3/13/2023 0 Comments Dolmen de guadalperalThe dolmen, which are made of porous granite, are suffering from being constantly submerged in water. They were also using honey, and eventually brewing their own beer. The people who lived in this area also left evidence that they were some of the first in the world known to make flour, and that was 1,000 years before the dolmen were erected. During the summer solstice, the hallway would be lit up, and the sun would shine on the ancestors for a few moments. The Dolmen of Guadalperal, when intact, would have consisted of a long, dark hallway that opened into a central room where the dead would be interred. The city also had an aqueduct and thermal baths and paved roads. That city included a temple, which was dismantled and moved to higher ground when the dam was being built. While Franco’s dam brought electricity and water to underdeveloped western Spain, it flooded this site as well as a Roman city that was called Augustóbriga. Unlike Stonehenge, archeologists believe that this was once a completely enclosed building. It’s believed to be about 7,000 years old, which is 2,000 years older than Stonehenge. The idea of hiking that long in a place known for its heat, and not being sure at the end if the dolmen will be completely covered in water, is rather unappealing to me.īut this site is very significant. But I’m grateful to whoever took that video, because to get to that site requires a hike of several hours. The tallest stones here are about 6 feet. Not nearly as tall as the ones at Stonehenge. Due to extreme drought, this archeological site was suddenly high and dry.Īs you can see from this beautiful short video, what remains of these dolmen are about 100 standing stones. According to this article, the Dolmen de Guadalperal rose above the waterline for the first time since Francisco Franco had a dam built which flooded that area of Extremadura, Spain in 1963. Human remains found in or near many have led to an often-cited theory that they are tombs.If, like me, you have always been fascinated by Stonehenge, you’ll be quite thrilled to hear about the one silver lining to global climate change. Although there are many scattered across Western Europe, little is known about who erected them. Since then it has only become fully visible four times.ĭolmens are vertically arranged stones usually supporting a flat boulder. It was discovered by German archaeologist Hugo Obermaier in 1926, but the area was flooded in 1963 in a rural development project under Francisco Franco's dictatorship. "It's a surprise, it's a rare opportunity to be able to access it," said archaeologist Enrique Cedillo from Madrid's Complutense University, one of the experts racing to study the circle before it gets submerged again. It currently sits fully exposed in one corner of the Valdecanas reservoir, in the central province of Caceres, where authorities say the water level has dropped to 28 per cent of capacity. Officially known as the Dolmen of Guadalperal but dubbed the Spanish Stonehenge, the circle of dozens of megalithic stones is believed to date back to 5000 BC. The circle of dozens of megalithic stones is believed to date back to 5000 BC.Ī brutal summer has caused havoc for many in rural Spain, but one unexpected side-effect of the country's worst drought in decades has delighted archaeologists - the emergence of a prehistoric stone circle in a dam whose waterline has receded.
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