The Megalithic Architectures of Europe

Buch | Softcover

248 Seiten

2022
Oxbow Books (Verlag)
978-1-78925-809-7 (ISBN)

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First major synthesis by leading regional specialists of recent excavation results and new approaches to the study of megalithic monuments and their individual histories across Europe.

Megalithic monuments are among the most striking remains of the Neolithic period of northern and western Europe and are scattered across landscapes from Pomerania to Portugal. Antiquarians and archaeologists early recognised the family resemblance of the different groups of tombs, attributing them to maritime peoples moving along the western seaways. More recent research sees them rather as the product of established early farming communities in their individual regions. Yet the diversity of the tombs, their chronologies and their varied cultural contexts complicates any straightforward understanding of their origins and distribution.

Megalithic Architectures provides new insight by focusing on the construction and design of European megalithic tombs – on the tomb as an architectural project. It shows how much is to be learned from detailed attention to the stages and the techniques through which tombs were built, modified and enlarged, and often intentionally dismantled or decommissioned. The large slabs that were employed, often unshaped, may suggest an opportunistic approach by the Neolithic builders, but this was clearly far from the case. Each building project was unique, and detailed study of individual sites exposes the way in which tombs were built as architectural, social and symbolic undertakings. Alongside the manner in which the materials were used, it reveals a store of knowledge that sometimes differed considerably from one structure to another, even between contemporary monuments within a single region.

The volume brings together regional specialists from Scandinavia, Germany, Britain, France, Belgium and Iberia to offer a series of uniquely authoritative studies. Results of recent fieldwork are fully incorporated and much of the material is published here for the first time in English. It provides an invaluable overview of the current state of research on European megalithic tombs.

Luc Laporte is Directeur de Recherche in the CNRS and is based at the Laboratoire Archéosciences at the Université de Rennes. He is currently directing field projects on megalithic monuments in western France and Senegal. Christopher Scarre is Professor of Archaeology at Durham University, and specialises in the Neolithic monumentality of the Atlantic façade of Europe. He has excavated at megalithic monuments in western France, Portugal and the Channel Islands.

1. Preface: megalithic architecture in Europe_x000D_
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Luc Laporte& Chris Scarre_x000D_
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Section 1: The megalith-builders_x000D_
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2. Menga (Andalucia, Spain): the biography of an exceptional megalithic monument_x000D_
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Leonardo Garcia Sanjuan& Jos├® Antonio Lozano Rodr├¡guez_x000D_
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3. Structural functions and architectural projects within the long monuments of Western France_x000D_
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Luc Laporte_x000D_
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4. Megalithic building techniques in the Languedoc region of southern France: recent excvations at two dolmens in H├®rault_x000D_
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Noisette Bec Drelon_x000D_
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5. Megalithic constructional techniques in north-west France: cairn III at Priss├®-la-Charri├¿re_x000D_
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Florian Cousseau_x000D_
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6. A monumental task: building the dolmens of Britain and Ireland_x000D_
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Vicki Cummings& Colin Richards_x000D_
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7. The megalithic construction process and the building of passage graves in Denmark_x000D_
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Torben Dehn_x000D_
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8. Accident or design? Chambers, cairns and funerary practices in Neolithic western Europe_x000D_
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Chris Scarre_x000D_
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9. Dolmens without mounds in Denmark_x000D_
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Palle Eriksen and Niels H. Anderson_x000D_
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10. In the eye of the beholder_x000D_
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J├©rgen Westphal_x000D_
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Section 2: Cemeteries and sequences_x000D_
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11. Building forever or just for the time being? A view from north-western Iberia_x000D_
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Ram├│n F├íbregas Valcarce& X.I. Vilaseco V├ízquez_x000D_
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12. The megalithic architecture of Huelva (Spain): typology, construction and technical traditions eastern And├®valo_x000D_
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Jose Antonio Linares Catela_x000D_
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13. The clustering of megalithic monuments around the causewayed enclosures at Sarup on Funen, Denmark_x000D_
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Niels H. Andersen_x000D_
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14. Two types of megaliths and an unusual dolmen at L├©nt (Denmark)_x000D_
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Anne Birgitte Gebauer_x000D_
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15. Common motivation, different intentions? A multiscalar approach to the megalithic architecture of the Funnel Beaker North Group_x000D_
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Franziska Hage, Georg Schafferer& Martin Hinz_x000D_
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Section 3: Chronologies and context_x000D_
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16. Between East and West: megaliths in the centre of the Iberian peninsula_x000D_
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Primitiva Bueno Ramirez, Rosa Barroso Bermejo& Rodrigo de Balb├¡n Behrmann_x000D_
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17. Megalithic hollows: rock-cut tombs between the Tagus and the Guadiana_x000D_
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Leonor Rocha_x000D_
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18. Houses of the dead and natural rocks: new evidence from western France_x000D_
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Philippe Gouezin_x000D_
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19. The stone rows of Hoedic (Morbihan) and the construction of alignments in western France_x000D_
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Jean-Marc Large& Emmanuel Mens_x000D_
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20. Paintings in the megalithic monuments of Brittany_x000D_
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Primitiva Bueno Ramirez, Rodrigo de Balb├¡n Behrmann, Luc Laporte, Philippe Gouezin, Rosa Barroso Bermejo, Antonio Hernanz Gismero, Jos├®M. Gavira-Vallejo & Mercedes Iriarte Cela_x000D_
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21. Stability in a changing world: insights from settlement intensity patterns and archaeobotany_x000D_
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Martin Hinz& Wiebke Kirleis_x000D_
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Part 4: Conclusion_x000D_
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22. Ostentation, power, and megaliths: the example of Easter Island_x000D_
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Nicolas Cauwe_x000D_
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23. A southern point of view_x000D_
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Primitiva Bueno Ramirez& Luc Laporte _x000D_
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24. A northern point of view_x000D_
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Chris Scarre& Torben Dehn_x000D_
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┬á

Erscheinungsdatum	28.07.2022
Zusatzinfo	B/w and colour
Verlagsort	Oxford
Sprache	englisch
Maße	215 x 279 mm
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Archäologie
Themenwelt	Technik ► Architektur
ISBN-10	1-78925-809-X / 178925809X
ISBN-13	978-1-78925-809-7 / 9781789258097
Zustand	Neuware