[dramatic music]
[narrator] a chance discovery on the ocean floor
Reveals a settlement from the dawn of civilization.
[ehud] we found walls, dwellings, structures,
It is a huge site, 40,000 square meters.
[narrator] an archeological treasure trove
Of ancient houses, human remains
And incredible engineering feats.
[karen] the technology and the skill is frankly stunning
For the time period.
[narrator] but in a world plagued
By early death and suffering.
You were more likely to be hungry.
You died younger, your kids were more likely to die.
[narrator] the evidence suggests these people
Were unlike any other.
[israel] the population were flourishing.
It is exceptional.
[narrator] now, have experts found the secret
To their success?
A 9,000 year-old stonehenge.
These stones are huge. They're about half a ton each.
It's clearly of some sort of sacred significance.
-[stones rumbling] -[dramatic music]
[narrator] what rituals were held here?
How did this monument help these people survive
A hostile world?
[karen] we see evidence of a survival instinct to latch on
To anything you think might give you some sense of control.
[narrator] and can a remarkable breakthrough in dna
Reveal how this stone circle
Inspired the ancient worlds' most famous monument?
It's intriguing to think that's where the seed
Of the idea first grew.
This is like a missing link.
[narrator] the relics of the past hold secrets.
[dramatic music]
[column thudding]
[man screaming]
Written in gold.
-Stone. -[soldier roaring]
And blood.
We can unlock them.
These are the secrets of history's greatest treasures.
[dramatic music]
[stones rumbling]
Over a period of several thousand years,
The prehistoric world saw the rise of a strange phenomenon,
As large, enigmatic stone circles began to appear
Across the globe.
We see monumental, megalithic structures
All over the world.
50,000 in western europe alone.
What were they?
Why were they made?
[narrator] over time, these monuments got bigger
And more complex,
Dominating the landscapes they were built in.
The tradition would culminate 4,500 years ago
With the most sophisticated stone circle on the planet.
[mary-ann] when you're looking at stonehenge
You're seeing a culmination of the labor of people,
Extraordinary use of resources,
And an astonishingly complex,
Perfectly executed idea.
[narrator] these monuments were constructed hundreds
Or thousands of years apart.
But what drove ancient civilizations,
Armed with only the most basic of tools, to build them?
It's clearly beyond any sort of practical purpose
That makes sense to us, and in that sense,
It has to be something that in the minds of people
In the past, it was essential for them to do.
The thing about the megalithic monument tradition
Is that we see it across such a broad geographical spread.
It begs the question: Was this a shared culture?
[water splashing]
[narrator] now an amazing discovery
Could finally help reveal the answer.
Every time we find a new stone monument
It gives us another piece of evidence
On that detective hunt to try and work out
What were the ancestors thinking?
Why did they build this and what did it all mean?
[narrator] northern israel.
The small town of atlit sits on
The country's mediterranean coast.
In 1984, maritime archeologist ehud galili,
Makes a routine dive around 400 meters off shore.
He's searching for shipwrecks,
Exposed by the shifting sands of the seabed
After a heavy storm.
But what he finds is much bigger and more important
Than any shipwreck.
He discovers an ancient sunken settlement.
Usually we find remnants from shipwrecks,
Like anchors, metal ingots, nails,
All kinds of artifacts.
But while we were diving here we found a wall.
[narrator] further investigation reveals the wall
Was once part of a house,
And it's not alone.
Within days more foundations are revealed,
Along with the skeletons of the people who once lived here.
[ehud] we found about 15 family houses.
We estimate that the population was between 70
To 150 people at one time.
[narrator] incredibly, galili and his team have stumbled
Upon a major archeological find.
We found walls, dwellings, structures, in situ,
As they were left.
And then little by little we came to realize
That it is a huge site, 40,000 square meters.
[narrator] radiocarbon dating reveals the site
Is almost 9,000 years old,
Making it one of the oldest human settlements on earth.
[dramatic music]
The level of preservation is absolutely extraordinary.
That it's survived that long,
And it's still there for us to explore now.
It's an absolute treasure trove.
[narrator] the settlement is named atlit yam,
Meaning atlit-by-the-sea.
Originally built on the banks of the mediterranean,
The ancient settlement covers an area
The size of eight football stadiums.
