A monument in Avebury, England, consisting of two huge, circular enclosures, was discovered being about 5300 years old, meaning the structure pre-dates the first stones erected at nearby Stonehenge by about 800 years.

A recent study showed that the complex of two circular enclosures with a small gap between them must have served ceremonial purposes, as it is believed to be too large for a stock enclosure. Archaeologists consider it as being completely unlike anything ever found in the British Prehistory. The wooden circles located about 37 kilometres from Stonehenge, were discovered when a pipeline was being laid in the 1960s and 1970s. In the late 1980s small excavations at the site were conducted unearthing charred remains of a massive wooden palisade mounted within a ditch that sprawled across the landscape at a length of 4 kilometres, with 250 metres in diameter. Right by the wooden circles, archaeologists discovered artefacts such as animal bones, remnants of ancient structures and pottery shards suggestive of late Neolithic housing. It is believed that the site was used as a gathering place. Initially, researchers dated a shard of pottery found in one of the post holes, using the ratio of carbon isotopes, receiving the date of 2500 BC, but a recent carbon-dating technique used on charred remains in the post holes, and on animal bones from the side revealed it was 800 years older than the prior research suggested.

(after Historic England & Live Science)