A megalith is a large stone that has been used to construct a prehistoric structure or monument, either alone or together with other stones. They are found worldwide, but more than 35,000 megalithic structures have been identified across Europe, ranging geographically from Sweden in the north to the Mediterranean Sea in the south.
The word was first used in 1849 by the British antiquarian Algernon Herbert in reference to StonehengeHerbert, A. Cyclops Christianus, or the supposed Antiquity of Stonehenge. London, J. Petheram, 1849. and derives from Ancient Greek μέγας (mégas), meaning "great", and λίθος (líthos), meaning "stone". Most extant megaliths were erected between the Neolithic period (although earlier Mesolithic examples are known) through the Chalcolithic period and into the Bronze Age.
Types and definitions
While "megalith" is often used to describe a single piece of stone, it also can be used to denote one or more rocks hewn in definite shapes for special purposes. It has been used to describe structures built by people from many parts of the world living in many different periods. The most widely known megaliths are not tombs.
Single stones
Menhir Menhir is the name used in Western Europe for a single upright stone erected in prehistoric times; sometimes called a "standing stone". Monolith A monolith is any single standing stone erected in prehistoric times. Capstone style Single megaliths placed horizontally, often over burial chambers, without the use of support stones.
Multiple stones Alignments Multiple megaliths placed in relation to each other with intention. Often placed in rows or spirals. Some alignments, such as the Carnac Stones in Brittany, France, consist of thousands of stones. Megalithic walls Also called Cyclopean walls Stone circles In most languages stone circles are called "cromlechs" (a word in the Welsh language); the word "cromlech" is sometimes used with that meaning in English. Dolmen A dolmen is a stone table, consisting of a wide stone supported by several other stonesDolman Glosarium Online. Retrieved 18 December 2022 Usually these were originally covered with earth and vegetation to form a mound with an accessible chamber beneath. Cist A cist is a small stone-built coffin-like box or ossuary used to hold the bodies of the dead. Burials are megalithic forms very similar to dolmens in structure. These types of burials were completely underground.
Timeline
Neolithic
9000 BC: Constructions in Asia Minor, Turkey (Göbekli Tepe, Nevalı Çori and other sites); a yet to be named culture (the oldest discovered ceremonial structures in the world). 7400 BC: A 12 m long monolith probably weighing around 15,000 kg found submerged 40 m under water in the Strait of Sicily south-west of Sicily. Its origin and purpose are unknown. 7000 BC: Construction in proto-Canaanite Israel (Atlit Yam). 6000 BC: Constructions in Portugal (Almendres Cromlech, Évora) – Possibly first standing stones in Portugal. 5000 BC: Emergence of the Atlantic Neolithic period, the age of agriculture along the western shores of Europe during the sixth millennium BC pottery culture of La Almagra, Spain nearby, perhaps precedent from Africa. 4800 BC: Constructions in Brittany, France (Barnenez) and Poitou (Bougon). 4500 BC: Constructions in south Egypt (Nabta Playa). 4300 BC: Constructions in south Spain (Dolmen de Alberite, Cádiz). 4300 BC: Kuyavian Pyramids, known as Polish Pyramids, enormous tombs, megalithic structures in Kuyavia, Poland 4000 BC: Constructions in Brittany (Carnac), Portugal (Great Dolmen of Zambujeiro, Évora), France (central and southern), Corsica, Spain (Galicia), England and Wales, Constructions in Andalusia, Spain (Villa Martín, Cádiz), Construction in proto-Canaanite Israel c. 4000~3000 BC: Constructions in the rest of the proto-Canaanite Levant, e.g. Rujm el-Hiri and dolmens. 3700 BC: Constructions in Ireland (Knockiveagh and elsewhere). 3600 BC: Constructions in Malta (Skorba temples). 3600 BC: Constructions in England (Maumbury Rings and Godmanchester), and Malta (Ġgantija and Mnajdra temples). 3500 BC: Constructions in Spain (Málaga and Guadiana), Ireland (south-west), France (Arles and the north), Malta (and elsewhere in the Mediterranean), Belgium (north-east), and Germany (central and south-west). 3400 BC: Constructions in Sardinia (circular graves), Ireland (Newgrange), Netherlands (north-east), Germany (northern and central) Sweden and Denmark. 3300 BC: Constructions in France (Carnac stones) 3200 BC: Constructions in Malta (Ħaġar Qim and Tarxien). 3100 BC: Constructions in Russia (Dolmens of North Caucasus) 3000 BC: Constructions in Sardinia (earliest construction phase of the prehistoric altar of Monte d'Accoddi), France (Saumur, Dordogne, Languedoc, Biscay, and the Mediterranean coast), Spain (Los Millares), Sicily, Belgium (Ardennes), and Orkney, as well as the first henges (circular earthworks) in Britain.
Chalcolithic
2500 BC: Constructions in Brittany (Le Menec, Kermario and elsewhere), Italy (Otranto), Sardinia, and Scotland (northeast), plus the climax of the megalithic Bell-beaker culture in Iberia, Germany, and the British Isles (stone circle at Stonehenge). With the bell-beakers, the Neolithic period gave way to the Chalcolithic, the age of copper. 2500 BC: Tombs at Algarve, Portugal. Additionally, a problematic dating (by optically stimulated luminescence) of Quinta da Queimada Menhir in western Algarve indicates "a very early period of megalithic activity in the Algarve, older than in the rest of Europe and [similar to] the famous Anatolian site of Göbekli Tepe" c. 2400 BC: The Bell-beaker culture was dominant in Britain, and hundreds of smaller stone circles were built in the British Isles at this time.
