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70-580: Marlborough White Horse , also called the Preshute White Horse , is a hill figure on Granham Hill, a fairly shallow slope of the downland above the hamlet of Preshute , southwest of Marlborough in the county of Wiltshire, England. Dating from 1804, it is one of several such white horses to be seen around Great Britain, and one of nine in Wiltshire. Many distant views of the horse are obstructed by trees, but it can be seen from parts of

140-592: A common impurity. Tin ores are rare, as reflected in the fact there were no tin bronzes in Western Asia before 3000 BCE. The Bronze Age forms part of the three-age system for prehistoric societies. In this system, it follows the Neolithic in some areas of the world. While copper is a common ore, deposits of tin are rare in the Old World , and often had to be traded or carried considerable distances from

210-539: A lost figure. Its existence is suggested by infrared photography . If it is a lost figure, its age is uncertain, and unlikely prehistoric in origin, as only one figure in the UK has been shown to be of this age, the Uffington White Horse . While presumed to be of prehistoric origin, surviving examples may have been created only within the last four hundred years. Of these giants only two survive: one near

280-674: A much more evident Mesolithic era, lasting millennia. In Northern Europe , societies were able to live well on rich food supplies from the marshlands fostered by the warmer climate. Such conditions produced distinctive human behaviours that are preserved in the material record, such as the Maglemosian and Azilian cultures. These conditions also delayed the coming of the Neolithic until as late as 4000 BCE (6,000  BP ) in northern Europe. Remains from this period are few and far between, often limited to middens . In forested areas,

350-633: A phenomenon especially seen in England , where examples include the Cerne Abbas Giant , the Uffington White Horse , and the Long Man of Wilmington , as well as the "lost" carvings at Cambridge , Oxford and Plymouth Hoe . From the 18th century onwards, many further ones were added. Many figures long thought to be ancient have been found to be relatively recent when subjected to modern archaeological scrutiny, at least in their current form. Only

420-503: A sediment analysis by the National Trust indicated an origin in the date range of 700 CE to 1100 CE, surprising historians who did not expect it to be medieval. In 2008, overgrowth forced a re-chalking of the giant, with 17 tonnes of new chalk being poured in and tamped down by hand. The Long Man of Wilmington is located on one of the steep slopes of Windover Hill, six miles (9.7 km) northwest of Eastbourne . The figure

490-654: A single room. Settlements might have a surrounding stone wall to keep domesticated animals in and hostile tribes out. Later settlements have rectangular mud-brick houses where the family lived in single or multiple rooms. Burial findings suggest an ancestor cult with preserved skulls of the dead. The Vinča culture may have created the earliest system of writing. The megalithic temple complexes of Ġgantija are notable for their gigantic structures. Although some late Eurasian Neolithic societies formed complex stratified chiefdoms or even states, states evolved in Eurasia only with

560-749: A single source. The emergence of metallurgy may have occurred first in the Fertile Crescent , where it gave rise to the Bronze Age in the 4th millennium BCE (the traditional view), although finds from the Vinča culture in Europe have now been securely dated to slightly earlier than those of the Fertile Crescent. Timna Valley contains evidence of copper mining 7,000 years ago. The process of transition from Neolithic to Chalcolithic in

630-408: Is 227 feet (69 m) tall and designed to look in proportion when viewed from below, and is shown holding two staves. The earliest record was made by the surveyor John Rowley in the year 1710. This drawing suggests that the original figure was a shadow or indentation in the grass, rather than the solid outline of a human figure. The staves were not depicted as a rake and scythe as was once thought, and

700-468: Is a nearly-lost hill figure which can be seen with the aid of infrared photography . Now looking more like a small ear of corn or a strange weapon than a human figure, there is a legend suggesting that a giant called Gill was once cut on this same hill and that he was considered an adversary of the Long Man of Wilmington not far away. According to one story, the giant on Firle Beacon threw his hammer at

770-800: Is also a transition period between Stone Age and Bronze Age, the Chalcolithic or Copper Age. For the prehistory of the Americas see Pre-Columbian era . The notion of "prehistory" emerged during the Enlightenment in the work of antiquarians who used the word "primitive" to describe societies that existed before written records. The word "prehistory" first appeared in English in 1836 in the Foreign Quarterly Review . The geologic time scale for pre-human time periods, and

