In them we tried to figure out what these ancient structures are, how they are structured and work, and what they are intended for. Perhaps someone will consider these articles not so important for spiritual seekers, diverting attention from the main goal, as they say, “the master’s business.” It seems to me that, to the best of our ability, together we are trying to restore history, lost knowledge and traditions, for the sake of, let’s say, a more holistic perception of reality, putting together puzzles into a single picture. How well this is working is still difficult to say.

In this article I would like to propose considering other megaliths, which, along with pyramids and dolmens, can also be part of a great architectural plan. And at some point, perhaps, they will help save humanity or transition to some new stage of civilization. We will talk about menhirs and cromlechs. Of course, there is a lot of information on the Internet, but it turned out to be difficult to put together. Taking into account the experience from the above articles about dolmens, in order to reduce the amount of “water” in the article, so as not to completely confuse you and myself, I will try to present it concisely, broken down into several parts.

Megaliths(from the Greek μέγας - large, λίθος - stone) - prehistoric structures made of large blocks. In the limiting case, this is one module (menhir). The term is not strictly scientific, therefore a rather vague group of buildings falls under the definition of megaliths and megalithic structures. As a rule, they belong to the “pre-literate” era. Megaliths are distributed throughout the world, mainly in coastal areas. In Europe, they mainly date from the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age (3-2 thousand BC), with the exception of England, where megaliths date back to the Neolithic era. Megalithic monuments are especially numerous and varied in Brittany. Also, a large number of megaliths are found on the Mediterranean coast of Spain, in Portugal, part of France, on the west coast of England, in Ireland, Denmark, and on the southern coast of Sweden. At the beginning of the 20th century, it was widely believed that all megaliths belonged to one global megalithic culture, but modern research and dating methods refute this assumption.

Types of megalithic structures.

• menhir - a single vertical standing stone,
• dolmen - a structure made of a huge stone placed on several other stones,
• cromlech - a group of menhirs forming a circle or semicircle,
• taula - a stone structure in the shape of the letter “T”,
• trilith - a structure made of a block of stone mounted on two vertical stones,
• seid - including a structure made of stone,
• cairn - a stone mound with one or more rooms,
• indoor gallery,
• boat-shaped grave, etc.

In many European countries, in the middle of fields and meadows, on high hills, near ancient temples, in forests, often right in the middle of roads and on lawns near houses where people live, huge long stones rise - menhirs (menhir is translated as “long stone”) "). Sometimes they stand alone, sometimes they line up in rings and semicircles, or form long rows and entire alleys. Some point straight up, others are tilted and appear to be falling. But this “fall” has been going on for five, or even six thousand years: that is exactly how long it is assumed today that the most ancient of them have existed. The Bretons call them pelvans, which means “pillar stones,” and the English call them standing stones. Science considers them the first authentically man-made structures that have survived to this day.

Menhir (also known as peilwan) - from Low Breton (France) maen - stone and hir - long - processed or wild rock, installed by man, whose vertical dimensions are noticeably larger than the horizontal ones. In the English-speaking tradition, the term “standing stones” is more often used. In Scandinavia, such monuments are called “bautasteine”.

Menhir- This is a free-standing stone that was considered sacred. A working menhir, that is, a stone that provides a connection with other megaliths, was usually located either in special zones (at the intersection of force fields, on faults) or above the sacred graves of ancestors. This is usually a tall stone, often in the form of a stele, or simply a free-standing huge boulder, strongly elongated upward. And in Egypt, for example, they specially carved it so that it was much larger in height than in width, and made it flat. All ancient menhirs are placed in the right places. Sometimes entire complexes are formed from menhirs - circles, semicircles, spirals and other shapes from menhirs. They are called cromlechs (but more on them later).

Menhirs are found among a variety of peoples, from the northern latitudes to the high latitudes of the southern hemisphere, and are found in different parts of the planet. There are especially many of them in Europe, Russia and the Caucasus.

The best studied and well known are the standing stones of Brittany and the British Isles. But there are many more of them on our planet. Today, menhirs ranging in height from one to 17 meters and weighing up to several hundred tons can be seen in Greece and Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica and the Balearic Islands, in the south of France, in Switzerland, Austria and the Czech Republic, in Spain and Portugal, in Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Germany and southern Scandinavia. They are found along the entire Mediterranean coast from Libya to Morocco and further south, all the way to Senegal and Gambia. There are them in Syria, in Palestine.

It is believed that the tallest menhir was the Fairy Stone, which stood near the village of Lokmariaker in French Brittany. It rose 17 meters above the ground and went more than three meters into the ground, and weighed about 350 tons! The fairy stone was supposedly erected 4,000 years ago, but unfortunately was destroyed around 1727. It now lies destroyed at the entrance to the village of the same name.) The most grandiose ensemble of menhirs is located there, in Brittany, in Carnac - grandiose stone alleys of more than 3,000 uncut stones (it is believed that there used to be about 10,000 of them!) stretch for several kilometers. They are about 6000 years old. From the air you can see that some large and small megaliths form huge circles and triangles.

How not to recall the megalithic complex of Akhunovo, mentioned earlier in articles on the site, or the Bakhchisarai menhir in Crimea, considered a very powerful place of power (by the way, the coordinates are still the same 43-44 degrees N. N44.76506 E33.90208) and many others.

A clear geometric plan can be traced in the arrangement of the stone “alleys” of the menhirs; some stone rows, stretching for kilometers from west to east, gradually move closer to each other according to a complex mathematical law described by a parabolic function.

Menhirs are a fertile topic for fantasy, including scientific ones. According to researchers, menhirs were used for a variety of purposes, incl. currently unknown and often already indefinable. Among the well-known purposes of menhirs are cultic (ritual fencing of other structures, symbolism of the center, ritual determination of the boundaries of possessions, elements of rituals of passage, phallic symbolism), memorial, solar-astronomical (sights and systems of sights), boundary and even informational. The idea that menhirs are ancient observatories is very attractive. Indeed, Stonehenge (a mega complex of menhirs and dolmens) became a place of pilgrimage for tourists after it turned out that at the time of the summer solstice the main axis of the entire structure points to the northeast, exactly where the Sun rises on the longest day of the year.

There is nothing on the simplest and most ancient objects, but over time, drawings, ornaments, inscriptions, and bas-reliefs begin to appear on the standing rocks.

And just look at the images on the menhirs of Göbekli Tepe:

Often, subsequent peoples reused menhirs for their own religious and other purposes, making additional drawings, editing, applying their own inscriptions and even changing the general shape, transforming them into idols. On the other hand, menhirs are functionally adjacent to single unprocessed stones, both specially installed and lying in their original places, as well as systems of specially placed stones.

Menhirs were installed either singly or forming complex systems: oval and rectangular “fences”, semi-ovals, lines, incl. many kilometers long, rows of lines, alleys. Despite the fact that the tradition of setting stones vertically is one of the oldest, it is also one of the most sustainable. Humanity still erects stone steles in honor of certain events or intentions. For example, the largest “menhir” - a monolith stands in St. Petersburg and is well known as the Pillar of Alexandria (let’s not get ahead of ourselves and pay much attention to this for now, since this is the topic of a separate subsequent article and separate conclusions). On the other hand, the tradition of being proud of one's tallest towers and broadcasting towers also has its roots in the tradition of menhirs.

Of course, there are many legends associated with menhirs. They say that dwarfs living underground turn into pelwans when sunlight hits them. And since these people are considered the keeper of treasures, legends claim that countless riches are hidden under the standing stones. However, the stones vigilantly guard them, and not a single person has yet managed to get them. According to other legends, menhirs are, on the contrary, petrified giants. And on the day of the summer and winter solstices, on Christmas Eve and Easter, they come to life - they walk, dance, spin around their axis or run to the nearest river to drink water or swim, and then return to their place and turn into stone again.

It is believed that menhirs are tombstones. Perhaps lighthouses. Or sights. There are known groups of menhirs that stand in such a way that from one you can see a second, from a second a third, from a third a fourth, and so on - very similar to a signaling system. True, the pelvans also stand far from the seashore, where it is strange to talk about them as lighthouses, and traces of burials are not found under all the long stones.

According to Ivan Matskerle, according to one theory, these religious buildings accumulate the energy of the Earth. “Scientists have found that at sunrise, especially during the solstice, menhirs scream and emit sound, but in an area inaudible to humans. Measurements have shown that ancient menhirs have a powerful magnetic field. This is how the hypothesis arose that menhirs are points of concentration of the Earth’s energy. They, like acupuncture points on the human body, are the intersection points of invisible vein-tunnels, magnetic flows passing along the surface of the Earth.”

It is known, for example, that in India, rough, upright stones are still considered the abodes of deities. In Greece, a huge rough stone pillar once represented Artemis. At the crossroads there were tetrahedral pillars with the sculpted head of the god Hermes - herms. In ancient Rome, Terminalia was celebrated in honor of the god of borders, Terminal. On this day, boundary stones were rubbed with oils, decorated with garlands of flowers, and sacrificial gifts were brought to them: honey, wine, milk, grain. Anyone who dared to move such a boundary stone was considered forever damned - borders in Rome were sacred. And the stone, representing the god Terminus himself, was located in the Capitoline Temple and guaranteed the inviolability of the borders of the entire empire. Maybe menhirs were the same boundary stones. Only they did not share neighboring properties, but rather something else. Nowadays a very popular hypothesis is that all these stones were placed on faults in the earth’s crust, where the Earth’s energy was concentrated and came to the surface. If you believe the myths, menhirs stand on the border of two worlds - the world where people lived and the world where gods lived. Thus, the Irish sagas say that standing stones marked the entrance to the Sides, the dwellings of the wondrous magical people of the Celts. And in Brittany, the belief remained that thanks to the pelvan one can meet the dead: in ancient times, people erected stone thrones somewhere in a prominent place, lit a fire and waited for the souls of their ancestors to sit on them to warm themselves by the fire. And just like the Termina stone, some menhirs, while they stand, guarantee the existence of entire villages, pushing back the end of times...

