Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 21.djvu/64

Rh 52 RUDE STONE MONUMENTS needing 100 feet in diameter. That most of the smaller circles have been used as sepulchres has been repeatedly proved by actual excavations, which showed that interments had taken place within their area. It is difficult, however, to believe that this could have been the main object of the larger ones. At May- borough, near Penrith, there is a circle entirely composed of an immense aggregation of small stones in the form of a gigantic ring enclosing a flat area, about 300 feet in diameter. Near the centre there is a fine monolith, one of several known to have formerly stood there. Of the same type is the Giant's Ring near Belfast, only the ring in this instance is made of earth, and it is consider- ably larger in diameter (580 feet) ; the central object is a line dolmen. It is more probable that such enclosures were used, like many of our modern churches, for the double purpose of burying the dead and addressing the living. Dolmens. In its simplest form a dolmen consists of three, four, or five stone supports, covered over with one selected megalith called a capstone or table. A well-known example of this kind in England is Kit's Cotty House, between Rochester and Maidstone, which is formed of three large supports, with a capstone measuring 11 by 8 feet From this simple form there is an endless variety of upward gradations till we reach the so-called Gaint Graves and Grottes aux Fees, which are constructed of numerous supports and several capstones. A dolmen (alUe couverte) situated in a plant- ation at the outskirts of the town of Saumur is composed of four flat supports on each side, with one at the end, and four capstones. The largest capstone measures 7 '5 metres in length, 7 in breadth, and 1 in thickness. The chamber is 18 metres long, 6 '5 broad, and 3 high. Another near Esse, called "la Roche aux Fees," is equally long, and is constructed of thirty supports, with eight capstones, including the vestibule. Dolmens of this kind are extremely rare in the British Isles, the only one approaching them being Calliagh Birra's House in Ireland. These (generally known as alTees couvertes) and many other examples of the simple dolmen show no evidence of having been covered over with a mound. When there was a mound it necessitated, in the larger ones, an entrance passage, which was constructed, like the chamber, of a series of side stones or supports and capstones. Some archaeologists maintain that all dolmens were formerly covered with a cairn or tumulus, a theory which undoubtedly derives some favour from the condition of many examples still extant, especially in France, where all stages of degradation are seen, from a partial to a com- plete state of denudation. The allees couvertes of France, Ger- many, and the Channel Islands had their entrance at the end ; but, on the other hand, the Hunnebedden of Holland had both ends closed and the entrance was on the side facing the sun. The covered dolmens are extremely variable in shape, circular, oval, quadrangular, or irregular. The entrance gallery may be attached to the end, as in the Grotte de Gavr'inis, or to the side, as in the Gaint's Grave (Jettestuer) at Oem near Roskilde. In other instances there is no distinct chamber, but a long passage gradually widening from the entrance ; and this may be bent at an angle, as in the dolmen du Rocher(Morbihan). Again, there may be several chambers cummunicating with one entrance, or two or three separate chambers having separate entrances, and all imbedded in the same tumulus. An excellent example of this kind is the partially destroyed tumulus of Rondosec, near Plouharnal railway station, which contains three separate dolmens. That such varia- tions are not due to altered customs, in consequence of wideness of geographical range, is shown by M. de Mortillet, who gives plans of no less than sixteen differently shaped dolmens (Musee prehis- torioiie, pi. 58), all within a confined district in Morbihan. No dolmens exist in eastern Europe beyond Saxony. They reappear, however, in the Crimea and Circassia, whence they have been traced through Central Asia to India, where they are widely distributed. Similar megalithic structures have also been recog- nized and described by travellers in Palestine, Arabia, Persia, Australia, the Penrhyn Islands, Madagascar, Peru, &c. The irregular manner in which dolmens are distributed along the western parts of Europe has led to the theory that all these raegalithic structures were erected by a special people, but as to the when, whence, and whither of this singular race there is no knowledge whatever. Though the European dolmens have a strong family likeness, however widely apart, they present some characteristic differences in the various countries in which they are found. In Scandinavia they are confined to the Danish lands and a few provinces in the south of Sweden. Here the exposed dolmens are often on artificial mounds, and surrounded by cromlechs which are either circular (runddysser) or oval (langdysser). In Sweden the sepulture d yalerie is very rarely entirely covered up as in the giant graves of Denmark. Hanover, Oldenburg, and Mecklenburg are very rich in the remains of these monuments. At Ricstedt, near Uelzen in Hanover, there is, on the summit of a tumulus, a very singular dolmen of oblong form, which measures about 40 feet long and over 6 feet in breadth. Another at Naschendorf, near