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840-516: Is an example. In archaeology, the Iron Age refers to the advent of ferrous metallurgy . The adoption of iron coincided with other changes, often including more sophisticated agricultural practices, religious beliefs and artistic styles, which makes the archaeological Iron Age coincide with the " Axial Age " in the history of philosophy. Although iron ore is common, the metalworking techniques necessary to use iron are different from those needed for

910-488: Is anonymous. Because of this, reference terms that prehistorians use, such as " Neanderthal " or " Iron Age ", are modern labels with definitions sometimes subject to debate. The concept of a "Stone Age" is found useful in the archaeology of most of the world, although in the archaeology of the Americas it is called by different names and begins with a Lithic stage , or sometimes Paleo-Indian . The sub-divisions described below are used for Eurasia, and not consistently across

980-782: Is called the Lower Paleolithic (as in excavations it appears underneath the Upper Paleolithic), beginning with the earliest stone tools dated to around 3.3 million years ago at the Lomekwi site in Kenya. These tools predate the genus Homo and were probably used by Kenyanthropus . Evidence of control of fire by early hominins during the Lower Palaeolithic Era is uncertain and has at best limited scholarly support. The most widely accepted claim

1050-500: Is common, as well as more abstract symbols and, in the modern era, advertising brands. The reasons for the creation for the figures are varied and obscure. The Uffington Horse probably held political significance, since the figure dominates the valley below. It probably dates to the British Iron Age since coins have been found exhibiting the symbol. The Cerne Abbas Giant might have been a work of political satire likely of

1120-415: Is natural vegetation covering the figures. In the case of chalk figures, natural vegetation encroaches from the edges and can grow on soil washed onto the figure by rain. Water erosion can also be a problem on steep or gentle slopes, because rain can wash the chalk off the horse, or soil onto the horse. Larger horses are more susceptible to this. If chalk is washed off the horse, the horse gradually creeps down

1190-520: Is not generally used in those parts of the world where the working of hard metals arrived abruptly from contact with Eurasian cultures, such as Oceania , Australasia , much of Sub-Saharan Africa , and parts of the Americas . With some exceptions in pre-Columbian civilizations in the Americas, these areas did not develop complex writing systems before the arrival of Eurasians, so their prehistory reaches into relatively recent periods; for example, 1788

1260-558: Is provided by a wide variety of natural and social sciences, such as anthropology , archaeology , archaeoastronomy , comparative linguistics , biology , geology , molecular genetics , paleontology , palynology , physical anthropology , and many others. Human prehistory differs from history not only in terms of its chronology , but in the way it deals with the activities of archaeological cultures rather than named nations or individuals . Restricted to material processes, remains, and artefacts rather than written records, prehistory

1330-551: Is seen as a transition period between the Stone Age and Bronze Age. An archaeological site in Serbia contains the oldest securely dated evidence of copper making at high temperature, from 7,500 years ago. The find in 2010 extends the known record of copper smelting by about 800 years, and suggests that copper smelting may have been invented independently in separate parts of Asia and Europe at that time, rather than spreading from

1400-500: Is that H. erectus or H. ergaster made fires between 790,000 and 690,000 BP in a site at Bnot Ya'akov Bridge , Israel . The use of fire enabled early humans to cook food, provide warmth, have a light source, deter animals at night and meditate. Early Homo sapiens originated some 300,000 years ago, ushering in the Middle Palaeolithic . Anatomic changes indicating modern language capacity also arise during

1470-446: Is usually taken as the end of the prehistory of Australia . The period when a culture is written about by others, but has not developed its own writing system, is often known as the protohistory of the culture. By definition, there are no written records from human prehistory, which can only be known from material archaeological and anthropological evidence: prehistoric materials and human remains. These were at first understood by

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1540-516: Is when the first signs of human presence have been found; however, Africa and Asia contain sites dated as early as c.  2.5 and 1.8 million years ago, respectively. Depending on the date when relevant records become a useful academic resource, its end date also varies. For example, in Egypt it is generally accepted that prehistory ended around 3100 BCE, whereas in New Guinea

1610-653: The Copper Age or Bronze Age ; or, in some geographical regions, in the Iron Age ). The term Neolithic is commonly used in the Old World ; its application to cultures in the Americas and Oceania is complicated by the fact standard progression from stone to metal tools, as seen in the Old World, does not neatly apply. Early Neolithic farming was limited to a narrow range of plants, both wild and domesticated, which included einkorn wheat , millet and spelt , and

