thereby identifying the probable origin of the stones. During 2017 and 2018, excavations by Professor Pearson's team at Waun Mawn, a large stone circle site in the Preseli Hills, suggested that the site had originally housed a diameter stone circle of the same size as Stonehenge's original bluestone circle, also orientated towards the midsummer solstice. The circle at Waun Mawn also contained a hole from one stone which had a distinctive pentagonal shape, very closely matching the one pentagonal stone at Stonehenge (stonehole 91 at Waun Mawn / stone 62 at Stonehenge). Soil dating of the sediments within the revealed stone holes, via optically stimulated luminescence (OSL), suggested the absent stones at Waun Mawn had been erected around 3400–3200 BC, and removed around 300–400 years later, a date consistent with theories that the same stones were moved and used at Stonehenge, before later being reorganised into their present locations and supplemented with local sarsens as was already understood. Human activity at Waun Mawn ceased around the same time which has suggested that some people may have migrated to Stonehenge. It has also been suggested that stones from other sources may have been added to Stonehenge, perhaps from other dismantled circles in the region. Further work in 2021 by Pearson's team concluded that the Waun Mawn circle had never been completed, and of the stones which might once have stood at the site, no more than 13 had been removed in antiquity. In popular culture See also Historical context Other monuments in the Stonehenge ritual landscape About Stonehenge and replicas of Stonehenge Fiction Stonehenge, novel Similar sites Carhenge - replica of Stonehenge near the city of Alliance, Nebraska Goloring - ancient earthworks near Koblenz, Germany - Calendar circle built circa 4900 BC in Germany Nabta Playa - Calendar circle built circa 5000 BC in Egypt Sites with similar sunrise or sunset alignments Museums with collections from the World Heritage Site Footnotes References Bibliography Atkinson, R.J.C., Stonehenge (Penguin Books, 1956) Bender, B, Stonehenge: Making Space (Berg Publishers, 1998) Burl, A., Great Stone Circles (Yale University Press, 1999) Aubrey Burl, Prehistoric Stone Circles (Shire, 2001) (In Burl's Stonehenge (Constable, 2006), he notes, cf. the meaning of the name in paragraph two above, that "the Saxons called the ring 'the hanging stones', as though they were gibbets.") Chippindale, C, Stonehenge Complete (Thames and Hudson, London, 2004) Chippindale, C, et al., Who owns Stonehenge? (B