A big man-made vertical stone known as a menhir standing stone, orthostat or lith is generally from the middle Bronze Age in Europe. Although they are found all across Europe, they are most prevalent in Western Europe, particularly in Ireland, Great Britain, and Brittany, where there are around 50,000 instances, and northwestern France, where there are another 1,200 such relics. They may be found separately as monoliths or in groups with other stones that resemble them. Menhirs come in a wide range of sizes, but they frequently slope toward the summit. Dating standing stones is typically a challenge. They were built across many different prehistoric eras as a component of the greater megalithic cultures in Europe and the surrounding territories. Menhirs are sometimes referred to as megalithic artifacts when they are found in clusters, frequently in the shape of a circle, oval, henge, or horseshoe. These were locations for historic religious rituals and occasionally included cemeteries. More dispute has surrounded the precise purpose of menhirs than almost any other prehistoric topic in Europe. They have been theorised to have served as early calendars, territorial markers, components of intricate ideological systems, mnemonic systems for oral traditions, or even as tools used by Druids to perform sacrifices. Archaeologists in the nineteenth century adopted the French name menhir as their own. The French military officer from the eighteenth century is credited with popularising the term in archaeology. Maen and hir, two Breton terms, are combined to form the word. They are known as maen hir, or long stones, in contemporary Welsh. Megalithic artwork can be found inscribed on several menhirs. Although they frequently featured representations of tools like stone axes, ploughs, crooks of shepherds and yokes, this frequently transformed them into humanoid stelae. All of these themes, with the exception of the stone axe, are called primarily for simplicity and none of them actually depict what they are named after. Some menhirs were dismantled and integrated into later passage burials, where new megalithic sculpture was carved on them without much consideration for the earlier images. [Information and Image Credit : Menhir, Wikipedia] [Image : Large Menhir situated in County Cork, Ireland, halfway between Millstreet and Ballinagree.] [The work (Image) has been released into the public domain by its author, Ceoil (Wikipedia) at English Wikipedia. This applies worldwide In some countries this may not be legally possible; if so: Ceoil grants anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.] [Source-Image-URL :: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ballinagree.jpg ] #Architecture
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