Overview

• Multidisciplinary analysis led by Richard Bevins used thorium, zirconium and petrographic data to link the Newall Boulder directly to rhyolite at Craig Rhos-y-Felin in north Pembrokeshire.
• Field surveys across Salisbury Plain found no glacial erratics or deposits, refuting the ice-transport hypothesis for Stonehenge’s bluestones.
• Surface wear previously attributed to glacial abrasion has been reinterpreted as the result of natural weathering and burial processes.
• The study settles a century-old debate by confirming that Neolithic communities intentionally quarried and carried bluestones over 200 kilometers to the monument.
• Researchers suggest that ropes, wooden sledges and trackways enabled the transportation of multi-ton stones, reflecting sophisticated Neolithic engineering.