And as the archeological investigation of the site
Continues, the divers find something even more exciting.
At the edge of the settlement,
The team discovers another structure.
But these stones are much larger
And unlike anything else they've uncovered.
[ehud] huge stones, almost two meters long.
They protruded about half a meter above the clay,
Above the sand.
But we very soon realized that there are no such
Natural rocks in this area.
This is a flat area,
And there is no way that natural rocks will be there.
[narrator] stranger still, six of the seven giant stones
Have been placed upright,
Their bases firmly implanted deep into the ground.
[narrator] the team realizes they've found
One of the earliest examples of the ancient world's
Most enigmatic monuments.
A megalithic stone circle.
The space inside is too small to serve as a dwelling,
Or a storage or an installation of production of something.
It must be a megalithic structure.
[dramatic music]
[narrator] now, this remarkable discovery
Is giving experts a unique opportunity to investigate
An untouched, ancient stone circle,
And the people who built it.
How could this structure be preserved?
Probably because it was covered by sand
For thousands of years, and only recently it was exposed.
So the sand preserved it and protected it
From the marine erosion.
[mary-ann] at atlit yam, not only do we have the monument,
We've also got the skeletons of the people
Who lived in that village and we also have the evidence
Of how they lived their lives.
And so bringing all those pieces of evidence together
Will help us really understand how these monuments were used,
What the people were doing, and maybe even why.
[narrator] atlit yam's underwater stonehenge
Offers experts a unique snapshot
Into a 9,000-year-old world.
The location on the banks of the mediterranean
Was precarious.
But ultimately, the sand and clay preserved the stone circle
Alongside the bodies of the people who used it.
So who were they?
And what can their remains tell us about the other
Mysterious stone circles around the world?
Atlit yam is like a missing link.
[dramatic music]
[narrator] 9,000 years ago, a prehistoric community
Living on the banks of the mediterranean,
Constructed one of the earliest
Megalithic stone circles ever found.
Now, experts are hoping the preserved remains of atlit yam,
Submerged off the israeli coast,
Can help reveal why the ancient world went to such lengths
To build these mysterious structures.
[karen] these stones are huge.
They're about half a ton each.
They did not occur nearby,
They had to be brought to this location.
They're shaped. They're put into place.
Six of the seven are still standing.
This was a very deliberate, purposeful act.
These structures cannot be a project of an individual,
And not even a family.
This requires the collaboration of the whole community.
[narrator] so who were the people who built
This remarkable monument?
And why did they do it?
Working out their motivation could help unlock the secrets
Of the puzzling stone circle building tradition.
And for scholars, the age of the settlement
At atlit yam is key.
This was a community living during one of the most
Seismic events in human history.
The end of the last ice age.
[anjana] over the history of the earth,
Which charts back 4.6 billion years,
Ice ages have come and gone.
The last ice age that we know of is
Actually called the pleistocene,
And it finished around about 10,000 years ago.
[narrator] for thousands of years previously,
Humans had survived as hunter-gatherers.
This was a nomadic lifestyle,
Often traveling vast distances to search out sources
Of meat and vegetation as the seasons changed.
Hunter-gatherers by necessity are mobile.
They've gotta keep moving.
They need anywhere from seven to 750 square miles
To support their group with wild foods.
And their groups as a result are quite small.
[narrator] but as the planet began to warm up
And the ice started to melt,
New opportunities for food emerged.
[anjana] during this time that these glaciers and ice sheets
Were retreating, huge amounts of land was exposed,
And because climates were warming,
This created the ideal conditions for vegetation
To start to flourish.
[narrator] the area that saw the first
Great transformation was the swathe of land
East of the mediterranean.
Known as the fertile crescent,
It's here where the world's first ever settlements
Were built.
[anjana] with the changing climate,
And particularly with this explosion in vegetation,
Humans at that time were able to start to harness
What this gift of nature had brought them,
And this meant they could stay in one place
And survive as a community.
[karen] a transition to agriculture involves
A completely different way
Of organizing your life on the land.
It makes it possible to put aside food, to store it,
And that allows the existence of larger population
In any given area.
From our perspective in the modern world,
It's actually the beginning of what we think of
As home in modern life.
