...
"It is very remarkable that no barrow or tumulus exists on the east
side, where the sun (the great object of ancient worship) first
appears."
[3] "Dr. Smith says that he has tried a bit of this stone, and found
that it would not stand fire. It is, therefore, very improbable that
it should have been used for burnt sacrifices."
The theory put forward in this article has in late years been upheld
by no less an authority than Sir Norman Lockyer, who thinks that the
practice of visiting Stonehenge on the longest day of the year--a
pilgrimage that goes back before the beginnings of recorded history,
essayed by a country people not addicted to wasting a fine summer
morning without some very strong tradition to prompt them--goes far to
bear out the theory that Stonehenge was a solar temple. If this is so,
the mysterious people who erected it were civilized enough to have a
good working knowledge of the movement of the heavenly bodies, and
probably combined that knowledge with a not unreasonable worship and
ritual. Sir Norman Lockyer's calculations give the date of the
erection as about 1680 B.
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