And these versions came across:

Menhirs are temples near which sacrifices were made. Menhirs are astronomical clocks from the Stone Age. The stones of Carnac (Brittany) are arranged in such a way that they show the position of the Sun at certain times of the year.

Indian menhirs with images of people in masks of animals and birds are symbols of religious cults.

Indian menhirs with two heads (human and animal) are symbols of the ancient Toltec teachings about the nagual and tonal. Perhaps our ancestors used dolmens - menhirs to practice the art of stalking - “recapitulating personal history” - one of the paths leading to the main goal of the Toltecs - freedom?

And take, for example, the ancient obelisks of the Egyptians:

Or take the ancient Slavic temples:

And if you look closely at the moai of Easter Island, these are also menhirs in their purest form.

In general, there is something to think about in your spare time.

Prepared by: Alexander N (Ukraine)

Menhir, translated from Low Breton, means men - stone and hir - long - “long stone” and is a roughly processed wild stone in the form of a pillar. The stones can stand alone or represent a whole group of menhirs located close to each other.

A great many legends are associated with Menhirs; they say that dwarfs living underground turn into pelvans when sunlight hits them. And under these stones there are supposedly countless treasures hidden. Well, of course these are all myths.

Menhirs that scream

Many legends and romantic stories are told about menhirs - stone pillars scattered across different parts of our planet. According to legend, the Druids held their sacred rituals near these stone monoliths. It was believed that a night spent near such a stone could cure a woman of infertility. And they say about the largest Czech menhir that, in fact, it is not even a stone, but a petrified shepherd who takes a small step closer to the local church every night. The secrets of the Czech menhirs could not leave our interlocutor, publicist and traveler Ivan Matskerle indifferent.
You can now admire menhirs in the Czech Republic in more than 20 places, mainly in the north-west of the country - an area that was formerly inhabited by the Celts. Czechs tend to give these stone structures nicknames. The menhir in Klobuky near Prague is called the “petrified shepherd”, the stone near the village of Dragomysl is the “enchanted monk”, and near Slavetin there is a “woman”. Not everyone knows that one of the sacred stones supports the fence of a private house in the Habra district of Prague.

“The owners of the site where the menhir stands specially placed their fence so that it goes around the stone. They are used to people coming to the menhir, putting their hands on it, and then talking about their strange sensations - some have numb hands, some feel warm, some feel nauseous,”
- says Ivan Matskerle.
Geologists have proven that many Czech menhirs were brought from somewhere to the territory of the Czech Republic, but the age of the stone blocks still remains a mystery. At first, archaeologists attributed the installation of megaliths to the Celts, who appeared in Europe 3 thousand years ago, but then they came to the conclusion that the real creator of menhirs was an ancient people who lived in the Stone Age. According to Ivan Matskerle, according to one theory, these religious buildings accumulate the energy of the Earth.

“Scientists have found that at sunrise, especially during the solstice, menhirs scream and emit sound, but in an area inaudible to humans. Measurements have shown that ancient menhirs have a powerful magnetic field. This is how the hypothesis arose that menhirs are points of concentration of the Earth’s energy. They, like acupuncture points on the human body, are the intersection points of invisible vein-tunnels, magnetic flows passing along the surface of the Earth.”
Pan Matzkerle also tried to solve the riddle of the magnetic field of one of the Czech menhirs.

“In the Czech Republic, the largest menhir is located in Klobuky, a village about 30 kilometers from Prague. There, a physicist and I conducted experiments during the Summer Solstice. The physicist recorded the parameters of the magnetic field at the menhir during sunrise and sunset. The results amazed us. A magnetic anomaly detected in one place before sunrise moved one meter to the west after sunrise, although the stone did not move.”

Two years later, the researchers repeated their experiment using ultrasound and infrasound technology, but did not record anything strange.
- By the way, what is this story about the menhir, which is moving towards the church?
“As the legend about the menhir in Klobuki says, every night, when the bell in the nearest village strikes midnight, the menhir approaches the church one step the length of a grain of sand, and when it reaches the church, the end of the world will come.”

Accompanying us to the Breton town of Lokmariaquer, our friends said:
— The town, of course, is small, but you won’t be bored with only dolmens and menhirs around. There will be something to do.

Indeed, literally at every step, as soon as we left the city (and it ended before it even began), we discovered huge stones: some stood like pillars, others were piled one on top of the other like giant tables, and still others were built into entire galleries . Legends have been formed about these stones for centuries, if not millennia, and, what is most amusing, they are still being formed, however, under the guise of unconfirmed supposedly scientific hypotheses.

For a long time it was believed that all these structures (they are found in Western Europe, as well as in some places in the Caucasus) were erected by the Celts - a stern and warlike people. These stones, they say, served as open-air temples, and the Druids, the priests of the Celts, performed bloody sacrifices near them. Well, many still think so, although it has been proven that the mysterious stones have been standing on the earth for more than three thousand years, and some are even older - archaeologists give the date 4800 BC. And many tribes, which we call Celts, appeared much later - in the middle of the first millennium BC.

In addition, if we talk about those giant stones that are located on the territory of Great Britain and France, then, most likely, they were actually used by the Druids, who replaced the more ancient priests unknown to us; after all, these buildings were built as pagan temples, but a holy place is never empty, and each new religion uses it in its own way.

But here’s the problem: in the Caucasus, for example, there were no traces of Druids, so where did such stones come from? However, in science fiction and non-popular science books you can find the most unexpected explanations for everything. For example, that the Druids are aliens sent to us or miraculously surviving inhabitants of Atlantis. If so, then anything is possible...

But real scientists courageously admit their own ignorance: we don’t know, they say, what the people who built these structures were called, we don’t know what and how these buildings were used. We can only establish their age and assume that they are somehow connected with cult activities. This is not as interesting as the hypotheses of romantic pseudoscientists, but at least it is honest.

In fact, no one even really knows what to correctly name these ancient monuments. Standing stones are usually called menhirs. Those that look like tables are dolmens. Stones arranged in a circle, like the English Stonehenge, are called cromlechs. Any guidebook says that these words are Breton, the first means “long stone”, the second “table-stone”, and the third means “rounded place”. This is true and not true.

Yes, the word “menhir” came into the French language, and after it into all others from Breton. But in the Breton language there is no such word, and a standing stone is designated by a completely different word “pelvan” - “pillar-stone”. How did this happen? The point is this: when scientists, and simply lovers of antiquities, first became interested in these strange structures (and this was back at the beginning of the 19th century), they decided to ask the local population what these strange things were called. The local population in those days had difficulty expressing themselves in French.

So from the very beginning there were continuous misunderstandings and misunderstandings between the bearers of the local tradition and the researchers.

Further more. Those “new legends” that romantic writers created in their works - about druids and singer-bards who drew their inspiration from the shadow of menhirs - have nothing in common with those legends that Breton peasants passed on from mouth to mouth. The peasants simply believed that these stones were magical.

And how could it be otherwise, because at first they served the pagans, and when Christianity came to Brittany, the old stones did not disappear along with the old religion. The first priests were smart people and understood that since local residents were accustomed to worshiping idol stones for thousands of years, it was stupid, if not dangerous, to try to convince them overnight that this was a sin. And instead of fighting the pagan stones, the priests decided to “tame” them, as priests of other religions had done more than once. The springs, which were considered magical even in ancient times, became sacred. Most often, it was enough to carve a cross on the top of the menhir. Sometimes they didn’t even do this: just some ancient ceremony with a procession to the stone turned into a religious procession. And the wolves are fed, and the sheep are safe. And what people tell about strange stones in fairy tales and legends is natural.

The alley of dolmens, which is located in Upper Brittany, near the town of Essay - called “fairy stones” - has always been surrounded with special reverence. They say that in order to build it, the famous Merlin, by the power of his magic, carried heavy stones from afar. Interestingly, archaeologists confirm with surprise: the multi-ton slabs that make up the alley actually traveled many kilometers before they were installed near Esse. But how did they do it? And who, and most importantly, why was it needed?

According to another legend, fairies built this stone alley. Each of them had to bring three huge stones at a time for construction - one in each hand and one on the head. And woe to that fairy who does not hold at least one stone. Having dropped it to the ground, she would no longer be able to pick it up and continue on her way - she had to return and start all over again.

They say that those who built this alley are not averse to joking with people even now. Many try to count how many stones are in the building, and everyone names their own number - some forty-two stones, some forty-three, and some forty-five. Even if the same person undertakes to count them several times, he will not succeed - each time the number of stones will be different. “Don’t joke with the devil’s power,” they said in the old days, “no one has ever been able to count these stones. You can't outwit the devil."

But the lovers believed that the fairies would help them choose their destiny. In the old days, young men and women came to the alley of ancient stones on the night of the new moon. The young man walked around them on the right, and the girl on the left. Coming full circle, they were dating. If both counted the same number of stones, then their union should have been happy. If one of them counted one or two stones more, then their fate was far from cloudless, but, in general, happy. Well, if the difference between the two numbers turned out to be too big, then, according to legend, it was better not to think about the wedding. However, even the fairies’ warnings did not stop the lovers.

There were also legends about menhirs. In the old days they believed that treasures were kept under standing stones. For example, under the menhir near the city of Fougeres. They said that every year on Christmas night a blackbird flies to the stone and lifts it, so that you can see the louis d'or lying on the ground. But if someone wants to take advantage of this moment and snatch the money, the huge menhir will crush him with its weight.

And there are also menhirs, who on Christmas night, while mass is being celebrated in churches, themselves go to the stream to drink, and then return to their place. Woe to the one who finds himself on the road of a stone that rushes at great speed and can crush everything in its path. However, as legends say, there are those who like to take risks: after all, in the hole left by the absent menhir, there could easily be a treasure. If you manage to pick it up while the menhirs are at the watering hole, you will live the rest of your life comfortably. True, few managed to survive: an angry menhir usually chased the thief like an angry bull and crushed the poor fellow into a cake.