This shift from primarily hunting and gathering,
To primarily growing one's own food and raising animals,
Was absolutely epic in its impact on human history.
[narrator] the fertile crescent has long been considered
The birthplace of agriculture.
And the perfectly preserved archeological remains
At atlit yam back this up.
We found more than 100 species of plant seeds.
We have domesticated barley, and domesticated legumes.
[narrator] atlit yam was home to some of
The world's first farmers.
But archeological evidence reveals it was one
Of the most catastrophic moves in the history of humanity.
[karen] so you can support a larger population
In one place with agriculture,
But that actually sets you up for trouble when crops fail.
Early farming was quite precarious.
You're only really one harvest away from disaster
If you don't have the means of finding food
In any other way.
Then if your crops fail, you are doomed.
[narrator] and it wasn't just how much produce
Was available that was a problem for the early farmers.
It was the food itself.
Previously, hunter-gatherers would have been able to
Respond to changes in their environment,
And they would have harvested and hunted
From so many different sources of food.
But when you're a farmer,
You're restricted really to what you've grown.
Nutritionally speaking,
This shift to agriculture was a disaster.
[narrator] the life expectancy of a typical
Hunter-gatherer was over 60 years.
But most early farmers died in their twenties.
The new way of life also saw the average height
Of both men and women plummet
By a staggering five inches
As a result of the poor nutrition.
Agriculture hugely impacted, for the worst, human health.
The reductions in lifespan and stature took 10,000 years
To reverse, and some populations still haven't recovered.
[narrator] the world's first farmers were fighting
For survival on a daily basis.
The dependence on crops meant a flood or a drought
Could wipe out entire communities.
Experts suspect it was no coincidence
That atlit yam's stone circle was built during this time.
When people face insurmountable obstacles,
They turn to higher forces.
[karen] throughout human history,
We see evidence of people trying to kind of get
Their hands around what's around them.
Things that are scary,
Just things they simply don't understand.
It's a very natural impulse, a survival instinct,
To latch on to anything you think might give you
Some sense of control.
[mary-ann] it's very, very likely
That the monumental structures,
These ritual structures that we see in atlit yam,
Were in some way to address those concerns,
To address those worries, perhaps to appease the gods,
To ensure that they did have a steady supply of fresh water,
That they did have the sunshine.
Because those are the things that stood
Between them and death.
[narrator] the traditions and rituals born here
At atlit yam 9,000 years ago
May be some of the earliest foundations of religious belief.
They would have logically sought to understand
What was going on in the natural world
And to do anything that they thought might
Actually influence the rising of the sun,
The coming of the rain,
And the growth and harvesting of their crops.
[clive] exactly what was going on
In people's minds, we don't know.
I think we can say it's something more
Than anything that's practical in our terms,
And that's why we would say it's to do with
Some sort of sacred significance ritual,
If you like.
[narrator] when atlit yam's stone circle was built,
Many of the world's first farmers were living
Miserable existences and dying young.
But now, forensic evidence suggests
This prehistoric community flourished.
So how did the people of atlit yam buck the trend
Of malnutrition and early death?
Could the stone circle hold the key to the secret
Of their success?
A quarter mile off the coast of israel,
Archeologists have discovered
The perfectly preserved remains of a 9,000-year-old settlement
With its very own stonehenge.
Originally built on the banks of the mediterranean,
Archeological investigations are revealing it was home
To some of the world first ever farmers.
Atlit yam is like a missing link
In terms of showing us how some groups
Would have made this transition
From strictly hunting-gathering to sedentary agriculture.
[narrator] experts suspect this stone circle
Was built for one purpose.
[water splashing]
To appease the gods and help the people who lived here
To become successful farmers.
[mary-ann] they were still at
The mercy of the natural elements.
If there was a drought, their crops would die.
If there was a flood the young plants would be destroyed.
And so I think it's very likely that they would have said,
Well, the gods are angry or the spirits are angry,
Or we need to appease the ancestors.
This is a monument that is for something greater
Than the people who are building it.
[narrator] now detailed analysis of 63 skeletons
Recovered from the sea floor reveals that whatever
The ancient people that built this stone circle were doing,
It paid off.
