In what era did megalithic structures appear. Notable megalithic structures

On a surface the globe, with the exception of Australia, there are many mysterious and ancient buildings. Modern research showed that they were erected in the Neolithic, Eneolithic and Previously it was believed that they all represent one common culture, but today more and more scientists are questioning this theory.

So, by whom and why were such megalithic structures? Why do they have this or that form and what do they mean? Where can you see these monuments? ancient culture?

Before considering and studying megalithic structures, you need to understand what elements they can consist of. Today it is considered to be the smallest unit of constructions of this type of megalith. This term was officially introduced into scientific terminology in 1867, at the suggestion of the English specialist A. Herbert. The word "megalith" is Greek, translated into Russian means "big stone".

An exact and exhaustive definition of what megaliths are does not yet exist. Today, this concept refers to ancient structures made of stone blocks, slabs or simple blocks of various sizes without the use of any cementing or binding compounds and solutions. The simplest type of megalithic structures, consisting of only one block, are menhirs.

The main features of megalithic structures

In different eras, different peoples erected huge structures from big stones, blocks and slabs. Temple in Baalbek and Egyptian pyramids are also megaliths, they are simply not customary to call them that. Thus, megalithic structures are various structures created by different ancient civilizations and consisting of large stones or slabs.

However, all structures that are considered megaliths have a number of features that unite them:

1. They are all made of stones, blocks and slabs giant size, whose weight can range from several tens of kilograms to hundreds of tons.

2. Ancient megalithic structures were built from rocks that were strong and resistant to destruction: limestone, andesites, basalts, diorites and others.

3. During construction, no cement was used - neither in the mortar for fastening, nor for the manufacture of blocks.

4. In most buildings, the surface of the blocks from which they are composed is carefully processed, and the blocks themselves are tightly fitted to each other. The accuracy is such that a knife blade cannot be inserted between two megalithic blocks of volcanic rocks.

5. Quite often, the preserved fragments of megalithic structures were used by later civilizations as a foundation for their own buildings, which is clearly seen in the buildings on Jerusalem.

When were they created?

Most of the megalithic sites located in the UK, Ireland and other countries Western Europe, date back to the V-IV millennium BC. e. The most ancient megalithic structures located on the territory of our country date back to the 4th-2nd millennia BC.

All diversity megalithic buildings can be conditionally divided into two large groups:

• funeral;
• non-funeral
• profane;
• sacred.

If everything is more or less clear with funerary megaliths, then scientists are building hypotheses about the purpose of profane structures, such as various gigantic calculations of walls and roads, combat and residential towers.

There is no accurate and reliable information about how ancient people used sacred megalithic structures: menhirs, cromlechs and others.

What are they like?

The most common types of megaliths are:

• menhirs - single, vertically installed stele stones up to 20 meters high;
• cromlech - the union of several menhirs around the largest, forming a semicircle or circle;
• dolmens - the most common type of megaliths in Europe, are one or more large stone slabs laid on other blocks or boulders;
• covered gallery - one of the varieties of dolmens interconnected;
• trilit - a stone structure consisting of two or more vertical and one horizontally laid stones on top of them;
• taula - a stone structure in the form of the Russian letter "T";
• cairn, also known as "gurii" or "tour" - an underground or ground structure, laid out in the form of a cone of many stones;
• stone rows are vertically and parallel blocks of stone;
• seid - a stone boulder or block, installed by one or another people in special place, as a rule, on a hill, for various mystical ceremonies.

Only the most famous types of megalithic structures are listed here. Let's take a closer look at some of them.

Translated from Breton into Russian, it means "stone table".

As a rule, it consists of three stones, one of which lies on two vertically installed ones, in the form of the letter "P". During the construction of such structures, ancient people did not adhere to any single scheme, therefore there are many options for dolmens that carry various functions. The most famous megalithic structures of this type are located on the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts of Africa and Europe, in India, Scandinavia, and the Caucasus.

Trilith

One of the subspecies of the dolmen, consisting of three stones, scientists consider trilith. As a rule, such a term is applied not to separately located megaliths, but to monuments that are constituent parts more complex structures. For example, in the famous megalithic complex, like Stonehenge, the central part consists of five triliths.

