Monday, April 09, 2007

Stonehenge Amulets?

Discovery Channel News has an interesting piece on some items that have been dubbed 'stonehenge amulets'

Stonehenge Amulets Worn by Elite April 6, 2007 Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News
Supernatural Stone? Photo from article (credit: National Museums Scotland)

Forget dressing for success: Clothing ornaments thought to confer supernatural power were all the rage among chiefs and other important people in England 4,000 years ago, say scholars. A recent find indicates some of these fashion trends might have originally been designed by Stonehenge leaders. While working two months ago in South Lowestoft, Suffolk, British archaeologist Clare Good excavated a four-sided object made of the mineral jet. It closely matches a geometrically designed gold object found far away at a burial site called Bush Barrow near Stonehenge in Wiltshire.

The match is so close that experts believe the black artifact is a skeuomorph, or a copy in a different material.

...

Editor Mike Pitts describes the jet object as having "two parallel lines around the edge, supporting 12 pendant semi-circles inside with a double circle and dot in the center. Small floating lines of rocker decoration, some on the side facets, complete the design."

[ Full Story ]

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