A passage grave or passage tomb consists of one or more burial chambers covered in earth or stone and having a narrow access passage made of large stones. These structures usually date from the Neolithic Age and are found largely in Western Europe. When covered in earth, a passage grave is a type of burial mound which are found in various forms all over the world. When a passage grave is covered in stone, it is a type of cairn.
A megalith is a large stone that has been used to construct a prehistoric structure or monument, either alone or together with other stones. There are over 35,000 structures or arrangements in Europe alone, located widely from Sweden to the Mediterranean sea.
The Sieben Steinhäuser also Siebensteinhäuser is a group of five dolmens on the Lüneburg Heath in the NATO training area of Bergen-Hohne, in the state of Lower Saxony in northern Germany. The stones are considered to be part of the funnelbeaker culture. The gravesite was granted protected cultural monument status in 1923.
This article describes several characteristic architectural elements typical of European megalithic structures.
The Cairn of Barnenez is a Neolithic monument located near Plouezoc'h, on the Kernéléhen peninsula in northern Finistère, Brittany (France). It dates to the early Neolithic, about 4800 BC. Along with the Tumulus of Bougon and Locmariaquer megaliths, also located in Great West France, it is one of the earliest megalithic monuments in Europe and one of the oldest man-made structures in the world. It is also remarkable for the presence of megalithic art.
The Tumulus of Bougon or Necropolis of Bougon is a group of five Neolithic barrows located in Bougon, near La-Mothe-Saint-Héray, between Exoudun and Pamproux in Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France.
In the area of present-day Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany, up to 5,000 megalith tombs were erected as burial sites by people of the Neolithic Funnelbeaker (TRB) culture. More than 1,000 of them are preserved today and protected by law. Though varying in style and age, megalith structures are common in Western Europe, with those in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern belonging to the youngest and easternmost—further east, in the modern West Pomeranian Voivodeship of Poland, monuments erected by the TRB people did not include lithic structures, while they do in the south (Brandenburg), west and north (Denmark).
Nobbin is a village in the municipality of Putgarten on the Wittow peninsula on the German Baltic Sea island of Rügen. The village, comprising just a few houses, lies between the road from Altenkirchen to Arkona and the bay of Tromper Wiek. As a result of its attractive location between Cape Arkona and the broad, over 10 km long beach of the Schaabe, the village is dominated by tourism.
The Goldbusch is a great dolmen, a type prehistoric grave site, that lies between Altensien and Moritzdorf on the German Baltic Sea island of Rügen. The megalithic tomb with Sprockhoff No. 508 was built between 3500 and 2800 B. C. in the New Stone Age as a megalithic site of the Funnelbeaker culture (TBK).
The Great dolmen of Dwasieden, is a great dolmen in the borough of Sassnitz, on the Jasmund peninsula of Germany's largest island, Rügen. It was excavated in 1970 by Ewald Schuldt and is designated a Sprockhoff No. 472. The megalithic site of the Funnelbeaker culture (TBK) was constructed between 3500 and 2800 BC.
The great dolmen or grand dolmen is a type of megalithic site of the Funnelbeaker culture (TBK) that occurs in Nordic megalith architecture, primarily in the east of what is now German Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and which has two different types of entrance. Neolithic monuments are features of the culture and ideology of Neolithic communities. Their evolution and function act as indicators of social development. The type of site, called Stordysse in Danish, does not follow the criteria listed below. In Germany, dolmens with three or more capstones are described as great dolmens and are divided into:
Guardian stones are standing stones, always occurring in pairs, at the corners of rectangular and trapezoidally-arranged stone enclosures (hunebeds) around a dolmen. They are found especially in Scandinavia, in the German states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony (Salongrab), Saxony-Anhalt and occasionally in Holstein. They are strikingly large stone blocks that form the corner post of enclosures or project above them like antae and lend the stone enclosures a monumental appearance.
The simple dolmen or primeval dolmen is an early form of dolmen or megalithic tomb that occurs especially in Northern Europe. The term was defined by archaeologist, Ernst Sprockhoff, and utilised by Ewald Schuldt in publicising his excavation of 106 megalithic sites in the north German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The simple dolmen emerged in the early days of the development of megalithic monuments of the Funnelbeaker culture (TBK) and around 3,500 BC they appeared across almost the entire region covered by the stone cult structures of Nordic megalith architecture, but not in the Netherlands, in Lower Saxony west of the River Weser nor east of the River Oder and only once in Sweden.
A rectangular dolmen, extended dolmen or enlarged dolmen is a specific type of megalith, rectangular in shape, with upright sidestones and, usually, two capstones. The term rectangular dolmen was coined by Ekkehard Aner and is used especially in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, where dolmens with this type of ground plan primarily occur. A more precise term, however, is extended dolmen, used by Ewald Schuldt and Ernst Sprockhoff, because these types of dolmen also occur with trapezoidal ground plans.
A polygonal dolmen is a megalithic architectural structure and often depicted as the archetypal dolmen.
The unchambered long barrowearthen long barrow, non-megalithic long barrow or non-megalithic mound, is a type of long barrow found across the British Isles, in a belt of land in Brittany, and in northern Europe as far east as the River Vistula. The term "unchambered" means that there is no stone chamber within the stone enclosure. In Great Britain they are often known as non-megalithic long barrows or unchambered long cairns.
The Harhoog is a dolmen, a rectangular megalithic tomb from the Funnelbeaker culture, located near Keitum on the island of Sylt in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. Discovered in 1925, it was moved to the present site in 1954 when a new airport was developed.
The various types of megalithic monuments in northeastern Germany were last compiled by Ewald Schuldt in the course of a project to excavate megalithic tombs from the Neolithic Era, which was conducted between 1964 and 1972 in the area of the northern districts of East Germany. His aim was to provide a "classification and naming of the objects present in this field of research". In doing so it utilised a classification by Ernst Sprockhoff, which in turn was based on an older Danish model.
Tholos de El Romeral, situated 2.5 kilometres (1.6 mi) north east of the town of Antequera (Andalusia), is one of the most important examples of early Bronze Age architecture in southern Europe. Tholos de El Romeral, also known as Cueva de Romeral and Dolmen de Romeral, is a megalithic burial site built circa 1800 BCE. It is one of three tombs in the region, the others being Dolmen de Menga and Dolmen de Viera, both situated to the south west.
A threshold stone or sill stone is a rectangularly dressed stone slab that forms part of the entrance of megalithic tombs of the Funnelbeaker culture, normally those with a passage. The red sandstone slab, up to 0.1 metres thick, was buried in the ground to a depth of 0.2 metres at the entrance to the chamber. Cultural sites of other types, such as Domus de Janas, also have a clear partition between the passage and the ante-chamber or main chamber.
