Sometimes archaeologists, like other scientists, come across evidence that supports one or another rival theory, or that suggests an explanation for a previously unexplained phenomenon. Other times, as in a recent high-tech investigation of a mysterious site in the Golan Heights dating about a millennium before the probable time of Abraham, a discovery contradicts existing explanations without offering anything better. Gavriel Fiske writes:
Rujm el-Hiri, sometimes called “Stonehenge of the East” or the “Wheel of Ghosts,” is a series of concentric stone circles encircling a central burial mound with a small chamber. Constructed of up to 40,000 tons of rock, the site’s purpose is unknown, but some researchers have speculated that it was used for religious rituals related to the solstices.
A new study, [however], found it is unlikely that Rujm el-Hiri . . . was used as an observatory. . . . By using “geomagnetic analysis and tectonic reconstruction” of land movement in the Golan over time, [a] Tel Aviv University team discovered that Rujm el-Hiri has shifted and rotated at an average rate of 8–15 millimeters per year—meaning it had moved tens of meters since its construction around 3000–2700 BCE.
More about: Ancient Israel, Archaeology