Wismar, consists of a mound surrounded by a large circle of stones and a covered chamber on its summit. Remains of a megalithic structure at Rudenbeck, in Mecklenburg, though now imperfect, show that originally it was constructed like an allee convert e. It had four supports on each side, two at one end (the other end forming the entrance), and two large capstones. The length had been about 20 feet, breadth 7i leet, and height from tho floor to the undcr-surface of roof about 3 feet. According to Bonstetten, no less than two hundred of these monuments are found distributed over the throe provinces of Liineburg, Osnabriick, and Stade ; and the most gigantic examples in Germany are iu the duchy of Oldenburg. In Holland, with one or two exceptions, they are confined to the province of Drenthe, where between fifty and sixty still e.xi.^t. Here they get the name of Honnebeddeo (Huns' beds). The Borger Hunnebed, the largest of this group, is 70 feet long and 14 feet wide. In its original condition it contained forty-live stones, ten of which were capstones. They are all now denuded, but some show evidence of having been surrounded with a mound containing an entrance passage. Only one dolmen has been recorded iu Belgium ; but in France their number amounts to 3410. They are irregularly distributed over seventy-eight departments, six hundred and eighteen being in Brittany. In the centre of the country they are also numerous, no less than four hundred and thirty-five being recorded in Aveyron, but they are of much smaller proportions than in the former locality. From the Pyrenees the dolmens are sparsely traced along the north coast of Spain and through Portugal to Andalusia, where they occur iu considerable numbers. Crossing into Africa they are found in large groups in Morocco, Algeria, ami Tunis. General Faidherbe writes of having examined live or six thousand at the cemeteries of Bou Merzoug, Wady Berda, Tebessa, Gastal, &C. 1 In the Channel Islands every species of megalithic monument is met with. At Mont Cochon, near St Helier, there was lately discovered in a mound of blown sand an allee couverte, and close to it a stone circle surrounding a dolmen. 2 In the British Isles they are met with in many localities, particularly in the west of England, Anglesey, the Isle of Man, Ireland, and Scot- land. In the country last named, however, they are not the most striking feature among its rude stone monuments tho stone circles and cisted cairns having largely superseded them. In the absence of historical knowledge all these megalithic structures were formerly regarded as of Celtic origin. By some they were supposed to have been constructed by the Druids, the so-called priests of the Celts ; and hence they were often described, especially since the time of Aubrey and Stukely, under the name of Celtic or Dniidical monuments. But this theory is disproved by the fact that the ethnographical range of the Celtic races does not correspond with the geographical distribution of these rude stone monuments. Thus, for example, in Europe, not to speak of their localization in non-Celtic countries, the megaliths occupy an elon- gated stretch of territory on its western seaboard extending from Pomerania to North Africa. This area crosses at right angles the lands supposed to have been occupied by the Celtic or Aryan races on their westward waves of migration. There can be no doubt from investigations of the contents of dolmens that their primary object was sepulchral, and that the megalithic chambers, with entrance passages, were used as family vaults. Against tho theory that any of them were ever used as altars there is prim fade evidence in the care taken to have the smoothest and flattest surface of the stones composing the chamber always turned inwards. Moreover, cup marks, and other primitive markings when found on the capstones or supports, are almost invariably on their inside, as, for example, at the dolmens of Keriaval, Kercado, Dol au Marchant, Gavr'inis (Morbihan), and the great tumulus at New Grange (Ireland). From its position in the centre of a large circular enclosure no dolmen could be more suggestive of public sacrifices than that within the Giant's Ring near Belfast ; yet nothing could be more inappropriate for such a purpose than its capstone, which is in fact a large granite boulder presenting on its upper side an unusually rounded surface. No chronological sequence can be detected in the evolution of the rude stone monuments, with perhaps the exception of the primitive cist which gave origin to the allees couvertes, giant graves, &c., and these again to the tumuli with microlithic built chambers. Much less can their appearance in different countries be said to indicate contemporaneity. The dolmens of Africa are often found to contain objects peculiar to the Iron Age, and it is said that in some parts of India the people are still in the habit of erecting dolmens and other megalithic monuments. Scandinavian archaeologists assign their dolmens exclusively to the Stone Age. It would therefore appear as if a subsequent stage of degradation occurred, when a tamer style of interment ensued, and the Bronze Age barrows replaced the dolmens, and these again gave way to the Iron Age burials the ship-barrows and large tumuli of the vikings, as manifested in the three tumuli of Thor, Odin, and Freya at Campte Retuiu du Congt-e'i Intft-nalionu/ it'Anth. et d'Arch., liruxelles, p. 408.
 * Socttte Jerttiaite, 9 Bulletin, 1884.