Another type of megalithic buildings is the cairn, or tour. This is a cone-shaped mound of stones, although in Ireland this name means a structure of only five stones. They can be located both on the surface of the earth and under it. In scientific circles, cairn most often means megalithic structures located underground: labyrinths, galleries and burial chambers.

Ancient and simplest form megalithic structures - menhirs. These are single, vertically massive boulders or stones. Menhirs differ from ordinary, natural stone blocks by their surface with traces of processing and by the fact that their vertical size is always larger than the horizontal one. They can either stand alone or be part of complex megalithic complexes.

In the Caucasus, menhirs were shaped like fish and called vishap. On the territory modern France, in the Crimea and the Black Sea region, quite a lot of anthropomorphic magalites - stone women - have been preserved.

Post-megalithic menhirs are also runic stones and stone crosses created much later.

Cromlech

Several menhirs, set in the form of a semicircle or circle and covered with stone slabs on top, are called cromlechs. The most famous example is Stonehenge.

However, in addition to round ones, there are cromlechs and rectangular ones, as, for example, in Morbihan or Khakassia. On the island of Malta, the cromlech temple complexes are built in the form of "petals". To create such megalithic structures, not only stone was used, but also wood, which was confirmed by the finds obtained during archaeological work V English county Norfolk.

"Flying Stones of Lapland"

The most common megalithic structures in Russia, strange as it may sound, are seids - huge boulders mounted on small stands. Sometimes the main block is decorated with one or more small stones, folded into a "pyramid". This type of megaliths is widespread from the shores of Onega and Ladoga lakes up to the coast of the Barents Sea, that is, throughout the whole part of Russia.

On and in Karelia, there are seids ranging in size from several tens of centimeters to six meters and weighing from tens of kilograms to several tons, depending on rock from which they were made. In addition to the Russian North, quite a few megaliths of this type are found in the taiga regions of Finland, northern and central Norway, and the mountains of Sweden.

Seids can be single, group and massive, including from a dozen to several hundred megaliths.

In addition to . All photos were taken on the territory of the former USSR

Megaliths, huge structures made of massive stone blocks, are also found in our country. There are a lot of similar structures in Russia, but they are not known like the famous Stonehenge in Great Britain or
Ollantaytambo in Peru. We will get acquainted with the ancient megalithic structures found on the territory of Russia further.

First
where to start the journey is Mount Vottovaara - the highest point
West Karelian Upland - 417.3 m above sea level. Square
mountains 6 sq. km.
The place is just full strange artifacts after which
you begin to think about ancient highly developed technologies for
stoneworking, let's take a better look at the photo.

Mount Vottovaara.
Scattered blocks of megaliths.

The middle block was cut at an angle of 90 degrees or a game of nature?

How
as if they had conducted a laser :) geologists believe that cracks and faults,
formed as a result of a strong earthquake about 9 thousand years
back. The smooth planes of the stones are the result of the properties of the local rock -
quartzite, the structure of which sets such even planes at
split.

So is it nature or man-made? Let's take a closer look.

More
it looks like perfectly sawn blocks tightly fitted to each other.
It is difficult to imagine an ancient ancestor with a copper chisel that is somewhere on
mountain grinds such even blocks.

Good angle, perfectly flat wall.

Who lost the ball?

Here, obviously, high technologies for stone processing could not have been done, or is it still a game of nature? :)

Ural. Ridge Kvarkush

Mount Pidan.
At first glance, it looks like an unremarkable pile of stones of a cracked rock.

But coming closer, it becomes more like a megalithic masonry.

Looking
between blocks, where the stones were less affected by erosion from
wind and rain, one can see man-made and how smooth edges have been preserved.

In the place where the junction of the blocks parted, you can see an even saw cut and the technology of laying these blocks opens before us.

Some blocks reach tens of tons in weight.

Despite the colossal destruction, many of the fragments are well enough preserved to be classified as building materials.

And this is all nature has created, as scientists say.

