Original subtitles

(mysterious music)

NARRATOR: 80 miles west of London,

the world's most famous Stone Age monument

still stands today.

Stonehenge.

But it's not alone.

MIKE (off screen): Most people don't realize

that there's a landscape out there

that is absolutely packed with prehistoric monuments.

NARRATOR: Why so many?

Are they all connected?

Is there more to it than we imagine?

350 miles away,

across the Irish Sea,

droughts and drones uncover a new Stonehenge.

ANTHONY: Never in my wildest dreams

would I have expected there to be such a huge monument

hidden in the landscape.

NARRATOR: This amazing find

may bring us closer than ever

to revealing its secrets.

♪ ♪

(stirring string music)

It's midsummer, and Ireland withers

in the grip of an epic drought.

The past month was the hottest in 175 years,

and there's no relief in sight.

30 miles north of Dublin

in the parched Boyne Valley, home to dozens

of the world's most spectacular prehistoric monuments,

author Anthony Murphy senses an opportunity.

ANTHONY: What a day to be making discoveries, huh?

KEN: (laughs)

NARRATOR: For decades, Murphy has been captivated

by the mysterious countryside

surrounding the great passage tomb of Newgrange,

a Unesco World Heritage Site

some 5,200 years old.

KEN: Isn't it, yeah?

NARRATOR: Today, he's using a drone to get a bird's-eye view.

(curious music)

♪ ♪

ANTHONY (off screen): I was aware

that several discoveries had been made in the UK and Europe

during the drought, so I was flying with intent.

I thought maybe we might see some features in the landscape

here at Brú na Bóinne that maybe hadn't been seen before.

(indistinct chatter)

NARRATOR: Following a hunch, Murphy fires up his drone

and takes to the skies over Newgrange Farm.

His friend, Ken Williams, a photographer,

joins in the flight.

Ireland is famously lush and green,

but not this summer.

A drought has drained all the color from the fields.

ANTHONY (off screen): It was like any other day

except for the weather.

We'd had sustained sunshine-- long days of sunshine,

warm temperatures, dry conditions.

It's very unusual for Ireland.

NARRATOR: But from an aerial view,

something astonishing emerges.

ANTHONY (off screen): I was flying near the Boyne River.

In the background, I could see a circular feature

that immediately jumped out at me,

and I flew closer to it.

I let out an exclamation-- "What the hell is that?"

Within moments, really, we knew we were seeing something

very substantial that had not previously been recorded.

♪ ♪

KEN (off screen): When I went to view it,

I said, "This is the most spectacular discovery

I've ever seen."

And within this same field,

more features started to turn up.

NARRATOR: The mysterious circle

looks strikingly like the footprint

of a large archeological feature

known as a henge.

These ancient earthworks,

composed of circular banks, ditches,

and wooden posts or stones,

are found throughout Ireland and Britain

and in more distant parts of the world,

separated by hundreds of miles.

But here in Ireland's Boyne Valley,

no one was expecting to uncover one this big.

Not today.

ANTHONY (off screen): I've flown dozens of times

trying to get a new perspective on the landscape.

Never in my wildest dreams

would I have expected there to be such a huge monument

hidden in the landscape

less than a kilometer from Newgrange.

KEN (off screen): As a photographer who has spent

many years with two feet on the ground

trying to capture these monuments in a new way,

this new perspective gives a whole new opportunity.

We're looking at a monument that has been hidden from human eyes

for generations and has now been revealed

with the use of camera technology.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Measuring over 570 feet across,

the structure's giant footprint

is the result of soil moisture deficit.

ANTHONY (off screen): The soil basically dries out,

and so the crop that's growing

out of the archeological features

has a tiny amount more trace moisture available to it

than the surrounding crop, and essentially what happens is,

there's a greener, healthier crop

growing out of the archeology

and a slightly paler, yellower crop

in the surrounding field,

and that's what creates the image.

And the actual image is several feet above the surface

even though the archeological features

are several feet below the ground.

