Tag Archives: scotland

The Massive Meteorite Impacted Northwest Scotland 990 Million Years Ago.

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Recent research by Curtin University reveals that an ancient influence, previously believed to have occurred 1.2 billion years ago, actually took place 990 million years ago, leading to the formation of the STAC FADA member. This discovery corrects the dating of some of the UK’s oldest non-marine microfossils and their significance in the timeline of eukaryotic colonization on land.

STAC FADA member. Image credit: Tony Prave.

“We utilized small zircon crystals as geological ‘time capsules’ to accurately date the impact at 990 million years ago,” stated Professor Chris Kirkland from Curtin University.

“These tiny crystals recorded precise moments of impact, some transforming into the rare mineral Reidite, which forms under extreme pressure.”

“This provided irrefutable evidence that the meteorite strike initiated the STAC FADA deposit.”

“When a meteorite strikes, it partially resets the atomic clocks within the zircon crystal. Although these ‘broken clocks’ can’t generate dates, they developed a model to reconstruct timing, affirming the impact’s occurrence 990 million years ago.”

The impact events coincided with the earliest emergence of freshwater eukaryotes, the ancient precursors to plants, animals, and fungi.

“The new date indicates that these life forms in Scotland appeared roughly at the same time as the meteorite impact,” Professor Kirkland remarked.

“This presents intriguing questions about whether significant impacts could have affected environmental conditions, potentially influencing early ecosystems.”

“The impact crater has yet to be located, but this study has gathered additional clues that may eventually uncover its position.

“Understanding the timeline of meteorite impacts will enable us to explore their potential effects on Earth’s environment and the diversification of life beyond the oceans.”

The team’s findings will be published in the journal Geological.

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CL Kirkland et al. The impact of Scottish meteors 100 million years ago. Geological Published online on April 28, 2025. doi: 10.1130/g53121.1

Source: www.sci.news

A Small Herbivorous Dinosaur Unearthed in Scotland

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Lead by a team of paleontologists from the National Museum of Scotland, this specimen is recognized as the first and most complete dinosaur skeleton discovered in Scotland to date.

The artist’s impression of Ornishkia’s dinosaurs. Image credit: Peter Trusler.

The newly identified specimen originates from the mid-Jurassic period, approximately 166 million years ago.

“Dinosaurs from the Triassic and Early Jurassic were typically small, bipedal, and carnivorous or omnivorous. However, by the late Jurassic, a remarkable diversification occurred, leading to the emergence of some of the largest terrestrial vertebrates to ever walk the Earth,” stated Dr. Elsa Pansilolli, a paleontologist and her colleagues at the National Museum of Scotland.

“This significant diversification in dinosaur species appears to have primarily occurred during the mid-Jurassic period, positioning these dinosaurs as key elements for understanding the drivers behind this rapid evolution.”

“Unfortunately, central Jurassic dinosaur fossils are exceedingly rare and underrepresented globally,” they added.

“Consequently, the early evolutionary history and major diversification of many dinosaur groups remain largely unknown.”

“Thus, new dinosaur findings from the central Jurassic are critical for unwinding the development of ecosystems dominated by dinosaurs.”

A 166 million-year-old skeleton of Ornithikian dinosaurs from the Kilmalag Formation on the Isle of Skye. Image credit: Pansilolli et al., doi: 10.1017/s1755691024000148.

Partial dinosaur skeletons were initially discovered in 1973, but the collection was only completed in 2018.

“The specimen comprises numerous bones and fragments that seem to originate from a single bedding plane within an area measuring approximately 60 cm x 40 cm,” remarked the paleontologist.

The skeleton was uncovered in the Kilmalag Formation, located north of the village of Ergol on the Isle of Skye.

This representation includes Scotland’s most comprehensive fossils, with its initial discovery preceding the earliest reported dinosaur fossils from Skye.

“The central Jurassic in Scotland is becoming more representative of fossil finds from the Kilmalag Formation, increasing its global significance in understanding this period of tetrapod evolution,” the researchers indicated.

“Despite being fragmented, it remains the most intact dinosaur specimen known from Scotland, including partial ilium, nerve arches, rib parts, and other key elements.”