At a time when most neolithic farmers didn't live
Much beyond their twenties,
Their lives cut short by disease and malnutrition,
The skeletons from atlit yam tell a very different story.
In atlit yam we find many more older people,
40 or 50 years of age.
It is exceptional.
Demographically the population were flourishing.
[narrator] in atlit yam, people were living
Almost twice as long as other farming communities
In the region.
And their bodies showed less signs of distress
And illness that plagued other early farmers.
So what were these people doing differently?
A discovery at the center of their 9,000-year-old circle
May offer a clue.
[ehud] we realized that there in the middle there are traces
Of freshwater spring.
We found some sediments typical to springs, fresh water,
And we saw some plant species also typical to freshwater.
[narrator] a reliable supply of fresh, clean water
Was essential for the survival of these early farmers.
Experts now suspect this life-giving resource
May have become the focus for the settlers
Newly evolving rituals.
You don't need a standing stone circle
To protect your well, but you might build one
To create a sanctuary, a place to go and worship,
And hopefully ensure that that fresh water
Remained available to you.
Across cultures throughout time,
You see the honoring of springs and sacred wells,
Not only because of their life-giving properties,
Because clean water is essential,
But also because they potentially act as some kind
Of portal, as a place where there's an opening
From the earth and water bubbles up.
It's perhaps a way into a different realm.
[narrator] now evidence of deep chisel marks
Carved into the stones suggest the community
Came to believe that the circle,
And the freshwater spring it surrounded,
Played a vital role in their survival.
Around the structure we have huge slabs
Weighing a few hundred kilograms each,
And on them there are tens of cup marks.
It means that somebody chose the flat stones, the slabs,
And they chiseled with flint and with hammers cup marks,
Cavities, to contain liquid or probably offerings
And probably water.
[narrator] the cup marks on the stones at atlit yam
Are some of the oldest ever discovered.
And they're identical to marks found on later stone circles
Across europe and great britain,
Ancient sites separated by more than 3,000 miles
And 5,000 years.
[mary-ann] cup marks are strange
Because there's no evidence of how they were used.
Maybe they were used to hold some kind of liquid
Or a kind of an offering.
Maybe they were created in the process
Of performing some kind of ritual.
But it is intriguing that cup marks seem to go hand in hand
With megalithic monument construction
And that world of beliefs.
[narrator] the natural spring discovered in the center
Of atlit yam's stone circle
Reveals why the monument was built where it still stands.
But, as the settlement grew,
A single trickle of fresh water wouldn't have been enough
To support everyone.
Now, ehud galili has discovered the need
To keep their community fed and watered,
Drove the world's earliest farmers to pioneer
A new innovation.
[ehud] we thought that it is a grave,
But then when we removed the superstructure,
We start to go down,
We realized right away that it is a water well.
[narrator] the deep vertical shaft revealed
The farmers had tapped into the reservoir of fresh water
That collected beneath the village.
The well provided atlit yam with a seemingly endless
And permanent water supply.
Over time, as the community grew,
A total of 30 stone-built wells were sunk.
All of them spreading out from the original
Freshwater spring in the stone circle.
These are the earliest constructed
Water wells in the world.
[karen] the technology and the skill to be able to plan
And execute a stone-lined well such as what we see
Archeologically at atlit yam,
Is frankly stunning for the time period.
At that point, they don't have to go with the goats
And with the livestock, to look for water.
They have their own permanent source of water.
[narrator] the atlit yam settlers
Had a limitless supply of fresh water,
Livestock, crops.
But even so, the transition to farming
Would not have been easy.
Food shortages were always a threat.
[karen] making a go of it at atlit yam
Was not an instant thing.
They didn't just build a few houses,
And watch their crops grow.
It took work. It took trial and error.
[mary-ann] being an early farmer was quite rubbish.
You were more likely to be hungry, you had to work harder,
You died younger, your kids were more likely to die.
And for the years that you did survive,
You probably didn't have that great a diet.
[narrator] despite the challenges faced
By the early farmers of atlit yam,
Their perfectly preserved remains suggests
They were mostly fit and healthy.
But, the pathologists have identified
An unusual medical condition among the adult population.
I'm entering through the middle ear
Through the external ear.