NARRATOR: The aerial discovery

kicks off a remarkable string of new finds.

ANTHONY: What we were seeing was an image of those

above the ground, but the actual archeology is under there.

There's a sort of a roadway of archeological discovery

that lays before us, and essentially what we've done is,

we've started the ball rolling, as it were.

So we have the images,

and the images provoke all sorts of questions,

but now it will be up to the archeological community

to put the flesh on the bones, as it were,

to tell us what might be down there,

and that makes it tremendously exciting

'cause there's all sorts of possibilities.

NARRATOR: For the two friends,

it's the discovery of a lifetime

and cause for celebration.

The stunning find adds to a rich complex of sites

dating from the Stone Age

combining henges,

tombs,

post rings, and other ceremonial enclosures.

Brú na Bóinne represents a grand project

that would have occupied generations

and involved unimaginable planning and labor.

♪ ♪

For chief archeologist Michael MacDonagh,

this new discovery enriches the fascinating landscape

that is this Unesco World Heritage Site.

MICHAEL: This representation of a late Neolithic structure

is reminiscent of the henge discoveries

made by drone down on the floodplain

here at Brú na Bóinne this summer.

We see a transition in this period

from the large stone-built monuments

of the passage tombs

to these massive wooden-built structures.

Large oak posts set deep into postholes in the ground,

forming these circular structures

that would have been placed as a great gathering

for the communities during that period

from across this landscape.

We believe that discovery dates around 2,900 B.C., roughly--

several hundred years after the building of these passage tombs,

forming part of an extensive Neolithic ritual landscape.

NARRATOR: Exactly what were those rituals?

With no written language to consult,

archeologists are left

with what amounts to giant puzzles in stone.

♪ ♪

But in recent years,

those puzzle pieces have started to fit together.

The key was to stop looking at them in isolation.

MICHAEL (off screen): The similarities

between the landscape

such as Brú na Bóinne here in Ireland

and the Stonehenge Salisbury archeological landscape

over in Britain--

they are similar.

The research and theories

around how those landscapes developed--

where did people live?

Where did communities live?

How did they marshal the resources

to build such fantastic monuments?

We can share those ideas.

We can share those theories and try to answer the questions

and the mysteries that we still don't know

about this landscape here.

NARRATOR: This new way of seeing these ancient sites

is the logical outgrowth of a revolutionary theory

first developed some 15 years ago

not here at Newgrange

but across the Irish Sea in England,

home to the most famous

and iconic Stone Age monument in the world...

♪ ♪

Salisbury Plain in southern England.

(rousing instrumental music)

Thousands of people worked to build Stonehenge.

♪ ♪

When completed,

an inner horseshoe of five great arches

is enclosed by a ring of 30 stone uprights

and topped by a circle

of perfectly horizontal stones called lintels.

Today, this mammoth feat of engineering

remains one of the great unsolved mysteries

of the ancient world.

MICHAEL (off screen): Myths and legend grew up

about these iconic sites-- Stonehenge and Newgrange.

Merlin of Arthurian legend

allegedly brought the stones from Ireland

to build Stonehenge.

These are stories that developed

because of the importance of these landscapes

and these monuments for millennia and centuries,

reflecting people's knowledge

that these stones were transported

from long, long distances away.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Such tales are more fantasy than fact.

♪ ♪

(motor rumbling)

MIKE: Okay, that's right. No deeper than that.

NARRATOR: But now, in a local farmer's field,

archeologist Mike Parker Pearson and his team

are finally digging up real answers.

♪ ♪

MIKE: Can we start by uncovering the trenches?

Take the polythene off, get the stones out,

move them to one side,

and then we'll all get out there.

Thank you.

NARRATOR: Archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson

is leading one of the biggest archeological investigations

of modern times,

a seven-year project

to unlock the mystery surrounding Stonehenge.

MIKE (off screen): There was a puzzle there, and we thought,

"Yeah, why don't we actually go and find out for ourselves?"

