Menhir from Beldorf
The menhir from Beldorf is an ornate prehistoric menhir from Beldorf in the district of Rendsburg-Eckernförde , Schleswig-Holstein .
location
The stone was found at Beldorf standing upright in the center of a burial mound from the Nordic older Bronze Age . In front of him was a flattened cup stone . The menhir was later placed in front of the Archaeological State Museum in Gottorf Castle . Around 2005 it was brought to the depot in Busdorf for conservation reasons .
description
The stone is round in shape and tapers slightly towards the top. On one side it has several grooves that form ladder tape patterns and converge in an arc at the top of the stone. The stone also has several bowls, most of them at its apex.
The representations are interpreted differently. In the upper part there is possibly a face with two eyes, so the drawing can perhaps be interpreted as an image of a deity. According to another interpretation, it could also be abstract entoptic patterns from shamanistic trance experiences.
Should the stone actually show a face, this would be an indication of cultural relations to Western Europe, where faces are more common on menhirs and in large stone graves. The depiction of a foot on the bowl stone in front of the menhir also suggests this. A foot depiction was also found on a menhir that was installed in the Bredelem gallery grave in southeastern Lower Saxony.
literature
- Johannes Groht : Menhirs in Germany. State Office for Monument Preservation and Archeology Saxony-Anhalt, Halle (Saale) 2013, ISBN 978-3-943904-18-5 , pp. 477–479.
- Horst Kirchner : The menhirs in Central Europe and the menhir thought (= Academy of Sciences and Literature. Treatises of the humanities and social sciences class. Born 1955, No. 9). Wiesbaden 1955, pp. 83-84, 92.
- Ernst Sprockhoff : The Nordic Megalithic Culture (= Handbook of Prehistory Germany. Volume 3), Berlin / Leipzig 1938, p. 141.