THE discovery of a second henge at Stonehenge has led to claims that the site may have been a showroom for henges.
The new henge was discovered 900m from the world famous original and carried a price tag of 460 cowpats.
Professor Henry Brubaker, of the Institute for Studies, said: “I’d imagine in future years we’ll discover at least a dozen more henges in the area, all with their own pricetags and perhaps even payment plans.
“What’s not clear is whether these henges were display models, like a fitted kitchen at Homebase, or whether the customer actually took the henge away with them, like it was a car or a new sofa.
“If they did then we should be able to find a series of very deep tracks caused by 40 ton lumps of stone being dragged towards some of the early middle-class hut developments near Warminster.”
He added: “I’d imagine the customers would have been offered a cup of diluted goat’s urine or some fresh mud and then shown around the henges as the salesman demonstrated various features such as its ability to stay up and how good it was at casting shadows in a mystical way.”
Tom Logan, professor of ancient consumer history at Reading University, said: “The documentary evidence tells of travelling merchants who would knock on your door just when you were having your dinner and tell you that they were in the area and that your hut had been one of only three that’s being offered a top-of-the-range show-henge ‘for the new brochure’.
“You’d then sign up for what was supposed to be a free henge, but before you know it you’d be hit with a bill for at least 300 cowpats, possibly more if your henge had one of those bits that sat on top of the other bits.”
He added: “It’s a fascinating insight and it shows that our ancestors were just as good as we are at spending borrowed cowpats on shit they didn’t need.”
