Quelfénnec is an archaeological site in the French commune of

Plussulien Plussulien (; ) is a Communes of France, commune in the Côtes-d'Armor Departments of France, department of Brittany (administrative region), Brittany in northwestern France. It is home to the archeological site of Quelfénnec. Population Inh ...

, in the

Côtes-d'Armor The Côtes-d'Armor ( , ; ; , ), formerly known as Côtes-du-Nord until 1990 (, ), is a department in the north of Brittany, in northwestern France. In 2019, it had a population of 600,582.Brittany Brittany ( ) is a peninsula, historical country and cultural area in the north-west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica in Roman Gaul. It became an Kingdom of Brittany, independent kingdom and then a Duch ...

. Discovered in 1964 by retired French Historian Charles-Tanguy Le Roux, excavation of the site started upon discovery and continued until 1976.

Archeology

The site is a

dolerite Diabase (), also called dolerite () or microgabbro, is a mafic, holocrystalline, subvolcanic rock equivalent to volcanic basalt or plutonic gabbro. Diabase dikes and sills are typically shallow intrusive bodies and often exhibit fine-grain ...

quarry which was exploited in the

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

period, from 3500 BC to 1800 BC, for the production of polished stone tools. This production is estimated at 5,000 axes per year, various other tools besides axes were produced and widely exported beyond the limits of

Armorica In ancient times, Armorica or Aremorica (Gaulish: ; ; ) was a region of Gaul between the Seine and the Loire that includes the Brittany Peninsula, and much of historical Normandy. Name The name ''Armorica'' is a Latinized form of the Gauli ...

. Quelfennec's axes have been found throughout western France (from Normandy to Languedoc), but also in North-West Europe, the British Isles, and Belgium, These polished stone axes were used to carry out deforestation to allow for the expansion of agriculture. It is the particular hardness of dolerite, without excessive brittleness, which explains its particular interest in making axes and adzes (hatchets with curved edges like the muzzle of an ermine) but also strikers. By around 2000 BC the site gradually went out of use with the introduction of metal tools, which ultimately replaced their stone predecessors.

References

{{Portal, France Archaeological sites in Brittany Prehistoric sites in France Neolithic sites of Europe