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: But they do not excavate at Stonehenge.

(camera whirs)

Instead, they excavate the surrounding countryside.

♪ ♪

It's here Parker Pearson believes they'll find evidence

to support a revolutionary new theory.

MIKE (off screen): I think Stonehenge

is such an iconic monument that most people don't realize

that there's a landscape out there

that is absolutely packed with prehistoric monuments.

(dramatic music)

NARRATOR: Stonehenge sits center stage

on a much bigger ceremonial landscape.

♪ ♪

A grand avenue connects the stone circle

to the River Avon,

while standing stones, burial mounds,

and circular earthworks called henges

fill the surrounding area.

♪ ♪

According to this theory,

Stonehenge was only half

of a vast religious complex.

The other half was a mysterious circle

built of wood just a few miles away.

♪ ♪

At certain times of the year, thousands traveled to the area

to take part in rituals

marking the cycle of life and death.

♪ ♪

MIKE (off screen): If this theory works,

then there should be some kind of settlement

close to Stonehenge,

and there should be an avenue linking it to the river

just as there's an avenue from Stonehenge to the river.

NARRATOR: If he's right,

Parker Pearson's theory will transform our understanding

of the prehistoric world.

MICHAEL: New discoveries have enabled a new conversation

to start about what do we know about the people who lived here

and what don't we know?

Especially in that later Neolithic period.

There'll be a new conversation starting now

amongst the archeological community

to look at the questions that we need to answer.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: An important key to this theory

lies just north of Stonehenge.

♪ ♪

The Cursus is the largest of the monuments

surrounding the stone circle:

an earthwork enclosure stretching over 1 1/2 miles.

Parker Pearson believes the Cursus is a dividing line

marking off the land surrounding Stonehenge as sacred.

MIKE (off screen): It seems that it became a boundary

dividing two kinds of landscape,

and what it would seem is that on the south side,

we really are looking at a landscape of the dead.

And I thought, "Well, if that's the case,

then there's got to be a domain for the living."

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: The investigation leads him to a site

a mile and a half away from the stone circle...

♪ ♪

A place called Durrington Walls.

Here, a vast circular henge dominates the landscape,

20 times the size of Stonehenge around the perimeter.

In previous excavations,

archeologists dug inside the henge

but found no sign of settlement.

Parker Pearson decides to look outside.

(birds chirping)

In doing so, he uncovers the lost city

of the builders of Stonehenge.

♪ ♪

This is the largest Stone Age settlement

found in northern Europe.

(indistinct chatter)

From the density of houses,

it's possible the population ran into the thousands.

♪ ♪

Tribes would have gathered from across England

to build Stonehenge.

♪ ♪

Was this how all the great prehistoric monuments

were constructed?

In Ireland, chief archeologist

Michael MacDonagh wishes it were only so simple.

In the Boyne Valley, a place of similar size

and even older than Stonehenge,

he's searched for evidence of a workers' village for years.

So far, no luck.

MICHAEL (off screen): Here in Brú na Bóinne

around the passage tombs of Newgrange

and Knowth and Dowth, we don't have such evidence.

We do have evidence for smaller houses

dating to around the time the tombs were built,

but what the theories over in Stonehenge show

is that there's many mysteries still to be told

about the people who-- who built these tombs

and who came into this landscape.

NARRATOR: The builders must have lived somewhere.

Or perhaps they traveled from nearby settlements

to complete their work.

At Durrington Walls, Parker Pearson believes

these residents were part-timers.

MIKE (off screen): I think what we're seeing

is a community that are bringing all their stock with them,

coming here for short parts of the year.

This isn't a full-time, permanent settlement.

(indistinct chatter)

NARRATOR: People came here to celebrate an important event

in their calendar:

the longest day of the year,

the midsummer solstice.

MIKE (off screen): If we'd been here at the midsummer solstice,

what would have happened?

