BOMBSHELL DISCOVERY: Ancient 'Stonehenge' Hidden Under Famed Author's Home Rewrites History

When the author Thomas Hardy was writing Tess of the D'Urbervilles in 1891, he chose to set the novel's dramatic conclusion at Stonehenge, where Tess sleeps on one of the stones the night before she is arrested for murder. What the author did not know, as he wrote in the study of his home, Max Gate in Dorchester, was that he was sitting right in the heart of a large henge-like enclosure that was even older than the famous monument on Salisbury Plain.

This extraordinary discovery was made recently by archaeologists, who used ground-penetrating radar and geophysical surveys to uncover the previously unknown henge. The team believes that the enclosure dates back to the Neolithic period, around 3,000-2,000 BC, making it at least 500 years older than the iconic Salisbury monument.

The finding has left historians and literary enthusiasts stunned, as it highlights the little-known fact that Hardy's home, where he spent the last 40 years of his life, was in fact situated in the heart of an ancient monument. This revelation not only rewrites the history of the area but also adds a fascinating layer of meaning to Hardy's work, whose connection to the region has always been well-documented.