Name _______________________________________
Date ______________
Read the following story and answer the questions on a separate sheet of paper..
You vocabulary words for this section are underlined. You are responsible for understanding the word meanings. I
suggest you make notes in the margins.
You may write on this sheet including marking up the text if you need to. Remember, it may help to read the questions
first.
You may be asked to summarize your reading, so be sure to read and take notes.
MYSTERY MONUMENT
What is there about
Stonehenge that has led
people around the
world to copy it?
To many people, the
world’s greatest mystery
lies in some huge stones near Salisbury, England. These
stones form a n ancient monument called Stonehenge. The
word Stonehenge means “hanging stones.”
Thousands of people from around the world visit Stonehenge
each year. Yet Stonehenge has baffled people for centuries.
Its stones are arranged in a precise pattern. But no one
knows who built the monument or why. Scientists can only
guess at the exact dates when it was built.
At first, people thought theat Druids, and ancient group of
priests, built Stonehenge as a temple. The Druids, however,
did not appear until long after Stonehenge. Other people
thought that Stonehenge marked the grave of the famous
King Arthur.
The Building of Stonehenge
Scientists know that Stonehenge was built in three stages
over a long period of time. The first stage occurred about
4000 years ago. Builders dug a circular ditch more than 300
feet across—which is longer than a football field. Around the
inside of the dich are two more circles, one inside the other.
One of the circles is formed by a bank and the other by 56
pits. An avenue passes through a break in these circles. It
leads to a massive stone 120 feet outside the circles. This 35ton stone, called the heel stone, seems to be very important
in Stonehenge’s design.
The second and third stages of construction stretched over
the next 200 years. At the center of the outer rings, builders
erected a circle of 20 stones. Each stone stands about 15 feet
tall. The builders placed 30 more stones across the tops of
these to form lintels—like door frames. Inside this stone
circle stand five stone structures in a horseshoe design. Each
structure, called a trilithon [try’-lith-on], has three stones,
two standing upright and one lying across them.
When people talk about Stonehenge, they are usually
referring to the stone circle and horseshoe. Here, huge rocks
appear to “hang” over other rocks.
The stones forming Stonehenge are huge. Some are 30 feet
long and weigh 50 tons apiece. Most came from rock
quarries [kwor’-eez] 20 miles away. But some stones in
earlier building stages came from mountains as far as 240
miles away.
The Mysteries of Stonehenge
Many mysteries surround Stonehenge. No one knows how
the builders, with only simple tools, built such a great
monument. They had to move giant stones, smooth their
surfaces, and then lift them. To pull a single stone upright
required about 200 workers. Also, somehow the builders had
to determine the exact positions of the stones.
Scientists try to answer these questions: How was
Stonehenge built? Who built it? And why?
They can only guess what the monument’s purpose was.
They feel quire sure, however, that it had something to do
with astronomy. Stonehenge seems to be a giant sun
calendar. On June 21, the longest day of the year, a person
can see one way that the calendar works. June 21, called the
summer solstice [sol’-stis], is the day the sun is at its most
distant point from the equator. On this day, when the sun
rises over the heel stone, the shadow it casts goes directly
through the center of the monument. Other stones also
seem to be placed in a way that relates to the rising and
setting of the sun and moon.
Copies of Stonehenge
Some people today are so interested in Stonehenge that they
try to imitate it. Many copies exist around the world. There
are even several new Stonehenges in the United States.
A full-sized copy made of concrete stands on the banks of the
Columbia River in Maryhill, Washington. Sam Hill, a
successful road builder and businessman, wanted to honor 13
local servicemen who had died in World War I. Over an 11year period, workers pored 1650 tons of concrete to make
Stonehenge I. They even put crumpled tin into the frames
when concrete was poured for pillars. The result was a
surface that looked much like that of the original Stonehenge.
An architect named Doug Hill built Stonehenge II in Hunt,
Texas. With money and land from rancher Al Sheppard, he
made this copy smaller than the original in England.
Unfortunately, fire ants have invaded the area. So people are
advised to visit the monument during the day to avoid
stepping on ant hills.
Another copy of Stonehenge sits on the campus of the
University of Missouri at Rolla. This monument is made of
granite [gran’-it] and, like the original, serves an accurate
calendar based on astronomy.
3.
4.
Spelling word alert
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Funhenges
Then there are Funhenges.
6.
7.
Take a bunch of beat-up old cars. Stick them in the ground,
rear ends up. Lay other beat-up cars across the top. Paint
them all gray. And what do you have—Carhenge!
In 1987, six families got together to build this so called
monument in Alliance, Nebraska. All were related to Jim
Reindeers, an engineer who had visited the Cadillac Ranch in
Texas. There, between 1949 and 1963, a man studk 10 of his
Cadillacs into the ground, back fins reaching for the sky.
Meanwhile, a sculptor named Bill Tishman built a copy of the
Nebraska Carhenge in Ontario, Canada. The cars in Tishman’s
“monument”, however, are partially crushed. As a result,
they are closer in size to the stones of the original
Stonehenge.
The strangest “henge” of all appeared—and disappeared—in
1994. On a farm near Gordonton, New Zealand, 41 old
refrigerators were used to build a fridgehenge. This henge
was built to mark the solstice on December 22. The builders
mowed a strip of grass pointing toward the sunrise and used
a refrigerator as the heel stone. Before removing the
monument, its builders held a huge party, using the
refrigerators as musical instruments.
Questions
1.
2.
What does Stonehenge mean?
Where is the real Stonehenge?
What is the “heel stone”?
Name two things besides stones that people have
used to build henges.
8.
Find the sentence that uses either –er or –est to
make comparative forms of:
a. Great
b. Early
c. Small
d. Close.
Write another comparative form of each word.
Find the sentences that use the following plurals:
a. Centuries
b. Quarries
c. Families.
Write a singular form of each word.
Find the sentences that use the following words:
a. Copy
b. Mystery
c. Party
Write the plural form of each word.
Each of the following words is part of a compound
word in the selection:
a. Ball
b. Beat
c. Full
d. Service
e. Shoe
f. Sun
Find and write the compound words.