This is most likely a product of the natural processes of stone formation and its uneven erosion. Inclusions of different density can manifest themselves as a result of greater wear resistance.
More like flowing stone wax)

Stone town in the Perm region.
By
version of scientists, Stone City is the mouth of the river that flowed into the Perm
sea ​​millions of years ago, this explains it beautifully and evenly, under
right angles, carved stones, their neat laying and
perpendicular to each other "ducts" "mouths".

Stone city.

See what smooth sides of the megaliths, as if cut down.

Again, the old method is to look between the blocks inside the masonry, look at the far block in the center, an even cut along the entire length of the block.

They say somewhere Kola Peninsula This pool is carved right into the rock.

On South Western Siberia in the mountainous Shoria in the Mezhdurechensk region there is a small geological settlement called Kameshki.
IN
Several educated talented geologists live in this village. This
Alexander Bespalov, Vyacheslav Pochetkin and others. These people all their lives
did research mountain systems Western Siberia. One day they
came across strange megalithic structures in the mountains, which, for
could not explain themselves. These were walls made of giant
stone blocks and strange buildings with vertically mounted
stone obelisks. On the Internet, they contacted Georgy Sidorov,
so the first expedition was assembled.

Mountain Shoria.
Some
the granite blocks below were made of red granite, crowned them
blocks of gray granite, and above lay a polygonal masonry of various
blocks, both red granite and gray.

Granite
in some places melted from exposure to enormous temperatures and
flow under the weight of the upper rows. Kungurov would say about this that it is
traces of melting from a thermonuclear explosion :)

The wall is composed of polygonal masonry of multi-colored blocks.

The size of the blocks is impressive, according to one version, the find is a man-made structure over 100 thousand years old.

On
photo Georgy Sidorov, in his opinion, all this is a megalithic structure
may be the ruins of an ancient power plant or power plant,
which translated seismic energy into some other.

Again
looking inside the masonry where the blocks were less prone to erosion, one can see
smooth straight edges, see how the two blocks lie tightly, it's better here
visible handicraft.

Polygonal masonry.

Mountain Shoria. Huge blocks.
on
Department of Radiophysics at Tomsk State University
showed pictures on the screen, talked about different types of
masonry, about stone castles that hold giant granite blocks together
and not a single learned physicist said that all this has a natural
origin. What surprised them most was how the ancients could raise
giant stone blocks to a height of more than 1000 meters and there
install them on a special platform.

Then
in the Tomsk branch of the Russian Geographical Society, photographs were studied by geologists and geographers. AND
both came to the conclusion that the presented artifacts are
man-made.

Sklyarova
asked to comment on the find. And what did he say? What all
found artifacts are nothing but cracked at a right angle
rocks. That there is nothing man-made here. Just a game of nature, nothing more.
After these words, I am not surprised why LAI does not study Russian megaliths.

Between blocks.

For comparison, on the left is the megalith in Baalbek, on the right is the megalith in the mountain Shoria, it looks like the author is the same :)

Mount Shaman near the village. Nizhnetambovskoye, Khabarovsk Territory.

Ancient megalithic masonry.

Again, between the blocks, man-made and straight lines are better visible.

Big block megalith.

A large block of megaliths on small stones, this is done for better seismic resistance.

Megalithic masonry resembles Mountain Shoria.

Kabardino-Balkaria, a cave in the Baksan Gorge.
At first
you need to squeeze into a hole measuring 40 by 120 cm, then go down to
rope along a narrow vertical shaft. It is formed by two parallel
stone slabs. After 9 meters - the first "knee": the hole goes to the side and
immediately drops down again. Already here you will be covered by absolute silence -
no sound comes from outside. Another 23 meters deep - and new
"knee". To reach the bottom of the cave, you need to overcome more than 80 meters,
and it will take an hour. But, having passed the "bottleneck", you
you will find yourself in a huge room, which the researchers called the "flask".
Inside we will see processed walls made of tuff and granite, built of
different-sized, tightly fitted polished megaliths.

Descent into the cave.

The edges of the blocks and the seams between them are clearly visible.

