America's Stonehenge
Encyclopedia
Salem, New Hampshire
Salem is a town in Rockingham County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 28,776 at the 2010 census. Salem is a marketing and distributing center north of Boston, with a major amusement attraction, Canobie Lake Park, and a large shopping mall, the Mall at Rockingham Park.- History :The...
in the northeast United States. America's Stonehenge is open to the public for a fee. Part of a recreational area that includes snowshoe
Snowshoe
A snowshoe is footwear for walking over the snow. Snowshoes work by distributing the weight of the person over a larger area so that the person's foot does not sink completely into the snow, a quality called "flotation"....
trails and an alpaca
Alpaca
An alpaca is a domesticated species of South American camelid. It resembles a small llama in appearance.Alpacas are kept in herds that graze on the level heights of the Andes of southern Peru, northern Bolivia, Ecuador, and northern Chile at an altitude of to above sea level, throughout the year...
farm, it is a tourist attraction
Tourist attraction
A tourist attraction is a place of interest where tourists visit, typically for its inherent or exhibited cultural value, historical significance, natural or built beauty, or amusement opportunities....
, with particular appeal to believers in New Age
New Age
The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...
systems.
A number of hypotheses exist as to the origin and purpose of the structures. One viewpoint is a mixture of land-use practices of local farmers in the 18th and 19th centuries and construction of structures by owner William Goodwin in the 1930s. Other claims that the site has pre-Columbian
Pre-Columbian
The pre-Columbian era incorporates all period subdivisions in the history and prehistory of the Americas before the appearance of significant European influences on the American continents, spanning the time of the original settlement in the Upper Paleolithic period to European colonization during...
origins are usually regarded as controversial, possibly pseudoarchaeological
Pseudoarchaeology
Pseudoarchaeology — also known as alternative archaeology, fringe archaeology, fantastic archaeology, or cult archaeology — refers to interpretations of the past from outside of the academic archaeological community, which typically also reject the accepted scientific and analytical methods of the...
or the result of an early-20th century hoax
Hoax
A hoax is a deliberately fabricated falsehood made to masquerade as truth. It is distinguishable from errors in observation or judgment, or rumors, urban legends, pseudosciences or April Fools' Day events that are passed along in good faith by believers or as jokes.-Definition:The British...
. Among structures at the site are standing stone
Standing stone
Standing stones, orthostats, liths, or more commonly megaliths are solitary stones set vertically in the ground and come in many different varieties....
s that may have been erected to align with astronomical
Astronomy
Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...
events.
The site was first dubbed Mystery Hill by William Goodwin, an insurance executive who purchased the area in 1937. This was the official name of the site until 1982, when it was renamed "America's Stonehenge", a term coined in a news article in the early 1960s, in an effort to separate it from roadside oddity sites
Tourist trap
A tourist trap is an establishment, or group of establishments, that has been created with the aim of attracting tourists and their money...
and reinforce the idea that it is an ancient archaeological site. Although the area is named after the archaeological site of Stonehenge
Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument located in the English county of Wiltshire, about west of Amesbury and north of Salisbury. One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is composed of a circular setting of large standing stones set within earthworks...
in England, there is no cultural connection between the two.
Origin
The site first appears in print in the 1907 History of Salem, N.H. It is described thus: "Jonathan Pattee's Cave. He had a house in these woods 70 years ago; took town paupers before the town farm was bought. This is a wild but beautiful spot, among rough boulders and soft pines, about which the most weird and fantastic tale might be woven. There are several caves still intact, which the owner used for storage purposes."The site's history is muddled partly because of the activities of William Goodwin, who became convinced that the location was proof that Irish
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
monk
Monk
A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of monks, while always maintaining some degree of physical separation from those not sharing the same purpose...
s (the Culdee
Culdee
Céli Dé or Culdees were originally members of ascetic Christian monastic and eremitical communities of Ireland, Scotland and England in the Middle Ages. The term is used of St. John the Apostle, of a missioner from abroad recorded in the Annals of the Four Masters at the year 806, and of Óengus...
s) had lived there long before the time of Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...
, a concept he sought to publicize. The site has been altered by stone quarrying and by the efforts of Goodwin and others to move the stones to what they considered their original locations, with Goodwin perhaps responsible for much of what can now be seen. Many of the stones have post 1830s drill marks from the quarrying that took place on the site.
