
Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)The Copper Age
Aasholm Dysse
DatedEst. 3500–500 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
Aasholm Dysse (the Runddysse of Aasholm) is a round dolmen on the road Dysseholm, south of the Holmevej and east of Gundsømagle, near Roskilde, on the Danish island of Zealand. It is a protected ancient monument in Denmark. It was built between 3500 and 2800 BCE as a megalithic monument of the Funnel Beaker culture (TBK); the catalogue gives a wider typological range of 3500 to 500 BCE.
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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
Aasholm Dysse
The capstone of the original dolmen projects about 70 cm from the ground in the centre of the mound.
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
The oval mound lies on flat ground near the marshy valley of the Værebro river and measures about 10.5 × 7.5 m, with a height of about 70 cm. The capstone of the original dolmen projects about 70 cm from the ground in the centre of the mound. It is 1.5 m long and 0.5 m wide, rests on three supporting stones, and bears cup marks (Danish skåltegn). Sixteen kerbstones are visible.
ConservationSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
The owner of the nearby farm burned a woodpile at the monument, and two kerbstones were damaged by spalling.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
Denmark has a very large number of surviving barrows, protected by law since 1937. The oldest belong to the Funnel Beaker culture of the fourth millennium BCE. The great majority of the round mounds in Denmark are younger, and many were raised in the Nordic Bronze Age, from about 1700 to 500 BCE.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Danish barrows (gravhøje)
Denmark has a very large number of surviving barrows, protected by law since 1937, and the Atlas draws most of its Danish mounds from the national register of monuments. The oldest belong to the Funnel Beaker culture of the fourth millennium BCE, whose long barrows and stone-chambered tombs are described in their own articles. The great majority of the round mounds are younger. Many were raised in the Nordic Bronze Age, from about 1700 to 500 BCE.
The Bronze Age barrows hold remarkable burials. In a number of them, oak coffins stayed sealed and waterlogged, so that wool clothing, hair and textiles survived; only the bones of the dead are gone. The Egtved Girl, a young woman buried beneath the mound Storehøj in a woollen blouse and corded skirt with a bronze belt plate, is the best-known case: tree rings in her oak coffin date the burial to the summer of 1370 BCE. Borum Eshøj gave similar finds from the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries BCE. Later in the Bronze Age cremation took over from inhumation, and the dead were buried in urns.
Mound-building did not stop with the Bronze Age: Danish round barrows were raised from the Neolithic to the Viking Age.
When visiting, look for flat tops where old diggers cut in, and for the hollows where kerb stones were once removed.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Tumulus, Wikipedia: Funnel beaker culture, Wikipedia: Nordic Bronze Age, Wikipedia: Egtved Girl, Wikipedia: Borum Eshøj, Wikipedia: Jelling · CC BY-SA 4.0
From the article
Dated moments in the story
- 2800 BCE
Der Dolmen entstand zwischen 3500 und 2800 v. Chr. als Megalithanlage der Trichterbecherkultur (TBK).
Source
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. 3500–500 BCEHow this date was established: Type comparisonTypical range for megalithic mounds in Denmark; this site has not been dated itself. Denmark has about 20,000 preserved tumuli with the oldest around 5,000 years old; the Neolithic examples are Nordic megalithic mounds (dysser) of c. 3500-2800 BC.Source for this date
Where it stands
Denmark
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 55°44′26″ N, 12°11′07″ EFor a GPS or map app: 55.74048, 12.18537
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.
- DolmenHovdysse3500–2800 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Maglehøj3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Skjoldmosegaard3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic long barrowStenhøj Jættestue3500–2800 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Vestl.Rævhøj3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Skelhøj3500–500 BCE
Hødysse3500–2800 BCE
Thoradysse3500–2800 BCE
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q26807787wikidata.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 "Runddysse von Aasholm" (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
- Wikipedia (German): Runddysse von AasholmCC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q26807787CC0