1680-487: The Indus Valley Civilisation , and ancient Egypt were the first civilizations to develop their own scripts and keep historical records, with their neighbours following. Most other civilizations reached their end of prehistory during the following Iron Age . The three-age division of prehistory into Stone Age , Bronze Age , and Iron Age remains in use for much of Eurasia and North Africa , but

1750-670: The Kennett 's running still, And see, the old White Horse still pads up there on Granham Hill. For a while in 1969, the horse was not the only hill figure in Marlborough, as the Scout logo was cut into a nearby hill, commemorating the Marlborough Group's Diamond Jubilee. As no permission was granted for the figure to be permanent, the land's owners replanted plants on it later in the year. The horse may have been inspired by

1820-531: The Paleolithic , by the Neolithic only Homo sapiens sapiens remained. This was a period of technological and social developments which established most of the basic elements of historical cultures, such as the domestication of crops and animals , and the establishment of permanent settlements and early chiefdoms. The era commenced with the beginning of farming , which produced the " Neolithic Revolution ". It ended when metal tools became widespread (in

1890-640: The University of Reading suggests that the figure dates from the 16th or 17th century AD. Until the early 17th century large outline images of the two giants, perhaps Gog and Magog (or Goemagot and Corineus ) had for a long time been cut into the turf of Plymouth Hoe exposing the white limestone beneath. An early and explicit reference was made to them by Richard Carew in 1602. At one time these figures were periodically re-cut and cleaned but no trace of them remains today. Firle Corn in Firle , Sussex

1960-606: The three-age system for human prehistory, were systematised during the nineteenth century in the work of British, French, German, and Scandinavian anthropologists , archaeologists , and antiquarians . The main source of information for prehistory is archaeology (a branch of anthropology), but some scholars are beginning to make more use of evidence from the natural and social sciences. The primary researchers into human prehistory are archaeologists and physical anthropologists who use excavation, geologic and geographic surveys, and other scientific analysis to reveal and interpret

2030-475: The "Chalcolithic", "Eneolithic", or "Copper Age" refers to a transitional period where early copper metallurgy appeared alongside the widespread use of stone tools. During this period, some weapons and tools were made of copper. This period was still largely Neolithic in character. It is a phase of the Bronze Age before it was discovered that adding tin to copper formed the harder bronze . The Copper Age

2100-474: The "Trendle", or "Frying Pan". Medieval writings refer to this location as "Trendle Hill", but make no mention of the giant, leading to the conclusion that it was probably only carved about 400 years ago. In contrast, the Uffington White Horse  – an unquestionably prehistoric hill figure on the Berkshire Downs  – was noticed and recorded by medieval authors. In 2021,

2170-455: The 'restoration' process distorted the position of the feet, an assertion backed up by several who had been familiar with the figure before 1874, and also by later resistivity surveys. It has also been suggested that it removed the Long Man's genitalia, though there is no historical or archaeological evidence which supports that claim. A wide range of dates of origin have been proposed for the Long Man, but more recent archaeological work done by

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2240-705: The Azilian cultures, before spreading to Europe through the Iberomaurusian culture of Northern Africa and the Kebaran culture of the Levant . However, independent discovery is not ruled out. "Neolithic" means "New Stone Age", from about 10,200 BCE in some parts of the Middle East, but later in other parts of the world, and ended between 4,500 and 2,000 BCE. Although there were several species of humans during

2310-460: The Early Modern period. Wiltshire is a county with a large number of White Horses; 14 have been recorded. The figures are usually created by the cutting away of the top layer of relatively poor soil on suitable hillsides. This exposes the white chalk beneath, which contrasts well with the short green hill grass, and the image is clearly visible for a considerable distance. Although most of

2380-460: The Iron Age, often through conquest by empires, which continued to expand during this period. For example, in most of Europe conquest by the Roman Empire means the term Iron Age is replaced by "Roman", " Gallo-Roman ", and similar terms after the conquest. Even before conquest, many areas began to have a protohistory, as they were written about by literate cultures; the protohistory of Ireland

2450-694: The Middle East is characterized in archaeological stone tool assemblages by a decline in high quality raw material procurement and use. North Africa and the Nile Valley imported its iron technology from the Near East and followed the Near Eastern course of Bronze Age and Iron Age development. The Bronze Age is the earliest period in which some civilizations reached the end of prehistory, by introducing written records. The Bronze Age, or parts thereof, are thus considered to be part of prehistory only for

