Passage tomb (passage grave)The Copper Age
Glentehøj
DatedEst. 3500–2800 BCE
Photo Toxophilus · CC BY-SA 4.0Source file on Wikimedia Commons
Overview
About this site
Overview
Glentehøj is a passage grave (Danish jættestue, ‘giant’s chamber’) on the Danish island of Lolland, in the north-west of the island, east of Kragenæs. It is a megalithic monument of the Funnel Beaker culture and was built between 3500 and 2800 BCE.
Its chamber is 8.95 m long, and one of its capstones weighs about 25 tonnes, making it one of the heaviest capstones in a megalithic monument of the Funnel Beaker culture. The grave was investigated in 1826 and restored in 1925 and 1988.
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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
Glentehøj
The long, straight north-west side and the south-east side, which is divided by the entrance, have seven supporting stones.
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
The chamber, oriented north-west to south-east from the entrance, is 8.95 m long and roughly trapezoid in plan. The long, straight north-west side and the south-east side, which is divided by the entrance, have seven supporting stones. The straight north-east end wall, 1.5 m wide, has one stone, and the slightly bulging south-west end, about 2.5 m wide, has two. Five capstones cover the chamber and decrease in size from south-west to north-east.
The high and wide entrance passage, typical of the monuments on Lolland, still consists of eight supporting stones and four capstones. Only the outer trilithon element appears to be missing. The gaps between the orthostats were filled with intermediate masonry.
ExcavationsSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
In 1826 Count Reventlow and the German tutor at the Pederstrup estate, Erasmus Carl Kamla (1800?–1865), investigated the grave. It was not Kamla’s first excavation, and his excavation report, written in German, shows that he had studied such monuments thoroughly. Before the excavation, local people had found some flint daggers and broken pottery.
FindsSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
The chamber contained a wooden chest and a number of objects: amber beads, axes, chisels and flakes of flint, and pottery. Vessels were also found at the dry-stone kerb of the mound. Kamla’s records of the contents show that the grave did not differ from others of its kind. The wooden chest indicates that this large grave was reused in the Bronze Age.
ConservationSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
After the excavation Count Reventlow had the mound restored and the monument closed. A bench was placed in the chamber, and a hole was made in the ceiling so that daylight could enter. Gustav Adolf Rosenberg (1872–1940) restored Glentehøj in 1925, when it had been left undisturbed for almost 100 years. In the 1980s the grave suffered from vandalism, and this was remedied by a restoration in 1988.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
Kong Svends Høj, the largest passage grave on Lolland and one of the best-preserved in Denmark, lies south of road 289, east of Horslunde. In Denmark and Sweden passage graves are generally the grandest form of megalithic tomb of the Funnel Beaker culture, with a chamber under a mound entered by a long passage of large stones.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Scandinavian passage graves
In Denmark and Sweden the passage grave is the grandest form of the Funnel Beaker culture's megalithic tombs. A passage grave has a chamber under a mound, entered by a long passage of large stones. Nordic megalith architecture, the style of Scandinavia and northern Germany, emerged mainly between 3500 and 2800 BCE, and passage graves are one of its main types alongside dolmens, long barrows and stone cists.
Kong Asgers Høj on the Danish island of Møn is one of the best known. Its chamber is 10 metres long and 2 metres wide, with a passage 7.5 metres long. This kind of grave is found primarily in Denmark, Germany and Scandinavia, and only occasionally in France and the Netherlands. The tomb is structurally untouched since ancient times, though it may have been cleared at some time, and it was reused for secondary burial in the Corded Ware period. Passage graves were often used for generations. At Frälsegården in Sweden, genetic analysis of several dozen buried individuals suggests that the dead were largely male descendants of one ancestor, with women who had married in from outside, so such a tomb could belong to an extended family.
The passage grave tradition is thought to have originated in Brittany and been spread to other regions by colonists, a view found in the wider literature but one that remains debated.
Dating of Scandinavian tombs relies on the pottery of the Funnel Beaker culture and on radiocarbon dates from bone.
When visiting, look at the size of the capstones over the chamber, the kerbstones around the mound, and the line of the passage.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Passage grave, Wikipedia: Nordic megalith architecture, Wikipedia: Funnel beaker culture, Wikipedia: Kong Asgers Høj · CC BY-SA 4.0
From the article
Dated moments in the story
- 2800 BCE
Das Vorzeitdenkmal ist eine Megalithanlage der Trichterbecherkultur (TBK), die zwischen 3500 und 2800 v. Chr. entstand.
Source - 1826
1826 untersuchten Graf Reventlow und der deutsche Hauslehrer auf Gut Pederstrup, Erasmus Carl Kamla (1800?–1865), den Glentehøj.
Source - 1872
Gustav Adolf Rosenberg (1872–1940) führte im Jahre 1925 eine Restaurierung des Glentehøj durch, der zu diesem Zeitpunkt fast 100 Jahre unberührt geblieben war.
Source - 1988
In den 1980er Jahren gab es Probleme mit Vandalismus am Glentehøj, die durch eine Restaurierung im Jahre 1988 beseitigt wurden.
Source
Photographs
1 photograph, each with its author and licence
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 passage tombs in Denmark; this site has not been dated itself. Danish passage graves belong to the Nordic megalith tradition which emerged predominantly between 3500 and 2800 BC.Source for this date
Where it stands
Denmark
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 54°54′23″ N, 11°21′08″ EFor a GPS or map app: 54.90647, 11.35228
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.
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Ravnsby3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Ravnsby3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Ravnsby3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Birket3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Torrig skov3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Torrig skov3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Søgård3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Torrig Skov3500–500 BCE
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q1531172wikidata.org
- 02Source for this dateen.wikipedia.org
Image files
- Glentehøj.JPGToxophilusCC BY-SA 4.0
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Around this place
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Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Glentehøj" (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): GlentehøjCC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q1531172CC0