Latest Fieldnotes

Driven past this a number of times recently (currently working nearby), and will endeavour to bring a camera with me soon and get some photos.

The Clach a’Mheirlich or ‘Thief’s Stone’ (Pictish Symbol Stone Class 1) stands in a field by the Alness to Invergordon road. On the front is an incised step symbol and on the left side what appear to be the traces of a crescent symbol with a pair of pincers below.

Park in the ‘Public slipway’ car park. The stone is about 20m into the field across the road.

We thought we’d have a go and look for some monuments we’d spotted on the map at Belz, a seaside village a few kilometers away. We had only a not very detailed map and my megalithic radar to guide us. We subsequently discovered these don’t even feature in Burl’s ‘Megalithic Brittany’, so we were pleased to have found two of the three marked on the map.

Urban dolmens! I love ‘em. Forgotten but not gone, these dolmen at Belz (east) were actually two burial chambers.

Only one still has capstones up, the other, directly next to it, just has a few uprights left marking the line of the chamber. It is situated on high ground overlooking the sea on a village greeny area.

Survivors!!

We thought we’d have a go and look for some monuments we’d spotted on the map at Belz, a seaside village a few kilometres away. We had only a not-very-detailed map and my megalithic radar to guide us. We subsequently discovered these don’t even feature in Burl’s ‘Megalithic Brittany’, so we were pleased to have found two of the three marked on the map.

Driving around a bit around the village a bit, we located this Belz dolmen (west) up to its knees in soaking wet buttercups on a patch of land occupying an entire building plot among the houses.

Around the village of Erdeven are tons of goodies. Call me undedicated if you like, but the combination of the weather being so horrible, the lack of time for painting opportunities and the prospect of a very wet 2km walk to see more stuff, didn’t appeal. Moth, being a completist wasn’t going to miss a thing, so he set off from the car park at Erdeven and began his walk to take in the Kerjean alignments, Kerherzo alignments, Mane Braz dolmens, Coet er bein and La Chaisse de Cesar. I stayed in car, driving it up to a place to get a good view of the Kerherzo alignments.

I lit a fag, got out a flask of tea and my sketchbook and while munching on a pain au chocolat, made a little study.

Just about 500ms away from Crucuno quadrilateral up among some trees is Mane Groh dolmen – a lovely allee couverte with four transepted chambers and lots of capstones still up. A little stone cist, not unlike a water trough for horses, stands very close by.

This is a very large long barrow sited a few hundred yards north of Bincombe bumps. It is behind a dry stone wall and is in excellent condition, with no signs of excavation or ploughing. It is not easy to photograph at this time of the year due to the crops in the surrounding fields, and the fact that is behind a dry stone wall.

The rectangle is a mystery to me. Like the rectangle at Manio, which we saw the day before, this is something that I couldn’t get my head around. Stone CIRCLES make more sense to me, partly cos I’ve seen tons of ‘em, so to see an alternative shape is very peculiar. The stones are large here (average of five or six feet high, I’d say) and the corners very precise. Recently cleared of its gorsey undergrowth I paced round it, trying to make sense of the lines and the corners and failing.

Signposted off the main Mao to Cuitadella Road, about 3km before Alaior and very near the navetas Rafal Rubi and l’Argentina Oriental. When you turn off the main road, after a sharp bend to your left, you’ll see a copse of trees – the monument is here. There are two gates, and through the second one you’ll see the blue “menorca monumental” bin showing you that you are in the right place. If you get to some of the very nice villas on your right, you’ve gone too far!

On the north west coast of the island; approaching Cuitadella from Mao on the main road, turn left as signposted just on the outskirts of Cuitadella and follow the road to the coast.

When you reach Cala Morell, turn left at the roundabout at the top of the cliff and head down towards the beach – the necropolis is on your left as the road bends right, and there are parking places just before that on the right, overlooking the beautiful bay. Open access, no fee.

It was quite busy when we visited, though many fellow visitors weren’t venturing into the caves at all.