Proponents of a pre-Columbian, yet non-Native American, origin for the site argue that some stones are encased in trees that may have sprouted before the arrival of the first colonists, claim that there are similarities between the ruins and Phoenicia
Phoenicia
Phoenicia , was an ancient civilization in Canaan which covered most of the western, coastal part of the Fertile Crescent. Several major Phoenician cities were built on the coastline of the Mediterranean. It was an enterprising maritime trading culture that spread across the Mediterranean from 1550...
n architecture, and say that marks on some stones resemble some ancient writing system
Writing system
A writing system is a symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in language.-General properties:Writing systems are distinguished from other possible symbolic communication systems in that the reader must usually understand something of the associated spoken language to...
s of the Old World
Old World
The Old World consists of those parts of the world known to classical antiquity and the European Middle Ages. It is used in the context of, and contrast with, the "New World" ....
. The late Barry Fell
Barry Fell
Barry Fell was a professor of invertebrate zoology at the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology. His primary research was on starfish and sea urchins...
, a marine biologist from Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
and amateur epigrapher, claimed that inscriptions at the site represented markings in Ogham
Ogham
Ogham is an Early Medieval alphabet used primarily to write the Old Irish language, and occasionally the Brythonic language. Ogham is sometimes called the "Celtic Tree Alphabet", based on a High Medieval Bríatharogam tradition ascribing names of trees to the individual letters.There are roughly...
, Phoenician
Phoenician alphabet
The Phoenician alphabet, called by convention the Proto-Canaanite alphabet for inscriptions older than around 1050 BC, was a non-pictographic consonantal alphabet, or abjad. It was used for the writing of Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language, used by the civilization of Phoenicia...
and Iberian scripts
Iberian scripts
The Iberian scripts are the Paleohispanic scripts that were used to represent the extinct Iberian language. Most of them are typologically very unusual in that they are semi-syllabic rather than purely alphabetic...
, which he also called Iberian-Punic.
Artifact
Artifact (archaeology)
An artifact or artefact is "something made or given shape by man, such as a tool or a work of art, esp an object of archaeological interest"...
s found on the site lead archaeologists to the conclusion that the stones were actually assembled for a variety of reasons by local farmer
Farmer
A farmer is a person engaged in agriculture, who raises living organisms for food or raw materials, generally including livestock husbandry and growing crops, such as produce and grain...
s in the 18th and 19th centuries. For example, a much-discussed "sacrificial stone" which contains grooves that some say channeled blood closely resembles "lye-leaching stones" found on many old farms that were used to extract lye
Lye
Lye is a corrosive alkaline substance, commonly sodium hydroxide or historically potassium hydroxide . Previously, lye was among the many different alkalis leached from hardwood ashes...
from wood ashes, the first step in the manufacture of soap
Soap
In chemistry, soap is a salt of a fatty acid.IUPAC. "" Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 2nd ed. . Compiled by A. D. McNaught and A. Wilkinson. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford . XML on-line corrected version: created by M. Nic, J. Jirat, B. Kosata; updates compiled by A. Jenkins. ISBN...
.
Carbon dating of charcoal pits at the site provided dates from 2000 BC to 173 BC, when the area was populated by ancestors of current Native Americans. In archaeological chronology, this places indigenous use of the site into either the Late Archaic or the Early Woodland
Woodland period
The Woodland period of North American pre-Columbian cultures was from roughly 1000 BCE to 1000 CE in the eastern part of North America. The term "Woodland Period" was introduced in the 1930s as a generic header for prehistoric sites falling between the Archaic hunter-gatherers and the...
time periods.
In 1982, David Stewart-Smith, director of restoration at Mystery Hill, conducted an excavation of a megalith found in situ in a stone quarry to the north of the main site. His research team, under the supervision of the New Hampshire state archaeologist, excavated the quarry site, discovering hundreds of chips and flakes from the stone. Both the state archaeologist and Dr. Stewart-Smith concurred that this was evidence of indigenous tool manufacture, consistent with Native American lithic techniques, although no date could be ascertained.
