The I don't know who, what or why of Stonehenge


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STONEHENGE, England -- Stonehenge is one of the biggest mysteries of our time, no one how it got here or why, but that doesn't stop some from trying to discover their secrets.

Mark Anstee has come to the monuments with paper and ink in order to draw the mysteries out.

"I've been coming here on and off for the last seven years," Anstee said. "I'm drawing them to learn them."

After years of studying the rocks he realizes he knows less now than when he started the process.

"It's always been here," Anstee said. "People think they know it, until they come look at it. Then the process of unknowing starts."

Archaeologists believe Stonehenge has stood for some 5,000 years. They even have ideas on what it could have been used for, such as a calender or ritual grounds. But, after looking at the size of the rocks, their fit on top of one another and their shape the question then becomes, "how?"

"It is something that can't really be known," Anstee said. "People have circumstantial evidence, as to what they think it could have been, how they could have been built, who built it. The truth is, we don't really know."

The questions are part of the attraction for Stonehenge. Tourists come by the busload to take pictures, stare and wonder about something from a long time ago.

"It's one of those things you have to see in person to be able to appreciate," said Kim Platt, a tourist from Michigan. "You can't really describe it. It's so old and so amazing, and... I don't know."

I don't know is a common phrase from tourist that Anstee hears all the time.

"There are knowns, there are known knowns and there are uknown knowns," Anstee said. "And this is an unkown known."

Even with the mystery people will still say to come and see it in person. The mystery is part of the appeal.

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