The dinosaurs from the Middle Jurassic are likely Ornithischian Dinosaurs, known as Ornithopoda.

“If the specimen is confirmed to represent Ornithischian, as suggested by the partial iliac bone and histological sections, it signifies a geologically recent event in Scotland, originating from the Kilmalag Formation,” the scientist noted.

The team’s study has been published in the journal Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

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Elsa Panchiroli et al. The first and most complete dinosaur skeleton from the central Jurassic region of Scotland. Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Published online on March 6, 2025. doi:10.1017/s1755691024000148

Source: www.sci.news

Archaeologists confirm Stonehenge altar stones originated from Scotland

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A new study led by archaeologists from Curtin University suggests that Stonehenge’s iconic circle of stones – the Altar Stone, a six-tonne sandstone megalith – was discovered at least 750 kilometres from its current location.

Stonehenge. Image by Regina Wolfs.

Stonehenge, a Neolithic standing stone monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England, provides invaluable information about prehistoric Britain.

Construction of Stonehenge began around 3000 BC and was modified over the next 2000 years.

The megaliths at Stonehenge are divided into two main categories: sarsens and bluestones.

The larger sarsens consist mainly of duriclast silicrite, taken from Marlborough’s West Woods, about 25km north of Stonehenge.

Bluestone is a general term for a variety of locally uncommon rocks, including volcanic tuff, rhyolite, dolerite, and sandstone.

Stonehenge’s central megalith, the Altar Stone, is the largest of the bluestones, measuring 4.9 x 1 x 0.5 metres, lying stone, weighing 6 tonnes, and is composed of a pale green mica sandstone with a distinctive mineral composition.

In the new study, Curtin University PhD student Anthony Clark and his colleagues studied the age and chemical composition of mineral grains within the altar stone fragments.

“Analysis of the age and chemical composition of the minerals in the altar stone fragments showed that they matched rocks from north-east Scotland, but were clearly different to the bedrock in Wales,” Mr Clarke said.

“We found that certain mineral grains in the altar stones are mostly between 1 and 2 billion years old, while other minerals date back to around 450 million years ago.”

“This provides a clear chemical fingerprint suggesting that the stone came from rocks in Scotland’s Auckland Basin, at least 750km from Stonehenge.”

“Given the constraints of Neolithic technology and its Scottish origin, this discovery raises intriguing questions about how such large stones could have been transported long distances around 2600 BC.”

Stonehenge layout and view of the Altar Stone. Image courtesy of Clark. others., doi:10.1038/s41586-024-07652-1.

“This discovery has important implications for our understanding of ancient communities, their connections and transportation,” Professor Chris Kirkland, from Curtin University, said.

“Our discovery of the altar stone’s origins highlights the importance of social co-operation in the Neolithic period and helps to paint a fascinating picture of prehistoric Britain.”

“Transporting such a large amount of cargo over land from Scotland to southern England would have been extremely difficult, so it is more likely that it was transported by sea along the English coast.”

“This suggests the existence of longer-distance trade networks and more advanced social organisation than is widely understood to have existed in the Neolithic in Britain.”

“We have succeeded in determining the age and chemical signature of perhaps one of the most famous stones from any world-famous ancient site,” said Professor Richard Bevins, from Aberystwyth University.

“We can now say that this iconic rock is Scottish rather than Welsh, but further research is needed to establish exactly where in the north-east of Scotland the Altar Stone came from.”

“The discovery is truly shocking, but if plate tectonics and atomic physics are correct, the altar stone is Scottish,” said Dr Robert Iksar, from University College London.

“This work raises two important questions: why and how was the altar stone transported from the far north of Scotland, over 70 kilometres away, to Stonehenge?”

of Survey results Published in the journal Nature.

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AJI Clark others2024. The altar stone of Stonehenge originates from Scotland. Nature 632, 570-575;doi:10.1038/s41586-024-07652-1

Source: www.sci.news

The altar stones from Stonehenge were carried to Scotland for transportation.

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The Altar Stone is located within the two large stone rings of Stonehenge.

Gavin Hellyer/Robert Suding/Getty Images

A study of the six-tonne altar stone at the heart of Stonehenge has revealed that it was almost certainly brought from northeast Scotland, much further away than any of the other stones in the megalithic structure.