(insects chirping)

Now, we don't have a time machine,

but I think there are ways that we can really get a glimmer

of an understanding,

and what I would imagine is that at dawn,

people gathered at Stonehenge,

and that begins a really important day.

(eerie horns playing)

NARRATOR: On this day,

Stonehenge aligns with the rising sun.

(crowd cheering)

The sun's rays pass between the standing stones

placed on its perimeter

and directly through a vast central arch

known as the Great Trilithon.

(rousing instrumental music)

♪ ♪

But Parker Pearson believes this sunrise ritual

was just the start of the midsummer celebrations.

♪ ♪

With the sun's movement,

he believes the people make their way

to Durrington Walls along the banks of the River Avon.

They move toward an astounding near-replica of Stonehenge

built out of wood.

The use of stone and wood is no accident,

and gives Parker Pearson a fundamental insight

into the religious beliefs of these ancient people.

MIKE (off screen): Because, of course,

wood is something that doesn't last forever,

just as our own lives won't last forever.

But stone,

that's gonna be there for eternity.

And it set me thinking as to,

"Well, was one monument for the dead

and one for the living?"

One in stone, one in wood.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Like Stonehenge,

this circle also aligns with the sun,

now setting in the west.

At the stone circle,

people paid their respects to the dead.

But at this wooden circle, they celebrate life.

They thank their ancestors for the gift of fertility,

for their crops, their animals, and themselves.

(thunder rumbles)

Such ritual complexity is echoed in the monuments of Ireland.

MICHAEL (off screen): Newgrange was built as a burial monument,

but it is much more than that and became much more than that.

It became a focal point for ritual activity

and ceremonial gathering

for centuries and millennia afterwards.

NARRATOR: Like Stonehenge,

the prehistoric monuments in the Boyne Valley

line up with the solstices.

MICHAEL: As much as they're different chronologically--

several hundred if not 1,000 years' difference

between the great passage tomb of Newgrange

and the sarsen build stone of Stonehenge--

there are amazing similarities

in terms of the prehistoric engineering.

NARRATOR: Even so, there's no Stone Age town

at Brú na Bóinne that compares with Durrington Walls.

But the summer of 2018 is filled with surprises.

A mere week after Anthony Murphy's drone flight,

an agricultural company excavating in the Boyne Valley

hits upon something they weren't expecting...

an undiscovered tomb.

Have they finally found

the elusive builders of Newgrange?

(mellow piano music)

NARRATOR: Dowth Hall: a grand 18th-century home

tucked in Ireland's Boyne Valley

is planning a renovation.

But in this part of Ireland,

digging is a complicated business.

Dr. Clíodhna Ní Lionáin

is the lead archeologist on-site.

CLIODHNA (off screen): In Ireland, we're lucky

that we've legal structures in place

to protect our archeological heritage,

so anyone who wants to build or develop land

in an area of high archeological potential--

like here, the Unesco World Heritage Site of Brú na Bóinne--

oftentimes, a condition is put on their planning permission

that they have to have an archeologist on-site

for all movement of earth.

NARRATOR: Under her watchful eye,

a crew begins the job

of excavating around the old home's basement.

CLIODHNA: Oh, yeah.

(rock clatters)

NARRATOR: Suddenly, work screeches to a halt.

CLIODHNA: We came across a large greywacke stone.

So it's a type of sandstone that's often used

in the construction of passage tombs,

and it looked like a back stone of a chamber.

Then we found an upright to the south

and an upright to the north

and we realized we definitely have something here.

Because it was something very special,

we had to stop work.

NARRATOR: While authorities investigate,

the crew relocates a little to the south.

♪ ♪

But just a few days later,

they're forced to halt again.

Now they've hit upon a second tomb chamber

lined with ornately decorated kerb stones.

♪ ♪

This can't be a coincidence.

CLIODHNA (off screen): It was only then that we realized

that the house itself was completely surrounded

by the remains of a passage tomb.

This is one of the most significant

megalithic discoveries in Brú na Bóinne

in the last 50 years.

