4,500 year-old limestone plaque indicates direct link with Stonehenge

London, Jan 3 (ANI): An archaeological team has uncovered a 4,500 year-old limestone plaque at south of Chester, in Cheshire, England, bearing a mysterious crisscross pattern, which indicates a direct link with the Stonehenge.

According to a report in the Telegraph, the closest parallel is a chalk plaque found in 1969 on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, just 1km from Stonehenge.

The markings were made with a flint tool and flint from Salisbury Plain has previously been found on site.

"There has obviously been contact between the two areas," said archaeologist Mike Emery. "There has got to have been trading of some kind," he added.

Mike explained that the plaque, found at the entrance to a later Bronze Age ring ditch monument, was connected with ritual or ceremonial activities, although its exact purpose is unknown.

He has suggested that the plaque maybe linked to some form of funerary activity, given its location close to cremated human bones.

"It is connected with the dead and may be some sort of invocation to the Gods to look after this person in the next life, some form of primitive writing or could be something abstract that just looks pretty," he said.

Engraved plaques have been recovered from elsewhere, but are extremely rare and are almost always sculpted from chalk.

The cross-hatching pattern found on the plaque is also similar to designs found on 'grooved ware' pottery, which is unique to Britain and Ireland.

However, this pottery is almost absent from the archaeological record in Cheshire.

Another mystery is the discovery of what is thought to be an Iron Age coin bearing the image of an animal, possibly a horse or a goat.

Two universities have failed to identify the coin and now Mike will approach experts at The British Museum to see if they can shed any light on the find. (ANI)