“We were all in shock, we couldn't believe it,” the geologist said. Anthony Clark Curtin University, Perth, Australia.

It's unclear how the altar stone got from Scotland to southern England, but it was probably by sea, Clark said, because there is evidence people at the time traveled by sea.

Stonehenge is thought to have been begun about 5,100 years ago and constructed over a period of about 1,500 years. The outer circle is made of large stones called sarsens, weighing about 25 tons, while the inner circle and altar are made of small stones called bluestones, weighing about 3 tons. Bluestones are any rock that is not a sarsen. Bluestones are made of many different types of rock.

“What's unique about Stonehenge is the distance the stones were transported,” the geologist says. Richard Bevins Bevins, a researcher at Aberystwyth University in the UK, said most of the stone circles were made from rocks found within one kilometre of the site.

But the sarsens' source has been identified as West Woods in Wiltshire, about 15 miles (25 km) from the site, and Bevins' team has found that almost all of the bluestones came from the Preseli Hills in Wales, about 175 miles (280 km) away. One theory is that they were part of an even older Welsh stone monument that had been moved.

Stonehenge's Altar Stone is different to other bluestones: “By the end of 2021, we had concluded that the Altar Stone does not match any known geology in Wales,” team members said. Nick Piercealso at Aberystwyth University.

The five-metre-long stone is set into the ground with only one side exposed and partially covered by two other stones. It is thought to have been placed there around 4,500 years ago.

Stonehenge's altar stone (which is embedded beneath the other stones) was brought from north-east Scotland.

Nick Pearce, Aberystwyth University

Clark is currently analyzing samples of the altar stone using sophisticated equipment commonly used in the mining industry. The altar stone is made of sandstone, which means grains of rock that were deposited on the floor of an ancient sea eroded away and eventually stuck together to form new rock. The age of each grain varies depending on when the eroded rocks first formed, so each sandstone is a mix of grains of different ages.

Clark analyzed the zircon, apatite, and rutile crystals in the rock sample. These minerals contain uranium, which slowly decays into lead, so the ratio of uranium to lead can be used to determine the age of the rock. For example, the zircon in the rock is between 500 million and 3 billion years old.

The dating pattern indicates with more than 95 percent certainty that the altar stone is made from ancient red sandstone from the Auckland Basin in northeast Scotland, team members say. Chris Kirkland Located at Curtin University, the basin was once a huge ancient body of water called Lake Orcadie.

The nearest older red sandstone sites to Stonehenge are near Inverness, 750 kilometres (470 miles) away, and the furthest are in the Shetland Islands, up to 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) away, so the team believes the altar stone was probably transported by sea.

Glaciers can carry rocks long distances, and there's evidence that during the last ice age, ice in the Orkney region flowed north rather than south, Kirkland said.

So why was the altar stone transported so far? “That's a big question that's impossible to answer,” Clark says. “All we know is that it's a six-tonne rock that was transported from 750 kilometres away. That alone tells us an enormous amount about Neolithic societies and their connections.”

“What they did was pretty rigorous.” David Nash A team from the University of Brighton in the UK has pinpointed the exact source of Wiltshire sarsens: “This is really solid research.”

Nash said pinpointing the source of the altar stone more precisely would be difficult because the Orkney Basin spans a vast area and is up to five miles deep. “It's a huge task, because there's a huge amount of old red sandstone in the north of Scotland.”

In contrast, finding the exact source of the sarsens was easier because there were fewer possible sources, he said.

Genetic studies have shown that the people responsible for much of Stonehenge's construction were largely replaced by new waves of immigrants by about 4,000 years ago, likely after a major epidemic wiped out much of Europe's population.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Research reveals Stonehenge’s main stone originated in Scotland

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summary

  • The “altar stone” at the heart of Stonehenge was likely made in what is now Scotland, a study has found.
  • It’s more than 450 miles away, raising the question of how ancient humans managed to transport the stone that far.
  • The study authors suggest they may have used boats.

Scientists say they have unlocked the secrets of Stonehenge’s six-tonne rock, a discovery that adds even more mystery to the site.