And definitely, with this monument,

we didn't even know it existed until work started

on the redevelopment of the house,

so a big find for the area

but also for the country and our understanding

of passage tombs in Ireland.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: It takes nearly a year

for archaeologists to reach the prehistoric layers

several yards underground,

but in the summer of 2018,

the payoff is a thunderclap.

The tomb dates to 5,500 years ago,

back to the time of the earliest farmers in Ireland,

the very people responsible for building Newgrange.

CLIODHNA (off screen): The people who built these monuments

were the descendants of the first farmers in Ireland.

They were able to dedicate resource and time

to building these amazing structures.

It says a lot about the society

that they were able to manage this

and able to encourage everyone

to be involved in the construction of it.

It would have definitely been a community effort.

Some of the larger tombs in this area of Knowth,

Newgrange, and Dowth, they're towards the end

of the passage tomb tradition

where they're getting bigger and bigger

and had the most lavish decoration.

NARRATOR: This part of the Boyne Valley

is a virtual gallery of megalithic artwork,

with more than 600 masterpieces in stone.

CLIODHNA: In this area, it's all abstract geometric shapes.

There's lots of circular shapes,

but we also get lozenges and more rectilinear shapes.

Like any good abstract art,

it's hard to know exactly what the artist meant

when he or she carved it.

It keeps people questioning

and trying to understand the people who carved these.

NARRATOR: The Knowth passage tomb.

Similar in size to Newgrange,

its outer walls are adorned

with elaborate and mysterious designs.

♪ ♪

MICHAEL: Yeah, this kerb stone

is one of the most highly decorated

and well-known of the 90 kerb stones here

around the main passage tomb at Knowth.

Various levels of design.

We have spirals and circles, we have cup marks,

and we have this hemisphere design

with lines radiating out like the rays of the sun, perhaps.

And this sort of design, again, like many of the passage tombs,

represents, perhaps, the importance

of planetary movements-- the sun and the moon, perhaps--

into the symbology and the funerary rights

of our Neolithic ancestors.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: The Knowth complex and its many satellite tombs

belong to a passage tomb tradition

similar to Newgrange.

Here, celestial and astronomical alignments

are critical to a developing belief system.

MICHAEL: And that level of belief system--

following the astronomical alignments

at certain auspicious days--

whether they're summer solstices or winter solstices--

you're looking at their shared belief systems

across Britain, Ireland, and Europe,

and indeed across the wider world

that we start to see shared beliefs and connections.

(singers vocalizing)

NARRATOR: At Stonehenge,

the midsummer celebrations continue.

(lively instrumental music)

MIKE (off screen): My guess is that

they're having the time of their lives

because when we look at the waste--

you know, the rubbish that litters this place--

it is excessive.

Normally, when you're digging a Neolithic site,

you find the odd bone,

maybe a small sherd of pottery.

But we have found it in vast quantities,

and they're living almost knee-deep in this stuff.

Just the sort of thing you'd find at a feast

when too much food is served.

(tools scraping)

NARRATOR: But not all the finds are evidence of celebrations.

Some reveal a darker side to this society.

MIKE: This is the artifact

that we find so many of-- in the hundreds--

and we call them oblique arrowheads.

Sharpened to quite a point, there,

and you can imagine this sort of thing,

it's gonna have a devastating effect

when shot from, you know, up to 50 meters or so.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: The recent discovery of this human leg bone

close to the henge

shows where some of those arrowheads ended up.

♪ ♪

Two small dents show how deep they penetrated.

Since they never healed,

the victim must have died from his wounds.

MIKE (off screen): It appears to come from an adult male...

♪ ♪

And we can only imagine what happened to him.

To get two injuries like that,

you might have basically stuck him like a pig.

Arrows from all directions.

Perhaps even an execution.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Executions may have taken place

in the middle of the Durrington Henge.

As in other ancient societies,

they may have been staged as popular spectacles.

