Overview
About this site
Overview
The Teufelssteine (also called Teufelsbett, Düvel- or Lehzensteine) is a Neolithic passage grave of the Emsland chamber type, catalogued as Sprockhoff no. 914, in the Voxtrup district of Osnabrück, Germany. It was built between 3500 and 2800 BCE as a megalithic monument of the Funnel Beaker culture.
The chamber is well preserved, oriented east-west and about 12.9 metres long, and lies within an oval enclosure of which only about a dozen stones remain.
Read on Wikipedia2 min readCC BY-SA 4.0
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
Teufelssteine
The gap for an entrance can be recognised in the middle of the south long side, between the third and fourth supporting stones.
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Großsteingrab TeufelssteineCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Großsteingrab TeufelssteineCC BY-SA 4.0
The chamber lies in an oval enclosure, of which only about a dozen stones survive. Its internal width is about two metres. One of the six capstones and one of the 14 supporting stones are missing. The gap for an entrance can be recognised in the middle of the south long side, between the third and fourth supporting stones.
SettingSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Großsteingrab TeufelssteineCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Großsteingrab TeufelssteineCC BY-SA 4.0
The Teufelssteine lie in the north of Voxtrup, south-west of Darum, Gretesch and Lüstringen, on a rise in a small wood in the angle between the river Hase and the Belmer Bach. The area bears the historical name Teufelsheide. In 1853 the state bought the land on which the monument stands. Today it lies between a substation to the west, the Heideweg and the Löhne–Rheine railway line to the north, a commercial area to the east and the Hase lowland to the south.
The monument lies on the Straße der Megalithkultur.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Großsteingrab TeufelssteineCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Großsteingrab TeufelssteineCC BY-SA 4.0
The megalithic tombs of northern Germany and the Netherlands were built by the Funnel Beaker culture (about 4100 to 2800 BCE), and the style, called Nordic megalith architecture, emerged between 3500 and 2800 BCE.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
German and Dutch Hünengräber (hunebedden)
The megalithic tombs of northern Germany and the Netherlands were built by the Funnel Beaker culture (about 4100 to 2800 BCE), and the style, called Nordic megalith architecture, emerged between 3500 and 2800 BCE. In the Netherlands the tombs are the hunebedden, built between 3470 and 3250 BCE by the western group of the Funnel Beaker culture and used until about 2760 BCE. Of an estimated 100 original tombs, 54 are preserved, 52 of them in the province of Drenthe and two in Groningen. After the Funnel Beaker culture ended the sites were reused by the Single Grave and Bell Beaker cultures in the Early Bronze Age and, to a lesser extent, into the Middle Ages.
In Mecklenburg-Vorpommern up to 5,000 megalith tombs were erected, and more than 1,000 are preserved and protected by law; they belong to the youngest and easternmost part of the western European tradition. Most are dolmens, often lying inside a circular or trapezoid frame of standing stones. Locally they are known as Hünengräber, "giants' tombs", or Großsteingräber, "large stone tombs"; the trapezoid frame is a Hünenbett, "giants' bed", and the circular one a Bannkreis. Between 1964 and 1974 Ewald Schuldt excavated over a hundred sites there and sorted them into simple dolmens, extended dolmens, passage graves, great dolmens, unchambered long barrows and stone cists.
Folklore: the German and Dutch names, with Hüne meaning "giant", carry the old idea that giants were buried here. This is a tradition; the stones were placed by Neolithic farmers.
When visiting, look for the capstones on their supports and the frame of kerbstones around them.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Megaliths in the Netherlands, Wikipedia: Megaliths in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Wikipedia: Nordic megalith architecture, Wikipedia: Funnel beaker culture, Wikipedia: Dolmen · 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.
Photographs
4 photographs, each with its author and licence
More photographs
Lore
Evidence & Lore
What the sources actually support — and, kept apart, what has been claimed.
What the evidence supports
Dates
Est. 3500–2800 BCEHow this date was established: Type comparisonTypical range for dolmens in Germany; this site has not been dated itself. German dolmens (Huengrab) belong to the Nordic megalith tradition which emerged predominantly between 3500 and 2800 BC.Source for this date
Where it stands
Germany
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 52°15′56″ N, 8°06′27″ EFor a GPS or map app: 52.26557, 8.10758
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.
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q1549657wikidata.org
- 02Source for this dateen.wikipedia.org
Image files
- Teufelssteine 06.jpgSail overCC BY-SA 3.0
- Großsteingrab Teufelssteine.jpgEncyachtCC BY-SA 4.0
- Großsteingrab Teufelssteine 01.JPGEinsamer SchützeCC BY-SA 3.0
- Großsteingrab Teufelssteine 02.JPGEinsamer SchützeCC BY-SA 3.0
Report a correctionWrong date, name, photograph or source? Tell us and it will be put right.
Around this place
The ten nearest sites, by compass
Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Großsteingrab Teufelssteine" (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