Whetstones (stone circle)

While the transition from the Early Neolithic to the Late Neolithic in the fourth and third millennia BCE saw much economic and technological continuity, there was a considerable change in the style of monuments erected, particularly in what is now southern and eastern England.^[2] By 3000 BCE, the long barrows, causewayed enclosures, and cursuses which had predominated in the Early Neolithic were no longer built, and had been replaced by circular monuments of various kinds.^[2] These include earthen henges, timber circles, and stone circles.^[3] Stone circles are found in most areas of Britain where stone is available, with the exception of the island's south-eastern corner.^[4] They are most densely concentrated in south-western Britain and on the north-eastern horn of Scotland, near Aberdeen.^[4] The tradition of their construction may have lasted for 2,400 years, from 3300 to 900 BCE, with the major phase of building taking place between 3000 and 1,300 BCE.^[5]

These stone circles typically show very little evidence of human visitation during the period immediately following their creation.^[6] This suggests that they were not sites used for rituals that left archaeologically visible evidence, but may have been deliberately left as "silent and empty monuments".^[7] The archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson suggests that in Neolithic Britain, stone was associated with the dead, and wood with the living.^[8] Other archaeologists have suggested that the stone might not represent ancestors, but rather other supernatural entities, such as deities.^[7]

These Whestones were among five probable stone circles that are historically recorded as being within two miles of each other, largely in Shropshire but also stretching in neighbouring Powys.^[9] Alongside the Whetstones are the Hoarstones and Mitchell's Fold, both of which still survive and which are comparatively large. A fourth stone circle, the Druid's Castle, as well as a fifth possible example, at Shelve, were smaller.^[9] Given the differences in size, the archaeologist Aubrey Burl suggested that the Druid's Castle was erected at a different time to the larger three rings.^[10]

Burl estimated that Whetstones circle had had a major axis of 30 metres, in which case it would have been a large stone circle.^[11] Three stones were reported as being extant in 1841, the largest being 1.2 metres long.^[11] No information on the shape of the circle survives.^[11]