Archaeologists Find 3000 B.C. Wooden Post Pits Near Stonehenge

Archaeologists uncovered two large pits that once held wooden posts in the village of Bulford, three miles east of Stonehenge in southern England. The posts aligned with the rising sun at the summer solstice and the setting sun at the winter solstice. , roughly 500 years before Stonehenge’s stones were erected.

Wessex Archaeology led the excavation between 2015 and 2017. Phil Harding, who directed the dig, said the structure shows communities tracked celestial events centuries earlier than previously documented at the famous monument. “But what we’ve discovered at Bulford is 500 years earlier than the famous stones we know so well,” Harding stated.

Researchers recovered pottery, flint tools, animal bones, and a rare disc-shaped flint knife at the site. These artifacts indicate the location served as a gathering place for ceremonies tied to the solar calendar. Harding described the team as “ecstatic, but cautious” while confirming their interpretations.

Jennifer Wexler, curator of history at English Heritage, said the find illustrates early farmers’ reliance on solar cycles for agriculture. “The ancient people had quite a sophisticated knowledge about the sky, and the movements of the moon and the sun,” she said. She added that celebrations linked to the solstices likely carried deep symbolic meaning.

Stonehenge was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986. K. summer solstice in 2026 falls on Sunday, June 21, when thousands are expected to gather at the monument. Harding noted that people were marking the same celestial events at Bulford long before the large stones were raised.