If you are picking up a hire car at the airport, or indeed dropping one off, spend a few extra minutes checking this out, right next to the car park! The site was removed and restored as Jane says, to make room for the runway extension, but if you go to the south end of the runway (by road of course!) you’ll find what was left behind – also posted as an “original location“.

As you come out of the airport, you can’t really miss Biniparraxtet (also known as Biniparraxtet Petit), relocated and restored in order to extend the runway... but not all of it was moved! A wrong turning (at Binissafullet) meant we ended up right under the flight path at the south end of the runway, and I spotted one of those blue signs....

Hidden behind a huge wire fence, there’s the remains, and there’s a talaiot a few metres NNE, almost scraping the landing gear of the planes coming in.

There’s a second, ruinous talaiot just behind the impressive one at Torrellonet. The site marked by a blue menorca monumental sign, but what appears to be an entrance has been blocked, or repaired! Round the back of the main talaiot, there were a couple of silos with added junk.

We thought we’d be polite and ask at the farm if it was OK to cross the fields opposite and check out the remains of a house, listed as a possible sanctuary in TME; it seemed the only word we had in common with the elderly lady in the farmyard was “Torrello” but we guessed she’d got the gist of what we wanted and wouldn’t mind us going ahead.

Recommendation: instead of taking the direct route to the house, over some wobbly walls, go to the left and keep the copse on your right – there’s gates!

If you’ve got the AA map of the island, beware, this is marked on it, but in the wrong place – go west to the next junction, and you’ll find the poblat right alongside the road.

It’s hard to work this site out in places – there’s the obvious taula and talaiot visible from the road, but behind them there’s a jumble of stone from the surrounding houses. The information board was trashed when we were there.

Approximate long/lat coordinates only, as we were taken (in the end) to the site & Na Comerma by someone who knew where they were!

Access: A walk of a few hundred metres after parking in a ‘back entrance’ to Torre d’en Gaumes a few hundred metres south of the main entrance.

For road directions to here, see Torre d’en Gaumes.

From there, we walked a few metres south down the lane (away from Torre d’en Gaumes). We went through the first gate on the left (east side of the lane). I’m afraid this is where it gets difficult!

From the gate we headed a few hundred yards diagonally right – roughly SSE, and amongst the dry stone walls & scrubby bushes, we found the tomb.

Visited 3 June 2005
A little beauty (actually, not that little!) this is one of the very few more ‘standard’ megalithic tombs on Menorca (only 4, I think I read somewhere!)

It’s the only one we saw, but one of the others is pretty near Torre Llisa Vell. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find it.

Access A walk of 1.5-2km along pretty good gravel & grass tracks. Not steep at any point (except climbing up to what I’ve called Sant Agusti ‘Bonus’ Talaiot, but undulating and rough underfoot in a few places – especially at the site itself!

Detailed directions, as long/lat co-ordinates are best guess

I headed west along the road from Mao to Ciutadella, and took the main left turn towards Sant Tomas. I passed through Es Migjorn Gran and about halfway from there to the little roundabout entering Sant Tomas, there is a dirt verge-cum-layby on the right. I know it’s roughly halfway because I went right past to make sure it was the right place!

This parking place is effectively on a triangular ‘island’ between 2 arms (the second of which was pretty difficult to spot in the vegetation) of a farm lane leading to Sant Agusti Vell.

Setting off on foot up the farm drive (’no vehicles’ sign), I immediately noticed what looked like an overgrown talaiot to the right, on a fairly steep hill. I figured it was probably way too soon for the ‘main’ Sant Agusti stuff, but had to have a stomp up to have a look. Apart from anything else, I didn’t trust the tourist map I had! See Sant Agusti ‘Bonus’ Talaiot – I couldn’t find a real name for it....

From this talaiot, roughly to the south/SSW I could see a couple of very clear talaiots on the horizon a km or 2 away. Target located! (There was yet another really trashed talaiot to the north too!)

So I headed back to the farm track and continued along the blessedly smooth track, but by the time I reached the farm buildings I hadn’t spotted an definite path to get to where the site appeared to be.

