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Location: Lochmariaquer, Brittany, France. |
Grid Reference: 47° 35' 45.47" N. 3° 3' 13.57" W |
 Description: This stone has the honour of having once been the
largest (known) standing stone in Europe and the largest of a huge
19-stone alignment. Today the menhir is broken into four pieces which
still lie where they fell.
Le Grande
menhir lies alongside
La Table des Marchands
passage-mound,
and
the
Er-Grah
tumulus, both built at around 3,300 BC, following the destruction of the original alignment,
which is now suspected of having been broken up and distributed around the Morbihan area
(see below).
(Click here
for map of location)
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Le Grande Menhir Brisé.
The Locmariarquer site today:
Le Grande menhir is one
of three structures at the Locmariarquer site. It lies beside the Er-Grah
tumulus and the Table des Marchands, both built around 3,300 BC. It is
the last surviving stone of an earlier construction dating from around 4,500
BC (6).
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Physical description
of the stone:
The stone, now fallen into 4 pieces, is estimated to have weighed about
355 tons when complete and to have stood over 20 metres high (1).
It was hand 'mauled' into its present shape and an axe-plough figure was
once visible on the middle fragment. John Michell reports the nearest source of similar stone at over
50 miles distance
(4), and even
though newer reports suggest a distance of only 10km north of Auray
(5), it still highlights the fact that the location
outweighed the difficulties involved in transporting such large stones over long
distances.
The transport of such large stones from such a distance indicates both that
the location was important to the builders and that the type of stone was.
This same behaviour was repeated at other important megalithic sites such as
Stonehenge and
Ghiza, where quartz stones were transported
over hundreds of miles in order to be used for significant prehistoric
structures.
The
bottom of the stone was beautifully 'keeled'.
(A design feature which
provided better stability when once the stone was packed in place.
(The Top-50 megaliths of all time) |
When did La Grande
Menhir fall?
'la Grande pierre de Locmariaker was visible from the scene of the
wreck'.
(4)
This information ties in
with the suggestion that it fell ' during
an earthquake in 1722'.(2)
However,
the way in which the stones landed may offer a
different interpretation. We can see in the photo below that the bottom
half fell in one direction and the top half in the other. The fact that the
three parts from the top half all line up together suggests that the top
half split into three parts
when it hit
the ground. If the cause of the fall was an earthquake, one would expect the
whole stone to have fallen in the same direction which supports the idea
that it may have been split and fallen from a lightning strike.
What was the original purpose of
the site?
 The
original construction of which Le Grande Menhir was only a part, was one
of Europe's greatest megalithic achievements. The site was suggested by
Prof. A. Thom to have served as a lunar marker, from which it
would have been able to calculate the 18.6yr lunar cycle by observing the stone
from positions in the surrounding countryside. He predicted the
locations of the sites and found ancient markers at several of them,
confirming his hypothesis.
Prof. Alexander Thom believed that it was
a huge foresight marker for the moon's rising and setting extremes. He
made predictions for the directions of eight observing points, of which
six have been shown to still have evidence of prehistoric mounds or
stones, one of which is ten miles distant. - (see right).
Another 18 stones once stood in a line of decreasing height
from
Le Grande Menhir.
How the 55m long
alignment would
have looked in its original form.
|
Where are the other stones?
Although the rest of the
menhirs appear to have been taken and re-used over time, parts of one remain
at the site, having been re-used for the capstones of the neighbouring
La Table des Marchands and
Er-Grah
monuments. The Table des Marchands cap-stone has several distinct
carvings on it and the discovery in 1984 of matching carvings on the
cap-stone of the
Gavrinis mound
confirmed that
the three stones fitted together until they were re-used sometime around 3,300 BC.
The
length of the Le Grand menhir is 20m from end to end. If approximately 20% of
this stone was originally underground (as suggested by a guide), then we can
assume that it actually stood at around 16m above ground level.
 The
Table des Marchand's has a huge engraved capstone, which has been
determined to have once been a part of a larger menhir. In 1984, archaeologists
uncovered the hidden upper-side of the Gavrinis capstone and found that it
bore engravings that fitted with those at La Table des Marchands, and
another stone on top of the 'Er Vingle' or 'Er Grah' tumulus. It was
concluded that the three slabs once formed a single menhir 15m tall, which
if we add another 2-3m for the missing section, results in a stone that
measures 17-18m, which would leave approximately 15m remaining visible
above ground level.
Note: We
can see from the photo above that the Table des Marchands capstone rests upon another stone which could
itself have once been the top section of another menhir from the
original construction.
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Estimating the difference in height and distance between stones.
In order to estimate the expected heights of the other stones, we need to
know the height of the smallest stone, which we can guess at being slightly
higher than the average observer (we can suggest a height of approximately
2m). If the tallest stood at 16m, the shortest at 2m, and with 17 others
in-between, We can now estimate the difference in height between each of the
other stones. (14m / 17 = 82.353cm), a figure that is coincidentally
almost exactly one
megalithic yard long
(82.966cm).
Although it is not possible to be exact about these matters, this result is not
surprising as Prof. Thom found the use of the Megalithic yard in other
constructions at Carnac.
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Other menhirs in the vicinity include the following:
-
The menhir at Mané Routuel, which is 11m long. (see J. Helgouac'h and S Cassen
- 1988) (7)
-
The two menhirs at Mané Er-Hrouk, which are 9m and 7.5m long.
-
There are also menhirs at 'Mané Lud' and 'Petit Mont'
(Other French Menhirs)
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Chronology -
The site shows two phases of construction. One at approximately 4,500 BC
(6),
when the initial 19 stones were placed, and the other at approximately 3,300
BC when they were re-used for other local constructions (such as the
capstone for the neighbouring passage mounds of La Table des Marchands, Gavrinis
and 'Er
Grah' tumulus).
 Archaeo-astronomy
-
The inter-visibility of the
sites was checked at night with the use of a light mounted on a water tower
and found to be satisfactory, thus confirming the idea that someone standing
at (the appropriate), one of the eight observing points would have seen the
moon set behind the distant spike at its major and minor 'standstills'.
It is interesting to note that there are 19 crescent symbols on the top
edges of the end-stone inside the Table des Marchands (see left side of
photo-right). This number has been suggested as being related to the lunar
cycle which lasts 18.6 solar years, supporting the idea that the original
site functioned as a means of measuring and calculating the lunar cycles.
Photo Gallery.
This 'observation stone' across the bay is
still visible from 'Le Grande Menhir'
(with a zoom lens).
A
'christianised' menhir in the graveyard right next to the Locmariaquer site.
(Was this one of the original stones too?)
(Other French Sites)
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