(dramatic music)

(crowd cheering)

♪ ♪

But in the Brú na Bóinne landscape,

there is no evidence to date of any such sacrifice

or ritual killings.

CLIODHNA (off screen): It's generally believed

that the communities that built this were egalitarian,

and people wanted to put this effort

into a ritual monument,

both for themselves as an individual

but for the wider community as well.

(indistinct chatter)

NARRATOR: At Stonehenge, people have not traveled here

just for the celebrations and rituals of punishment.

They have a daunting job,

one so big it will take centuries to complete.

MIKE (off screen): Now, when we look at the concentration

of population that we have in this one valley,

there's one major task that they had to perform,

and that is the building of Stonehenge,

the construction of the great sarsen circle,

and the trilithons within it.

NARRATOR: Exactly how this feat of engineering was accomplished

may be the biggest mystery of all.

NARRATOR: In 2,500 B.C.,

Stonehenge is one of the largest active building projects

in the prehistoric world.

(mysterious music)

No one knows how long it took to complete.

The great stones are sarsen,

a dense rock as hard as granite.

Each weighs up to 45 tons.

Lifting them involves sophisticated engineering...

(all grunting)

But the construction work is only half the story.

(all shouting)

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Building Stonehenge requires

over 1,000 tons of sarsen stone,

and the closest source is 25 miles away.

♪ ♪

In Ireland, hauling stone to the Newgrange monument

was even more challenging.

It meant covering a greater distance.

MICHAEL (off screen): The large greywacke stones

that were used to decorate it, to build the passage tombs

of Newgrange, Knowth, and Dowth, they were quarried

from over 25 kilometers away to the northeast,

and we've long thought that the river played a major role

in being able to transport those stones here to Brú na Bóinne.

NARRATOR: Shipping these massive stones overland

and then by river

would have required sophisticated navigational

and engineering skills.

MICHAEL (off screen): We do have evidence

from very recent discoveries here on the River Boyne

of Neolithic log boats.

That wood was cut between--

radio carbon dating suggests 3,300 to 2,900 B.C.,

and that is the exact time that the passage tombs were built.

So we're thinking with this recent discovery

that such a craft would have been used

to carry them down the Boyne River here to Newgrange.

So they were then dragged up the floodplain terraces

to build the tombs.

NARRATOR: Incredibly, they may even have traveled by sea,

hugging the coasts

until reaching the intercoastal areas

and then the Boyne River.

♪ ♪

Such distances easily exceed 70 miles.

Convincing simple farmers

to expend such extraordinary effort

must have been no easy task,

and suggests a high degree of organization

and political power.

There must also have been

a strong internal motivation.

MICHAEL (off screen): There must have been that need--

that belief need, that ritual need--

to honor their dead

and to bury them in these large tombs

that allowed these communities

to marshal the huge resources necessary

to build these monuments over many, many years

and to take the risk in doing so.

NARRATOR: For the builders of Stonehenge,

moving the sarsen is entirely an overland journey,

but they have devised ingenious methods

to accomplish this task.

Hauling a single 45-ton stone

requires an enormous effort

from every single member of the group.

(all chanting)

NARRATOR: On firm ground, they run the stone

over a bed of wooden rollers.

Archaeologist Mike Pitts

has studied the various techniques

that might have been employed to transport these great stones.

PITTS (off screen): It's a challenging journey,

and they would have had to employ everything, I think,

that they could draw on

to get these stones along that route.

NARRATOR: But the route is not all level.

At times, it is too steep to pull the stone.

PITTS (off screen): There's really quite a steep climb

up onto Salisbury plain,

and I think at occasions like that,

what they would have done is use very large poles as levers,

and if you have a number of people

on each side of the stone,

you can almost literally row the stone forward.

(all shouting indistinctly)

NARRATOR: No one knows how long it took

to bring a stone to Stonehenge.

It may have taken months or even years.