A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature suggests that the ancient site’s central sandstone “altar stone” was likely created in what is now Scotland, meaning it was transported more than 450 miles to southern England — farther than any of Stonehenge’s other stones of known origin.

The discovery raises important questions: Researchers estimate that the altar stone was placed about 4,500 years ago, meaning Neolithic people could have moved it hundreds of miles, long before the invention of the lightweight spoked wheel.

The find also suggests that culture and social structure in the British Isles at this time was more intertwined than previously thought, and that Neolithic people were capable of carrying out complex projects with relatively simple tools.

The discovery was made based on the dating analysis of mineral grains within the sandstone. After profiling the age of the grains, the researchers were able to compare the altar stone’s age “fingerprint” with a database of sandstone samples from across the UK and nearby areas, such as Brittany in France.

“We can link the age spectrum with a fairly high degree of statistical certainty – in fact more than 95% confidence – to a very specific region in northeast Scotland,” said study co-author Chris Kirkland, professor of earth and planetary sciences at Curtin University in Australia.

The area Kirkland refers to, the Orkney Basin, includes the Orkney Islands themselves; Known for its elaborate stone circles.

“We can’t directly answer the question of why this rock was transported,” Kirkland said, “all we know is that this 6.5-ton rock was transported from 750 kilometers away, and that alone tells us an awful lot about Neolithic societies and their connections.”

Stonehenge — UNESCO World Heritage Site One of the best-preserved prehistoric megalithic monuments, the site is surrounded by large sandstone slabs called “sarsens”, which support stone lintels (also horizontal spans of rock, some held together by joints). Inside the outline of the sarsens is an inner circle of “bluestones”, which in turn is a horseshoe shape.

of The sarsens are thought to have originated approximately 15 miles north of Stonehenge.Meanwhile, bluestone comes from Wales, about 140 miles away.

The new study concerns the central Altar Stone, a roughly 16-foot-long slab of stone that shows evidence of being shaped by human tools. Stonehenge’s other slabs currently rest on top of the Altar Stone but have apparently been toppled over time.

“Whatever the reason, this is a special stone,” said David Nash, a professor of physical geography at the University of Brighton who has studied Stonehenge but was not involved in the new study. “It’s totally different to the other stones on the site.”

Kirkland and his colleagues looked at three possible routes the altar stones could have taken from Scotland to Stonehenge: They could have been transported by shifting glacial ice during the Ice Age, but the study authors don’t think that’s a good explanation, or they could have been transported overland by humans, but the team thinks that would be too difficult in the wooded area.

The third possibility, which they consider to be the most likely, is that the stones were transported by ship, and there is evidence of seaborne transport during this period, when England’s coastline was different to what it is today.

Nash said the authors had reached a “sound conclusion” about the altar stone’s origins.

“Their work is really fascinating,” he said, adding that their findings add to the evidence that Neolithic people travelled throughout the British Isles and were part of wider social structures. “There was clearly a social structure, there were connections and there was a very clear transmission of ideas.”

Stonehenge is one of approximately 1,300 surviving ancient stone circles. According to the British MuseumResearchers believe the site’s stones were shaped with hand tools and assembled using a winch and pulley system, with the stones aligned to coincide with the movement of the sun and the summer and winter solstices.

Experts speculate that Neolithic people may have used these sites for rituals and ceremonies, but details have been lost to time — especially what was so special about the altar stones.

“Today’s billionaires decorate their mansions with Italian Carrara marble, but I don’t understand why they do it. It’s a mystery,” said Anthony Clark, lead author of the new study and a doctoral student at Curtin University. “Humans have always been fascinated by finding the perfect stone, and perhaps Neolithic Britons were too, so their motivations have been forgotten over time.”

As a next step, the researchers hope to pinpoint the exact outcrop or region where the rocks originated, but said fundamental mysteries are likely to remain.

“They placed a lot of value in transporting that stone 700, 800, 900 kilometres,” said Nick Pearce, a professor of geography and geosciences at Aberystwyth University in Wales and another co-author of the study. “However they transported it, it meant something to them. What did it mean? Why did it mean so much to them? It gives us all something to think about.”

Source: www.nbcnews.com