Blick Mead: Exploring the 'First Place' in the Stonehenge Landscape

Stonehenge is the most famous prehistoric site in Britain, but there are still many questions about its origins. Who were the people who built it, why was that particular site chosen, and what was its purpose? The Neolithic site of Durrington Walls has been identified as the place where the community lived who conducted the main stage of construction at Stonehenge, but what existed in that area beforehand? The fairly new discovery of Blick Mead, a Mesolithic site only 2 kilometers from Stonehenge (near today’s Amesbury), is helping to provide some answers.

The excavations at Blick Mead started in 2005 and have so far revealed evidence of continuous human habitation from 8,000 BCE to 4,000 BCE (the oldest inhabited Mesolithic site in Britain), and that it was the center of a network of paths from throughout southern Britain. This indicates that the area was significant to the prehistoric inhabitants before Stonehenge was built, and was possibly why the site was chosen.

The book Blick Mead: Exploring the ‘First Place’ in the Stonehenge Landscape, 2018, was compiled by David Jacques, the Director of the Blick Mead Project, and Tom Phillips and Tom Lyons of Oxford Archaeology East. However, each chapter detailing a different aspect of the excavation was written by the relevant specialists on the project.

Even though the excavations are ongoing and a lot of data has not yet been analyzed, this book details the findings so far. It also explains the evolution of the project and how the excavations are being carried out, not only with a team of specialists, but also with a dedicated team of volunteers from the surrounding area.

David Jacques explains in the Preface:

“This book attempts to set out how, why and what Blick Mead has changed. The ways the site was discovered, the challenges it has presented and how some of them were overcome are detailed in Chapter 1 (Landscape History and Project Methodology); Chapter 2 (Fieldwork Results: The Archaeological Narrative) presents the results of the fieldwork; analysis of the site’s setting and its vegetational history is provided in Chapter 3 (Environmental Setting); Chapter 4 presents the evidence for flintworking; Chapters 5 and 6, the evidence for large and small fauna; and the results and the questions they have provoked are pondered in Chapter 7. A series of Appendices provide additional and supplementary data.”

Although I find the information fascinating, this book is not for everyone. The detailed descriptions of the excavation methods and the findings are extremely technical, as are the Figures and Tables throughout the book. Because the findings are not yet complete, there is not much information on what the project has revealed about the people who visited or inhabited Blick Mead over the millennia.

That being said, there were some revelations that are intriguing.

For example, the site is situated near a spring that has some unusual characteristics. Since it never freezes, but has a constant temperature year-round, it must have been extremely valuable. Even more interesting is that a rare algae called Hildenbrandia rivularis grows in the spring and causes stones in the water to turn a bright magenta color when they are removed from the water. This suggests that this feature could have had a magical or spiritual significance to the inhabitants, and is perhaps why the site was originally chosen.

Another feature is the approximately 79 kilograms of unworked burnt stone found during the excavation. The extent of burning indicated extreme heat was used. The specialist who contributed the information in the chapter Lithic Material explains:

“The sheer quantity of the burnt flint and the intensity to which it had been heated argues strongly against it being the incidental product of hearth use or arising from the fire-setting of vegetation; instead it must be concluded that it had been purposefully produced.”

Among the theories of why it was produced, the most accepted view is that this was the waste generated from using stone to heat food, “with the heated stones used either to boil water or to provide direct heat for roasting.” An experiment is described that proves this is possible.

“Food could be boiled by being placed in skin bags and held over heated stone or, alternatively, the food could have been roasted on a bed of hot stone, or buried in pits alongside heated stone, which would have slowly steamed or baked it. The scale of the burning of flint recorded here may argue that large-scale cooking was occurring, perhaps involving many people and the aggregation of the wider community, and this resonates with the large quantities of animal bones recovered.”

An interesting aspect of the excavation that is included in the book is the input from the community volunteers who have been a part of the project from its inception. Each chapter begins with a quote from one of the volunteers describing what the project has meant to them. One of the Afterwords also focuses on these volunteers: Community: The Contribution of Volunteers from Amesbury to the Blick Mead Project. The Amesbury History Centre with the Amesbury Museum and Heritage Trust now organize the team of volunteers for the excavations each year.

I’m looking forward to further findings from this incredible excavation and what they could reveal about the people who inhabited the ‘first place’ in the Stonehenge landscape.

NOTE: This book is also in the category History of the 2024 Nonfiction Reader Challenge, although I have already read a book in that category (see post of 18 January, "Lady Sapiens").