(mysterious music)

MIKE: Stonehenge, which is multi-phased,

which culminates in this large,

iconic sarsen stone-built structure,

is part of a much wider landscape.

Similarly, here in Newgrange,

it was a construction project that took many years.

It wasn't a once-off project.

It took many years of continued activity

in order to construct what we see now.

NARRATOR: Finally, these weary people

have their destination in sight.

But their work still isn't finished.

♪ ♪

There's the matter of dressing

and raising the stone into position,

and this is just 1 of 80 it will take

to complete the monument.

NARRATOR: Thousands return to the domain at Durrington

to prepare for another celebration:

the midwinter solstice.

MICHAEL: Our prehistoric ancestors

had an awareness-- a full-on awareness

of the movement of astronomical bodies,

of our planetary alignments,

of our auspicious dates on calendars

such as the winter solstice

that obviously then played a further part

into their funerary monuments and their burial practices.

NARRATOR: 1 1/2 miles from Durrington,

work resumes at Stonehenge.

♪ ♪

This is the only stone circle in the world

where the stones are shaped and jointed.

It's grueling work.

They use wood formers

to check the shape and dimensions...

♪ ♪

And flour milling techniques

to grind the surface of the stones

to a marble-smooth finish.

♪ ♪

The workers are expert stonemasons and engineers.

(indistinct chatter)

They prepare to drag the stone into a pit

that will secure and hold it upright.

The sarsens vary greatly in length,

so the depth must be precise to keep the top line level.

(man shouting)

NARRATOR: Ropes running over wooden A-frames

increase leverage.

MAN: (shouts)

(people chanting)

NARRATOR: They haul the stone up an earth ramp

toward a pivot point made of tree trunks.

(people chanting)

(dramatic music)

(people chanting)

NARRATOR: Now, they can pull the stone vertical.

(people chanting)

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Each of these stones brings these ancient Britons

closer to fulfilling their ambition

of building a domain for the ancestors.

♪ ♪

The ancient farmers of Ireland also mastered the challenges

of building a megalithic monument at Newgrange.

MICHAEL: 3,300 years before Christ,

a community decided to build this immense burial monument.

The stones were transported 22 kilometers.

As at Stonehenge,

rolled, pulled up the floodplain terraces,

socket stuck, and then using ropes,

using ramps of earth,

they were then hauled up into these upright positions.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Both at Newgrange and Stonehenge,

rough and clumsy stones have been moved

over dozens of miles

and raised into position.

Now, they must be arranged with watch-like precision

in time to mark the calendar's most important event.

(pensive music)

♪ ♪

(indistinct chatter)

At Stonehenge,

these people labor with a dual purpose:

to build their grand monument

and prepare for the midwinter solstice.

It's a time of year imbued with meaning.

(indistinct chatter)

MIKE (off screen): Everything is heading towards death.

The land is getting less and less green,

the sun itself appears to be dying,

and we need to wait for that crucial moment

when everything is restarted.

That is at the midwinter solstice.

(mysterious music)

(indistinct chatter)

NARRATOR: While the summer solstice

was about life and fertility,

the winter solstice brings the year full circle

with a ceremony for the dead.

On the shortest day of the year,

thousands assemble before dawn at the wooden circle

inside the Durrington settlement.

Like Stonehenge,

the circle's posts are precisely positioned.

Almost 350 miles to the west,

Ireland's Newgrange monument

also awaits the moment of sunrise.

Only here, the entire structure has been fine-tuned

with this purpose in mind.

MICHAEL: Such a monument as this great passage tomb of Newgrange

required tremendous effort, both in workforce

to bring the materials in

but in the precision of its architecture,

the precision of the engineering to align perfectly

with that astronomical alignment of the rising of the sun

on the morning of the winter solstice.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: The slope of the hill

on which Newgrange is constructed

poses an additional challenge.

To achieve the solstice effect, the sun's first rays

must penetrate a 62-foot passageway

that rises toward the burial chamber.