2520-739: The Middle Palaeolithic. During the Middle Palaeolithic Era, there is the first definitive evidence of human use of fire. Sites in Zambia have charred logs, charcoal and carbonized plants, that have been dated to 180,000 BP. The systematic burial of the dead , music , prehistoric art , and the use of increasingly sophisticated multi-part tools are highlights of the Middle Paleolithic. The Upper Paleolithic extends from 50,000 and 12,000 years ago, with

2590-480: The Pewsey White Horse at its centre. Prehistory Prehistory , also called pre-literary history , is the period of human history between the first known use of stone tools by hominins c.  3.3   million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems . The use of symbols, marks, and images appears very early among humans, but

2660-644: The Uffington White Horse appears to retain a prehistoric shape, while the Cerne Abbas Giant may be prehistoric, Romano-British, or Early Modern. Nevertheless, these figures, and their possible lost companions, have been iconic in the English people's conception of their past. In England there are at least fifty landscape figures, the majority of which are in the south. The creation of hill figures has been practised since prehistory and can include human and animal forms. Cutting of horses

2730-468: The Wilmington giant and killed him, and that the figure on the hillside marks the place where his body fell. As a publicity stunt for the opening of The Simpsons Movie on 16 July 2007, a giant Homer Simpson brandishing a doughnut was outlined in water-based biodegradable paint to the left of the Cerne Abbas Giant. This act angered local neopagans , who pledged to perform "rain magic" to wash

2800-484: The building now The Ivy House Hotel. This was not the present-day Marlborough College , which is only a short distance away. The horse was designed and marked out on the hill by a boy called William Canning, whose family owned the Manor House at Ogbourne St George . From then onwards, it was "scoured", or cleaned up, every year, this becoming a tradition at the school marked by revelry. Greasley died about 1830, and

2870-569: The case of Indigenous Australian "highways" known as songlines . The Mesolithic, or Middle Stone Age (from the Greek mesos , 'middle', and lithos , 'stone'), was a period in the development of human technology between the Palaeolithic and Neolithic . The Mesolithic period began with the retreat of glaciers at the end of the Pleistocene epoch, some 10,000 BP, and ended with

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2940-463: The collection of folklore and by analogy with pre-literate societies observed in modern times. The key step to understanding prehistoric evidence is dating, and reliable dating techniques have developed steadily since the nineteenth century. The most common of these dating techniques is radiocarbon dating . Further evidence has come from the reconstruction of ancient spoken languages . More recent techniques include forensic chemical analysis to reveal

3010-506: The earliest known writing systems appeared c.  5,200 years ago. It took thousands of years for writing systems to be widely adopted, with writing having spread to almost all cultures by the 19th century. The end of prehistory therefore came at different times in different places, and the term is less often used in discussing societies where prehistory ended relatively recently. In the early Bronze Age , Sumer in Mesopotamia ,

3080-506: The end of the Bronze Age large states, whose armies imposed themselves on people with a different culture, and are often called empires, had arisen in Egypt, China, Anatolia (the Hittites ), and Mesopotamia , all of them literate. The Iron Age is not part of prehistory for all civilizations who had introduced written records during the Bronze Age. Most remaining civilizations did so during

3150-639: The end of the prehistoric era is set much more recently, in the 1870s, when the Russian anthropologist Nicholai Miklukho-Maklai spent several years living among native peoples, and described their way of life in a comprehensive treatise. In Europe the relatively well-documented classical cultures of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome had neighbouring cultures, including the Celts and the Etruscans , with little writing. Historians debate how much weight to give to

3220-446: The few mines, stimulating the creation of extensive trading routes. In many areas as far apart as China and England, the valuable new material was used for weapons, but for a long time apparently not available for agricultural tools. Much of it seems to have been hoarded by social elites, and sometimes deposited in extravagant quantities, from Chinese ritual bronzes and Indian copper hoards , to European hoards of unused axe-heads. By

3290-565: The figure away. There are 16 known white horse hill figures in the UK, or 17 including the painted one at Cleadon Hills . The horses in Cockington Green, Georgia and Juárez are all based on the style of or direct copies of the Uffington White Horse. The white horses of Wiltshire, of which there are currently nine, have inspired other sculptures in the county. Julive Livsey's sculpture White Horse Pacified (1987) in Shaw, Swindon

