Stonehenge was once sold at auction, for £6,600.

3000 BC · 1915 · apart: 4915 years

In 1915 local barrister Cecil Chubb bought it on a whim so the stones wouldn't go to someone overseas, and in 1918 he gave it to the nation.

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The event

• Building of Stonehengec. 3000 BC–2000 BC · Salisbury Plain. Neolithic Britons began a circular sanctuary on Salisbury Plain, raising its giant sarsen stones around 2500 BC. Aligned with the solstice sunrise and sunset, it is the most famous prehistoric monument in Europe.

30th century BC · 20th century

More amazing facts

• 3200 BC Possibly the first personal name ever written belongs not to a king but to an accountant.
• 3180 BC · 1850 A village older than the pyramids was uncovered by a storm.
• 3100 BC · 2560 BC Ireland's Newgrange is about 500 years older than both Stonehenge in its present form and the Great Pyramid.
• 3000 BC Stonehenge's bluestones were hauled from Wales, 240 km away — and may even be recycled.
• 3000 BC · 2560 BC Stonehenge is older than the Great Pyramid.
• 3000 BC · 100 BC The druids did not build Stonehenge: it went up around 3000–2000 BC, some two thousand years before druids appear in Britain.

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