Page 265 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - France

WHAT DOES
THAT MEAN?
There are several
different formations of
megaliths. Words from
the Breton language,
such as men (stone),
dole (table) and hir
(long), are still used
to describe them.
Menhirs, the most
common type of mega­
lith, comprise upright
stones that stand
alone or arranged in
lines, while cromlechs
are menhirs that stand
in a circle. Dolmen are
usully formed of two
upright stones roofed
by a third; these were
once used as a burial
chamber. A tumulus is
a dolmen covered with
a cairn of stones and
soil to form a burial
Examiningthe mound, while allée
menhirs near couverte were placed
Camaret sur Mer to form a covered alley.

Coastal Megaliths
Prehistoric monuments have been found
around the Breton coast. On the skinny
Quiberon peninsula (p280), drive or cycle
down the “coast of Megaliths”, which runs
south from Carnac to the tip, to investigate
each in turn. On the northern coastal path in The Cairn de Barnenez at
Plouézoc’h, you’ll find the largest, and Plouézoc’h, which predates
oldest, burial chamber in Europe. the pyramids of Egypt
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