3360-419: The figure referring to the horse. The Cerne Abbas Giant , also referred to as the "Rude Man" or the "Rude Giant", is a hill figure of a giant naked man 180 ft (55 m) high, 167 ft (51 m) wide. The figure is carved into the side of a steep hill, and is best viewed from the opposite side of the valley or from the air. The carving is formed by a trench 12 in (30 cm) wide, and about

3430-595: The figures are of great age, many are relatively new. Devizes in Wiltshire created a large white horse for the 2000 Millennium celebrations and in October 2009 celebrated this with an aerial photo of volunteers making the figure 10 for an aerial photo. Figures must be maintained to remain visible, and local people often work regularly to restore or maintain a local landmark, though two cuttings of military badges at Sutton Mandeville , Wiltshire, are becoming lost. A lost map of Australia at Compton Chamberlayne , Wiltshire,

3500-493: The first organized settlements and blossoming of artistic work. Throughout the Palaeolithic, humans generally lived as nomadic hunter-gatherers . Hunter-gatherer societies tended to be very small and egalitarian, although hunter-gatherer societies with abundant resources or advanced food-storage techniques sometimes developed sedentary lifestyles with complex social structures such as chiefdoms, and social stratification . Long-distance contacts may have been established, as in

3570-497: The first signs of deforestation have been found, although this would only begin in earnest during the Neolithic, when more space was needed for agriculture . The Mesolithic is characterized in most areas by small composite flint tools: microliths and microburins . Fishing tackle , stone adzes , and wooden objects such as canoes and bows have been found at some sites. These technologies first occur in Africa, associated with

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3640-421: The head was a helmet shape. Sir William Borrow's drawing of 1766 shows the figure holding a rake and a scythe, both shorter than the staves. Before 1874, the Long Man's outline was only visible in certain light conditions as a different shade in the hillside grass, or after a light fall of snow. In that year an antiquarian marked out the outline with yellow bricks, later cemented together. It has been claimed that

3710-473: The introduction of agriculture , the date of which varied by geographic region. In some areas, such as the Near East , agriculture was already underway by the end of the Pleistocene , and there the Mesolithic is short and poorly defined. In areas with limited glacial impact, the term " Epipalaeolithic " is preferred. Regions that experienced greater environmental effects as the last ice age ended have

3780-474: The keeping of dogs , sheep , and goats . By about 6,900–6,400 BCE, it included domesticated cattle and pigs, the establishment of permanently or seasonally inhabited settlements, and the use of pottery . The Neolithic period saw the development of early villages , agriculture , animal domestication , tools , and the onset of the earliest recorded incidents of warfare. Settlements became more permanent, some with circular houses made of mudbrick with

3850-401: The nature and behavior of pre-literate and non-literate peoples. Human population geneticists and historical linguists are also providing valuable insight. Cultural anthropologists help provide context for societal interactions, by which objects of human origin pass among people, allowing an analysis of any article that arises in a human prehistoric context. Therefore, data about prehistory

3920-811: The nearby Cherhill White Horse , which itself was probably created in imitation of the first such Wiltshire horse, at Westbury , remodelled in the 1770s. It is unclear whether the Westbury horse is ancient, but the Uffington horse , now in Oxfordshire , has been shown to date from the Bronze Age . The earliest evidence of the Westbury horse is in a paper of the Rev. Francis Wise published in 1742, which refers to it. 51°24′46″N 1°44′15″W  /  51.41271°N 1.73757°W  / 51.41271; -1.73757 Hill figure Hill figures cut in grass are

3990-658: The regions and civilizations who developed a system of keeping written records during later periods. The invention of writing coincides in some areas with the beginnings of the Bronze Age. After the appearance of writing, people started creating texts including written records of administrative matters. The Bronze Age refers to a period in human cultural development when the most advanced metalworking (at least in systematic and widespread use) included techniques for smelting copper and tin from naturally occurring outcroppings of ores, and then combining them to cast bronze . These naturally occurring ores typically included arsenic as

4060-502: The rise of metallurgy, and most Neolithic societies on the whole were relatively simple and egalitarian. Most clothing appears to have been made of animal skins, as indicated by finds of large numbers of bone and antler pins which are ideal for fastening leather. Wool cloth and linen might have become available during the later Neolithic, as suggested by finds of perforated stones that (depending on size) may have served as spindle whorls or loom weights. In Old World archaeology,

4130-520: The same depth, which has been cut through grass and earth into the underlying chalk . In his right hand the giant holds a knobbled club 120 ft (37 m) in length. Its history cannot be traced back further than the late 17th century, making an origin during the Celtic , Roman or even Early Medieval periods difficult to prove. Above and to the right of the Giant's head is an earthwork known as