And what you see here is the internal wall
Of the middle ear.
And we see on this wall, we see a lot of bony growth,
And bone remodeling,
Which indicate that there was chronic infection in the ear.
And it wasn't just once,
It could be a repetitive disease
That this individual suffered again and again
Throughout their life.
[narrator] these marks are evidence of a condition
Called auditory exostosis.
And a high percentage of the adult males
From atlit yam suffered from it.
These days it's more community known as surfers' ear,
And it's found in people who spend large amounts
Of time in the sea.
Atlit yam survived because the settlers
Were harvesting the ocean.
This may be the oldest fishing village on earth.
To be intensively engaged in seafaring, in fishing,
This is something which is very new,
And from here onwards people start using
The sea more intensively.
So they were the pioneers, they were the first to do it.
[narrator] the physical evidence in the bodies
Marries up with the archeological evidence
Found at the settlement.
More than 6,000 fish bones were discovered
Discarded across the site.
The villagers were supplementing their food resources by fishing.
And the seabed excavation is revealing
The tricks of their trade.
You can see here the weight nets.
These are heavy weights that were used to anchor
The ends of the net.
This is a fishing hook, and these are spatulas.
This is probably for sewing nets.
[narrator] the early settlers developed a range
Of fishing techniques.
And their remains again reveal the lengths they went to.
We can see how the tooth is actually completely ruined.
And this is a pattern we see in most of the people
That were found in atlit yam.
By looking at the tooth wear,
We can see how they used their tooth.
Probably to create or prepare some tools,
Maybe nets for fishing.
[narrator] 9,000 years ago,
While many early farming settlements
Were struggling for survival,
Atlit yam was feasting on a bounty of treats
Harvested from the land and sea.
Even today their diet is widely acknowledged
As the gold standard in nutrition.
The mediterranean diet.
[mary-ann] so, the modern mediterranean diet
Is considered to be
A kind of a light and healthy way of living.
So lots of fruit and vegetables, whole grains,
Legumes, lean meat and fish
And not too much saturated fat.
And this was established in the 1960s,
Partly as a health fad,
But actually underpinned by science,
Because it is good for the human body to eat
That kind of range of whole foods,
And to have that low level of saturated fat
And a broad plant-based diet.
[narrator] with an ocean full of fish,
Fields bursting with crops, and plentiful water,
Life was good for the people of atlit yam.
But it wasn't to last.
The climate that had given them paradise
On earth was changing.
And atlit yam was about to be caught in a devastating battle
Between humans and nature.
The chance discovery of one of the world's
Oldest stone circles,
And the remains of the people who built it,
Are helping experts unlock the secrets of a tradition
That would spread throughout the ancient world.
[mary-ann] when we look at the range of monumental structures,
Including 50,000 stone circles that have been built
Across europe, including stonehenge,
Perhaps the pinnacle of complexity
In stone circle construction,
There is a linking factor,
Which is this connection between people and the land,
And powers that are greater than their own.
[narrator] the investigation of atlit yam's stonehenge,
Now submerged just off the coast of israel,
Is revealing how this one community of early farmers
Successfully negotiated the world 9,000 years ago.
[karen] they grew crops, they domesticated and raised animals,
And they still supplemented their diet
With some hunting and with a great deal of fishing.
[narrator] compared to many other neolithic farming
Communities, the people of atlit yam were living
A life of plenty.
But eventually the settlers in this fertile land
Were forced to abandon their homes,
And their stone circle.
And ehud galili's investigation has revealed
A desperate battle between the early farmers
And the forces of nature.
The clues come from the life-giving wells
On the edge of the settlement.
We were surprised to find,
In the upper layers of the well, it was full of garbage.
We found hundreds of animal bones.
It was an enigma.
[narrator] the resource these early farmers had engineered
And were dependent on for survival,
Was being contaminated.
Further investigation revealed the garbage
Wasn't the only anomaly in the well.
We excavated one of them, all the way down,
About five and a half meters.
And then we found layers of stone
In the middle of the well.
Huge stones were dumped there in the middle of the well.
[narrator] excavations of other wells
Across the settlement revealed they too had been filled
With large stones first, followed by garbage.
Carbon dating suggests these strange modifications
Occurred around 5,000 bc.