We, of course, were not going to look for treasures, especially since Christmas was still far away. It was just interesting to look at the stones that they talk and write about so much. First of all, we went to a small open-air museum, where for a modest fee you could see the largest menhir in Brittany - 20 meters long, weighing approximately 280 tons. True, the giant did not stand, as a decent menhir should, but lay on the ground, split into several parts. This most likely happened in ancient times, but no one knows why. Maybe the ancient builders were let down by gigantomania, and they simply could not install the miracle stone and dropped it. Perhaps the stone stood for some time, but then collapsed due to an earthquake. Local residents claim that it was broken by lightning. Who knows what really happened?

By the way, not all menhirs and dolmens are gigantic. Once, while still a student (I studied in the Breton city of Rennes), a funny incident happened to me. It was in the town of Pont-Labbe, where my friend and I were invited by a classmate, a native of this town. Among other attractions, he decided to show us a whole clearing of dolmens. We all piled into his old Ford and drove a distance that we could easily have covered on foot. Getting out of the car, I began to look around in bewilderment: where were the promised dolmens?
“Yes, here they are,” they told me, “look around.”

And indeed, the clearing was dotted with dolmens. Small: the tallest one reached my knee. I couldn’t help but laugh, but my guide began to defend the dwarf dolmens, claiming that they were no less ancient than those multi-meter giants that they so love to show tourists. I did not deny this, but still the clearing made a somewhat depressing impression on me, and not at all because of the size of the dolmens. I remembered Moscow forest parks after the May holidays: under the dolmens there were candy wrappers, cigarette butts and a countless number of empty bottles, indicating that non-ritual libations were regularly performed here.

“Yes,” my guide sighed, “we don’t take care of dolmens and menhirs, they don’t take care of them... That’s nothing, it can be removed, but twenty or thirty years ago we saw enough films about your virgin lands and we also began to unite small fields and destroy boundaries... Under the hot hand, even menhirs turned up: imagine, a menhir stands in the middle of a field, seemingly not bothering anyone. Not included in the list of monuments due to his small stature. Of course, you can carefully drive around it with a tractor every time, but this requires time, attention, and unnecessary waste of fuel. What about the savings? So they uprooted menhirs that scientists had never even heard of. No one knows how many of these stones have disappeared.

Large menhirs with dolmens are really lucky. They are heavily protected by the state. You won’t get close to them in Lokmariaker; they are fenced off with ropes, and dozens of visitors wander in crowds along the narrow paths, gawking left and right. Outside the city, however, there are underground galleries where you can freely climb. Near each there is a sign and a panel explaining the history of the monument in four languages: French, Breton, English and German.

The most beautiful gallery seemed to me to be in the town of Kerere, at Cape Kerpenhir, about two kilometers from Lokmariaker. We went there early in the morning to enjoy the beauty of the ancient monument without bumping heads with our own kind. From the outside, the view is not so great: stone slabs on the top of a small hill, some kind of hole, at the entrance to which there is a small menhir, slightly taller than a man. We go down to the gallery. It smells of salt and dampness - no wonder, because the sea is very close. You have to walk on all fours: over several millennia, the huge slabs have managed to grow thoroughly into the ground. Although, most likely, the gallery’s vaults were not initially very high; people were much smaller: just remember the knight's armor in museums - not every thirteen-year-old boy can fit into them. What can we say about people five thousand years ago! To them, such galleries probably seemed high and spacious. Be that as it may, we, people of the twentieth century, have to protect our heads.

You can straighten up to your full height only at the end of the gallery, in a small hall. And only if your height is not above average.

On a panel installed nearby, a plan of the gallery is drawn and two slabs are indicated on which mysterious drawings are carved. However, it is impossible to see them; darkness reigns in the gallery, and only occasionally a ray of sun breaks through the gap between the ceiling tiles. You have to feel your way through, which makes the gallery seem even more mysterious: it turns unexpectedly and ends just as unexpectedly. However, I managed to find the slabs with drawings. Moreover, we managed to photograph them with flash. And only when the photographs were ready, we were able to see the message left to us by the ancient artists.

It is unknown what the ornaments from the Kerere gallery mean, but one of them is very reminiscent of a traditional Breton embroidery motif. It must be assumed that from time immemorial local artisans repeated the ornament once seen by torchlight in the underground galleries. They tell amazing things: for example, on one of the dolmen slabs in Lokmariaker, half of some animal is depicted. The second half is located on the dolmen slab of the island of Gavriniz (which means “Goat Island” in Breton), located four kilometers from Lokmariaker. Scientists suggest that these are two parts of one, once split fourteen meters long stone stele, which was divided between two temples. It’s just unknown how it was possible to carry such a heavy weight across the sea all the way to the island of Gavriniz?

...After pitch darkness, the summer sun is blinding. It feels like we have taken a trip into the darkness of centuries - in the literal sense of the word.

Sevastopol menhirs are stone blocks placed vertically in the form of obelisks, one of the most famous monuments of primitive man. We can say that this is a kind of Sevastopol Stonehenge, although the number of stones, of course, is much less than the “original” version.

To date, two menhirs have survived. The dimensions of the first of them are as follows: height 2.8 m, cross section - 1x0.7 m. The second menhir is slightly lower, its height is 1.5 m, with a cross section of 1.2 x 0.55 m. The weight of the larger stone is more than 6 tons, and this is surprising since there are no quarries nearby. This means that the blocks were brought from the Crimean mountains.

Stonehenge menhir: heel stone

Stonehenge is an area on the marshy Salisbury Plain in southwestern England that fans of the detective genre have heard a lot about. It was there that the chilling events of Conan Doyle's story “The Hound of the Baskervilles” unfolded. Sherlock Holmes's attention was absorbed elsewhere, otherwise the astute detective would probably have turned the full power of his deductive method to unraveling the mystery of the monolithic blocks of stone that dotted the swamps of Stonehenge. And not randomly, but, as it turned out, in the strictest mathematical sequence.

Stonehenge is a megalithic structure belonging to cromlechs - ring structures consisting of stone monoliths dug into the ground. Several hundred such structures with a diameter of 2 to 113 meters have been discovered in England and Scotland. Although, as is known, the remains of cromlechs are found in many other countries of the world, the ruins of Stonehenge amaze with their grandeur and mystery. This is a unique structure, erected several centuries before the fall of Homeric Troy, i.e. almost four thousand years ago. It would not be an exaggeration to say that there is nothing in the whole world like these harsh ruins.

Let's at least mentally take a tour of the stone structure... In the center of Stonehenge there is a stone measuring 4.8 x 1.0 x 0.5 meters. Around it, five trilithons rise in the form of a gigantic horseshoe with a diameter of about 15 meters. Trilith is a structure of two vertical stones on which a third is placed. The height of the trilithons varies from 6.0 to 7.2 meters and increases towards the center of the horseshoe.

The trilithons were once surrounded by thirty vertical stones about 5.5 meters high. On these supports lay horizontal slabs, forming a ring. The diameter of this ring, which is called sarsen, is about 30 meters. Behind the sarsen ring there were several more ring structures. One of them had a diameter of about 40 meters and had 30 holes. The other, a ring with a diameter of approximately 53.4 meters, also had 30 holes. The next ring, whose diameter is 88 meters, received its name in honor of the first explorer of Stonehenge, J. Aubrey, who lived in the 17th century. The Aubrey ring has 56 holes. Further, behind this ring there was an internal chalk shaft. Its diameter is approximately 100 meters, the width of the embankment is about 6 meters and the height is just under two meters. And finally, the entire complex of structures was surrounded by an external earthen rampart with a diameter of 115 meters, the width of the embankment was 2.5 meters, its height was 50-80 centimeters. The entrance to Stonehenge is made from the northeast, it was in this direction that the horseshoe of the trilithons opened. In the same direction, at a distance of approximately 85 meters from the center of the complex, there is a stone pillar - a menhir, up to 6 meters high and weighing approximately 35 tons. It is often called the “Heel Stone”, although there is no heel-shaped indentation on the menhir.

What purpose did the ancient monument serve, created by people from whom there was no other material evidence of existence left on Earth? What is this - the Temple of the Sun? Place of ritual ceremonies? The strange structure has given rise to many legends. Hundreds of scientific expeditions (including in our time) have explored the mysterious ruins. To the question “when?” Radiocarbon helped scientists find the answer. Radioactive analysis of human remains burned during burial reliably established the most likely date for the construction of the complex - this, as already reported above, is 1900-1600 BC.

To the question “how?” - how these huge stones were transported and installed - so far no definite answer has been found, but a lot of interesting material has been revealed for archaeologists, engineers and all those who are interested in the abilities and capabilities of prehistoric people... In this regard, the work of the Czechoslovak engineer P. Pavel, who revealed the secrets, is not without interest installation of Easter Island statues. The researcher has long been interested in the question of how the ancestors of the British, thousands of years ago, managed to pile five-ton stone slabs onto menhirs? Paul was sure that the original inhabitants of Britain, without cranes and other modern devices, could lift such weights to a considerable height. He wanted to conduct the experiment on site, but the British refused. Then, at the end of 1990, a fragment of Stonehenge appeared in the Czech city of Strakonice: two concrete pillars - an exact copy of those that have stood in foggy Albion for thousands of years. And next to it lay a concrete slab weighing five tons. With the help of ropes, 18 voluntary assistants of Pavel, who were by no means heroes, were able to lift this slab upward. So, after thousands of years, a 35-year-old engineer may have discovered a completely safe and simple method of the ancient builders of Stonehenge...

As for the basic question “why?” - for what purpose Stonehenge was built - it was decided quite difficult. It has long been suggested that Stoneheidge was not only a temple, but also a kind of astronomical observatory. In fact, the observer, being on the central platform of the complex, could see through one of the arches of the sarsen ring how on the day of the summer solstice the daylight rose directly above the menhir. On all subsequent (as previous) days, the sunrise point lies to the right of the menhir.

