Le Gros Caillou (Oisy-le-Verger)
DatedEst. 2800–1800 BCE
No licensed photograph yetWe have no photograph we may publish for this site, so the interpretive 3D view leads instead.
Overview
About this site
Overview
Le Gros Caillou (French for the large pebble) is a menhir about two kilometres west of Oisy-le-Verger, near Douai, in the Pas-de-Calais département of France. It is a sandstone standing stone 2.9 m high and about one metre wide, and has been registered as a Monument historique since 1981.
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Where it sits in time
The site's dated range, placed against world reference points.
The scale is logarithmic: each step to the left is about ten times older than the last.
Article
Le Gros Caillou (Oisy-le-Verger)
The menhir stands in the marsh of the Sensée valley, in a river bed, and is surrounded by a belt of reeds.
DescriptionSources for this section
Sources for this section
The menhir stands in the marsh of the Sensée valley, in a river bed, and is surrounded by a belt of reeds. Its position makes access difficult, especially in rainy periods. Its origin goes back to the Neolithic (5000 to 2500 BCE); the waterlogging of the land came later.
ContextSources for this section
Sources for this section
Many historians believe that the high concentration of megaliths and unusual stones along the Sensée valley is not accidental. Within a radius of about 15 kilometres there are six places where menhirs, dolmens or polishing stones are found. They include the menhir of Aubigny-au-Bac, the menhir of Lécluse, Hamel’s Dolmen, the polissoir of Féchains and the unusual stone circle Les Sept Bonnettes at Sailly-en-Ostrevent. Further megaliths were still visible in the 19th century.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Central and southern European menhirs
Outside the Atlantic fringe, menhirs also occur across central and southern Europe. In the Czech Republic there are about 40 real menhirs and dozens of stones that could also be menhirs, and others have been erected recently. The largest real menhir is Kamenný pastýř, the "stony shepherd", near Klobuky, 3.3 metres high; the Czech menhirs are probably the last outcrop of a tradition that ran across northern Germany. Some of the Czech stones in the Atlas may be natural boulders.
Italy has its most famous menhirs in Sardinia, where at least 332 standing stones can be seen. They include elaborate "statue-menhirs" that show a human face at the top and gendered symbols on the flat front; over a hundred of this standardised type have been found, mostly around the village of Laconi. In the Sardinian language they are called perdas fittas or perdas lungas. In Switzerland, in the canton of Vaud, several menhirs form linear patterns at Clendy in Yverdon-les-Bains, and date back to the third millennium BCE.
A statue menhir is a carved standing stone of the later European Neolithic, in which a slab or pillar has a stylised human figure cut into it, sometimes with hints of clothing or weapons. They are most commonly found in southern and western France, Catalonia, Corsica, Sardinia, Italy and the Alps.
Menhirs are usually difficult to date, and those without excavation can only be given a broad range. A stone's present position is not always its original one.
When visiting, check whether a stone stands in its original position and look for signs of shaping.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Menhir, Wikipedia: List of menhirs, Wikipedia: Statue menhir · CC BY-SA 4.0
See it in 3D
An interpretive reconstruction of the monument, standing on the real ground at its exact point, under the sun for that place and season. Drag to look around it.
The reconstruction is ours, not a survey: it shows what a monument of this type looks like, at the size the record gives for this one.
Lore
Evidence & Lore
What the sources actually support — and, kept apart, what has been claimed.
What the evidence supports
Dates
Est. 2800–1800 BCEHow this date was established: Type comparisonTypical range for menhirs in Belgium; this site has not been dated itself. Standing stones are associated with the Beaker people of the European late Neolithic and early Bronze Age c. 2800-1800 BC.Source for this date
Where it stands
Belgium
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 50°15′11″ N, 3°05′38″ EFor a GPS or map app: 50.25317, 3.09397
Access is as our sources describe it; we have not visited the site to check.
Nearby
The closest sites in the Atlas, by straight line.
- Menhir (standing stone)menhir d'Oisy-le-Verger2800–1800 BCE
Gros Caillou2800–1800 BCEPhoto: The original uploader was Pir6mon at French Wikipedia . · CC BY-SA 3.0
Pierre qui Pousse2800–1800 BCE
dolmen du Bois4000–3000 BCE- dolmen du Bois4000–3000 BCE
Pierre du Diable2800–1800 BCE
Cromlech des Bonnettes3300–2500 BCE
pierres jumelles de Cambrai2800–1800 BCE
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q56070884wikidata.org
- 02Source for this dateen.wikipedia.org
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Around this place
The ten nearest sites, by compass
Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Le Gros Caillou (Oisy-le-Verger)" (German), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; authors are listed in the page history. Reused under CC BY-SA 4.0. Read on Wikipedia · Edit history and authors