Q 01/05

Stonehenge stands on Salisbury Plain in which English county?

A) Somerset

B) Dorset

C) Hampshire

D) Wiltshire

Answer · why

D) Wiltshire

Wiltshire's chalk downs around the stones hold one of the greatest clusters of Bronze Age burial mounds in Britain, many of them placed on ridges with...

Q 02/05

What is the name for the large sandstone blocks that form Stonehenge's outer ring and trilithons?

A) Bluestones

B) Menhirs

C) Sarsens

D) Dolerites

Answer · why

C) Sarsens

Sarsens are silcrete, the broken remains of a hard sandstone crust that once capped much of southern England; boulders of it still lie scattered over ...

Q 03/05

What joinery technique, borrowed from woodworking, holds Stonehenge's lintels onto the uprights?

A) Dovetail joints

B) Iron dowel pins

C) Mortise and tenon

D) Halved lap joints

Answer · why

C) Mortise and tenon

Mortise and tenon joints pin each lintel to its uprights, and tongue-and-groove joints lock the lintels end to end; no other prehistoric monument is k...

Q 04/05

What is a trilithon?

A) Two uprights topped by a single lintel

B) Three stones set in a triangle

C) A stone carved with three axes

D) A three-tiered burial mound

Answer · why

A) Two uprights topped by a single lintel

Two uprights topped by a single lintel; Stonehenge had five, set in a horseshoe, and three stand complete today, one only because it was put back up i...

Q 05/05

Stonehenge is aligned to the sunrise on which day of the year?

A) The summer solstice

B) The spring equinox

C) The autumn equinox

D) The first of May

Answer · why

A) The summer solstice

The summer solstice sunrise lines up with the main axis, but the same line run backwards marks the midwinter sunset, which many archaeologists now thi...