The even masonry is striking and the seams are clearly adjusted to each other.

The trihedral blocks parted a little.

Barely visible block seams on the left crescent wall and on the wall behind it.

how do you like the seams?

Rotate the cave at an angle of 90 degrees. Two large megalithic blocks stand on top of each other.

Technologies
stone processing is amazing, and even more amazing is the comment of the boss
section of the Kabardino-Balkarian geological exploration expedition Vera
Davidenko, but she is a realist and believes that nature is capable of doing everything
conclusion: “Tuff is an accumulation of ejection products of a volcano -
ash, lava fragments, volcanic glass and, to a small extent,
fragments of rocks that make up the walls of the crater. Ejection material at
accumulation was hot and therefore cracks formed during solidification
separately - that is, the entire tuff massif turned out to be, as it were, divided into
blocks. The depression discovered near the village of Zayukovo represents
is one of such gravitational separation cracks, for which
flat contact surfaces are characteristic, ”but this is the head
geological exploration expedition, she probably knows better.

Structure diagram.

A bit of fantasy for the finale) Arakul Shikhan, a strange structure in the middle of the forest. I have everything, kick :)

Fossilized litas with ripples along the banks of Rassokha.

Sayan megaliths. Kuturchinskoye Belogorye:

Does anyone need to explain that these are not remnants, but the REMAINS of structures of an ancient civilization unknown to us?

Hope you can see for yourself. No need to comment?

This,. of course it's difficult. It is hard to imagine what this structure looked like before, but you can imagine how thousands, tens of thousands of years, day after day, skalfs were sharpened by wind, sand, water, temperature changes, lighting changes, glaciers, earthquakes (the area is seismically active, there are even dormant volcano). Sharp corners were ground down, straight edges were smoothed out, and now we see what we see.

The climate in these places is very harsh, in such a climate, Machu Picchu would have remained the same as in this photo, I have no doubt about it.

Complete this arch mentally, and imagine a vaulted ceiling above your head. Are the dimensions of the "corridor" impressive?

Built absolutely in accordance with the technology of seismic resistance, which is used in Mesoamerican megalithic structures, and in the "temple" in the Middle East: Small blocks at the base, larger ones are laid on them, and it doesn't matter on top. Small ones work like a shock absorber, and polygonal masonry is the best invention of masons of all time. It can be destroyed only by breaking off piece by piece, or powerful explosion, after which a kurumnik appears in place of the monolith - stone river from the wreckage.

These structures are also so poorly identified as "man-made" because they have been subjected to powerful influences from changes in the landscape itself. Mountains "breathe", constantly changing heights and deviations from the horizontal.

Pay attention to the sun... yes! The same "Megandavid", which is considered to be a symbol of Judaism!

Only the supporting pillars have been preserved.

The term "megaliths" (English - megaliths) comes from the Greek words μέγας - large, λίθος - stone. Megaliths are structures made of stone blocks or blocks, from different rocks, of various modifications, sizes and shapes, combined and installed in such an order that these blocks / blocks represent a single monumental structure.

Stone blocks in megalithic structures weigh from a few kilograms to hundreds and even thousands of tons. Individual structures are so huge and unique that it is not at all clear how they were built. Also in the scientific world there is no consensus regarding the technologies of the ancient builders.

Some megaliths seemed to be carved (processed) with some tools, some objects seemed to be cast from liquid materials, and some objects have traces of clearly artificial processing of unknown technologies.

Megalithic culture is represented in absolutely all countries of the world, on land and under water (and…probably not only on our planet..). The age of megaliths is different, the main period of megalithic construction is determined from the 8th to the 1st millennium BC, although some objects have a much more ancient origin, which is often denied by official science. Widely represented megalithic monuments and later period - 1-2 millennium AD.

