The Menhir of Beisenerbierg is a three-metre-tall

standing stone A menhir (from Brittonic languages: ''maen'' or ''men'', "stone" and ''hir'' or ''hîr'', "long"), standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large human-made upright rock (geology), stone, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age. T ...

which stands on a hilltop at

Reckange Reckange (, ) is a small town in the commune of Mersch, in central Luxembourg. , the town has a population of 587. The nearby Menhir of Beisenerbierg is a Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological ...

(; ) in the

Grand Duchy of Luxembourg Luxembourg ( ; lb, Lëtzebuerg ; french: link=no, Luxembourg; german: link=no, Luxemburg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, ; french: link=no, Grand-Duché de Luxembourg ; german: link=no, Großherzogtum Luxemburg is a small land ...

. An excavation in 2001 revealed its age to be

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...

Description

The standing stone, or "

menhir A menhir (from Brittonic languages: ''maen'' or ''men'', "stone" and ''hir'' or ''hîr'', "long"), standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large human-made upright stone, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age. They can be foun ...

", is 3 metres high, 0.7 metres wide, and weighs around 4 tonnes. It is made from

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

and owes its yellow-brown colour to its high iron content. It appears to have been shaped to give it an "anthropomorphic" form.

History

The stone was buried for centuries until 1978 when it was identified by members of the "Friends of Old Mersch" association. It was re-erected 30 metres from its original location. In 2001, an archaeological excavation was undertaken by the National Museum. The excavations which uncovered the original foundation pit confirmed the antiquity of this

megalithic A megalith is a large stone that has been used to construct a prehistoric structure or monument, either alone or together with other stones. There are over 35,000 in Europe alone, located widely from Sweden to the Mediterranean sea. The ...

monument, and showed it to be

References

{{reflist Archaeological sites in Luxembourg Mersch