Phases Of Construction And Megalith Types

The construction of the megaliths in Western Europe is divided into several phases. The oldest megaliths - many of them heavy, and by tens and sometimes hundreds of tons - were erected around 3800th do 3000 p.n.e. on large meadows and slopes of hills, and were processed with stone tools. Around the 2600th BC begins a new phase characterized by the fact that the inhabitants of Western Europe began to produce iron implements. During this phase was raised most harmonious stone circles many of which are preserved to this day. Around 900th p.n.e. interest in raising megalithic structures are weak.

Megalithic legacy builders today are divided into three basic types. According to the concise and picturesque description offered in the dr.sc John Simatovic, co-author of HOMO X, represent the first Menhir (Breton: men - stone, hir - long). These are huge, long erect blocks of natural or rough hewn stone is firmly embedded in the ground. Are usually cylindrical, conical or spindle-shaped and a height of 1.4 to 20m. Weight them ranging from 3 tons up to 350 tons of fantastic. Most of them are preserved in France (about 6200), then in England and Italy, but there are also in the Crimea. The most impressive formation Menhir are long stone rows at Carnac and Meneca in the French province of Bretagne. At Carnac in three rows of long and 3.9 km, flowing into a gently undulating lines, ordered about 3000 Menhir, while on the field at Meneca, with an area of ​​about 1000x100m, arranged in 11 rows around 1100 The height above the ground they usually range from 4 to 7 m, and weight them 15 to 40 tons.

The second type are dolmen (Breton: dol - table, men - rock) - a simple three stones buildings erected in the form of a table of two massive upright stones of equal height and covered horizontally placed heavy stone slabs. These are the most widespread megalithic structures in Europe. Originally were strew earthen mound (tumuli), or gravel. Dolmen Design ranges from the simplest buildings up an unusually large monumental tombs with access corridor and several chambers for the construction of which were spent hundreds of thousands of roughly dressed stone blocks.

The third type are kromlech (Breton: Crom - round, Lech - place) - a circular or elliptical distributed formation of a dozen to a hundred untreated or treated roughly massive stone blocks. This is the most intriguing group megalithic buildings. Characterized it defined geometric shape (circle, ellipse, and ovoids. flattened circles) and extreme precision performance. The first serious research, based on geodetic recordings have revealed that (taking into account the possibility that many blocks are no longer the primary place) maximum deviation from the ideal geometric shape below 1%.

Besides these three main types of megaliths, there is a fourth type called 'allees couvertes' (French: covered streets), which consists of two parallel rows of stone blocks covered by a massive horizontal stone slabs.

Many of the megalithic stone rings were designed and constructed so that they represent a proper stone wreaths that are often quite different from the circle as the most simple closed curves. This unusual phenomenon in kromlech was among the first to warn the Scottish archaeologist Alexander Thom, a former professor of the University of Oxford, which has most of her life with her ​​devoted son megalitith study of complex structures. Visited and surveyed in detail numerous stone cornice in the British Isles and northern France, in the province of Bretagne, and was able to identify a few standardized forms of stone cornices. Mostly it was about circles, ellipses and symmetrical egg-shaped forms. The earliest wreaths lined the massive stones were of a circle, while the younger wreaths were mostly in the form of the ellipse or oval shape.

Menhir, dolmen and kromlec were built of rough stone, which is consistent with the tools to work by then people had at their disposal. However, it seems that people then knew the unusual property of matter - that the curvature of the inner curve of a bunch of energy. It is obvious in the sanctuary on the island of Malta, the kromlec, as in many other circular structures. In later buildings, the energy is visible character development tools and craft skills. Worked Menhir was called obelisk, and all the buildings in the shape of the tower - the unorthodox researchers - completed the energy function Menhir. The development is monitored and the dolmen, which gradually began to build the four walls - that is, ultimately, it resembled a chapel, which in various forms and on different continents There are myriad.