MYSTERIES of Avebury are being unravelled as a new virtual reality tour takes visitors back thousands of years to see how the stones might have looked when originally built.

Visitors put on a headset with earphones and use games console-style controllers to move among the stones.

The sounds of sheep grazing, and rituals being performed can be heard as users get the chance to guide themselves and even fly over the stone circles.

A nine-month project has been carried out by Bournemouth University with Avebury to create a 360 degree world of what Avebury might have been like 4000 years ago.

The project team now need members of the public to get involved and have their say about looking at the ancient area through a new lens.

Liz Falconer is part of the team funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to construct the virtual world. She said: “We want to find out how we can use this immersive technology to give visitors a better experience of sites like Avebury.

“For us it allows us to do things that we wouldn’t be able to in real life, for example move the stones or move houses that have since been built to get an idea of the view of the landscape.”

Ros Cleal is curator of the Alexander Keiller Museum at Avebury. She said: “It was really interesting for me because as an archaeologist I always had an idea in my mind how I thought Avebury would have looked like in the past.

“One thing that struck me with the headset is the absolute scale at ground level and how many stones there are. Looking through the virtual reality makes you realise we might not have such a good idea as we think we do about the site and will always be learning.

“When the university was putting together the virtual reality world they were mainly working from published sources. By working with us they were able to ask us if they were right or if any of their work contradicted what we knew about the site.”

The virtual reality tour is free to take part in, but on some days requires booking, which can be done through the Bournemouth University website https://tinyurl.com/virtual-avebury.