Just as I reached the first byre, there was a farmgate on the right, with a nice herd of cattle in close attendance. There looked to be a faint grassy track beyond the gate, heading in the right direction. Once I rounded the west side of the farm buildings, the talaiots were clearly visible.

After about 10-15 minutes, the talaiots were very close, but somewhat obscured by shrubby bushes between them and the path. Here I got a sign that the site’s definitely supposed to be accessible to the public, as it has the familiar ‘official’ Menorca monument litterbin. Approaching the talaiots, I even spotted an info board!

Visited 3 June 2005
Two talaiots in pretty good condition stand in a poblat which is quite scattered and large, but close to them is largely a rolling sea of rubble with remnants of walls poking out. Between the talaiots I could see an oval enclosure with several fairly tall uprights – I took this to be the remnants of a taula-less taula sanctuary.

I’ve since discovered comments on the rather ‘quaint’ (frames!) but useful ‘The Archaeology of Minorca’ website, that this makes sense, and apparently another enclosure is taken to be a second taula(less) sanctuary.

I picked my wobbling way around the edge of the rubble sea to the south of the talaiots, by a (probably) more modern wall, spotting a series of cisterns as I went.

But then, peeping over the wall…the unmistakeable ‘T’ of a complete Taula!!!! How could this not be mentioned in the info we had? I resisted the temptation of elation and having seen several other taulas during the week, I adopted a cynical view – it didn’t seem to be in the ‘right’ place in relation to the other remains & the taula itself didn’t quite look right.

Getting a foothold in the wall where it passes closest to the ‘T’ of the ‘taula’, I peered over. The taula seemed suspiciously close to one ‘corner’ of the only very vaguely oval enclosure. The enclosure seemed unusually ‘open’, not particularly oval and rather ‘plain’ for a taula sanctuary. Not sure it’s the ‘real deal’.

As mentioned above, however, there is meant to be another taula sanctuary here, without a ‘T’. I suppose this could be it, but with a ‘modern’ T....

Also in its ‘favour’, the ‘T’ at Na Comerma is also very much in a ‘corner’ of its enclosure yet seems to be accepted as ‘real’. But the enclosure at Na Comerma is so full of rubble that it’s difficult to tell what’s going on. Overall though, Na Comerma still manages to feel more like other taula sanctuaries than this one does.

And the final thing that makes me think I may be wrong to doubt its authenticity is that according to a taula ‘reconstruction’ diagram I’ve seen, (at least some) taula sanctuaries may have had many smaller ‘T’s on pillars round the edges of the sanctuary. And there is possible evidence of that here.

Have a look & decide for yourself!

The talaiots
The talaiots both seemed relatively small compared with, say, Trepuco or Talati de Dalt.

And to be honest, after a week in Menorca, the one to the west was ‘just another quite nice talaiot’, once I’d established that it wasn’t the one that you can get inside. (It does have what look like a couple of small blocked entrances though.)

But the other is a mindblast! This was the eastern one – nearest the path I described arriving by. From the outside it’s the same, but once you find the actual entrance…(round the ‘side’, facing the ‘dodgy’ taula)…and look in – WOW!!! Suddenly vague thoughts of the vaulting of Orcadian tombs like the Fairy Knowe come stealing in…. (Though without the ultra-classy Orcadian flag stonework and it wasn’t built as a tomb!) It also reminded me a bit of a less claustrophobic Grain Souterrain.

Assuming that talaiots were indeed lookout towers, presumably the inside was used as a shelter for the lookouts or was where they lived. I’ve read that most or many talaiots had an entrance and/or ‘room’ either at the bottom or near the top, but I don’t think I’ve read anything that said anything about the use of the inside.

Well worth the walk!!!

If you have copy of The Megalithic European and turn to pages 320 and 321, you’ll see a double page spread on a site called Torre Llisa Vell. Don’t be misled! What Julian is actually describing in this spread is the nearby So Na Caçana. So get yourself a pen, and retitle the page now!

In fact, the ‘real’ Torre Llisa Vell isn’t included in TME. Which is a shame, as it’s an all-singing, all-dancing taula sanctuary with talaiot. It is just a couple of fields away from So Na Caçana.

