Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a megalithic monument located in southern England. The word comes from the Anglo-Saxon stone, meaning 'stone', and henge, meaning 'hinge', because the distinctive upright pylons with their crosspieces were thought to resemble a door or gate. The tallest of these, known as the 'sarsen', is nearly 100 feet high.
Stonehenge was constucted between 3000 and 1600 BC.[1]
Stonehenge is aligned to the sunrise at the summer solstice, or longest day of the year, around June 21. On that day the sun shines through the sarsen stone and hits something called the heel stone which lights up like a mirror, as it is made of polished quartz.
In World War I the British government decided to demolish Stonehenge in order to make room for a longer runway for the nearby airforce base. After a great deal of public protest, it was instead decided to divert the runway. Stonehenge currently receives over a million visitors a week during the summer season, and some of the stones are already showing signs of imminent collapse due to wear and tear. Furthermore, the Druids insist on holding there ceremonies there as they have done for thousands of years. When the government tried to stop them in the mid 1980s, the Druids took them to court and won.