And this date is key.
Because the end of the ice age was beginning
To change life for the worst at atlit yam.
[anjana] so for those communities
Living at atlit yam,
Sea levels would have gradually started to rise,
Because we were really at the end of the last ice age.
So these ice sheets had collapsed.
They were releasing meltwater into the oceans,
And those communities were experiencing
The tail end of those natural processes.
[narrator] as sea levels began to rise,
Saltwater began seeping into the freshwater wells
Nearest the sea.
The villagers worked out that salt water
Was heavier than freshwater,
So they used stones to raise the bottom of the wells,
Pushing the freshwater higher.
[ehud] so they did it twice.
Two attempts to dump these stones into the well,
Trying to solve the problem,
And then when it was no use anymore
Because sea level continued to rise,
They turned the well into a garbage pit.
[narrator] in spite of the settlers' ingenious solution,
One by one the wells closest to the coast
Were put out of action.
Atlit yam's water supply was slowly but relentlessly
Being poisoned by the ocean, as it drew ever closer.
Having become the blueprint
For successful farming and survival,
The fertile paradise of atlit yam
Lost its battle with nature.
[anjana] when we looked at the data records
For sea level rise at that time,
The indications were that sea levels were rising
By about 13 millimeters a year.
And we know that atlit yam now sits beneath sea level
By about 12 meters.
So we can calculate that within the lifetime
Of a community member living at that time,
So possibly 67 years,
The whole community would have been submerged
Under a meter of sea water.
Their life was slowly being washed away.
People realize that sea level is rising.
They faced the consequences,
And they tried to adapt themselves.
The adaptation is what we see in the well.
But eventually the cost was too high.
[dramatic music]
[narrator] along with countless other communities
Along the coast, the people of atlit yam
Were forced to leave their homes.
While there are no historical records of this mass exodus
Caused by rising sea levels,
Ehud galili believes the traumatic events
Could have been the basis for a legendary biblical tale.
[ehud] so there may be a possibility that the inundation
Of these sites were kept in the memory,
And from this maybe the biblical stories of noah,
Maybe there is an association.
[narrator] theological scholars suspect
Many biblical stories are rooted in real life events.
Could it be that noah's ark was based in reality,
Passed on through word mouth from generation to generation,
Until it was finally written down in the bible
Thousands of years later?
When you look at biblical stories like noah's ark,
There are always echoes of real human experiences
Of loss, of death,
Of the mighty and terrifying power of nature.
[narrator] according to the scriptures,
Noah saved a mating pair of every land animal
Before god sent a flood to destroy the world.
The fact that life had to change because the sea was rising,
That does feed into human stories about
The power of water
And the fact that it can both save your life,
Give life, but also take life away.
[dramatic music]
[narrator] atlit yam and its stone circle was left
To the mercy of the sea, as the farmers fled inland.
And their farming practices and beliefs traveled with them.
Now cutting-edge science may help to reveal
How far they went,
And the monuments atlit yam's stone circle
May have ultimately inspired.
[dramatic music]
The discovery of a 9,000-year-old settlement,
Off the coast of israel,
Has revealed a fight for survival,
As early farmers battled with rising sea levels.
It was a battle the settlers lost,
Forcing them to abandon their homes,
And their remarkable stone circle.
The amazing thing about atlit yam is that it flooded
And has been preserved by the sea.
That is an absolute gift to us as archeologists.
[narrator] the incredible preservation has revealed
That the community at atlit yam had successfully pioneered
A blueprint for a long and healthy life,
While also developing early religious rituals
Based at the stone circle.
When the community was forced to leave,
Their traditions left with them.
[karen] the emergence of monumental structures
With no apparently practical function
Points really strongly to ritual activity.
And we see a huge flowering of this kind
Of ceremonial architecture simultaneously
With the emergence of agriculture.
[narrator] over the next four-and-half thousand years,
Farming spread,
From the fertile crescent, to as far as the british isles.
As farming spread, stone circles spread as well.
So is it possible that britain's stonehenge,
Regarded as the most sophisticated stone
Circle ever built,
Was the final evolution of a concept
That originated in atlit yam?
It's intriguing to think whether there is a link
Between those two sites,
And maybe that's where the seed of the idea first grew.