Classification and types of megaliths

According to their classification, megaliths are divided into separate categories:

• megalithic complexes (ancient cities, settlements, temples, fortress-forts, ancient
• observatories, palaces, towers, walls, etc.);
• pyramids and pyramidal mountain complexes;
• mounds, ziggurats, kofuns, cairns, tumuluses, tombs, galleries, chambers, etc.;
• dolmens, triliths, etc.;
• menhirs (standing stones, stone alleys, statues, etc.);
• seids, blue stones, tracker stones, cup stones, altar stones, etc.;
• stones / rocks with ancient images - petroglyphs;
• rock, cave and underground structures;
• stone labyrinths (surads);
• geoglyphs;
• and etc.

There are many hypotheses about the purpose of megaliths, however, there are some features that are characteristic of many megaliths of the world, regardless of their classification, modification, size, etc. - this is their external similarity, location (geolocation), geophysical characteristics and belonging to some highly developed civilizations. The study of (sites of) megaliths by methods of geophysics and dowsing began in the 20th century. During the studies, it was absolutely precisely established that the places for the construction of megaliths were not chosen by chance, very often megaliths are located at places (near) dowsing anomalies (in geopathogenic zones of different frequencies - near or on a tectonic fault in the earth's crust).

Thus, it can be assumed that the generator of these waves of different frequencies are tectonic faults, and stone structures in this case, they play the role of multifunctional acoustic devices resonating with this frequency.

It turns out that megaliths can influence human bioenergetics! This allows you to effectively correct the human biofield by influencing both its energy points of the body and individual systems.

In ancient times, dedicated priests were engaged in such practices, and this was practiced with the help of various rites and rituals.

With the help of stones, ancient priests, shamans, healers communicated with the spirits of departed ancestors, with the gods, received answers they were interested in, treated illnesses, etc., and also made offerings-requirements (not sacrifices, which appeared later and most likely not by the creators of megaliths). Knowledge about this was first distorted, then completely erased.

Almost everywhere near the megaliths there was or is water (any reservoir, stream, spring, etc.)! Often the orientation of megaliths is just directed towards the water, this is especially clearly seen in the example of most of the dolmens Krasnodar Territory, which in turn, not without reason, are the standard in the dolmen structure.

It is also worth mentioning the orientation of many megaliths to the cardinal points, taking into account some astronomical features.

Often, when studying megaliths, one gets the impression that over time the builders somehow lost the ability to build stone buildings and over time, megaliths became like only distant copies of the original structures.

Perhaps, for some reason, the ancients lost that knowledge and technology, and most importantly, the need for megalith building was also lost over time.

However, despite the time, megalith building in the world continues to exist. Even today in Sumatra (Indonesia), people continue to create funerary stone monuments outwardly similar to ancient megaliths, thus preserving the memory and customs of their ancestors.

In many places of the world, traditions, legends and stories have been preserved that many megaliths are associated with the reincarnations of dead people.

Many megaliths are closely related to astrology, in connection with this, a new direction of researchers of antiquities has arisen - archaeoastronomy. It is archaeoastronomers who are engaged in the study of the astronomical aspect in megalithic construction. It was archaeoastronomers who proved many hypotheses regarding the purpose of many ancient stone structures.

Some megalithic structures were created to determine the major solar and lunar cycles of the year. These objects served as calendars and observatories for observing celestial bodies.

Megaliths - a legacy of ancient civilizations

Unfortunately, in our time, in all corners of the world, for various reasons, the trend of destroying ancient monuments continues, but all over the world, new finds of ancient structures also continue to be discovered.

Many studies and the objects themselves are stubbornly hushed up by official departments, or dates are deliberately incorrectly determined and the reports and conclusions of scientists are falsified, because. many objects simply do not fit into the generally accepted chronology of our civilization.

Megaliths are the very objects that connect us with the distant past, with the deep past, and it can definitely be argued that they have not yet revealed all their secrets to people ...

To be honest, I did not hesitate for a second when choosing a topic. It is so interesting, multifaceted, not a single generation of scientists, archaeologists, researchers thought about it. It is interesting to me that so far no tools have been found that could be used to cut huge blocks of stone with such incredible accuracy, nor what they were delivered to the installation site and according to what laws they installed. Their meaning is also not clearly known: some are inclined to occultism, for example, H. P. Blavatsky, others believe that thanks to them, electromagnetic waves and energy were transmitted, there are even energy cards, but more on that later. You are reading this work and do not understand what it is about.

