Sample: W243-11, context 9585, submitted by M Allen on 16 May 1994
Material: charcoal, Pinus sp. (R Gale)
Initial comment: from the secondary fill of postpit 9580 in the car park, just beneath the monolith tin sample (C99, context 5). This sample relates to boreal woodland pollen at c 40 cm.
Objectives: this sample may be contemporary with the large pieces of charcoal from the lower fills (see below) which were also identified as pine, or may be significantly later.
Calibrated date range: 7700-7420 cal BC (95% confidence)
Archaeological comment (M Allen): the determination confirms that this sample is pine from the boreal period forest.
OxA-4920 8400+/-100BP (-25.1 per mil)
Sample: W243-14, context 9582, submitted by M Allen on 16 May 1994
Material: charcoal, Pinus sp. (R Gale)
Initial comment: from the tertiary fill of postpit 9580 pit in the car park, at c 30cm in the monolith tin sample (C99, context 5).
Objectives: this sample may date the occurence of cereal pollen in the sequence, or it may be residual and relate to the date of the lower fills (see below).
Calibrated date range: 7580-7090 cal BC (95% confidence)
Archaeological comment (M Allen): this result is much too early for it to be related to the cereal pollen, it must be residual charcoal from the boreal period forest and so relates to OxA-4919 above.
Quality assurance measurements are available for these samples, in addition to details of the chemistry and measurement techniques.
GU-5109 8880+/-120BP (-24.5 per mil)
Sample: W243-008, context 9585, submitted by M Allen on 25 January 1991
Material: charcoal, Pinus sp.
Initial comment: from the base of the secondary fill of postpit 9580 in the car park, at c 70cm (C99).
Objectives: the date would enable the environmental sequence and pit to be placed within the broader sequence of the Stonehenge environs.
Calibrated date range: 8090-7580 cal BC (95% confidence)
Archaeological comment (M Allen): this result confirms that the feature is Mesolithic and can be included as a group with three postholes excavated in 1966.
Quality assurance measurements are also available which relate to this sample.
HAR-455 9130+/-180BP (-24.2 per mil)
Sample: CHAR1, submitted by H Keeley in 1966
Material: charcoal, Pinus sp. (S Limbrey)
Initial comment: from postpit A (depth 0.76m), half way between the top (natural chalk) and the base, at the edge of the hole (C82).
Calibrated date range: 8820-7730 cal BC (95% confidence)
Archaeological comment (M Allen):
References: Vatcher and Vatcher 1973; Pitts 1982
HAR-456 8090+/-140BP (-25.4 per mil)
Sample: CHAR2, submitted by H Keeley in 1966
Material: charcoal, Pinus sp. (S Limbrey)
Initial comment: from postpit B (depth 0.19m)(C82).
Calibrated date range: 7480-6590 cal BC (95% confidence)
Archaeological comment (M Allen):
References: Vatcher and Vatcher 1973; Pitts 1982
Archaeological comment on HAR-455 and HAR-456 (F Vatcher): in the excavator's opinion the charcoal samples, although pertaining to the original posts, were of poor quality, being fine and mixed with other material. This may, perhaps, account for the unexpectedly early dates and the radiocarbon dating difference of approximately one millennium for postholes which had every indication of being contemporary with each other.
Comment on series (M Allen): all of these determinations fall into the eighth or late ninth-millennium BC. They cover a period of about one millennium and so it cannot be established whether these features, containing upright pine posts, were exactly contemporary and ever all stood together, but they are certainly Mesolithic and not related to the main Monument.
Mesolithic Activity