Maumbury Rings Prehistoric henge and Roman amphitheatre, Dorchester, England. Shows Civil War ramp.
Maumbury Rings Prehistoric henge and Roman amphitheatre. Looking east from the top of the henge/amphitheatre bank across interior space to north entrance and shows Civil War ramp. Taken at twilight. Maumbury Rings is a Late Neolithic Henge monument converted to a Roman amphitheatre c/ AD 70-80, later used in the English Civil War, C17th by Parlimentary supporters as a gun-emplacement/artillery fort , and in C18th as a place of public execution. 1n 1706 a woman called Mary Channing 19 year old woman, was executed by strangling and burning,on the floor of the amphitheatre for poisoning her husband. The original prehistoric Henge monument external 100m in diam, (internal 47m, consisted of a single bank high with 1 entrance to the north east, an internal ditch comprising a series of 45 tapering shafts about apart, some down to a depth of 11m. These were immediately half refilled with chalk rubble and carefully selected objects: tools of stone + bone at bottom. Higher up offerings (some burnt) of broken pottery, antlered stag skulls, (one with a thick chalk phallus laid nearby), jaw bones of pigs, carved chalk tablets, grooved blocks, and a plain chalk drum. All this concealed by layers of chalk at top of which lay fragments of human skull (bits from the back of the head and forehead) covered in tumble from weathering sides of shafts. These are similar to later BA/IA ritual shafts and wells eg. Wilsford Shaft,near Stonehenge. (Theories include communication with spirit world/Under World; suitable home for remains of ancestors? ) The Romans adapted the henge to create their amphitheatre; lowering and levelling the interior, and raising the bank to its present 9m or so.
Size: 4961px × 3713px
Location: Maumbury Rings, Dorchester, Dorset, England, UK
Photo credit: © Jean Williamson / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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