What are megaliths

Megaliths (from the Greek ????? - large, ????? - stone) - structures made of huge stone blocks, characteristic mainly of the final Neolithic and Eneolithic (IV-III millennium BC. . in Europe, or later in Asia and Africa). The term was proposed in 1849 by the English researcher A. Herbert in the book Cyclops Christianus, and in 1867 it was officially adopted at a congress in Paris. The term is not exhaustive, therefore, a vague group of buildings falls under the definition of megaliths and megalithic structures. In particular, the so-called hewn stones large sizes, including those not used for the construction of burials and monuments.

Categories of megaliths

All megaliths can be divided into two categories: The first includes the most ancient architectural structures of prehistoric (pre-literate) societies (temples of the island of Malta, menhirs, cromlechs, dolmens). For them, either not processed at all, or with minimal processing, stones were used. The cultures that left these monuments are called megalithic. Often megaliths include structures made of rather small stones (mazes), and individual stones with petroglyphs (sledoviki). Some structures of more advanced societies (the tombs of the Japanese emperors and the dolmens of the Korean nobility) also carry a similar architectural aesthetic.

The second category is represented by buildings of more developed architecture, largely consisting of very large stones, which are usually given a geometrically regular shape. They are typical for early states, but were built in later times. In the Mediterranean, for example, these are the pyramids of Egypt, the buildings of the Mycenaean culture, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. IN South America-- some structures in Tiwanaku, Sacsayhuaman, Ollantaytambo.

The term is not exhaustive, therefore, a rather vague group of buildings falls under the definition of megaliths and megalithic structures. In particular, hewn stones of large sizes, including those not used for the construction of burials and monuments, are called megaliths.

A separate group is represented by megalithic structures, that is, objects largely consisting of megaliths. They are distributed throughout the world. In Europe, for example, this is Stonehenge, structures Cretan-Mycenaean culture or Egypt. In South America - Machu Picchu, Puma Punku, Ollantaytambo, Pisac, Sacsayhuaman, Tiwanaku.

Their common characteristic feature is stone blocks weighing sometimes more than a hundred tons, often delivered from quarries located tens of kilometers away, sometimes with a large elevation difference relative to the construction site. At the same time, the stones are processed in such a way that it cannot enter the joint between the blocks razor blade .

As a rule, megalithic structures did not serve as housing, and from the period of construction to the present day, no records have come down about the technologies and purpose of construction. The absence of reliable written sources and the fact that all these structures have been significantly damaged under the influence of time make the task of their exhaustive study almost impossible, which, in turn, leaves a wide field for various conjectures.

The purpose of megaliths cannot always be established. For the most part they, according to some scholars, served for burials or were associated with a funeral cult. There are other opinions as well. Apparently, megaliths - community buildings(function - socializing). Their construction represented for primitive technology the most difficult task and required the unification of large masses of people.

Some megalithic structures, such as complex of more than 3000 stones in French Brittany), were important ceremonial centers associated with the cult of the dead. Other megalithic complexes have been used to determine the timing of astronomical events such as the solstice and equinox.

Megalithic structures are subject to a certain architectural design. By appearance researchers divide them into three groups: menhirs, dolmens, cromlechs. These words themselves came to us from the ancient Breton. It was the language of the inhabitants of Brittany, a peninsula in the northwest of France.

MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS IN BRITTANY

Brittany is, of course, a country of megaliths. It was from the words of the Breton language, at the end of the 17th century, that the names of the main types of megalithic buildings were compiled (dolmen: daol - table, men - stone; menhir: men - stone, hir - long; cromlech: kromm - rounded, lec'h - place). In Brittany, the era of megalithic construction began around 5000 BC. and ended around 2500 B.C. The builders of megaliths were not the autochthonous population of Armorica. They came from the shores of the Mediterranean, gradually moving northwest from the south and western coast The Iberian Peninsula, densely populating the coast of Morbihan, between the rivers Vilaine and Ethel, and then other lands of present-day Brittany, rising deep into the peninsula along the rivers and moving along the coast ...

