Homework: Absolutism: ENGLAND Part 1 Textbook Global History I H

H009 - 001 ABSOLUTISM: England – Part 1 textbook10/15/2018

Name: ______Thu. 2.26.15

Homework: Absolutism: ENGLAND – Part 1 TEXTbook Global History I H

CLASSWORK & HOMEWORK “NOT to be collected by the Substitute”
… Folks … “Please” hold on to this. “Please” bring it to class with you on Mon. 3.2.15 … so “we” can go over it.
… … “Appreciate your help & cooperation” … especially today with the Substitute for the Substitute …
V/R Mr. Joyce 1LT / USAFR

INSTRUCTIONS:
1. You need THIS handout + a TEXTbook.
… Due to the lack of textbooks in our Room (267) … two (2) students can work TOGETHER …
… Just “please” keep the noise level down a bit … so the substitute doesn’t have to go looking for earplugs.

As we start our discussion of British Monarchy, we go way back in time. The Ice Age, during which Neandertals and then Cro-Magnons inhabited Great Britain, ended about 8000 BCE. The rising sea level produced the English Channel and made Great Britain an island. In the new environment of forest and swamp the Middle Stone Age came and passed, followed by the New Stone Age, during which the practice of agriculture was begun. This period brought a stream of new people to Britain. By 3000 BC the Iberians, or Long Skulls, were farming the chalk soil of southern England, and by 2500 BC the pastoral Beaker folk had established themselves. The latter, named for their characteristic pottery, are noted for their bronze tools and their huge stone monuments, especially Stonehenge. These monuments attest to their social and economic organization as well as their technical skill and intellectual ability.

Stonehenge is a prehistoricmonument located in the England. One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is composed of earthworks surrounding a circular setting of large standing stones and sits at the centre of the densest complex of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred burial mounds. Archaeologists had believed that the iconic stone monument was erected around 2500 BC, as described in the chronology below. However one recent theory has suggested that the first stones were not erected until 2400-2200 BC, whilst another suggests that bluestones may have been erected at the site as early as 3000 BC. The surrounding circular earth bank and ditch, which constitute the earliest phase of the monument, have been dated to about 3100 BC.

New archaeological evidence found by the Stonehenge Riverside Project indicates that Stonehenge served as a burial ground from its earliest beginnings. The dating of cremated remains found on the site shows that burials took place there as early as 3000 BC, when the initial ditch and bank were first dug. Burials continued at Stonehenge for at least another 500 years.

Stonehenge was a place of burial from its beginning to its zenith in the mid third millennium B.C. The cremation burial dating to Stonehenge's sarsen stones phase is likely just one of many from this later period of the monument's use and demonstrates that it was still very much a domain of the dead.

— Mike Parker Pearson

Stonehenge itself evolved in several construction phases spanning at least 1500 years. There is, however, evidence of large scale construction on and around the monument that perhaps extends the landscape's time frame to 6500 years.

It is widely assumed that Stonehenge once stood as a magnificent "complete" monument, although this cannot be proved as around half of the stones that should be present are missing, and many of the assumed stone sockets have never been found. Dating and understanding the various phases of activity is complicated by disturbance of the natural chalk and animal burrowing, poor quality early excavation records, and a lack of accurate, scientifically verified dates.

Stonehenge was produced by a culture that left no written records. Many aspects of Stonehenge remain subject to debate. This multiplicity of theories, some of them very colorful, is often called the "mystery of Stonehenge".

There is little or no direct evidence for the construction techniques used by the Stonehenge builders. Over the years, various authors have suggested that supernatural or anachronistic methods were used, usually asserting that the stones were impossible to move otherwise. However, conventional techniques using Neolithic technology have been demonstrably effective at moving and placing stones of a similar size. Proposed functions for the site include usage as an astronomical observatory, or as a religious site. Other theories have advanced supernatural or symbolic explanations for the construction.

More recently two major new theories have been proposed. Professor Mike Parker Pearson, head of the Stonehenge Riverside Project, has suggested that Stonehenge was part of a ritual landscape and was joined to Durrington Walls by their corresponding avenues and the River Avon. He suggests that the area around Durrington Walls Henge was a place of the living, whilst Stonehenge was a domain of the dead. A journey along the Avon to reach Stonehenge was part of a ritual passage from life to death, to celebrate past ancestors and the recently deceased. On the other hand, Geoffery Wainwright, president of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and Timothy Darvill of Bournemouth University have suggested that Stonehenge was a place of healing – the primeval equivalent of Lourdes. They argue that this accounts for the high number of burials in the area and for the evidence of trauma deformity in some of the graves. However they do concede that the site was probably multifunctional and used for ancestor worship as well

