Megalithism
MEGALITHISM IN GALICIA
In the long period between the 5th and the 2nd millennium BC, the communities that lived in our geographical area erected a diverse typology of burial mounds that gradually covered most of the territory.
These prehistoric constructions, which in this chronological period link us culturally to the rest of the Peninsula and most of Atlantic Europe, are best represented in Galicia in tombs with a polygonal chamber and passage or antas such as this one, also known as Pedra do Mouro.
These monuments, erected by the first food-producing societies, were built to serve as burial sites, either individual or collective. At the same time, as they could be seen from far and wide and given the sheer scale of some of these structures, they symbolised the bond between the communities that owned and used them with the territory they inhabited and over which they exercised their dominion.
Audio - Megalithism in Galicia
- Distribution of currently listed megalithic monuments in A Coruña (Xunta de Galicia, 2023).
- Earliest photo still known to exist of the Dolmen of Axeitos. 1927. (Collection: Ramón Sobrino Buhígas. Archive: Núñez Sobrino. Photo library: Colectivo A Rula).