DOLMENS

Dolmens are usually "boxes" made up of stone slabs, which are joined, sometimes, by long or short galleries. They were collective burial chambers, as evidenced by the remains of bones and votive treasures (ceramics, jewelry, axes made of polished stone). Dolmens could be either free-standing structures or be part of more complex structures. Let's consider some of them.

cairn

Cairn is an ensemble of galleries and chambers covered with earth on top, that is, in this case, the dolmens were, as it were, their skeleton. There are relatively many cairns in Brittany, but two of them, which are masterpieces of the megalithic architecture of the West, I would like to dwell on in more detail.

Built around 4700 BC, this prehistoric necropolis may have been destroyed in our time: it was deliberately turned into a stone quarry for tourist road in l955 and only the intervention of one of the most famous Breton archaeologists, Professor Pierre-Roland Giot (Giot), stopped this technocratic barbarity.
To be precise, the monument in Barnenaise is a structure of two cairns. It is, in total, 72 meters long and 20 to 25 meters wide and includes eleven dolmens (in this case, individual chambers) from each of which a gallery extends to the exit, from 7 to 12 meters long. The first cairn (A) was built around 4350 BC, and the second (B) around 4100 BC.

The necropolis in Barnenez is one of the most ancient architectural structures on Earth. Older than Stonehenge, New Grange, Egyptian pyramids...

Karin on the island of Gavrinis

This monument of megalithic art, built around 4000 BC, is remarkable for its interior design. The cairn itself is not complicated: a thirteen-meter corridor leads to the burial chamber. However, its walls are painted with amazing drawings, more abstract than concrete, carved in stone. Among the elements of the whimsical ornament there are spiral, cruciform and other elements.

covered alley

There is a variety of dolmens, which is called covered alleys. A covered alley is a series of dolmens that make up a gallery, which can end with a chamber not exceeding the width of the gallery, or with a blind end. It looks like this:

Dolmen with gallery

Unlike a covered alley, a dolmen with a gallery, such as the famous Table of Merchants (Table de Marchands) in Lokmarieker (pictured), is a round or square burial chamber, to which a long corridor leads, which is, so to speak, a passage from the world of the living world of the dead(and back probably :)). The plan of dolmens of this type can be supplemented by side rooms (the dolmen in Keriaval, near Ploirnel).

So, nothing is so different from a dolmen as another dolmen. Moreover, not all types of such structures are described here. There are also knee dolmens, transept - dolmens (cruciform) and some others. Frankly, some names had to be invented in the process of working on the article, since they simply do not exist in Russian, and literal translation from other languages ​​usually does not reflect the essence of the objects described here.

As we already know, dolmens are both crypts and tombstones, as evidenced by the bones and votive deposits (decorations, polished axes, ceramics, etc.) found there. We are talking about traces, burials, mostly collective, small or colossal, originally covered with stones (cairns) or earth (mounds), and undoubtedly equipped with additional wooden structures. Breton variations of dolmens are very numerous and their architecture has changed over time. The most ancient were big size, but the burial chambers in them were reduced; this suggests that they were intended for some of the most significant figures of the tribe. Over time, the volume of dolmens decreased, while the size of the burial chambers grew, and they became real collective graves. In the town of Chaussée-Tirancourt, in the Paris Basin, during the study of such a burial, archaeologists discovered about 250 skeletons. Unfortunately, in Brittany, the acidity of the soil often leads to the destruction of bones. In the Bronze Age, burials again become individual. Later, during the time of Roman rule, some dolmens were adapted to meet the religious needs of the conquerors, as evidenced by the numerous terracotta figurines of Roman deities found in them.

How were dolmens built? If we compare the heaviness and bulkiness of these stone structures with the technical arsenal of their creators, then we can only take our hats off to their perseverance and resourcefulness. It was almost like this...

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Outcome

Thus, we already know something about one of the types of megalithic architecture. It's time to move on to the next, no less interesting.