Facts About Stonehenge

• Stonehenge was built between 3100 – 1100 BCE.
• The circle was aligned with the midsummer sunrise, the midwinter sunset, and the most southerly rising and northerly setting of the moon.
• The ground plan and structural engineering of Stonehenge incorporate sophisticated mathematical and geometrical understandings on the part of its builders.
• There were two types of stones used in its construction: the ‘bluestones’ (weighing as much as four tons and brought from 240 miles away) and the Sarsen stones (averaging eighteen feet in height and twenty-five tons in weight).
• It has been estimated that the construction of Stonehenge required more than thirty million hours of labor.
• More than nine hundred stone rings exist in the British Isles. Of these, Stonehenge is the most well known.
• The megalithic monuments of Britain and Europe predate those of the eastern Mediterranean, Egyptian, Mycenaean and Greek cultures.
• The Druids had nothing to do with the construction of the stone rings. Druids are known to have conducted their ritual activities mostly in sacred forest groves.

Stonehenge Purposes

• Prior to the 1950’s most archaeologists believed that Stonehenge’s use had been limited to the ritual activities of different Neolithic chiefdoms. However, it is now known that Stonehenge had another equally important function, which was its use as an astronomical observatory.
• In the 1950s and 1960s, the Oxford University engineer Professor Alexander Thom and the astronomer Gerald Hawkins pioneered the new field of archaeoastronomy - the study of the astronomies of ancient civilizations. Conducting surveys at Stonehenge and other megalithic structures, Thom and Hawkins discovered many significant astronomical alignments among the stones. This evidence indicates that Stonehenge and other stone rings were used as astronomical observatories.
• Stonehenge was simultaneously used for both astronomical observation and ritual function. By gathering data regarding the movement of celestial bodies, the Stonehenge observations were used to indicate appropriate periods in the annual ritual cycle. During those periods, among them being the solstices, equinoxes and different lunar days, festivals and ceremonies were held.

Stonehenge Legends

• Myths and legends of Stonehenge shed light on the nature of the activities and ceremonies performed at the festivals. For example, the legendary Merlin tells King Aurelius:
  Laugh not so lightly, King, for not lightly are these words spoken. For in these stones is a mystery, and a healing virtue against many ailments. Giants of old did carry them from the furthest ends of Africa and did set them up in Ireland what time they did inhabit therein. And unto this end they did it, that they might make them baths therein whensoever they ailed of any malady, for they did wash the stones and pour forth the water into the baths, whereby they that were sick were made whole. Moreover they did mix confections of herbs with the water, whereby they that were wounded had healing, for not a stone is there that lacketh in virtue of leechcraft.
• And Layamon, a 13th century British poet, also speaks of the healing quality of Stonehenge.
  The stones are great
  And magic power they have
  Men that are sick
  Fare to that stone
  And they wash that stone
  And with that water bathe away their sickness

Christianity came from two directions—Rome and Ireland. In 596 Pope Gregory I sent a group of missionaries under a monk named Augustine to England, where King Ethelbert had married Bertha, a Christian Frankish princess. Soon after, Ethelbert was baptized and thus became a Christian.

In another part of England the Christianity from Rome met Celtic Christianity, which had been brought from Ireland to Scotland by Saint Columba and then to Northumbria, England by Saint Aidan, who founded the monastery of Lindisfarne in 635. In 664, Northumbria's King Oswy chose to go with Rome, giving England a common religion and a vivid example of unification.

QUESTIONS based on the aforementioned text:
1. Physically speaking … what is England?

2. When wasEngland first inhabited?

3. How far back in time does Stonehenge go?

4. What is “Stonehenge”?

5. State two (2) problems with trying to understanding the meaning of Stonehenge?

6. What do people think Stonehenge was used for?

7. What do you call some of the people involved in answering these questions?

8. What has helped to “glamorize” Stonehenge ? … make it a bit more “colorful”?

INSTRUCTIONS: pages 308 - 309 .. Ch. 9 - Section 2 "Invaders "

1. What was another name for “the Vikings”?

2. Where did the Vikings come from?

3. State three (3) things the Vikings did.

4. “Why” did the Vikings do what they did? What was their own land like? What was the climate like?

5. State one (1) thing the Vikings were known for.

6. State two/three (2/3) places the Vikings traveled to/explored.

7. What religion/belief system did the Vikings convert to?

INSTRUCTIONS: pages316 - 318 .. Ch. 9 - Section 3 "The Growth of European Kingdoms "

1. “Physically” speaking … what is England?

2. Who invaded England in the 5th century?

3. When was England “united”? …. What was England like “before” this? What historical era was “that” part of?

4. Who was “Norman the Conqueror”? State three (3) things he did/accomplished.

5. What was “the Battle of Hastings of 1066”?

6. State two (2) accomplishments of King Henry II of England.

7. What is “common law”?

8. Describe the struggle between the English monarch and the Christian Church in England in 12th century.

9. What term best describes the English monarchy in the 12th century?

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