Neolithic age1

We can trace the art of building from this age.The still existing examples of this neolithic style are:The stonehenge at Salisbury,England and The Temple at Tarxien,Malta.Neolithic or "stone age" architecture includes some of the oldest known structures made by humankind. Neolithic cultures are distinguished from earlier Paleolithic and Mesolithic structures by the domestication of plants and animals, and extensive making and use of stone tools.

Neolithic cultures have been shown to have existed in southwest Asia as early as 8000 b.c. to 6000 b.c., and Neolithic cultures had existed around the globe by 1500 b.c. By 3500 b.c., Neolithic cultures in the Tigris and Euphrates river valleys in the Middle East had developed into Bronze Age urban civilization. The stone henge is of the neo-lithic monumental style.It was used as a temple or an observatory.
Current archaeological research shows that this site was constructed and modified on various phases, spanning several centuries:
* Pre-Stonehenge (9th-8th millennium BC): at least 4 mesolithic pits which originally contained big pine posts, in a line about 200m from the present henge site
* Stonehenge 1 (from 3100 BC): construction of the circular bank, the ditch, and the 56 Aubrey Holes which probably originally contained timber posts
* Stonehenge 2 (from 2550 BC): pottery, animal bones, and cremated human remains placed in ditch; cremations deposited in some of the partially filled Aubrey Holes; complex of posts in interior and in entrance causeway
* Stonehenge 3 (from 2100 BC): sequence of stone-related structures. A close dating is not possible, but the sequence was probably as follows:
1. Bluestones from Wales erected in q and r holes and then dismantled
2. Sarsen circle and trilithons erected, possibly also a bluestone setting which may have included trilithons, this latter then dismantled
3. Bluestone circle and oval setting
4. Arc of bluestones removed from oval to leave present horseshoe setting
5. Y and Z holes dug, probably for stones which were never erected; during this phase the avenue was also constructed.
Early mention of Stonehenge was made in 1135 by chronicler Geoffrey of Monmouth, who claimed that it was brought by a tribe of giants from Africa to Ireland, and from there flown by the wizard Merlin across the sea. Another legend claims that the stones were stolen from an Irish woman by the Devil, and re-erected on Salisbury Plain by Merlin for Ambrosius Aurelianus, the King of Britons.
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