h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Spare me the histrionics. I was only offering my opinion.

and indeed trying to help. But if you don't want my help, I'll have to remove my name from the author list again!

I do want help, but if you go through the original posts, you'll see that it wasn't me who said that Wales was 300 miles from Stonehenge.

I don't know squat about gases, about as much as I know about sacred spirals!

I'm just trying to get this entry edited, which it deserves to be.

I don't understand why you would critisise me for what other people have said.

I didn't criticise you. I pointed out places where the Entry was not up to the standard I would expect from a h2g2 entry. I didn't say it was your fault.

"This still reads like a whole lot of disjointed discussions of Stonehenge stuck together. It does not read like a h2g2 entry. I already gave detailed suggestions before as to how it should be structured, but you don't seem to have implemented them"

That read like personal critisism

There are other entries in PR where the author has not implemented changes that have been suggested, but no-one is telling them they should be done?

""to attract and emit radioactive fields" -- perhaps you could provide a footnote explaining what a radioactive field is, because I've never heard of them. But then, I only studied physics for six years."

That sounded an awful lot like sarcasm.

Of course I appreciate help in PR, but if you don't think I am capable of turning this into a reasonable h2g2 entry then I will remove my name, and hand it back to Jimster and let him sort it. Unless you'd rather do it?

I do think you are capable. That's why I am making suggestions. If I didn't think it was ever going to be picked, I wouldn't bother. This will inevitably get picked, because it is about a subject which is very interesting and close to the hearts of the UK people. I just want to make sure that the entry reads well.

Annie, if I make suggestions about an entry in PR and they are not followed, I keep making them until:

- they are done;
- it is made plain to me that the author has no intention of doing them;
- the entry gets picked.

The suggestion about restructuring is an essential one in my opinion. I personally don't think this will be ready to be picked until it is done.

OK, I was being sarcastic about the radioactive fields. I apologise. I have studied physics and I know you haven't, so they sound funny to me. But the sarcasm wasn't really aimed at you so much as whoever wrote that bit. Perhaps there are such things, but I know them by a different name. You could ask for clarification from whichever researcher provided the information originally.

Thanks Gnomon, I really appreciate that. I will keep trying with this entry, I will go through and remove all the new-age stuff, because it doesn't read well. (I'm still trying to find the reference about Stonehenge being 300 miles from Wales, I can't find it to alter it though)

I'm still trying to persuade someone else in PR to change their entry and I wish someone else would help!

'...you'll see that it wasn't me who said that Wales was 300 miles from Stonehenge.'
Well, there will be more authoratitive sources than this, but this is what it says in 'Citadelds of Mystery' (Fontana Books de Camp & de Camp,1972) - which is what I have to hand, and which looks reasonable:

'Mynedd Preselly is 135 miles from Stonehenge in a straight line; the roundabout sea-and-land route, which the builders probably used, is 240 miles long.'

(compare this with what I said earlier was my journey distance from Salisbury to Haverfordwest)

'Over four thousand years ago, a Bronze Age tribe remembered as the Beaker People dug eighty-odd columns out of the mountain, each one weighing about four tons'.

Phase 1 of SH (4000 years ago) pre-dated the Beaker Folk who were Bronze Age and only arrived in the 2nd millenium BC.

(See also my Entry on 'Pembrokeshire', which is still under construction).

'The transportation feat was human then, and it was very remarkable, but of greater interest still is how the Beaker People came to know that the stones were there in West Wales'.

>see also my 'Pembrokeshire' Entry, where I mention the 'Golden Road' - an ancient trade route between Ireland and Wessex, taking them past Carn Menyn.

I don't see any problem with the New Age stuff as long as it is carefully explained. My objection to the sacred spirals bit is that it suddenly launches into the symbolism of the spirals without ever having previously mentioned them. Where are the spirals? Are the stones laid out in a spiral? ( I don't think so). Are they energy spirals detectable by dowsers? Are they etched on the stones?

Just a minor suggestion, can that information not be removed completely? The Entry is on Stonehenge, not on Stone Circles and the mathematics behind them (if there truly IS any) and perhaps that is an Entry in itself?

Just a thought, not necessarily a good one

A2523188

In Post 29 I shouild've said that Phase one of SH was 3000 years BC (not 4000 years ago).(I keep having to check myself as to whether I'm talking 'BC' or 'Years ago'

See this reference for a timeline:

http://www.anima.demon.co.uk/stonehenge/history.html

Very good and comprehensive entry. Although I'm surprised that no mention has been made of Sir Cecil Chubb who bought stonehenge and gave it to the public in 1918 http://www.this-is-amesbury.co.uk/stonehenge.html There was also a campaign in the 1920s to obtain the land surrounding the monument to save it from development http://www.savestonehenge.org.uk/1920sappeal.html

A useful(?) chronology of Stonehenge can be found at http://www.warband.org/stonehenge%201130-1964.htm I expect it's too late to incorporate or structure the entry around a chronogy, but there may be some facts for insertion at appropriate places.

I think the A303 tunnel scheme has been scrapped. However, there is to be yet another review starting January 2006 http://www.gnn.gov.uk/environment/fullDetail.asp?ReleaseID=175616 although it may be better just to link to the www.savestonehenge.org.uk site, which carries all the latest news.

Thank you. I've mentioned good old Sir Cecil Chubb. Added some more stuff I found too.

heres a more proper link to SaveStonehenge
http://www.savestonehenge.org.uk/homepage.html

'It's supposed that they used a combination of river-barging and dragging overland using rollers to move these 'Bluestones' the three hundred miles to Salisbury Plain'

This statement is not comnsistent with the correct info. you've got at footnote 4.

Thanks BigAl, I'll remove it.

I meant, change it.

It's changed