almost defy belief. It must have been an astonishing, perhaps frightening, sight. Using the latest survey, excavation and scientific techniques, the project will reveal priceless insight into the lives of those who witnessed its construction.

“Marden Henge is located on a line which connects Stonehenge and Avebury. This poses some fascinating questions. Were the three monuments competing against each other? Or were they used by the same communities but for different occasions and ceremonies? We hope to find out."

He led the talk I attended at the North Site and very interesting it was too.

My own interest in Marden Henge dates back to the nineties when I was researching Edward Duke, who had a great interest in the line that links Marden Henge to Stonehenge, Avebury and elsewhere. Duke had a theory that the Druids (sic) had built a giant planetarium in the land, with temples, representing all the planets known to ancient man, in apparent orbit around Earth.

In The Druidical Temples Of The County Of Wilts (dedicated 13th August 1846, Lake House, Amesbury), he wrote “that our ingenious ancestors portrayed on the Wiltshire Downs, a Planetarium or stationary Orrery, if this anachronism may be allowed me, located on a meridianal line, extending north and south, the length of sixteen miles; that the planetary temples thus located, seven in number, will if put into motion, be supposed to revolve around Silbury Hill as the centre of this grand astronomical scheme; that thus Saturn, the extreme planet to the south, would in his orbit describe a circle with a diameter of thirty-two miles; that four of these planetary temples were constructed of stone, those of Venus, the Sun, the Moon, and Saturn; and the remaining three of earth, those of Mercury, Mars, and Jupiter, resembling the “Hill Altars” of Holy Scripture; ...while the Sun himself pursues his annual course in the first and nearest concentric orbit, and is thus successively surrounded by those also of the planets, Venus, Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; that these planetary temples were all located at due distances from each other; that the relative proportions of those distances correspond with those of the present received system; and that, in three instances, the sites of these temples bear in their names at this day plain and indubitable record of their primitive dedication.”

Duke also writes, “Marden (although local appellatives are usually derived from the Saxon) is derivable from the ancient British words Mars and den; the one (according to the “Ductor Linguarum,” of Minshieu) signifying the planet Mars, and the other, a cave or residence. What have we then but the temple of Mars?”

Duke goes on to explain with regard to his straight line that Marden, “…on an extent of 32 miles, will be found about half a mile to the left out of the strict line; and this slight deviation, which at first sight would appear to disprove, in reality confirms, our rule: for upon investigation it is found, that this temple, if sited on the meridianal line, must have been looked for in the bed of the neighbouring river, and even as it is, if at the present day a spectator place himself at the temple of Mars, in the centre of the vale of Pewsey, and look alternately at the temple of Mercury, and at the temple of Jupiter, sited respectively on the summit of the northern and southern hills bordering on that vale, all the three temples will appear to be on a straight line.”

So, in his Planetarium, Avebury represents the Sun, and Stonehenge Saturn, with Marden Henge corresponding to the south node of Mars as it orbits the Sun. The line, now known as the Duke Line, has become of great interest to dowsers, who consider it a major ley line. This aspect of Marden Henge is, of course, outside the remit of the dig and was not mentioned by Dr Leary.

Before the talk I had visited the South Site where a Roman settlement was being uncovered as part of the dig. They had just discovered a skeleton of a horse, thought to have been a work horse at the camp and one could see its exposed skull - astonishing to think it had died in around 230 A.D.

L.
18.7.2015 (2125 hr)

Blip #1617 (#1867 including archived blips)
Consecutive Blip #003
Day #1943
LOTD #851 (#972 including archived blips)

Marden Henge Open Day, 18 July 2015 (Flickr album)

Marden Henge National Mapping Programme (English Heritage)
New dig begins at Marden Henge to investigate Neolithic life (Gazette and Herald)

Lozarhythm Of The Day:
Trembling Bells - Killing Time In London Fields (2015)

One year ago:
River Avon At Batheaston