The 4,000 year old timber circle on the Norfolk coast, was built during a period of extreme cold as part of rituals intended to end harsh winters and bring back summer.
New research suggests that Seahenge, the mysterious timber circle uncovered on a Norfolk beach, was built as part of ancient rituals to fight off a period of severe cold weather.
Dr David Nance of the University of Aberdeen has published his findings in the journal GeoJournal, focusing on Holme I, commonly known as Seahenge, and a neighbouring site called Holme II. Both were built around 2049 BC and were revealed on Holme-next-the-Sea beach in 1998 after centuries of shifting sand.
Seahenge is made up of an upturned tree stump surrounded by 55 tightly packed oak posts. It was originally built on a saltmarsh, sheltered from the sea by dunes and mud flats, and was later preserved beneath a layer of peat.
Earlier theories suggested the site marked a death or was used for “sky burials”, where bodies were left for birds to consume. Dr Nance instead argues that the timbers were felled in spring and aligned with sunrise on the summer solstice, at a time when Britain was suffering from falling temperatures and severe winters.
He believes Seahenge was designed to copy a folk tale about trapping an unfledged cuckoo, a bird linked to fertility, in order to stop it flying away and taking summer with it.