It has been over 40 years since any significant excavation have been done at Stonehenge, but during the spring of 2009, that changed when Timothy Darvill, professor of archaeology at Bournemouth University, and Geoffrey Wainwright, president of the Society of Antiquaries of London, headed a new dig in the monument's inner circle.

The pair hoped to prove that Stonehenge was "primarily a sacred place of healing, where the sick came to be cured and the injured and infirm restored." The pair base their theory on the discovery of rock formations near the origins of the famous blue stones. Some areas showed evidence of water dams used to create pools. Darvill and Wainwright matched this with the writing of Geoffrey of Monmouth who, speaking of Stonehenge, "noted that the medicinal powers of Stonehenge's stones were stimulated by pouring water over them for the sick to bathe in."