To find it, continue up the road from So Na Caçana towards Alaoir for about 1km at the most, until you reach a minor crossroads. Turn left here and drive 300ms until you see a gate on the left to a farm called Torre Llisa Vell. Walk down this lane for 100ms and ask the friendly old man at the farmhouse on the right for permission and directions. He doesn’t speak English, but Moth got the gist.

By now you will have already sussed that the great tree-covered lump on your left is an overgrown talaoit and if you look carefully, you’ll see the crest of what looks like a naveta beneath it on the northern side. Walk about 10 ms past the farmhouse and then turn left. After only a few metres the track enters an open field, but to the left is another short track only a few metres long. At the end and you’ll see a gate and a break in the on the right. Go up towards the gate and through the break in the wall. Can’t you already smell it? Walk 25 metres through long grass and a few trees until to th left, you see a huge wall with an archway. You’ll find the taula through that archway.

The wall enclosing the taula sanctuary is very complete indeed – I have no idea if it has been restored or not, it certainly didn’t look like it to me. It conforms to the standard ground plan of a horseshoe-shaped area with a slightly concave front entrance wall. In the case of Torre Llisa Vell the entrance is a beautiful corbelled arch through the wall which is an amazing 4ms thick. True!

Given that the entire sanctuary measures only – what? – 12ms in total, these walls seem totally out of proportion. They are also maybe 3ms high, so whatever went on within the sanctuary was not for general viewing. I also noted that the entrance passageway through the wall wouldn’t have allowed the entry of a fully grown bull.

At least not a modern bull. P’raps they were smaller then, or they only sacrificed calves?

The T itself is a chunky beast and completely dominates the internal space. The stone forming the top of the T being thicker, heavier and wider in proportion with the vertical stone than at any other taula we saw.

From the top of the wall, you could see the poblat of So Na Caçana lying directly south, just about 400-500ms away.

This is a truly resplendent monument! We were both completely blown away and so sorry that Julian missed it.

Very close to our villa in Calan Porter was the poblat of So Na Caçana. Julian incorrectly calls it Torre Llisa Vell, which, to be fair is nearby. So go to pages 320 and 321 in your copy of TME, cross out the title and replace with So Na Caçana. Here, beneath the gargantuan talaiot lie not one but two taula sanctuaries.

Sadly both Ts are wrecked but there is still plenty to admire: the tall pillars surrounding the sacred spaces and the niches in the walls. I wondered what magical objects were once placed in these – skulls or horns, jars of oil or bull’s blood, perhaps?

Torre Blanca, also known as Sa Torreta de Tramuntana, is an unusual monument as it lies in the northern half of the island, above Mahon towards Es Grau. It lies on an outcrop of limestone at the point where the geology seems to change to something more slate-like.

We’d see it on a couple of basic maps and thought we’d have a crack at finding it, despite having absurdly inadequate directions, having the kids with us, it being midday and very hot, and haing to go a long way from our favourite beach….

Our initial attempt took us up to the Favortx lighthouse in the national park, too far north. Our second attempt was more successful. Follow the main road north for about 5.3 kms after the roundabout leaving the Mahon ringroad. Then turn right by a small white building with orange painted detail and then immediately fork right. This leads us down a long narrow lane which eventually turns sharp right. Here a gate finally barred us from going any further. Privado. We parked, knowing we were close. Moth went stomping off for a look around.

A car pulled up. A man opened the gate and drove through. As he closed it I asked ‘Torre Blanca?’ He replied in Spanish which I didn’t understand. He pointed and twiddled his fingers implying that we walk in the direction he was pointing. ‘Gracias.’ Not having a clue how far, we set off into the midday heat. Moth caught up having also asked the man for directions. After a pleasantly warm walk perhaps 1-1.5kms uphill we reached the farm, vaulted over the gate and asked a farm labourer who pointed behind the barn. Suddenly it was there. What a result!!!

From the top of the talaiot the views stretch over the tiny fields towards a bay and down the coast as far as Mahon, rocky land tumbling into the sea. Magic.

