Sépulture mégalithique
MonumentHidden Treasure
Sépulture mégalithique, located in Saint-Just (Département 35), is a historic monument. The monument is currently closed to visitors.
Key facts
- Type
- autre
- Location
- Saint-Just, Département 35, Bretagne
- Visit
- Closed to visitors
- GPS
- 47.7753, -2.0057
- Mérimée Reference
- PA00090791
In the heart of the Breton moorland of Saint-Just, this Neolithic megalithic burial site reveals one of the most unusual funerary complexes in Ille-et-Vilaine, erected over 5,000 years ago by stone builders.
History
Nestling in the wild moors of Saint-Just, in Ille-et-Vilaine, the megalithic burial site is one of the most eloquent testimonies to the Neolithic presence in inland Brittany. Far from the hustle and bustle of the major tourist circuits, it offers an intimate and striking encounter with a past five millennia old, in a landscape of heather moorland and schist outcrops that seems to have stood the test of time without changing much. This funerary monument belongs to the large family of Armorican megaliths, of which Brittany has the most remarkable concentration in Europe. What makes it so special is its setting in an unspoilt natural environment, where the slabs of local schist blend into the relief as if the earth itself had shaped the edifice. The Cojoux moor, on which this sector of Saint-Just lies, is in fact a veritable open-air megalithic sanctuary, grouping together several funerary and ceremonial monuments over a few square kilometres. The visit is above all a sensory experience: the silence punctuated by the wind on the gorse bushes, the low-angled morning or evening light sculpting the edges of the standing stones, the sensation of treading on ground charged with collective memory. Those with a passion for prehistory will find traces of an organised Neolithic society, capable of mobilising a considerable workforce to honour its dead and structure its symbolic territory. The site is accessible on foot from the waymarked paths that criss-cross the Cojoux moor, in a listed and protected setting. Families, hikers and archaeology enthusiasts come here all year round, but it's in the golden hours of dusk that the monument reveals all its evocative power, the stones casting long shadows over the red heather.
Architecture
The Saint-Just megalithic burial site belongs to the corpus of Armorican Neolithic funerary monuments, characterised by the use of large slabs of local purple schist, a material abundant in the subsoil of the Cojoux moor. In accordance with the morphology typical of burials in this region, the structure probably consists of a burial chamber delimited by orthostats - large vertical slabs set in the ground - and covered by one or more horizontal covering slabs forming the ceiling. An access corridor, facing east or south-east according to Armorican Neolithic traditions, allowed the deceased to be brought into the chamber during successive burials, as these graves served as collective tombs that were reused over several generations. The dimensions, typical of the region's covered walkways and corridor dolmens, generally range from five to fifteen metres in total length, with a chamber width of one to two metres. The purple shale of Saint-Just, with its characteristic purplish hues, gives the stones a distinctive hue that stands out against the moorland landscape. The weight of some of the slabs, which can reach several tonnes, testifies to the technical mastery of Neolithic builders in terms of moving and balancing massive blocks. The mound of earth and stone that originally covered the chamber has, for the most part, disappeared as a result of erosion and ancient ploughing, leaving the slabs exposed in their bare mineral state.
Related Figures
Populations néolithiques de l'Armorique (bâtisseurs anonymes, v. 4500-2500 av. J.-C.)Érudits de la Société Polymathique du Morbihan (XIXe siècle, premiers inventaires mégalithiques bretons)Prosper Mérimée (inspecteur général des Monuments Historiques, initiateur de la politique de protection des mégalithes français)Chercheurs du Service Régional de l'Archéologie de Bretagne (prospections et études contemporaines)
Tags
Nearby castles
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Sépulture mégalithique located?
Sépulture mégalithique is located in Saint-Just, Département 35 department, Bretagne region, France.
Is Sépulture mégalithique open to visitors?
Sépulture mégalithique is currently closed to visitors.