Exposing the Epiphanian menhir

Today, observatories of the Stone and Bronze Ages are known on all continents, with the exception of Antarctica. They were erected from the V-VI to the II millennium BC inclusive. Europe turned out to be unusually rich in astronomically oriented structures. The oldest star observation sites in the Old World were found in Malta and Portugal. Moreover, not all megaliths (structures made of stone or stone blocks) have an astronomical reference, although the total number of observatories is impressive.

Academic scientists are of the opinion about the utilitarian purpose and independent origin of stone structures in different cultures: with the transition from the primitive communal system to agriculture and cattle breeding, people began to everywhere observe the movement of the stars in order to know when to plow, sow and drive livestock. Romantic-minded researchers have put forward a theory about the remnants of an unknown highly developed civilization, whose representatives “traveled” across the globe, setting up Cyclopean observatories.

Russia has always tried to be the homeland of elephants. Naturally, sooner or later, its own Stonehenge should appear in its vastness.

Back in the 70s, the first reports of domestic “astronomical” megaliths appeared. Near Nalchik, they found a stone with a cup-shaped depression, allegedly repeating the pattern of the constellation Ursa Major. Repeated mentions of revered stones, which in some respects are suitable for astronomical observatories, appeared on the pages of the regional press or in popular science history books.

The breakthrough occurred in late Soviet times. Tula local historian Alexander Levin came up with the idea of ​​​​the astronomical orientation of some unusually shaped stones located in the south of the Tula region. Then the Tula publicist Valery Shavyrin wrote the book “Muravsky Way”. One of the chapters of the work, which does not pretend to be historically accurate, talked about Levin’s research and the stones he found, which supposedly served in ancient and not very ancient times as stone observatories and even sacred solar calendars of the ancestors of the Slavs, and then the Russians of the Middle Ages.

This was enough for the birth of the legend of the “Tula Stonehenges”. Local historians were not at all embarrassed by the fact that in central Russia ancient sanctuaries made of stones are unknown to science. And if they were, then, due to the shortage of stone, they would have long ago been taken away for economic needs - just as in the 19th century and in Soviet times, the foundations of former churches and medieval graves with a stone lining were dismantled for the construction of roads or buildings.

Stonehenge, the birthplace of samovars and gunsmiths, continued to delight the imagination of impressionable citizens. Year by year, the number of legends grew. Now the ubiquitous aliens have begun to be listed as the authors of stone observatories. But for some reason, almost no one, even visiting the stones, bothered to check the initial information about their astronomical orientation.

The hour of reckoning came last year. The Labyrinth group unites lovers of scientific tourism who are passionate about searching for and introducing little-known natural and historical objects from all over Russia into scientific circulation. There are speleologists, physicists, zoologists, and you name it. They not only search for themselves, but also check the information of their colleagues. The inspiration for the squad of pundits with backpacks was Kaluga resident Andrei Perepelitsyn.

“Labyrinth” made the first attempt at a comprehensive field study of the megaliths of the Tula region: they drove around the stones and interviewed the local population. The results were quite unexpected.

The first victim of the experts was the so-called Epiphanian menhir. The uniqueness of the stone, according to Levin and Shavyrin, as well as a number of authors who repeated their conclusions, is in its vertical arrangement. In the classification of megaliths, a menhir just means a stone stuck vertically into the ground. If the data about the ancient origin were confirmed, then there would be a sensation - there are no more menhirs on the territory of the Russian Plain.

Members of the Labyrinth expedition immediately strongly doubted the authenticity of the stone. Menhir is clearly visible from the road, you can drive up to it by car, it is located not in the middle of swamps and swamps, as Levin wrote, but almost on a collective farm field. Around the menhir there were traces of active human activity in recent years. The stone has clearly become a local tourist attraction.

The “Epiphanian miracle” is oriented along a north-south line; it also has a face located in the plane of the celestial equator. At the same time, near the stone there were not only vodka caps and cigarette butts, but also other stones with a similar structure. People with a geological background who were on the expedition identified a natural sandstone outcrop, which is typical for the forest-steppe zone of the Tula region.

The final revelation happened in a nearby village. Local residents told, not without pride, how about ten years ago a tractor driver put a stone upright on a dare. The daring collective farmer won a bottle in a bet and went off to enjoy life. (Another part of the aborigines claimed that the collective farmer tried to tear a stone out of the ground for the foundation, but something did not work out there.) And after a while, people passing by often visited the “stone guest” visible from the highway. This is how the legend about the first Russian menhir was born. Now the villagers really like to watch the “city fools” who go to the stone to “worship”.

After the debacle with the menhir, the expedition headed to the neighboring area, to the Gypsy Stone. According to preliminary information, there were drilled holes in it, pointing directly to the North Star, to the point of sunrise on the summer solstice on June 22, and so on.

The geographical position of the stone again let us down. The megalith lies on the slope of a ravine. It turns out either a hoax or a world sensation - the first observatory is in a ravine, and not at the top of the area. But why bother and follow the luminaries from below is completely incomprehensible. The examination showed that there was only one through hole on the stone. There are, however, a few more shallow, blind “holes”, but all of them are, with a high degree of probability, of natural origin. Such depressions are formed in place of the roots of ancient plants during the weathering process. After all, sandstone is a sedimentary rock, the cemented sand of the “beaches” of the Carboniferous period. It was pierced by the roots of plants, which, when rotting, left “donut holes”...

It is possible that the “hole” in the Gypsy Stone was slightly modified by people. Residents of the surrounding villages reported that a gypsy camp once stood near the stone. Its inhabitants adapted the holes for mini-stoves for cooking. Hence the name of the object.

The main goal of the expedition remained the Horse-Stone on the banks of one of the Tula rivers. “Labyrinth” asked not to give more precise coordinates due to the popularity of stone slides and rock gardens among Russian summer residents.

According to local historians and the local press, the Horse-Stone is an impressive multi-ton block on an artificially paved area. The stone is supported on three supports, so cleverly designed that, they say, the ancients could naturally turn it after the luminaries! And at the top of the stone there is a groove cut out for “aiming”. The moving megalith is one of a kind.

As they approached the stone, the “labyrinthians” perked up a little. Unlike the “collective farm menhirs” and observatories in the ravine, the Horse-Stone rises majestically above the bend of the river. The indigenous people told a legend about a horseman who appeared from the sky and turned to stone. And it was as if their grandparents went to the Horse-Stone on Trinity Sunday.

A detailed examination of the megalith refuted the assumption of artificial origin. Firstly, there is no platform under the stone. The horse-stone actually stands on three supports - stones from a natural rock outcrop on the shore, one of which has almost collapsed - this relates to the question of the movements of the megalith. The supports, like the stone itself, are of purely natural origin; no one has processed them. Instead of a groove, there is a small cross-shaped groove at the top.

Perepelitsyn suggested the natural nature of the depression, while another member of the expedition, Ilya Agapov, admits that it is man-made and may be associated with attempts by the Orthodox Church in the Middle Ages to baptize a pagan symbol. Astronomically, neither the groove nor the stone itself are oriented in any way. However, the greatness of the Horse-Stone is amazing.

At the end of June this year, Andrei single-handedly made another attempt to study the Tula megaliths. After his return from the expedition, we contacted the Kaluga researcher.

“How are the ancient Russian observatories?” — I ask Andrey. “The final defeat of the megaliths near Tula,” he laughs in response. — On the night of June 21-22, I specifically watched the sunrise at the Gypsy Stone with measuring instruments. Alas, the hole does not point to the sunrise, not only on the day of the solstice, but never at all - it is directed to the dead zone of the horizon, where the sun does not exist.”

Unfortunately, no one has yet systematized information about Russian megaliths. Therefore, the Labyrinth group - and the guys believe that there will still be astronomical observatories in Russia - calls on every Russian to take the problem of finding stone observatories seriously. “If you have seen something similar to megaliths, be sure to let us know,” says Andrey, “we will come and definitely figure it out. We must hurry with this work, because villages are dying out, legends are forgotten, and stones are lost and overgrown..."

Menhir of Bakhchisarai

The Bakhchisarai menhir is located at the southern cliff of the Inner Ridge of the Crimean Mountains near the village of Glubokiy Yar. In the middle ages there was a settlement here called Balta-chokrak. Chokrak is a spring in Crimean Tatar, and balta is an ax or hammer.
A menhir, according to the generally accepted international classification, is a single, vertically standing stone pillar, representing a monument of megalithic culture (from the Greek megas - large and lithos - stone).

The menhir at Glubokoe Yar is one of the few preserved in Crimea where it was installed in ancient times. According to scientists' calculations, this could have been around 1900 BC. Other Stone Age sites in the area confirm that the local population had very sophisticated stone-working skills and the engineering knowledge to move multi-ton blocks over long distances. Higher in the mountains near the village of Vysokoye, for example, two diabase stelae were discovered, on which ritual images, quite complex in plot and graphics, were carved with the help of hydrofluoric acid and bronze tools. One of these steles is exhibited in the Republican Museum of Local Lore in Simferopol, right in the lobby.

Thus, the Bakhchisarai menhir cannot be considered a random play of nature. This is a specially created astronomical structure. Along with other megalithic monuments, it testifies to the presence in those times of authoritarian leaders, wise priests, skilled craftsmen, and in general. a fairly high standard of living.
The height of the menhir is 4 meters, width is 2 m.

There is an artificial through hole in the rock east of the menhir at a distance of about 400 m in a natural grotto. On the days of the spring and autumn equinox (March 21 and September 23), the sun rises from behind this rock, a ray of sun passes through the hole in the grotto and hits exactly the top of the menhir.

Thus, even in ancient times, this menhir served as an accurate astronomical calendar for the local population, like the famous Stone Henge in Great Britain.

It remains a mystery what kind of tribes they were, what language they spoke, how strong their spiritual and trade ties were with other tribes that left megaliths from Siberia to England.

