Spanish Stonehenge | Dolmen of Guadalperal In The Valdecañas Reservoir

Описание: #GuadalperalDolmen #SpanishStonehenge #Talaverilla

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I’ve mentioned the importance of preservation of ancient sites in the past, and I will keep mentioning this regularly in the future.
If we lose a piece of our ancient human history, we will lose a piece of our identity as a species.
Unfortunately the Dolmen of Guadalperal, otherwise known as the Spanish Stonehenge is at risk of completely disappearing from the face of the earth if changes are not made in time.
This monument spends most of its time being submerged under water and the stones have been eroding at a fast rate, so today it’s time to look into the importance of preservation.

The treasure of Guadalperal, the Spanish Stonehenge, the Dolmen of Guadalperal, many names for a unique monument in the province of Cáceres in the autonomous community of Extremadura.
This ancient monument was discovered in 1926 during a research and excavation campaign led by German Archaeologist Hugo Obermaier. A
After his death the German couple Georg and Vera Leisner took charge in compiling all the documentation that was scattered between the University of Freiburg and the Alba estate; they eventually made a scientific publication from these documents.

This ancient monument looked vastly different in prehistoric times than what we see today, the difference between what once was and what we now see is staggering.
I explained in my Dutch Dolmen video I made about a year ago that most Dolmen found in Europe are the skeletal remains of the burial mounds they once were, and this particular monument is a great example to that.

Between 3000 and 2000 BCE the ancient people from the Bell Beaker Culture in the area placed between 140 and 150 granite orthostats in a vertical arrangement, within this arrangement was an oval shaped chamber which was approximately 5 meters in diameter.
An eastern entrance leads to a passage measuring 21 meters long and between 1.3 and 1.4 meters wide led into this chamber, in this entrance archaeologists found a Pillar stone of 2 meters in height with a carved serpent and several bowls.

It is believed that these carvings were made as protection or as to signify the importance of this sacred monument.
The serpent carving could signify the Tagus river as well, as this monument stood near the original flow of the river long ago, several studies have noticed the similarities between the meanders of the river and the pattern on the Pillar, the latest research points to this being the case instead of the previously believed snake pattern.
The chamber and passage were covered by a mound of earth and gravel, in a similar fashion as the burial mounds in Ireland that we have covered in the past.
This particular monument was surrounded by another circular ring that most likely served to uphold the upper mound, possibly due to the sloping of the terrain where this monument is located.

To think that for thousands of years this monument stood in its place, slowly being damaged as the Romans took away the mound leaving the stones to bear the elements, but this wasn’t the worst that happened to this structure, as these stones can survive millennia of weather erosion.
No, unfortunately this monument had to endure a worse fate..
In 1963 construction of the Valdecañas dam on the Tagus river started, which filled the Valdecañas reservoir with water and flooded the monument.
The nearby Roman town Augustóbriga on the opposite bank was flooded as well.
Nowadays the monument is hidden under water 90% of the time and only visible in times of drought when the water level is low.
Because the monument is submerged most of the time it has rapidly deteriorated, the stones are heavily eroded and the engravings are damaged.

music: Adrian von Ziegler
footage;    • Talaverilla. Talavera la vieja  
   • Dolmen de Guadalperal  
   • DÓLMENES GUADALPERAL - DRON  
   • Dolmen Guadalperal (Cáceres - España)  
   • 🎥 DOLMEN DE GUADALPERAL. [Grabación Drone ...  
   • Dolmen de Guadalperal y Ruinas de Talaverilla  
sources; DAMAGE assessment of cultural stone Heritage in reservoir environments - IMEKO-TC4-MetroArchaeo2020-080
https://mymodernmet.com/dolmen-of-gua...
https://www.hunebednieuwscafe.nl/2019...
https://www.itinari.com/hidden-treasu...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolmen_...