The recent discovery of the "Bluestonehenge" site has claims that it is similar to the Woodhenge and Stonehenge burial rituals of Neolithic England (Sacred Stones, 2010). The reason for this was that Madagascar people did not build houses with stones and the archaeologists felt that the only purpose for this monument was for the dead.There are still few ancestor worship practices done in Madagascar and that it is believed to be spiritual and honouring the dead.
Personally, because my project is on dolmens itself, I learned few of the meanings interpreted cross culturally. The claim of putting a universality belief of the ancestor stones in every context of dolmens are not right. The blogger replied with a responsing to Mike Parker Pearson's theory. He says, "[Pearson is] looking for a reason to label the bluestones as sacred or special, and then by extension to justify the imagined stone collecting expeditions to West Wales." I agree with this blogger and his insights on that just because the structures might be similar, not all cultures have the same meaning behind it. Learning more about the dolmens cross culturally, all the countries had different reasoning behind their stone structures. For example, Korea was more associated with hierarchy and social status, whereas in Jordan, the structures had to do with the astronomical and mytholocial side to it. Archaeologists should see what the stone structures are like in Madagascar and find historical backgrounds to it, without comparing cross culturally and thinking that these stone structures have the same meaning as a culture that is across the seas.
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