4200-461: The school was closed, leading to the horse being neglected for some years, but by 1860 it was back in good condition and can be seen in a photograph taken that year at a cricket match. In 1873 a Captain Reed, an old boy of Greasley's Academy who had taken part in the horse's creation, saw to a new scouring. The horse is 62 feet long by 47 high, and it has got thinner since the early twentieth century. It

4270-578: The slope; or if soil is washed onto the horse, it collects onto the lower edges and the horse gradually climbs up the slope. A solution is to provide drainage, either using run-off drains, as at Uffington White Horse, or a french ditch . Since hill figures must be maintained by the removal of regrown turf, only those that motivate the local populace to look after them survive. Surviving ancient figures all have an associated fair or ceremony that involves maintaining them. Unmaintained figures gradually fade away. Firle Corn at Firle Beacon , Sussex could be

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4340-635: The sometimes biased accounts in Greek and Roman literature, of these protohistoric cultures. In dividing up human prehistory in Eurasia, historians typically use the three-age system, whereas scholars of pre-human time periods typically use the well-defined geologic record and its internationally defined stratum base within the geologic time scale . The three-age system is the periodization of human prehistory into three consecutive time periods , named for their predominant tool-making technologies: Stone Age , Bronze Age and Iron Age . In some areas, there

4410-635: The town of Marlborough. One good view is from a footpath running from Preshute House to the A345 road . The figure is some 500 metres south of Marlborough College , within 100 metres of the southeast corner of the college sportsground. The smallest such horse in Wiltshire, the Marlborough horse was cut in 1804 by boys at Mr Greasley's Academy, also called the High Street Academy, a school in Marlborough High Street which occupied

4480-587: The use and provenance of materials, and genetic analysis of bones to determine kinship and physical characteristics of prehistoric peoples. The beginning of prehistory is normally taken to be marked by human-like beings appearing on Earth. The date marking its end is typically defined as the advent of the contemporary written historical record. Both dates consequently vary widely from region to region. For example, in European regions, prehistory cannot begin before c.  1.3  million years ago, which

4550-525: The village of Cerne Abbas , to the north of Dorchester , in Dorset and one at Wilmington, Long Man civil parish in the Wealden District of East Sussex . Examples located at Oxford , Cambridge , and on Plymouth Hoe can no longer be seen with the naked eye. The Osmington White Horse carries a rider ( King George III ) but is not considered an example of gigantotomy due to the name of

4620-644: The whiteish underlying soil, which is not itself dug. Geoglyph is the usual term for structures carved into or otherwise made from rock formations. In 1949, Morris Marples "half-humorously" coined the words "leucippotomy for the cutting of white horses and gigantotomy for the cutting of giants on rare occasions". Though neither word appears in the Oxford English Dictionary , the terms occasionally appear in print. Until recently, three methods were used to construct white hill figures. The biggest threat to white horses and other hill figures

4690-460: The whole area. "Palaeolithic" means "Old Stone Age", and begins with the first use of stone tools . The Paleolithic is the earliest period of the Stone Age . It extends from the earliest known use of stone tools by hominins c.  3.3  million years ago, to the end of the Pleistocene c.  11,650   BP (before the present period). The early part of the Palaeolithic

4760-423: Was inspired by the white horses. In 2010, Charlotte Moreton created the steel sculpture White Horse for Solstice Park, Amesbury , taking influence from white horses. The Westbury White Horse is depicted on a roundabout and mosaic in the town. An 1872 sketch of the Cherhill White Horse was incorporated into an unofficial flag of Wiltshire . The Town Flag of Pewsey , registered in September 2014, features

4830-451: Was restored again in September 2001, when it was re-chalked with pure chalk mixed with water and applied with a stiff brush, but by the late summer of 2002 it already had grass growing on much of its surface. A verse of the Marlborough College school song refers to the horse: And when to Marlborough old and worn we shall creep back like ghosts, And see youngsters yet unborn run in between the posts, Ah, then we'll cry, thank God, my lads,

4900-417: Was restored in 2018. Similar pictures exist elsewhere in the world, notably the far larger Nazca Lines in Peru , which are on flat land but visible from hills in the area. However, these were made in desert terrain rather than on grassy hillsides, so have not become overgrown and thus have survived much longer without maintenance. The Nazca Lines were formed by removing loose stones from the lines to expose

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