Crimean menhirs

There is a lot that is mysterious and mysterious in Crimea. Take menhirs - large unhewn stones placed vertically (from the Greek “megas” - large and “litos” - stone). Why and when they were created - there are only assumptions and conjectures on this matter. These ancient idols stand and are silent about some forgotten customs and aspects of the life of long-vanished civilizations...
Several menhirs are known on the peninsula: two - in the village of Rodnikovskoye in the Baydar Valley, three - were discovered during excavations of a sanctuary in Scythian Naples, another - the largest - is located in the Bogaz-Sala ravine, 7 kilometers from Bakhchisarai.

The Bakhchisarai menhir is located in the upper reaches of the Bogaz-Sala tract, not far from the village of Glubokiy Yar. Behind the Bakhchisarai ring on the Sevastopol-Simferopol highway, take the first right turn and drive through a peach orchard. Soon the road climbs onto the right (orographically) side of the gully. At first there seems to be no road there, just a field, and then suddenly it looms. Having passed the pine strip, through a passage carved into the rock, we get... no, not yet to the menhir.

Here we are interested in a grotto gaping in a monolithic rock. The walls of the small cave are smoked from fires. It is clearly visible that the grotto and the surrounding area have been used for economic purposes for a long time. There are many different cuts in the limestone: steps, round and rectangular post sockets, and a large hole that looks like a door. According to the technique of creating cuttings, including the “door”, they date back to the late Middle Ages - it was then that the creation of such structures was widespread.

It is obvious that at all times the grotto was used as a temporary shelter by shepherds grazing cattle on the slopes of the ravine. This assumption is supported by the fact that previously the outer open side of the grotto was “sewn up” with boards, the grooves of which were well preserved in the floor and flow of the grotto. The lonely figure of a shepherd with a small herd of cows still looms below.

The Bakhchisarai menhir turned out to be what it should have been - a roughly hewn rectangular stone block 4x2 meters. One glance is enough to convince you that this stone is not a random play of nature, but the work of human hands.

Back in the late 90s, a hypothesis appeared according to which a four-meter stone and a grotto with a hole on the opposite slope are a kind of solar calendar of the ancients. The menhir and the hole, located on the same east-west axis, are like parts of a colossal optical instrument. On the days of the spring and autumn equinox (March 21 and September 23), the sun rises from behind the rock, a ray of sun passes through the hole in the grotto and hits exactly the top of the menhir. This was the starting point.

Menhirs are a fertile topic for fantasy, including scientific ones. The main version of the appearance of such stone steles is some kind of cult purpose. There is no need to convince esotericists that menhirs stand in special “zones of power” where energy flows that go into Space converge. Another assumption is that menhirs are ancient observatories. Stonehenge became a place of pilgrimage for tourists after it was discovered that at the time of the summer solstice, the main axis of the entire structure points to the northeast, to where the Sun rises on the longest day of the year. By the way, the involvement of the Bakhchisaray menhir in astronomy was established by A. Lagutin, an employee of the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory, who spent many years observing the sunrise at the menhir.

In general, there are many versions, you can choose according to your taste. In any case, the menhir is unusually attractive for its loneliness and mystery.

Skel menhirs

Skel menhirs (III - II millennium BC) - a cult astronomical structure of the Stone Age. The most famous structure of this kind in the world is Stonehenge. Preserved near the village of Rodnikovoe (Skelya), at the entrance to the village, on the left, near the first stone house (club). Skel menhirs are stone blocks of marble-like limestone placed vertically in the form of obelisks. There are two of them: a large one, 2.8 m high, the other is squat, its height is less than 1.2 m. There was also a third one, 0.85 m high, but in the 50s it was dug up during the construction of a water pipeline. The local name for this place is Tekli-Tash ("placed stone"). The larger one weighs more than 6 tons, but there are no quarries nearby, and the nearest rocks are visible only a few kilometers away. Menhirs are said to heal well. A lone menhir stands above an underground stream of water, and at the point where the rivers intersect each other. It is assumed that water is the concentration of accumulation and conservation of energy and information. And in the place where the rivers intertwine into a ball, the water acquires the properties of a magic crystal. Other studies have shown that menhirs, like a snake, are entwined with an energy ribbon that goes upward. And they stand at points of accumulation of negative energy, transforming it into positive. People call such places zones of Power. As soon as you touch the megalith, your hands seem to be washed by an invisible stream of water.

Baydar (Skel) menhirs

The most famous monument of primitive man in the vicinity of Sevastopol is located in the center of the Baydar Valley, in the village of Rodnikovskoye (formerly Skeli) - the oldest example of conscious human construction activity, the first example of architecture.

Menhir means “long stone” in Breton. This word refers to long stone idols dug vertically into the ground, which are cult monuments of the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. They are known in Western Europe, North Africa, India, and Siberia. They are found in the Caucasus and Crimea. The Skel menhirs are the largest known in South-Eastern Europe. They were discovered near the village of Skelya (now the village of Rodnikovskoye, Bakhchisaray district) 85 years ago by archaeologist N.I. Rennikov. In Tatar, these stone obelisks are called “temke-tash” (“placed stone”).

There are two menhirs, these are monolithic blocks of marble-like limestone, covered with cracks, mosses or lichens. In 1978, they were examined by A. A. Shchepinsky. He noted that the menhirs with their “facade” and “rear” are located almost along the north-south line, and their compacted sides are oriented to the east and west. And although similar monuments are quite often found in Europe and Asia (in Siberia, the Caucasus, the largest menhir, more than 20 m in height, is located in France, in Brittany), but the monuments of the Baydar Valley are the largest of those found in southeastern Europe . He believes that they had cult significance, and dates their appearance to the 3rd - early 2nd millennium BC. It is possible that the ancient inhabitants of these places who established them, like the creators of the famous English Stonehenge, which is the same four thousand years old, were engaged in astronomical observations.

Simferopol historian and archaeologist A. A. Stolbunov came to the same conclusion. Skel menhirs rise on a flat area near the building of the Rodnikovsky rural club. One of them - Big - with an above-ground height of about 2.6 m (up to 1 m in diameter), the other - Small - has a height of 0.85 m (width up to 0.8 m). They are made of marbled limestone, which makes up the Main Range of the Crimean Mountains. There is nothing like a quarry nearby - it was brought from the mountains and, apparently, from afar. Imagine how much effort it took to transport the menhir and install it in a vertical position.
The top of the Big Menhir has a conical shape, the Small one is flattened. The monument has not been fully studied. Only in the 1960s. a third menhir (fragment) was excavated in Rodnikovsky, and in 1989 a fourth, fallen menhir, about 2.4 m high (up to 0.8 m in diameter), was discovered. Skelskie< менгиры охраняются в составе Байдарского ландшафтного заказника, созданного в 1990 г.

Alley of menhirs of Arkaim

There is probably no person in the modern world who is interested in ancient history and has not heard about such colossuses of Eurasian religious architecture as Stonehenge or the rows of menhirs in Le Menec. However, how many people know that in our Trans-Ural steppes in the Late Bronze Age the megalithic cult was highly developed? The alleys of menhirs and single menhirs of the Southern Trans-Urals are not colossal in size, but monuments of a megalithic nature were widespread, and the expressive features of their construction speak eloquently of the special sacred significance of these complexes in the culture of the population of the Late Bronze Age of our steppes. One of these monuments - the Simbirsk Alley of Menhirs - is currently represented among the objects of the historical park of the Arkaim Museum-Reserve.

The alley was excavated in 1990 by an archaeological expedition team from Chelyabinsk State University under the leadership of I.E. Lyubchansky when conducting archaeological research in the construction zone of the Ilyas reservoir in the Kizilsky district of the Chelyabinsk region. After the research work, the alley was dismantled and transported to the reserve in order to preserve the monument, which was located in the planned flood zone. The Simbirsk Alley of Menhirs is an example of an unknown cult, widespread in the Trans-Ural steppes in ancient times.

The monuments studied and discovered in the Southern Trans-Urals can be divided into 4 types:

* Single menhirs.
* Alleys of menhirs in the form of a straight line.
* Alleys of menhirs in the form of an arc.
* Menhir complexes.

To which specific Late Bronze Age culture did menhirs and menhir avenues belong? What cult were they dedicated to - solar-lunar, phallic? What did the menhir buried in the ground symbolize? From whom did the alley protect? What role did megalithic monuments play in the development of cultural space by the ancient population of the Eurasian steppes? Archaeologists are now trying to answer all these questions. Today, these mysterious stones have not been sufficiently studied, but during research over the years, some interesting patterns have emerged.

Almost all the studied megalithic complexes are located in close proximity to the monuments of the Late Bronze Age. Most often these are settlements, less often - burial grounds. There are cases when a complex of monuments of the same time and located in close proximity is represented: a settlement - a community religious object (megalith) - a community necropolis (for example, monuments of the Sistema microdistrict in the Kartalinsky district of the Chelyabinsk region, reconnaissance and excavations of V.P. Kostyukov in 1989 and F.N. Petrova in 2001). Megalithic monuments are not just located near settlements, but occupy a strictly defined position relative to them. The monuments seem to line up along a certain semantic line: settlement - megalith - burial ground/hill. In the landscape it looks like this: river - settlement (for example, on the first terrace above the floodplain) - then, along a gradually rising terrain - a menhir or alley of menhirs (in almost all cases this is the slope of the nearest, often very low hill) - further, on the indicated line the top of the hill described above will be located. In some cases, when settlements near the menhir or alley of menhirs are not recorded, there is, as it were, part of the above diagram: megalith - burial ground. In this case, the burial ground will also be located in the landscape above the megalith, as if replacing or preceding a hill dominating the surrounding area (for example, the alley of Peschanka menhirs, excavations by S.S. Markov, 2002). Predominantly, the specified line or axis runs along the north-south line, often with deviations. This is probably due to the general structure of the landscape, in which the alley must be located on the slope of a hill, for example, in the case of the Simbirsk Alley of Menhirs, the alley was located to the east of the settlement, that is, the settlement was accordingly located to the west of the nearest hill. Apparently, the location of the cult megalithic complex precisely on the hillside had a particularly important role in its construction, even if (in very rare cases) no settlements or burial grounds were recorded near the megalith. For example, two alleys of menhirs on the Cheka mountain massif in the Kizilsky district of the Chelyabinsk region (Cheka I and Cheka II) studied during the 2002 field season. No settlements or burial grounds were found in the immediate vicinity of these monuments, however, both alleys, like most alleys of menhirs in the Southern Trans-Urals, were built along a west-east line and located on a hillside.