MENGIRS

Menhir is vertically dug into the ground stone pillar. Their height varies from 0.80 meters to 20. Menhirs standing alone are usually the highest. The “record holder” was Men-er-Hroech (Stone of the Fairies), from Lokmariaker (Morbihan), which was destroyed around 1727. Its largest fragment was 12 m, and in general, it reached 20 m in height, with an approximate weight of 350 tons. Currently, all the largest menhirs in France are located in Brittany:

- menhir in Kerloas (Finistere) - 12 m.

- menhir in Caelonan (Cote d'Armor) - 11.20 m.

- menhir in Pergale (Cote d'Armor) - 10.30 m.

There are also menhirs lined up in a line (let's call it conditionally rows of stones) sometimes in several parallel rows. The most grandiose ensemble of this kind is located in Karnak, and has about 3,000 (!) Menhirs

Carnac (Department of Morbihan)

Carnac is by far the most famous megalithic ensemble in Brittany and one of only two (along with Stonehenge) in the world. Brittany, and France, too, will not surprise you with a menhir, but Karnak strikes the imagination with an unthinkable concentration of these monuments in a relatively small area. Initially, there were about 10,000 (!) monuments of various sizes in the Karnak complex. In our time, there are approximately 3,000 of them left. This complex of megaliths (mainly cromlechs and menhirs) from the end of the Neolithic - the beginning bronze age(the end of the third - the second millennium BC) includes 3 megalithic systems:

Menek - West Side Karnak complex. Includes 1,099 menhirs in eleven lines, about 1200 meters long.

Kermario - about 1,000 menhirs in ten lines 1 km long. In the southwestern part, the ensemble is complemented by a dolmen.

Kerleskan - 555 menhirs in thirteen lines, the length of which is 280 meters. In the west, these lines are preceded by a cromlech of 39 stones. The height of the largest menhir in Kerleskan is 6.5 meters.

By 5000 BC, sites located on the island of Hoedic in Morbihan show the existence of small human groups living mainly by hunting, fishing and shellfish gathering. These human groups buried their dead, in some cases resorting to a special ritual. The deceased was supplied on the road not only with stone and bone products, shell decorations, but also crowned with something like a “crown” of deer antlers. During this era, called the Mesolithic, the sea level was about 20 meters lower than today. Starting from about 4500 BC, the first megaliths appear in Carnac (which was observed by that time in other areas of present-day Brittany).

Let's try to reconstruct the method of erecting menhirs:

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The purpose of menhirs, which are not tombstones, remains a mystery. Due to the lack of instructions for use left by the builders for future generations, archaeologists carefully manipulate several hypotheses. These hypotheses, which are not mutually exclusive, vary in each case and depend on a variety of factors: whether the menhirs are isolated or not; rows of stones are composed of one row or several, more or less parallel; menhirs oriented in a readable way, etc. Some may mark territory, point to graves, or refer to the cult of the waters.

But the hypothesis most often put forward concerns several large rows of stones oriented between east and west. There is an assumption that these are attributes of the solar-lunar cult, coupled with agricultural methods and astronomical observations, and gathering near them, large crowds of people, for example, during the winter and summer solstices. “The direction of some blocks according to privileged directions is amenable to analysis,” emphasizes Michel Le Goffy, a Breton archaeologist, and when cases repeat themselves, sometimes in a clearly traced system, one can rightfully think that this is not accidental. This is almost exactly the same in many cases, as in Saint-Just and Carnac. But doubts will always exist, due to the lack of direct evidence. Archaeological finds among the rows of stones are indeed very vague, some pottery and processed flints were found, but the remains of ritual fires dating from the same time as the construction of megaliths suggest that they were outside the habitation zone.

KROMLEHI

As an example of a cromlech, one can cite such a well-known building as Stonehenge.

Cromlechs are called ensembles of menhirs standing, most often, in a circle or semicircle and connected by stone slabs lying on top, however, there are menhirs assembled in a rectangle (as in Сrucuno, Morbihan). On the small island of Er Lannic, in the Gulf of Morbihan, there is a "double cromlech" (in the form of two adjoining circles).
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Comparative table of the number of megalithic structures in France and Brittany.