♪ ♪

To counteract the slope of the passage,

engineers build a roof-box above the tomb entrance.

♪ ♪

It would have taken years to get the size

and position just right.

MICHAEL (off screen): On the morning of the solstice,

as sun rises through a roof-box

built directly above the entrance,

the sun's rays get concentrated and they shine a beam of light

that illuminate the burial chamber.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Now, the moment has arrived.

All eyes are fixed on the Newgrange roof-box

and the posts of Durrington Walls.

(insects chirping)

♪ ♪

(all cheering)

♪ ♪

MICHAEL (off screen): The winter solstice

was an auspicious date.

It's the effective start of the new year,

the end of one and the start of another

as the days begin to lengthen,

so it's hugely important in terms of--

for a farming community in terms of fertility, renewal.

A sign of hope.

But also, we have that winter solstice sun

illuminating the burial chambers of their ancestors,

giving some sort of sense of rebirth, renewal.

NARRATOR: Across Stone Age Europe,

bands of people honor their ancestors.

It's a day for both sadness and hope.

But at the settlement of Durrington Walls,

there's still one last journey to make:

a procession that completes the cycle of the year

and renews life itself.

(somber music)

♪ ♪

(all cheering)

At Durrington Walls, the sun has risen,

but their day is not done.

(indistinct chatter)

MIKE: So it's quite careful work because...

NARRATOR: Mike Parker Pearson believes

the wooden circle is the start of a journey for the dead

that leads them back to Stonehenge.

♪ ♪

He believes that at midwinter solstice,

ancient Britons travel from the wooden circle

at Durrington Walls along the River Avon,

then up a wide avenue to Stonehenge.

The almost 2 1/2 mile journey

culminates in a slow climb up a ridge.

♪ ♪

MIKE (off screen): They can't see where they're going.

They've not a had a view of the great stone monument all day,

and it is hidden until the very last moment

as they come over King Barrow Ridge.

Suddenly, for the first time, they actually see Stonehenge

at really quite close range.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: At the midwinter solstice,

the upright pillars of the Great Trilithon

will perfectly frame the setting sun.

♪ ♪

Now they ask the ancestors to accept the spirits

of those who have died in the past year.

(all cheering)

♪ ♪

MIKE (off screen): Now, we do have similar ideas

in the sense that death isn't the end

but it's the beginning, that the soul will live on,

and I think what we're seeing here

is just another version

of that overall kind of principle

which is right at the heart of human religious belief.

(all cheering, shouting)

NARRATOR: But the midwinter festival

is not only about death.

It's also a celebration.

From this day forward, the sun will grow stronger

and the days longer

until these people return to Stonehenge

for the next midsummer solstice.

(mysterious music)

♪ ♪

For thousands of years,

Stonehenge has remained a mysterious monument

from the distant past.

Now, Parker Pearson and his team of archaeologists

are uncovering its true significance.

MIKE (off screen): We've got the evidence here

for a city for the living,

the largest settlement in northern Europe

from this period.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: He's convinced

that Stonehenge is one half of an extraordinary complex.

♪ ♪

The other half is a huge wooden circle,

a mirror image of the stone monument

that joins the world of the living

with the world of the dead.

♪ ♪

MIKE (off screen): The other great discovery

is that it's a monument

not to ancient gods

but actually to the dead,

and I think that's remarkable.

♪ ♪

MICHAEL (off screen): Lot of mysteries

and a lot of questions still to be answered,

but what we hope now is that with further research,

we're gonna be able to help solve some of the mysteries

about this landscape and the people who inhabited here

over 5,000 years ago.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: In Britain and across northern Europe,

the ancients carved their beliefs

in pillars and tombs of stone.

♪ ♪

These great monuments tell a timeless tale

not of giants or gods,

but of simple human beings,

community, sacrifice,

the cycle of life and death.

♪ ♪

Separated by centuries and hundreds of miles,

we are only now discovering

how much they share in common

and how much we have to learn.

Captioned by Captionmax