Excavations of megalithic monuments provide a wide variety of data. And this, in its own way, makes their analysis even more difficult. In essence, today researchers can only say with a certain degree of certainty that the chronological affiliation of the majority of Trans-Ural megaliths is the Late Bronze Age. This is a time of close contacts between the Alakul (eastern) and Srubnaya (western) tribes on the territory of our region.

The main results of excavations in the steppe zone are material traces of precisely such contacts. In addition, there is so far a single case of obtaining materials from Cherkaskul (forest) tribes during excavations (excavations of the Akhunovo megalithic complex in the trans-Ural part of the Republic of Bashkortostan, F.N. Petrov, 2003). Also, as a result of these excavations, materials were obtained that presumably date back to an earlier period - the Chalcolithic.

During excavations of some megalithic monuments of the Southern Trans-Urals, remains of burials were discovered (burnings and corpses, which in itself speaks of different cultural traditions or a mixture of them). It is difficult to say whether they were traces of special burials. In the case of corpse burnings, neither a grave pit nor corresponding grave goods (vessels or altars) were found. The only encountered case of a complete funeral rite was recorded on a single menhir of Lisya Gora (excavations by F.N. Petrov, 2003). The burial was carried out according to the log rite.

What did these burials, performed outside the traditional necropolis of the community, mean? Perhaps there was a case of abnormal death (for example, a strange disease)? Or did the deceased have some special status during his lifetime? In the case of the Lisya Gory menhir, where the burial of a woman with two infants was discovered, one can assume either death from natural causes, or ritual murder - the sacrifice by the community of twins, whose birth was perhaps considered a bad sign, and their mother. Also, burials at megalithic monuments could be a “construction sacrifice” widely known in the cult practice of different peoples (Tylor, 1989).

There is another relatively new direction in the study of ancient monuments, including megalithic ones - archaeoastronomy. Researchers working in this direction suggest that certain rituals of an astronomical nature associated with agricultural cycles could have been carried out at megalithic monuments. For example, during excavations of the Simbirsk alley of menhirs, remains of cremation were found located inside a certain wooden or stone structure. Their location emphasizes the northeast direction relative to the center of the alley. This direction is generally significant for near-horizon astronomy, since it marks the direction of sunrise on the days of the summer solstice, and was of particular significance in the ritual (including funeral) practice of antiquity. It is also appropriate to mention the fact that during excavations at perhaps the most famous megalithic monument in Europe - Stonehenge (this is one of the most ancient observatories) traces of cremation were also found (J. Wood, 1981, pp. 227-228). A possible analogy in this case does not allow us to talk about some kind of kinship or continuity of cultures, but it can emphasize by the very presence of human sacrifice the special significance of the megalithic cult in the life of ancient societies.

A special place in the study of megaliths of the Southern Trans-Urals is occupied by the question of artistic work found on the stones - zoomorphic or anthropomorphic, extremely rare for menhirs of this territory. Why is this so? Researchers have no reason to believe that Bronze Age people - the creators of amazingly beautiful clay dishes and small stone sculptures - were not able to reproduce artistic images. More ancient in time, relative to the menhirs of the Southern Trans-Urals, Okunev steles are known, on which one can trace both achievements in stone processing and extraordinary stylistics. In essence, all artistic and creative skills were adopted by humanity at the earliest stage of its development - in the ancient Stone Age. “From XXX to X thousand BC. e. all the basic principles of fine art have been mastered - in the ensemble and in its individual components, in compositions and in decoration. Creating a sacred “temple” space; canon of a figure unfolded on a plane; frieze and heraldic construction of the scene; the relationship between a thing and its embodiment; interaction between the shape of the object and the image. Whatever we touch, everything has its own post-types, post-images, everything develops in the subsequent multi-thousand-year history of human art” (Laevskaya, 1997, p. 23). However, among the menhirs of the Southern Trans-Urals, among which only in a few cases there was a difficultly guessed attempt to give the stone some not entirely clear shape, there is only one reliable case of finding an image - this is one of the two central steles of the megalithic complex of Akhunovo. Judging by the state of the image on this stone, and it is very deplorable, it can be assumed that time itself (geological weathering to which the stone was constantly exposed) erased the work of ancient masters from the monuments. But this is just a version.

It can also be suggested that most of the menhirs of the steppe Trans-Urals did not have any images applied at all. The semantic load of complexes, alleys and single menhirs was completely different, in no way tied to the morphology of individual stones. “The essence of ancient art, especially monumental art, was determined by its special function, which differed from the function of modern art. Not so much a reflection or copying of reality, but rather a recreation of the ideological foundations of existence in order to influence both the real and illusory spheres of society's life - these ideas determined the specifics of the creation and functioning of ancient monuments of this kind. The art of creating a monument (stele, menhir, sculpture, etc.), thus, was thought of and perceived as a demiurgic religious-magical process designed to ensure normal interaction between the world of people and the world of gods, ancestors and heroes" (Samashev, Olkhovsky, 1996. P. 218). Thus, we can assume that for the South Ural builders of megalithic monuments, the most significant could be both the structure itself, the “architecture” of the structure, and its position inside or outside the cultural “civilized” space of the community.

So, as we see, the problem of studying megalithic monuments is very multifaceted. This is a relatively new direction in the study of ancient societies of the Southern Trans-Urals. Here there are broad prospects for research in a variety of areas, both archeology itself and searches in the field of mythology, religious studies, and art history. Paleosoil scientists and astronomers are already actively participating in the field work of archaeologists; the data they obtain expands the capabilities of archaeologists in terms of clarifying the chronology and reconstructing the spiritual life of ancient societies.

Disputes over the correct naming of monuments continue. Is it right to call them “megaliths”? In fact, the majority of Trans-Ural menhirs are not that large, although there are individual stones of very impressive size. But we think that the main criterion is not the size of a particular stone. It is worth thinking deeper about this cultural phenomenon. Neolithic steles with “masks”, deer stones of different cultures and eras, Scythian “stone women”, Turkic funeral sculpture and, finally, Er-Gra and Stonehenge. On the vast territory of the Eurasian steppe, ancient stones have stood for thousands of years. Installing them was not always such a labor-intensive task, but it required the efforts and intellectual potential of the entire community. So the use of the term “megalith” seems to us to be quite legitimate in the sense not of “large stone”, but of “larger than a stone”.

The energy invested in the construction of alleys of menhirs or the installation of single stones was more of a spiritual nature than physical, and the traces of this spiritual culture left to us by the ancient population of the South Ural steppes are still waiting to be solved.

Menhir of the North Caucasus

In different countries of the world and on different continents: in Asia, America, and Europe, you can look at megalithic structures called dolmens. In addition to dolmens on the territory of the Earth, both in the coastal parts of the world and in the interior of the mainland, you can see mysterious and rather strange pillars called menhirs. These are huge pillars that are made of solid stone.
The size and mass of menhirs are unusually large, for example, a stone pillar or menhir, which is located in the French city of Lokmariaker, reaches a height of twenty-three meters, and its mass is three hundred and thirty tons. Sometime in the distant past it was destroyed, perhaps by human hands, perhaps by a natural phenomenon. And now this menhir has been destroyed into 3 parts, each weighing several tons. Megalithic structures such as menhirs are among the most common on Earth. So in some areas of Western Europe you can find up to 100 menhirs. In addition, dolmens and cromlechs are often located next to menhirs, which indicates their relationship, which is not clear to modern people.

In Russia there are dolmens that are located in the Caucasus, and there are quite a lot of them, but there are practically no menhirs, or they are destroyed. Those who built these huge stone structures thought that menhirs had no place here, which is quite likely. But still, in the North Caucasus there is one menhir, which is considered a classic representative of such structures. This menhir is located in a small settlement called Khamyshki. Menhir, which is a local landmark here, is visited by crowds of tourists from different cities of Russia, and even other countries of the world. This menhir stands on the left bank of the river, which is called Belaya, and next to it stands a trough-shaped dolmen. There are petroglyphs written on this dolmen, and there is a stone bowl nearby. The dolmen was saved from destruction when it was moved one hundred and fifty meters from the construction of the highway connecting Guzeripl and Maykop to the territory of a private park.

The dolmen standing next to the menhir previously looked like a flower that rose from the ground, but the rock from which this flower was made split open right where the hole is located. Part of the dolmen lies on its side, namely the part that was at the very top. Near this place there is a menhir, it is slightly smaller than the other one mentioned above. There is also a huge stone bowl, which may have functioned as a vessel for sacrificial blood or sacred water.
The private park on which all these stone structures are located is just beginning to be built. This park can already be visited, and it is quite cozy and pleasant to visit. In addition, in the village of Goncharka there is a “Museum of Stones”, where you can look at megalithic stone menhirs.

Let us turn to some features of the installation of menhirs. These are not stone pillars dug into the ground, but a pillar made of a certain type of stone. The menhir was placed on a flat stone slab, which lay horizontally to the surface of the earth, and a special recess was made in it. This recess was equipped with a special insert on which the megalithic stone menhir itself was placed. The bottom of the stone was filled with soil and reinforced with stones and turf so that the menhir could stand for a long time.

Akhunovsky menhirs: a message from the ancients

Recent decades have been marked by an unabated growth of humanity's interest in its distant past, a recapitulation of the fundamental principles of Darwinism, and the discovery of archaeological sites that provide new insights into the ancient ways of life of the current human race. Among them are Stonehenge, Arkaim, Ryazan Spassky Luki, the Tibetan pyramid mountain Kailash and... the Bashkir Stonehenge - the Akhunovsky megaliths of the Uchalinsky district.

Intrigued by the stories about Bashkir menhirs, we headed towards Akhunovo. We were met by the acting head of the local administration, historian by training Amir Kharisov.

