Menhir de Run-ar-Gam
DatedEst. 2800–1800 BCE
Photo Liberliger · CC BY-SA 4.0Source file on Wikimedia Commons
Overview
About this site
Overview
The Run-ar-Gam menhir is a standing stone at Trébeurden in the département of Côtes-d'Armor, Brittany, France. It is catalogued with a typological date estimate of 2800 to 1800 BCE.
It is 2.90 m high and made of granite from Ile-Grande.
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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
Menhir de Run-ar-Gam
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (French): Menhir de Run-ar-GamCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (French): Menhir de Run-ar-GamCC BY-SA 4.0
The menhir is included in a bank in a plot called Parc-Ar-Peulvennic. It measures 2.90 m in height and 1.85 m in width at the base, and is made of Ile-Grande granite. Its faces are hollowed by fairly pronounced erosion grooves.
A menhir, also called a standing stone, is a large upright stone placed by humans, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age, although many are far older.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (French): Menhir de Run-ar-GamCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (French): Menhir de Run-ar-GamCC BY-SA 4.0
A menhir, also called a standing stone, is a large upright stone placed by humans, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age, although many are far older. Menhirs vary greatly in size and often taper toward the top.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Menhirs
A menhir, also called a standing stone, orthostat or lith, is a large upright stone placed by humans, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age, although many are far older. They stand singly or in groups, vary greatly in size, and often taper toward the top. Menhirs are found across Europe, Africa and Asia, with a concentration in Western Europe, notably in Ireland, Great Britain and Brittany. Theories about their purpose remain speculative and include rituals, territorial markers and elements of an ideological system. Some bear engravings, including human figures and symbols, and are often associated with ancient religious ceremonies and burial chambers. Because the great majority are on coasts, islands and peninsulas, it is believed that practitioners of megalithic religions travelled by sea.
Armenia has numerous menhirs known as vishapakar, "dragon stones", which are cigar-shaped, typically 3 to 6 metres tall and often found in the mountains near the sources of rivers or lakes. Many are carved in the shape of a fish. An inscription in Urartian cuneiform on one at the temple of Garni shows that they were made before the Urartian kingdom, before the eighth century BCE, and the earliest are thought to date to the eighteenth to sixteenth centuries BCE.
In Bulgaria several menhirs are known in villages such as Ovcharovo and Pethocladentsi. Standing stones in Indonesia and India are described in their own articles.
Dating is a standing difficulty: standing stones are usually hard to date, since they were raised during many different periods of prehistory. The Atlas gives a broad range and marks it as an estimate.
When visiting, look for the shape and surface of the stone, its setting on a rise or by water, and any carving.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Menhir, Wikipedia: List of menhirs, Wikipedia: Statue menhir · CC BY-SA 4.0
From the article
Dated moments in the story
- 1991
Anne Marchat et Michelle Le Brozec, Les mégalithes de l'arrondissement de Lannion, Institut Culturel de Bretagne, 1991, 102 p.
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.
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. 2800–1800 BCEHow this date was established: Type comparisonTypical range for menhirs in Kingdom of the Netherlands; 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
Kingdom of the Netherlands
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 48°47′32″ N, 3°34′12″ WFor a GPS or map app: 48.79230, -3.57010
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 Q125636797wikidata.org
- 02Source for this dateen.wikipedia.org
Image files
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Around this place
The ten nearest sites, by compass
- Prajou-Menhir gallery grave0.5 km NE
- Allée couverte de l'Île-Grande1.2 km N
- Milin-ar-Lann1.4 km SE
- menhir de Kerariou1.6 km S
- Saint-Uzec menhir1.9 km E
- Dolmen de Keryvon2.0 km E
- Dolmen de Kerellec2.0 km SW
- Allée couverte von Evez-Bihan2.2 km NE
- Île Milliau gallery grave3.2 km SW
- Kergüntuil gallery grave4.3 km NE
Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Menhir de Run-ar-Gam" (French), 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 (French): Menhir de Run-ar-GamCC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q125636797CC0