[narrator] at atlit yam the stone circle consisted
Of just seven stones in an eight-foot diameter circle.
By the time stonehenge was completed,
It measured 330 feet across,
Comprised of more than 100 stones,
The heaviest weighing 30 tons.
The difference is staggering.
But archeologists can see a direct connection
Between this awe inspiring pre-historic site,
And the remains of atlit yam.
The stones at stonehenge were erected around 2,500 bc.
The stone circle that was found at atlit yam
Was constructed probably about 5,000 years earlier.
And even though atlit yam is small and simple,
Maybe atlit yam represents a first iteration
Of building circles in stone and what that might mean.
[narrator] archeological evidence has shown that,
Just like atlit yam,
Stonehenge was a center for ritual activity.
But many believe the alignment of the stones
Also mark the longest and shortest days of the year,
Making stonehenge an early calendar that marked out
The passing of the seasons.
Could this also have been a function that was pioneered
On earlier monuments at sites like atlit yam?
[karen] elsewhere in the world, we know that stone circles
Have a very strong calendrical purpose.
They link to the movement of the sun and the moon
And the seasons.
And so it's quite possible that this circle at atlit yam,
Also was a reminder, a calendar of sorts.
[clive] maybe there is a comparison to be made,
But of course it's a jump because there's many, many
Thousands of years in between that.
But I think it's an enticing possibility.
[narrator] now, modern astronomy programs allow
Archeologists, like stonehenge expert clive ruggles,
To wind back time and visualize how the sky
Once looked above atlit yam.
Now the positions where the stars
Rise and set changes a lot.
But as far as the sun rise, the solstices,
That also moves, but much less.
[narrator] recreating the sun's movement
Above atlit yam's stone circle on a summer solstice
9,000 years ago produces an intriguing result.
It suggests there could be a connection between
The circle's alignment and the sunset.
The megalithic structure, this semi-circle opening out,
Is opening out broadly to the northwest.
And that northwesterly direction is pretty close
To where the sun would have set
Around the longest day of the year,
Which leaves the enticing possibility that
That was of significance to the builders
Or some of the people that used that place.
[narrator] the pioneering early settlers of atlit yam
May have invented the original farming calendar.
In time the stone circle was lost to the sea,
But the evidence suggests the farming practices
And rituals developed at atlit yam lived on
And spread far and wide.
Now modern science can track just how far
Atlit yam's influence reached.
Farming first appears in britain around 4,000 b.C.
And for a long time, archeologists have wondered
Whether that's native people who pick up the idea of
Farming and then try it out for themselves,
Or whether it's actually new people
Bringing their farming culture with them.
And in 2019, a team were able to do ancient dna analysis,
So that they could actually track the genetic spread
And work out where these neolithic farmers
Were from, what their ancestry was.
[narrator] the results from the bones
Of 67 neolithic farmers from across britain,
Including near stonehenge,
Reveal an astonishing connection.
The people who make up the neolithic farming population
Of britain and ireland weren't native british.
They traveled through the mediterranean countries
And then ultimately ended up in the british isles.
[narrator] incredibly, britain's first farmers
Were descendants of the people who farmed,
And then abandoned, the earliest settlements
On the fertile crescent.
[mary-ann] the ground-breaking research with the ancient dna
Really indicates unequivocally this transition
Of not just ideas, but people with a whole package
Of culture and a way of life.
[narrator] a tradition that started with modest ritual sites
Like the one found in atlit yam
Spread and evolved over millennia.
Four and a half thousand years later,
Descendants of the world's first farmers had traveled far.
And in britain, they set to work,
Building the ultimate evolution of the stone circle.
Stonehenge.
[clive] the big stones were brought to stonehenge
Around 2,500 b.C.
That's 4,500 years ago.
Double that, you get 9,000 years ago.
That's around the time when the stones
Were being put up in that megalithic structure
At atlit yam.
Twice as old as stonehenge. That's incredible.
[mary-ann] it's extraordinary to think that
When you're looking at a little site in the near east
And you see a circular stone monument,
You have to wonder is that what emigrated out
Of those first farming communities?
They brought their seeds and they brought their cattle,
But they also brought
Stonehenge.