In 2003, archaeologists from the Chelyabinsk scientific center "Arkaim" carried out excavations at the site where the menhirs were installed, found artifacts, took them, but with the condition that they returned finds of value for the history of Bashkortostan. They did not keep their word. Recent publications in newspapers indicate that many millennia ago, representatives of an ancient civilization lived in our region - the Aryans, who then built Arkaim and went to the east. Our local historian Zhavdat Aitov, the discoverer and keeper of local historical monuments, knows this well. He didn’t study anywhere, he comprehends everything himself and can tell you a lot.

Amir Kharisov has no doubt that the Akhunovsky menhirs are a near-horizontal astronomical observatory. According to available information, as shown by scientific research by the leaders of the historical and archaeological center “Arkaim” F.N. Petrova, A.K. Kirillov, with the help of the megalithic complex, the priests observed the starry sky, the movement of the sun and moon, which made it possible to maintain a systematic calendar containing key astronomical dates: the days of the summer and winter solstices - June 22 and December 22, as well as the spring and autumn equinoxes. The data obtained, scientists say, allow us to consider the megalithic monument of Akhunovo as one of the largest ancient observatories in Eurasia in terms of the number of observed astronomical events. Based on the totality of archaeological and archaeoastronomical data, it can be assumed that it was built in the 4th millennium BC. The shards of clay pots and animal bones found at the complex belong to the Late Paleolithic, that is, they are more than 10 thousand years old.

The only direct analogue of the Akhunovo megalithic complex currently known on the territory of Eurasia is the larger, but having a fundamentally similar structure and reflecting a similar level of astronomical knowledge, the English megalithic monument Stonehenge.

And our Zhavdat, who is now over fifty years old, while still a schoolboy, when the virgin lands were being developed, suddenly declared, continues Amir Iskandarovich, that there is an ancient burial ground on the mound and it should not be disturbed or destroyed.
We met Zhavdat Talgatovich riding a bicycle along the street of the village. He has been working as a plumber for a long time, fixing leaks. He got into our car from his bicycle without any further questions, showing the way to the megaliths, just as he did then, in 1996, to the first Chelyabinsk archaeologists.

I went to the place of worship of these shamans as a boy,” Zhavdat said first, getting into the car. “My grandmother treated this place with great respect, went there to pray and considered it an ancient sanctuary, in our words: “aulia cabere.” To some extent, she even protected him. Apparently, the mission of guardian of the secrets of the centuries was passed on to me by inheritance...
Zhavdat Aitov knows his seven generations, and for as long as he can remember, something has always drawn him to mysterious stones. Information about the religious unusualness of the ancient temple was passed down from generation to generation, and the villagers avoided it. Even when the garden of the Red Partisan collective farm was built nearby in the 1930s, stones were brought from outside, and the ancient “calendar” was not disturbed. Until the time has come to reveal it to the world.
“It was I who showed the Chelyabinsk people the way to the stones,” continues Zhavdat, “and four years ago I gave them a bronze medallion I found - a shamanic sign - it was worn by those who installed these menhirs. It is a cross enclosed in a circle. I thought that they would explain its meaning, but there is still no information, no cross.
Meanwhile, the car drove up to the bank of the Aykreelgi river and Zhavdat pointed to several hewn stones (menhirs) installed vertically.
- I myself noticed that by looking at the stones you can determine in what place the sun will rise and where the moon will appear. Especially on a full moon,” says Zhavdat Talgatovich. “But it seems to me that this “calendar” has a completely different purpose. Here began the shamanic road to their holy place, where they prayed to God. It passed between the “northern” and “southern” menhir to the east, towards the forests.
The “calendar” consists of 10 menhirs, but another one, according to Zhavdat, with mysterious drawings and signs, the priests and wise men took with them or hid somewhere.

To the west of the object is Mount Uslutau, 666 meters high. Note that the peak of Tibetan Kailash, a world place of worship, is located at an altitude of 6666 meters. Strange coincidence! While at Akhunovsky “Stonehenge”, you can notice that in spring and autumn, on the days of the equinox, the sun sets precisely behind Uslutau. And this can no longer be a mere coincidence. Uslutau translated from Bashkir means “peak peak,” and some dreamers call Akhunovo the navel of the earth. This means that the locations of the menhirs and the sanctuary itself were carefully selected.
“In ancient times, this territory was revered as a great source and considered sacred,” says Chelyabinsk resident Konstantin Bystrushkin, author of the books “The Arkaim Phenomenon” and “The People of the Gods.” — The megalithic complex in Akhunovo is more than an observatory, more than Stonehenge. Why did the ancient builders erect an entire megalithic complex here?

The answer to this question was found after careful measurements. It turns out that the line passing through the two central menhirs deviates from the north-south magnetic direction by 13 degrees. In this case, the northern menhir points to the dominant peak in this area, Uslutau, located 14 kilometers from the object. And the southern menhir points to the hill separating Akhunovo from the Karagai forest. And this hill lies on the same meridian with... Arkaim.
In addition, the Akhunovo “stones” are located almost at the same latitude as the English Stonehenge and the Ryazan “Stonehenge” Spasskiye Luki.

Zhavdat Aitov believes that there are several such “calendars” in the vicinity of Akhunovo; one of them was destroyed in 1947. All of them together represent some kind of complete ensemble, a sign that can be seen from above, and maybe even from space. Since, according to the local historian, ancient people studied the movement of stars, for example, the Big Dipper, they probably knew the secrets of astrology and knew how the location of the heavenly bodies affected earthly processes and people. Everything in space is interconnected.

By the way, ufologists who came to Akhunovo believe that this megalithic complex is nothing more than a landing strip for a UFO, or a sign for the cosmic mind... And a couple of tourists who came to worship the “stones” actually saw luminous balls flying over Akhunovo , and Zhavdat saw the “plate” itself, hovering at night 900 meters from him with running lights around its circumference and a diameter of about a hundred meters.

It’s a shame that the people of Arkaim covered up the bronze cross,” Zhavdat continues to be indignant, “they didn’t show it, they didn’t tell the world, and yet it is a symbol of the Aryans’ beliefs. After all, the shaman’s road leads to the top of the mountain - a place of worship and rituals, where the Aryans built a 15-meter-long stone wall. Such huge stones were lifted, in what way is it interesting, if the heaviest one weighs one and a half tons? There are two circles there. I just showed this place to the people of Arkaim, and next year I look - everything has been dug up... Well, you can’t treat sanctuaries like that... I’m very offended... Let’s come here.
Zhavdat Talgatovich leads me to a certain point in the sanctuary.

Here the chief shaman, the priest, stood and led the ceremony - the rite, and others stood around him. They sang, danced, beat the tambourine - they talked with the gods and the elements of nature. And the gods lived among them...
The ancients knew that God is one and at the same time multiple, he has many faces and the natural elements are fire, wind, earth, water. They knew the laws of nature and lived in harmony with them. Being friends with the elements and honoring the pagan God - Rod and the deities - Veles, Perun, Mitra, Kryshnya, Zhavdat believes, they grew excellent crops, controlled the weather, and ensured peace and spiritual order in the village. The main deity of the Aryan-Slavs was the sun god - Ra - the god of fertility, light, Vedic knowledge, peace, and prosperity. It was to him that the medallion given to the Chelyabinsk residents was dedicated - a cross in a circle, denoting the four solar signs of the year.
“In addition, they deified the missing third stone, probably of alien origin,” Zhavdat surprises. — We drew strength and knowledge from him. Where is this stone?

The latest discoveries by scientists indicate that the famous teacher and prophet Zarathushtra was born and preached in the Southern Urals, near Mount Iremel. He was a kind of conductor of divine knowledge about nature, the world order, spiritual laws, and one of the founders of the solar religion - Zoroastrianism and Mithraism, to which an unprecedented interest has recently flared up in society. And the ancient people who chose the surroundings of Akhunov were none other than the Zoroastrians, who then went to Iran and India...

Do menhirs cure infertility?
One Ufa woman who is fond of esotericism and everything unusual told us that the megalithic complex in Akhunovo is famous for its healer of infertile women. It was not possible to find out what this is connected with. Maybe because the central menhir has a phallic shape... Or maybe because the god of fertility was worshiped here... But
The Ufa woman assures that women really come to Akhunovo and stand for a long time near the menhir.
“Yes, I heard about it,” confirmed Zhavdat Talgatovich. — Our “calendar” also has healing properties...
... We were leaving, and Zhavdat continued:
- Akhunovo is located between the mountains, like on a plate. Where is its center, the main point of observation of the priests? It would be necessary to excavate all the objects, connect them mentally and try to decipher the information contained in them. But I think that no one will ever succeed...
And I thought that the megalithic complex carries a message from the ancients to our time. Just what? Good or bad?
The question remains open, we will come back here...

Menhirs are vertically installed huge stones processed by man. Their creation dates back to ancient times, before the Neolithic era. The largest of them is preserved in France - 20 meters high and weighing 300 tons. True, over time it split into three parts. There are several such menhirs in Crimea...

Menhir of Belyansky

The largest and most famous is the Belyansky menhir (Bakhchisarai menhir) in the village of Glubokiy Yar. Named in honor of the local historian who discovered a vertically standing stone pillar in the Bogaz-Sala ravine, near Bakhchisarai. The height of the menhir is four meters, weight is about 10 tons. It is interesting because, firstly, electromagnetic anomalies are periodically created around it, which cause the compass needle to deviate. And secondly, as the engineer of the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory Alexander Lagutin proved, the Bakhchisarai menhir in combination with the rock mass opposite forms a unique ancient astrophysical observatory. Through a window carved into the rock, the rising sun hits the menhir twice a year. This ray records the direction west - east and, most likely, served to determine the days of the summer and winter solstices. It is at this time that esotericists come to the menhir to recharge with the energy of the sun. After all, it is believed that the summer solstice saturates space with energy and on this day those born under fire signs (Leo, Aries and Sagittarius) can feel like real magicians.

