Dolmen dit La Pierre Levée
MonumentHidden Treasure
Dolmen dit La Pierre Levée, located in La Chapelle-Vendômoise (Loir-et-Cher), is a historic monument. The monument is currently closed to visitors.
Key facts
- Type
- autre
- Location
- La Chapelle-Vendômoise, Loir-et-Cher, Centre-Val de Loire
- Visit
- Closed to visitors
- GPS
- 47.6610, 1.2580
- Mérimée Reference
- PA00098407
A stone sentinel that has stood guard over the Vendôme region for 5,000 years, the Pierre Levée at La Chapelle-Vendômoise is one of the few dolmens in the Loir-et-Cher region to be classified as a Historic Monument, a striking vestige of mankind as builders of the invisible.
© Wikimedia Commons
History
In the heart of the Vendôme region, in a gentle landscape of hedged farmland and valleys through which the River Loir flows, the Pierre Levée at La Chapelle-Vendômoise rises from the ground like a signal to eternity. This Neolithic dolmen, listed as a Historic Monument in 1889 as one of the first buildings protected by French law, is the embodiment of several millennia of human presence in the Loire region. Its quiet mass and recognisable silhouette - one or more stone tables resting on vertical supports - make it a landscape landmark as discreet as it is unforgettable for those who know how to look for it. What makes the Pierre Levée so special is first and foremost its age. Built between 4,500 and 2,500 BC, it predates the Gothic cathedrals by three to four millennia. In a region best known for its Renaissance châteaux and French-style gardens, it represents a layer of archaeology that is rarely showcased: that of the first sedentary farmers who populated the Loire basin, carefully burying their dead and organising the land around monumental landmarks. The visitor experience is resolutely contemplative. There's no ticket, no compulsory guided tour: La Pierre Levée is a direct, almost intimate encounter with prehistory. Archaeology enthusiasts will see the traces of a carefully constructed sepulchral edifice; photographers will find the low-angled light magnificent at the end of the day; families will marvel at the masses of flint and sandstone that no modern machine has been able to lift. The surrounding scenery adds to the emotion. La Chapelle-Vendômoise, a small village in the Loir-et-Cher department, is a relatively undeveloped area, where the dolmen stand in an open landscape bordered by hedges and crops. This virtually untouched landscape is in itself a rarity: many megaliths have been destroyed, moved or drowned in the urban periphery. Here, La Pierre Levée retains something of its original context, inviting us to meditate on the long term and on the permanence of human action in the face of the transience of history.
Architecture
La Pierre Levée belongs to the family of single-chamber dolmens, the most widespread form of megalithism in central France. Its fundamental structure is based on an architectural principle of absolute clarity: several orthostats (vertical slabs) set into the earth form the walls of a burial chamber, on which rest one or more horizontal cover slabs - the characteristic "table" that gave the dolmens their Breton name. Originally, the whole structure was covered by a mound of earth or stones that concealed it completely, forming a cairn or mound that could be seen from a distance in the landscape. The materials used were those available locally in the Vendôme region: Cretaceous flint, tuffeau limestone or sandstone, depending on the geological outcrop closest to the site. The selection and assembly of these blocks, each weighing between one and several tonnes, reveal a remarkable empirical knowledge of the mechanical properties of stone. The roof table, which is slightly inclined to allow water to run off, illustrates a mastery of construction that has nothing to envy the builders of later centuries. The dimensions of the monument, typical of dolmens of modest to intermediate size in the Loire, meant that access to the chamber was via a lower entrance slab or a rudimentary corridor. The inner chamber, around two to three metres long and one to two metres wide, was the sacred space for burial deposits. Compared with the great covered walkways of the Île-de-France region or the monumental burial mounds of Brittany, the Pierre Levée at La Chapelle-Vendômoise is a megalithic structure on a human scale, an intimate setting, characteristic of the dispersed settlements and medium-sized communities that populated the Vendôme region in the Neolithic period.
Related Figures
Les bâtisseurs néolithiques anonymes du Vendômois (vers 4000-2500 av. J.-C.) — communautés agricoles à l'origine du dolmenArcisse de Caumont (1801-1873) — archéologue normand fondateur de la Société française d'archéologie, dont les travaux pionniers sur les mégalithes français préparèrent leur protection légaleProsper Mérimée (1803-1870) — Inspecteur général des Monuments Historiques, promoteur de la protection du patrimoine préhistorique en FranceAlexandre Bertrand (1820-1902) — fondateur du Musée des Antiquités nationales de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, acteur clé du premier classement des mégalithes en 1889Gabriel de Mortillet (1821-1898) — préhistorien français qui contribua à la classification scientifique des monuments mégalithiques, dont ceux du Centre-Val de Loire
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Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Dolmen dit La Pierre Levée located?
Dolmen dit La Pierre Levée is located in La Chapelle-Vendômoise, Loir-et-Cher department, Centre-Val de Loire region, France.
Is Dolmen dit La Pierre Levée open to visitors?
Dolmen dit La Pierre Levée is currently closed to visitors.