CD1-track10

Stonehenge

What is the main topic of the lecture?

A Two different views on the original purpose of Stonehenge.

B The detailed history of how Stonehenge was built.

C The geological explanation about the stones used in building Stonehenge.

D The Astronomical significance of the midsummer sunrise and eclipses.

(A)

听力原文：

CD1-track10

Stonehenge

Moving on to another ancient discovery, let's discuss the magnificence and mystery of

Stonehenge. Theree kilometers west of a town called Amesbury stands a large, tall

stone ruin known as Stonehenge. This unique monument has stood for over 5 000

years in an open downland of Salisbury Plain in Southern England.Stonehenge is not

a single structure, but consists of a series of earth, wood, and stone structures that

were revised and re-modeled over thousands of years. How were the stones moved

into place? No one knows exactly, but it is definite that it took a lot of muscle power

and numerous men to move these heavy stones in place. The next logical question

might be: why was Stonehenge built? Well, to answer this question, we can look at the

findings of an 18th century British scholar named William Strukeley who noticed that

the horseshoe of great stones and the houseshoe of 19 smaller stones called

bluestones opened up in the direction of a midsummer sunrise. He concluded that

these stones were placed not accidentally, but deliberately positioned and planned so

that on a midsummer's morning the sun rose directly over the Deel Stone and the fist

rays shone into the centre of the monument between the open arms of the horseshoe

arrangement. This discovery has had tremendous impact on how Stonehenge has been

interpreted. Both Stukeley in the 18th century and Sir J. Norman Lockyer, a British

astronomer and scientist, in the 20th century, belived that this alignment implied a

ritualistic connection with sun worship. Their conclusions led to the belief that

Stonehenge was built as a temple to the sun. Nowadays, an astronomer named Gerald

Fawkins disagrees with Stukeley and Lockyer's conclusions and instead argues that

Stonehenge is not simply aligned with solar and lunar astronomical events, but can be

used to predict other events such eclipses. In a nutshell , he believes that Stonehenge

was not built as a temple; instead it was built as an astronomical calsulator.