Menhir of Belyansky

Skel menhirs

In the village of Rodnikovskoye, in the Baydar Valley, there are three vertically standing blocks. The tallest menhir reaches almost three meters. The famous Crimean archaeologist Askold Shchepinsky, who studied the object in 1978, points out that the Skel menhirs are not only the largest, but also clear monuments of this kind in southeastern Europe, which have not been disturbed in subsequent centuries and stand in their original place. The scientist claims that the Skel menhirs had cult significance, and dates their appearance to the 3rd - early 2nd millennium BC. Thus, these ancient monuments are more than four thousand years old.

As the book of Genesis narrates, Jacob, fleeing the wrath of his brother Esau, who had been deceived by him, fled, hoping to find shelter with his uncle Laban. Having spent the night along the way in a desert area, resting his head on a stone, he woke up in great fear: God appeared to him in a dream... As a sign of memory of this event, Jacob stood up the stone that served as his headboard, and poured oil on its top. He named the whole place Bethel (Russian transcription of the word bet-el, “house of God”); later a city with this name was founded here.

From this episode we can judge that vertically placed oblong stones, bearing traces of rough processing, were revered in ancient Palestine as the dwellings of gods or spirits. The ancestors of the Semitic peoples (and most likely, much more ancient peoples) tried to appease them by making sacrifices in the form of aromatic oils. Indeed, bet-el are widespread in the south of Palestine, in Syria and date back to the local Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, i.e. to the 7th - 3rd millennia BC. The tribes that succeeded those who erected these primitive obelisks remained respectful of them and tried not to anger the spirits of their predecessors, who (it was believed) had gone into stones.

But these first megaliths received their most famous name from the Breton language: menhirs (from menhir - “long stone”). And this is no coincidence - after all, Western Europe is especially replete with not only single stone pillars, but also entire compositions of them - many kilometers of straight rows (often several, parallel to each other), circles (cromlechs) and other, more complex groups. The largest of the European menhirs is Er-Grah in Brittany, the "great split menhir", erected around 5000 BC. e. and collapsed during an earthquake in 4300 BC. e., splitting into several pieces. This block once reached 20 m in height and weighed 380 kg; it was carved from gneiss, the nearest exit to the surface is 10 km from Er-Grah. The destroyed menhir stood in a line with 18 other, smaller stones.

The construction of menhirs was and is often attributed to the Celts. Allegedly, the Celtic Druid priests performed their bloody sacrifices near these stones. But the settlement of Western Europe by the Celts ended only at the beginning of our era; menhirs are several thousand years older. It is possible, of course, that the Druids used for their religious purposes structures that were already considered in their era to have been erected in ancient times. This was the case in other places where similar objects are found - in Europe, Africa and Asia, in the Altai, Sayan Mountains, Crimea and the Caucasus. Everywhere, peoples who replaced others left intact cult artifacts that reminded them of the former population.

However, one can only speculate about the purpose of the menhirs. Whether they were really centers for the performance of unknown rites and rituals, or served only as boundary signs dividing the territories of various tribes, or as some kind of viziers on the ground, marking some important directions for ancient people (including astronomical objects), this is not certain. clarified. At least, it has been established that all menhirs date back to the Neolithic era, when man first moved from an appropriating economy (hunting, fishing, gathering) to a producing economy - cattle breeding and agriculture. This was a huge breakthrough in the history of mankind - then, for the first time, small wandering groups of people wandering in search of food were replaced by more sedentary communities that provided themselves with food in abundance. As a result, naturally, in the regions where the “Neolithic Revolution” took place (this is the name adopted in science to denote this gigantic shift), the population increased many times; people had more free time, which they could devote not only to food; human resources have increased and, accordingly, the ability to use them to carry out large-scale work. It is estimated, for example, that it took at least several tens of man-years to fill the parallel earthen ramparts characteristic of Neolithic Europe or to build alleys of menhirs. Apparently, the organization of society has become more complicated, in any case, the class of shamans, priests, in a word - ministers of worship has probably already emerged. It was they who preserved and passed on from generation to generation those ideas that encouraged people to create structures that seemed to have no economic purpose.

However, it is quite possible that menhirs served many purposes at once - both religious and practical. In a still primitive society, any activity was of an undifferentiated, syncretic nature. Thus, art was not divided into genera and types - song, dance, even plastic and graphics formed a single complex. Only later, already at the emergence of the first state formations, did professional singers, sculptors, and artists appear. Such specialization, of course, contributed to the improvement of each type of artistic creativity, but something of the primitive integrity was lost.

Apparently, menhirs, initially representing something holistic and multifunctional, then began to develop in different directions. On the one hand, the compositions of menhirs - ranks, alleys, cromlechs, as well as more complex megaliths (trilithons in Britain, taulas in the Balearic Islands) - probably became the beginnings of architecture. And the appearance at first of only roughly hewn blocks of drawings, carved signs, carvings, and later attempts to give them an anthropomorphic appearance meant the birth of monumental sculpture.

Menhirs are monuments of that distant era when man, having first achieved some independence from nature, ascended to another level of awareness of himself and his place in the universe.

In many European countries, in the middle of fields and meadows, on high hills, near ancient temples, in forests, often right in the middle of roads and on lawns near houses where people live, huge long stones rise - menhirs (menhir is translated as “long stone”) "). Sometimes they stand alone, sometimes they line up in rings and semicircles, or form long rows and entire alleys. Some point straight up, others are tilted and appear to be falling. But this “fall” has been going on for five, or even six thousand years: that is exactly how long it is assumed today that the most ancient of them have existed. The Bretons call them pelvans, which means “pillar stones,” and the English call them standing stones. Science considers them the first authentically man-made structures that have survived to this day.

Of course, there are many legends associated with them. They say that dwarfs living underground turn into pelwans when sunlight hits them. And since these people are considered the keeper of treasures, legends claim that countless riches are hidden under the standing stones. However, the stones vigilantly guard them, and not a single person has yet managed to get them. According to other legends, menhirs are, on the contrary, petrified giants. And on the day of the summer and winter solstices, on Christmas Eve and Easter, they come to life - they walk, dance, spin around their axis or run to the nearest river to drink water or swim, and then return to their place and turn into stone again.

The best studied and well known are the standing stones of Brittany and the British Isles. But there are many more of them on our planet. Today, menhirs ranging in height from one to 17 meters and weighing up to several hundred tons can be seen in Greece and Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica and the Balearic Islands, in the south of France, in Switzerland, Austria and the Czech Republic, in Spain and Portugal, in Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Germany and southern Scandinavia. They are found along the entire Mediterranean coast from Libya to Morocco and further south, all the way to Senegal and Gambia. There are them in Syria, in Palestine.

There is no historical or material evidence left of the people who placed the mighty stone pillars on the ground. (By the way, the word pillars appears in the names of some rocks - the Pillars of Hercules, the Krasnoyarsk Pillars; maybe they were especially revered in the past and played the same role as menhirs?) We only have hypotheses and legends.

MENHIRS are stone pillars dug vertically into the ground. It is traditionally believed that the word menhir comes from the Breton roots men - “stone” and hir - “long”. Their height varies from 80 centimeters to 20 meters, weight reaches 300 tons. It is believed that the tallest was the Fairy Stone, which stood near the village of Lokmariaker in French Brittany. It rose 17 meters above the ground and went more than three meters into the ground, and weighed about 350 tons! The Fairy Stone was supposedly erected 4,000 years ago, but was unfortunately destroyed around 1727. Sometimes a third one lies on two vertically mounted blocks; such gate-like structures are called trilithons. The most grandiose ensemble of menhirs is located there, in Brittany, in Carnac - grandiose stone alleys of more than 3,000 uncut stones (it is believed that there used to be about 10,000 of them!) stretch for several kilometers. They are about 6000 years old. From the air you can see that some large and small megaliths form huge circles and triangles.

It is believed that menhirs are tombstones. Perhaps lighthouses. Or sights. There are known groups of menhirs that stand in such a way that from one you can see a second, from a second a third, from a third a fourth, and so on - very similar to a signaling system. True, the pelvans also stand far from the seashore, where it is strange to talk about them as lighthouses, and traces of burials are not found under all the long stones.

But although the practical function of menhirs is not clear, it is clear that they were all cult stones. What kind of cult it was is unknown, but the surviving traditions of honoring stones among ancient peoples reveal the secret of menhirs.

It is known, for example, that in India, rough, upright stones are still considered the abodes of deities. In Greece, a huge rough stone pillar once represented Artemis. At the crossroads there were tetrahedral pillars with the sculpted head of the god Hermes - herms. In ancient Rome, Terminalia was celebrated in honor of the god of borders, Terminal. On this day, boundary stones were rubbed with oils, decorated with garlands of flowers, and sacrificial gifts were brought to them: honey, wine, milk, grain. Anyone who dared to move such a boundary stone was considered forever damned - borders in Rome were sacred. And the stone, representing the god Terminus himself, was located in the Capitoline Temple and guaranteed the inviolability of the borders of the entire empire.

Maybe menhirs were the same boundary stones. Only they did not share neighboring properties, but rather something else. Nowadays a very popular hypothesis is that all these stones were placed on faults in the earth’s crust, where the Earth’s energy was concentrated and came to the surface. If you believe the myths, menhirs stand on the border of two worlds - the world where people lived and the world where gods lived. Thus, the Irish sagas say that standing stones marked the entrance to the Sides, the dwellings of the wondrous magical people of the Celts. And in Brittany, the belief remained that thanks to the pelvan one can meet the dead: in ancient times, people erected stone thrones somewhere in a prominent place, lit a fire and waited for the souls of their ancestors to sit on them to warm themselves by the fire. And just like the Termina stone, some menhirs, while they stand, guarantee the existence of entire villages, pushing back the end of times...

“First of all, there is a stone. He always remains himself, he continues to exist,” wrote Mircea Eliade. The stone has always been revered as “an instrument of spiritual influence, as a focus of energy, a special power designed to protect,” it lives for so long that by its existence it protects the world from death. Perhaps even now?

for the magazine "Man Without Borders"