Newsademic British English edition 260

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Archaeologists have dated an an­
cient circular structure in the Middle 
East. They believe it was built about 
5,500 years ago. However, what it 
was used for is still a mystery. There 
are several ideas, or theories. Some 
think it was the burial site of an im ­
portant person. Others believe it was 
constructed for burials. Another idea 
is that it was a type of sky calendar.
W heel o f giants from the a ir (israeltourism)
In Arabic the structure is known 
as 
Rujm el-Hiri.
This means ‘stone 
heap o f the wild cat’. In the Hebrew 
language it is called 
Gilgal Refaim,
or ‘wheel o f giants’. This name may 
refer to a race o f legendary giants that 
is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. 
The site is in a place called the Golan 
Heights. Originally, this was a part 
o f Syria. Israeli forces now occupy 
the area. They captured the Golan 
Heights during an Arab-Israeli war 
in 1967.

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26th November 2015 
N e w s a d e m ic .co m ™
 - British English edition 
page 
9
The wheel o f giants is about 160 
metres (520 feet) across. It was 
made from hundreds o f thousands 
o f stones. The walls form several 
concentric circles. The outer wall, 
or ring, was about 2.4 metres (eight 
feet) high. The inner walls gradually 
get lower and narrower the closer 
they are to the middle o f the wheel.
Entrance to the tomb o r burial cave (Ani Nimi)
At the centre there is a large tom b­
like structure or cave. This was bro­
ken into long ago. Nothing has been 
found inside it. Some people believe 
that the whole structure was part of 
the tomb. Others are not so sure. They 
suspect that the central tomb was 
added to the structure about 2,000 
years after the circles were built.
One idea is that the wheel was 
used for w hat’s known as ‘sky buri­
als’. The bodies o f people who had 
died were left in the centre o f the 
wheel. Vultures would then arrive 
and eat them. The concentric walls 
were built for the vultures to sit, or 
perch, on. After the vultures had fin­
ished only the bones were left. These 
were collected and placed inside a 
special box, or container, called an 
ossuary. The boxes o f bones were 
then buried or placed elsewhere.
Zoroastrianism is an ancient re­
ligion. It’s known that people who 
followed this religion in places that 
are now parts o f Iran and India used 
sky burials. They put the dead on 
raised platforms called sky tow­
ers for vultures to eat. Today, some 
monks in Tibet (a part o f China) 
do something similar. However, 
archaeologists have not found any 
human bones within the wheel. So 
some people think it’s unlikely that 
it was built for any type o f burial.
Other ancient circular stone 
structures seem to have been used to 
track the Sun. Stonehenge in the UK 
is the best-known example. It was 
probably used as a ‘calendar’. Some 
o f its large stones line up with the 
places on the horizon where the Sun 
rises on M idsum m er’s Day and sets 
at midwinter. Another theory is that 
the wheel o f giants served a similar 
purpose. If so, it was used to track 
how the Sun appears to travel across 
the sky during the different seasons.
Nowadays, it is possible to visit 
the wheel o f giants on holidays and 
weekends. On other days the Israeli 
army uses the area for training. □
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