Carbon-14 dates
All dates are uncorrected radio carbon years expressed as Years before Present (BP) with present being defined as the year 1950. A number of them have no clear association with human activity.- 6530 +/- 40 BP Excavation in wall east of north stone by David Stewart-Smith, Patricia Hume & W.E.J. Hinton Jr. in 1995. Lab Report 8923 (PDF)
- 3470 +/- 30 BP Fire pit at North Stone excavated by David Stewart-Smith, Patricia Hume & W.E.J. Hinton Jr. in 1995. Lab Report 8924 (PDF)
- 3475 +/- 210 BP Flecks of charcoal were found lodged between the exterior stones of the north wall of the Collapse Chamber 2 to 4 inches above the bedrock during a 1971 excavation. The charcoal was most likely in backfill disturbed during the construction of the chamber and therefore does not date the chamber. Lab Report GX2310 (PDF)
- 2995 +/- 180 BP James Whittall Jr. excavated several units outside of the north wall of Collapsed Chamber in 1969. At the 24 inch level charcoal was found in association with fire-burnt stone spalls, hammer stone, broken pick, and scraper. Lab Report GX1608 (PDF)
- 2120 +/- 95 BP James Whittall Jr. excavated a unit near the earthen ditch on the summit of the hill near the main complex of structures. Charcoal was found on and in a seam of quarried bedrock. Lab Report GX2029 (PDF)
- 1910 +/- 190 BP Excavation in 1995 by David Stewart-Smith, Patricia Hume & W.E.J. Hinton Jr. in the parking lot for the visitors center uncovered the remains a Native American lodge and multiple hearth features. Charcoal from the different hearths produced three C-14 dates. Lab Report GX20669 (PDF)
- 1640 +/- 135 BP Native American lodge hearth feature (see 1910 BP for details) Lab Report GX20670
- 1195 +/- 75 BP Native American lodge hearth feature (see 1910 BP for details) Lab Report GX20671 (PDF)
- less than 400 BP In 1967 Frank Glynn excavated the lower section of the covered drain which originated in the Sunken Courtyard. Between 1825 and 1849 Jonathan Pattee utilized a portion of the courtyard as a foundation for his house. The C-14 date was from charcoal found in the drain. Glynn argued that the sample came from soil contaminated by Pattee era sediments which intermixed with earlier sediments in the drain. This was one of two C-14 dates from this excavation. Lab Report GX0025
- 260 +/- 90 BP Wood sample from root of a pine stump Lab Report GX1118 (PDF)
- 220 +/- 140 BP charcoal from a fire pit excavated by James Whittall Jr. The lab report cover letter mentions brick making suggesting the location was near the clay pit. It is known that Jonathan Pattee produce his own bricks on site therefore this fire pit may be related to that activity. Lab report GX1651 (PDF)
- 75 +/- 160 BP Excavation by W.E.J. Hinton Jr. (No Information) Lab Report GX15348 (PDF)
- 140 BP See the “Less than 400 BP” entry for details. Lab Report GX-0024.
In popular culture
American horror writer H. P. LovecraftH. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
, an enthusiast for New England megalith
Megalith
A megalith is a large stone that has been used to construct a structure or monument, either alone or together with other stones. Megalithic describes structures made of such large stones, utilizing an interlocking system without the use of mortar or cement.The word 'megalith' comes from the Ancient...
stone sites, is known to have visited Mystery Hill sometime between 1928 and the 1930s. Mystery Hill is popularly attributed as inspiration for Lovecraft's story "The Dunwich Horror
The Dunwich Horror
"The Dunwich Horror" is a short story by H. P. Lovecraft. Written in 1928, it was first published in the April 1929 issue of Weird Tales . It takes place in Dunwich, a fictional town in Massachusetts...
". Scholars, however, place Lovecraft's visit too late to have inspired the 1929 story.
The site was featured on an episode of the American History Channel TV series Secrets of the Ancient World which aired on January 14, 2002, and in which Boston University
Boston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
archaeology professor Curtis Runnels refuted the theory that the site was built by Celts in ancient history.
In Search Of..., a 1970s show narrated by Leonard Nimoy
Leonard Nimoy
Leonard Simon Nimoy is an American actor, film director, poet, musician and photographer. Nimoy's most famous role is that of Spock in the original Star Trek series , multiple films, television and video game sequels....
, did an episode about the site, titled "Strange Visitors". It was referred to as "Mystery Hill".
In the Weird or What?
Weird or What?
Weird or What? is a series on the Discovery Channel and History Television hosted by William Shatner. Each episode contains three separate stories of the bizarre and unexplained. As the show unfolds, it attempts to find logical and scientific answers or reasoning to back up the story...
TV series hosted by William Shatner
William Shatner
William Alan Shatner is a Canadian actor, musician, recording artist, and author. He gained worldwide fame and became a cultural icon for his portrayal of James T...
, the "Human Popsicle" episode covered America's Stonehenge and a variety of explanations as to its origin.
Further reading
- Cahill, Robert Ellis, New England's Ancient Mysteries 1993, Old Saltbox, Danvers, Mass: ISBN 0-9626162-4-9
- Fell, Barry, America B.C. 1989 (2nd edition), Pocket Books: ISBN 0-671-67974-0
- Feldman, Mark, The Mystery Hill Story 1977, Mystery Hill Press
- Gage, Mary, America's Stonehenge Deciphered 2006, Powwow River Books: ISBN 0-9717910-4-X
- Goudsward, David, America's Stonehenge 2003, Branden Books: ISBN 0-8283-2074-8
- Goudsward, David, Ancient Stone Sites of New England 2006, McFarland Publishing:0-7864-2462-1
- Lambert, Joanne, America's Stonehenge 1996, Sunrise Publications: 0-9652630-0-2