Passage tomb (passage grave)The Copper Age
Orkenspends Dys
DatedEst. 3500–2800 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
Orkenspends Dys is a small megalithic tomb in Ferslev parish, Frederikssund Municipality, Denmark, catalogued as a passage grave. It belongs to the northern group of the Neolithic Funnel Beaker culture and is dated to between 3500 and 2800 BCE on typological grounds.
The round mound is 8 m in diameter and 1.25 m high. The chamber is almost entirely buried, and its form and type cannot be established without closer investigation.
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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
Orkenspends Dys
The passage grave Maredys lies 110 m west-north-west of it and the passage grave Venslev Marker 7 lies 110 m east-north-east.
SettingSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
The tomb lies at the eastern edge of the forest Sømer Skov, in a meadow. The passage grave Maredys lies 110 m west-north-west of it and the passage grave Venslev Marker 7 lies 110 m east-north-east. There are, or were, numerous other megalithic tombs in the immediate surroundings.
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
The mound is round, with a diameter of 8 m and a height of 1.25 m. No stone kerb can be made out. The chamber lies almost entirely within the mound, and only the upper surface of a single capstone is visible.
It is presumably a small chamber with a rectangular plan, perhaps oriented north-west to south-east judging from the shape of the capstone. Its form and type cannot be determined with certainty without closer investigation.
Research historySources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
Staff of the Danish National Museum documented the site in 1873 and 1942, and staff of the forestry and nature authority documented it again in 1989.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (German): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
In Denmark and Sweden the passage grave is the grandest form of the Funnel Beaker culture's megalithic tombs. It 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.
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
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
- 55°47′23″ N, 11°52′53″ EFor a GPS or map app: 55.78963, 11.88148
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.
- Passage tomb (passage grave)Venslev Marker3500–2800 BCE
- Passage tomb (passage grave)Maredys3500–2800 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Venslev Marker3500–500 BCE
- Passage tomb (passage grave)Venslev Marker3500–2800 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Store Mørkebjerg3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Store Mørkebjerg3500–500 BCE
- Megalithic long barrowVenslev Marker3500–2800 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Sømme Skov3500–500 BCE
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q30146852wikidata.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 "Orkenspends Dys" (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): Orkenspends DysCC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q30146852CC0