Qualla: Stonehenge Avenue

Stonehenge Avenue: Introduction

Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Psychostevouk (talk), Public domain. Long before Stonehenge, before any human placed a stone on Salisbury Plain, the last ice age scratched a set of parallel grooves into the chalk. The grooves ran from north-east to south-west, and by sheer geological accident they aligned almost exactly with the midsummer sunrise and the midwinter sunset. Three thousand years after the ice retreated, Neolithic people seem to have noticed. They built a ceremonial avenue along those grooves. Then, where the avenue ended, they built Stonehenge.

Read more: Stonehenge Avenue on Qualla

Image: Psychostevouk (talk) | Public domain

Stonehenge Avenue: An avenue, by definition

Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Drawn by Adamsan, CC BY-SA 3.0. In archaeological language, an avenue is a pair of parallel banks and ditches running between two points. The Stonehenge Avenue runs for nearly three kilometres, from the north-east entrance of the monument down to the River Avon at West Amesbury. It was first noticed in the 18th...

Read more: Stonehenge Avenue on Qualla

Image: Drawn by Adamsan | CC BY-SA 3.0

Stonehenge Avenue: The midsummer sunrise

Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit David Smith, CC BY-SA 2.0. For at least part of its length, the avenue is aligned on the sunrise of the summer solstice. Stand at Stonehenge on the morning of 21 June, look down the avenue past the Heel Stone, and the sun comes up directly along it. Reverse the direction and the same axis catches the midwi...

Read more: Stonehenge Avenue on Qualla

Image: David Smith | CC BY-SA 2.0

Stonehenge Avenue: The ice age noticed first

Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ethan Doyle White, CC BY-SA 4.0. Excavations along the avenue have revealed natural features called periglacial stripes, parallel rills cut into the chalk during the last ice age by repeated freezing and thawing of waterlogged ground. The rills happened to run in the direction of the solstitial sun. Mike Parker ...

Read more: Stonehenge Avenue on Qualla

Image: Ethan Doyle White | CC BY-SA 4.0

Stonehenge Avenue: Walking the line today

Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Graham Horn, CC BY-SA 2.0. Most of the avenue is now invisible. The banks have eroded down, the ditches have silted in, and only crop marks and excavation trenches reveal where it ran. The most visible stretch is the section just outside the north-east entrance to the stone circle, where you can still see ...

Read more: Stonehenge Avenue on Qualla

Image: Graham Horn | CC BY-SA 2.0