Stone Age 2100 BC:The highest plateau Lampung, West Lampung Regency, Batu Brak Liwa, Indonesia Megalith Site. Bronze Age
2000 BC: Constructions in Brittany (Er Grah), Italy : (Bari); Sicily (Cava dei Servi, Cava Lazzaro);, and Scotland (Callanish). The Chalcolithic period gave way to the Bronze Age in western and northern Europe. 1800 BC: Constructions in Italy (Giovinazzo, in Sardinia started the Nuragic civilisation). 1500 BC: Constructions in Portugal (Alter Pedroso and Mourela). 1400 BC: Burial of the Egtved Girl in Denmark, whose body is today one of the best-preserved examples of its kind. 1200 BC: Last vestiges of the megalithic tradition in the Mediterranean and elsewhere following the Bronze Age Collapse. Megalithic construction persisted in Egypt into the Iron Age.
Geographic distribution of megaliths European megaliths
The most common type of megalithic construction in Europe is the portal tomb—a chamber consisting of upright stones (orthostats) with one or more large flat capstones forming a roof. Many portal tombs have been found to contain human remains, but it is debated if their primary function was use as burial sites. The megalithic structures in the northwest of France are believed to be the oldest in Europe based on radiocarbon dating. Though generally known as "dolmens", the term most accepted by archaeologists is "portal tomb". Local names for portal tombs exist in multiple locations, such as anta in Galicia and Portugal, stazzone in Sardinia, hunebed in the Netherlands, Hünengrab in Germany, dysse in Denmark, and cromlech in Wales. It is assumed that most portal tombs were originally covered by earthen mounds.The second-most-common tomb type is the passage grave. It normally consists of a square, circular, or cruciform chamber with a slabbed or corbelled roof, accessed by a long, straight passageway, with the whole structure covered by a circular mound of earth. Sometimes it is also surrounded by an external stone kerb. Prominent examples include the sites of Brú na Bóinne and Carrowmore in Ireland, Maes Howe in Orkney, and Gavrinis in France. The third tomb type is a diverse group known as gallery graves. These are axially arranged chambers placed under elongated mounds. The Irish court tombs, British long barrows, and German Steinkisten belong to this group.
Standing stones, or menhirs as they are known in France, are very common throughout Europe, where some 50,000 examples have been noted. Some of these are thought to have an astronomical function as a marker or foresight. In some areas, long and complex "alignments" of such stones exist, the largest known example being located at Carnac in Brittany, France.
In parts of Britain and Ireland a relatively common type of megalithic construction is the stone circle, of which examples include Stonehenge, Avebury, Ring of Brodgar and Beltany. These, too, display evidence of astronomical alignments, both solar and lunar. Stonehenge, for example, is famous for its solstice alignment. Examples of stone circles are also found in the rest of Europe. The circle at Lough Gur, near Limerick in Ireland has been dated to the Beaker period, approximately contemporaneous with Stonehenge. The stone circles are assumed to be of later date than the tombs, straddling the Neolithic and the Bronze Ages.
Tombs
Megalithic tombs are aboveground burial chambers, built of large stone slabs (megaliths) laid on edge and covered with earth or other, smaller stones. They are a type of chamber tomb, and the term is used to describe the structures built across Atlantic Europe, the Mediterranean, and neighbouring regions, mostly during the Neolithic period, by Neolithic farming communities. They differ from the contemporary long barrows through their structural use of stone.
There is a huge variety of megalithic tombs. The free-standing single chamber dolmens and portal dolmens found in Brittany, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, Wales, and elsewhere consist of a large flat stone supported by three, four, or more standing stones. They were covered by a stone cairn or earth barrow.
In Italy, dolmens can be found especially in Sardinia. There are more than 100 dolmen dating to the Neolithic (3500–2700 BC) and the most famous is called Dolmen di Sa Coveccada (near Mores). During the Bronze Age, the Nuragic civilization built c. 800 Giants' grave, a type of megalithic gallery grave that can be found throughout Sardinia with different structures. The earliest megalithic tombs in Sardinia are the circular graves of the so-called Arzachena culture, also found in Corsica, southern France and eastern Spain.
Dolmens are also in Apulia and in Sicily. In this latter region, they are small structures located in Mura Pregne (Palermo), Sciacca (Agrigento), Monte Bubbonia (Caltanissetta), Butera (Caltanissetta), Cava Lazzaro (Siracuse), Cava dei Servi (Ragusa), Avola (Siracusa), and Argimusco in Montalbano Elicona (Messina). Dating to the Early Bronze Age (2200–1800 BC), the prehistoric Sicilian buildings were covered by a circular mound of earth. In the dolmen of Cava dei Servi, archaeologists found numerous human bone fragments and some splinters of Castelluccian ceramics (Early Bronze Age) which confirmed the burial purpose of the artefact.
Examples with outer areas, not used for burial, are also known. The Court Cairns of southwest Scotland and northern Ireland, the Severn-Cotswold tombs of southwest England and the transepted gallery graves of the Loire region in France share many internal features, although the links between them are not yet fully understood. That they often have antechambers or forecourts is thought to imply a desire on the part of the builders to emphasize a special ritual or physical separation of the dead from the living.