Stonehenge Archer

The Stonehenge Archer is the name given to a Bronze Age man whose body was discovered in the outer ditch of Stonehenge. Unlike most burials in the Stonehenge Landscape, his body was not in a barrow, although it did appear to have been deliberately and carefully buried in the ditch.

Examination of the skeleton indicated that the man was local to the area and aged about 30 when he died. Radiocarbon dating suggests that he died around 2300BC, making his death roughly contemporary with the Amesbury Archer and the Boscombe Bowmen buried 3 miles away in Amesbury.

He came to be known as an archer because of the stone wrist-guard and a number of flint arrowheads buried with him. In fact, several of the arrowheads' tips were located in the skeleton's bones, suggesting that the man had been killed by them. [cite book
last = Richards
first = Julian C.
authorlink = Julian Richards
coauthors =
title = Stonehenge: The story so far
publisher = English Heritage
date = 2007
location = Swindon
pages =
url =
doi =
id =
isbn = 9781905624003]

His body was excavated in 1978 by Richard Atkinson and John G. Evans who had been re-examining an older trench in the ditch and bank of Stonehenge. His remains are now housed in the Salisbury and South Wiltshire museum in Salisbury.

References

Bibliography

* Chippendale, C, "Stonehenge Complete" (Thames and Hudson, London, 2004) ISBN 0500284679
* English Heritage Guidebooks: "Stonehenge" (English Heritage 2005) ISBN 1850749337

External links

* [http://www.salisburymuseum.org.uk/galleries/index.php?Action=4&obID=32&prevID=34&oprevID=15 Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum page on the archer]
* [http://www.britannica.com/eb/art-84316/The-only-complete-set-of-human-remains-everfound-at-Stonehenge Encyclopaedia Britannica short video documentary (takes a short time to load)]
* [http://www.eternalidol.com/?p=407 Details and a theory about the Stonehenge Archer]