And the taula! Wooo! Great taula! Dinky and entirely self supporting, thanks to the vertical ridge at the back as at Torralba, it has that cheese-like colouring on the front I so admired at Trepuco. We liked it here muchos.

El Toro is Menorca’s sacred mountain and can be seen lurking or dominating the horizon from almost every point on the island of Menorca. It is the highest mountain on the island, measuring 358ms above sea level. Certainly we could see it from just about every talaiot tower we visited. It had to be visited. Everyone traveller to Menorca should see it, and probably does.

Bristling with ugly communications towers, it is now inhabited by nuns who run a convent up there with café and tat-shop because somebody once had a vision of the Holy Virgin up there. Frankly, I’m not surprised. Imagine climbing that after no breakfast and little water in the midday heat. Reckon I’d start seeing things, too! Thankfully visitors can now drive to the summit in air conditioned vehicles to enjoy the astonishing views of a beautiful and largely sparsely populated island.

My children tittered with glee as I read out the inscription beneath an 18th century statue of a local monk who was ‘interred beneath the altar in the church’. “In holy shit, perhaps?” Cleo mused. (Interred/in turd… geddit?)

The lane between Alaoir and Cala’n Porter where we were staying was a tortuous one we had to travel many, many times... There’re some great sites down here though. Torralba d’en Salort (see pages 316 to 318 of TME) lay at the top of this lane and having seen the top of the taula sticking up already I was itching to see the place.

All the regular poblat features here: caves, talaiot, cisterns, houses and also a wonderful quarry area.

The place was crawling with caterpillars though so I had to move with extreme caution. Cleo and Rupes liked this one as there were tons to explore and had informative signs to help them understand what they were seeing. As ever, the main attraction for me was the taula itself.

To aid stability, this taula has a ridge carved up the back and is thicker than Trepuco’s wafer thin cheese slice. I chose a caterpillar-free area to sit in and made a sketch.

Torrellonet (see page 322 of TME) is one of many talaiot towers on Menorca. They occupy positions of height or view and almost everywhere you look on Menorca, you can see one of these on the horizon.

Torrellonet is a really nice example of a talaiot as it is still tall with intact walls, is uncovered by vegetation, is easy to climb and has great views of the runway, so you can watch the aircraft coming and going. Fab. Ancient and modern engineering simultaneously.

From here we could see Talati de Dalt talaiot and others rising through the trees as well as the remains of a prehistoric house two field away.

There are two navetas at Rafal Rubi.

Both are in magnificent condition and have huge cool chambers with whopping great slabs in the ceiling.

Time to tackle some navetas. Structures less like boats, after which they are named, I cannot imagine. ‘Pyramids’ is what Rupert called them. I like that, because they are burial chambers, stand above ground level, slope inwards like pyramids and are made of large dressed blocks.

There are four close together just off the main road, all signposted and dead easy to find. (see page 307, 308 and 309 of TME).

Naveta de Biniac Argentina Occidental is a bit trashed, the roof has gone and its chamber is open. Still well worth a look.

Time to tackle some navetas. Structures less like boats, after which they are named, I cannot imagine. ‘Pyramids’ is what Rupert called them. I like that, because they are burial chambers, stand above ground level, slope inwards like pyramids and are made of large dressed blocks.

There are four close together just off the main road, all signposted and dead easy to find. (see page 307, 308 and 309 of TME).

Naveta de Biniac Argentina Oriental is reather trashed but has some really lovely steps built into the side of it which are well worth checking out.

Naveta d’es Tudons (see pages 304 and 305 of TME) is just off the main road at the western end of the island and judging by the huge car park with spaces for buses, frequently visited by coach parties.

Fortunately, we had it pretty much to ourselves. ‘Naveta’ means ‘boat’ and some archaeologist has interpreted the large burial chambers on the island as boat-shaped and given them this name. I can’t see it myself. They are more burial chamber-shaped to my mind. Anyway, Es Tudons has been restored according to this boat theory so you have to visit this one with a pinch of salt.

It is an impressive pyramidal type structure and beautifully cool inside its double-decker chamber. We liked it a lot, despite it being a bit overly restored.