<HTML>3,760 Heelstone Carvings' Chips Verified by English Heritage
In 22 separate excavations, for which the detailed records are published, a total of "over 11,500 stone fragments were recorded" (PROCEEDINGS AT THE BRITISH ACADEMY . 92, SCIENCE AND STONEHENGE, Cunliffe & Renfrew, 1997, pages 258-9) at Stonehenge, representing all of its different lithologies. Approximately 4,000 sarsen chips, including "a total of 3,760 sarsen fragments", and "sarsen sand from the area", excavated by Lieutenant-Colonel William Hawley (REPORT ON THE EXCAVATIONS AT STONEHENGE DURING THE SEASON OF 1923, W. Hawley, 1925, pages 21-50), from a single location within ten (10) meters of the Heelstone, in the Avenue between the Heelstone and the Slaughter Stone, "do strongly suggest that a stone was either dressed or broken up in the vicinity" (STONEHENGE, Cleal, Walker, Montague, 1995, page 290), in front of the Heelstone Petroglyphs:
[
www.english-heritage.org.uk]
In 1975, Arizona State University (ASU) GLG 324 Petrology-Petrography class analyzed the Cainozoic Reading Formation sarsen samples provided by Professor Richard Atkinson from the London Basin, the Hampshire Basin, and from each of the sarsens at Stonehenge. The ASU 1975 GLG 324 Petrology-Petrography class determined through optical mineralogy and geochemical analysis that the source area of the Palaeogene-Oligocene age heavy mineralogy Heelstone was from the Hampshire Basin located to the south of Stonehenge, and all of the rest of the Neogene-Miocene age lighter mineralogy sarsens at Stonehenge were from the London Basin to the north of Stonehenge. It was from this first detailed analysis by ASU in 1975, and the subsequent works of H. Howard 1982; A petrological study of the rock specimens from excavations at Stonehenge, 1979-1980, in M.W. Pitts, 1982, 104-24, where the Heelstone carvings fragment chips from its petroglyphs were determined. In short, the piles of sarsen chips and sarsen sand in front of the Heelstone, "do strongly suggest that a stone was either dressed or broken up in the vicinity" (STONEHENGE,
Cleal, Walker, Montague, 1995, page 290), in front of the Heelstone Petroglyphs:
[
www.asu.edu]
QHD of ASU's Heelstone carvings' chips (7) measured 2,800 ya.
Garry W. Denke
Geologist/Geophysicist
Plano, Texas, United States
[
www.freewebs.com];
