Chance
If you ever find yourself cruising around the western end of Lake Geneva, why not heave to, and check out the stones at Lutry. Chances are that you’ll be doing your cruising in a motorcar, which for this particular prehistoric site is a real paradox. Before any roads or tracks were used, the way the original builders wanted you to see the site was from the lake, but if it wasn’t for the motorcar, nobody in the present time would have seen the site at all.
The stones, which date from the Middle Neolithic (ca. 4500-4000 BC), were partially destroyed by a flood and buried under a landslide from the river Lutrive which runs into the lake a couple of hundred meters to the west. The site had been undisturbed for millennia until discovered when the area was being developed for a car park. The stones were carefully excavated and re-erected on the present site in 1986. I had a look around but I could not see any indication to mark were their original position within the modern car park, unlike the post holes in the car park at Stonehenge.
There are now twenty three stones, which seem to form two parts. The first part is made up of twelve standing stones forming a straight line running east to west and this section contains the largest stones. The second section comprises smaller stones ranging from eighty to twenty centimetres in height which form a slight curve. As the stones were partially destroyed, there may have been a mirror of this smaller section on the eastern side.
All the stones are very thin making the stelae very slender. They all show signs of being shaped too, their rounded tops may have been formed to symbolize a head. The fourth stone from the east, on the second row has various engravings. The top has chevrons cut into it which have been interpreted as hair, lower down are five rings, interpreted as female breasts elements and finally at the bottom is a male element shaped like a bottle opener. This stone has been reproduced and takes pride of place in a glass case a little further away in the Simplon passage of the main shopping area. These markings could easily be nothing more than graffiti, carved by a bored adolescent long after the site had been abandoned and passed into ruin.
In some ways the Lutry menhirs are typical of a lot of the Swiss megalithic sites, but their discovery and restoration is unique. Where as most ancient sites have been persevered in some form or another by successive generations of farmers or towns people, the megalithic sites of Switzerland were completely abandoned in the mass exodus and scorched earth policy adopted by the Helvetians and their neighbouring tribes in 58 B.C.
Image credit: Chance - May 2013
Image credit: Chance - May 2013
The “Stonehenge Urn”, probably the largest barrel urn in Britain, was found upright by Colt Hoare. It contained a cremation and was sealed by a large triangular stone.
It is now on display in Devizes Museum.
Image credit: Stonehenge and its Barrows by William Long, Esq., M.A., F.S.A. 1876
English Heritage’s artistic interpretation
Image credit: English Heritage
Details of Barrow Group on Pastscape
(SU 105443) Tumuli (AT) (1)
A barrow cemetery comprising of eight barrows; four disc, three bowl and one bell barrow (Durrington 1-3, Winterbourne Stoke 46-50). Excavations were carried out by Cunnington but little or no records survive. Burials accompanied by grave goods are know to have come from Winterbourne Stoke 46 (SU 14 SW 296) and two of the four disc barrows but these were not identified. (2-3) Published 1:2500 survey revised. (4) Excavations carried out in 1961 by Vatcher located burials within three barrows, Winterbourne Stoke 46 (SU 14 SW 296) Winterbourne Stoke 47 (SU 14 SW 297) and Winterbourne Stoke 50 (SU 14 SW 300). Grave goods recovered included beads, awls, and a bronze dagger. The excavations identified the two disc barrows, excavated by Cunnington and found to contain burials, as Winterbourne Stoke 49 (SU 14 SW 299) and Winterbourne Stoke 50 (SU 14 SW 300). These two barrows, together with Winterbourne Stoke 47 (SU 14 SW 297) contained stake-built structures. A possible stake-built structure was also identified outside of the barrow ditch of Winterbourne Stoke 46 (SU 14 SW 296) (5)Barrow A at SU10714435 , Barrow B at SU10784433 now descheduled(6) The barrows are visible as slight earthworks, and some appear as cropmarks, on aerial photographs, and have been mapped by both RCHME’s Salisbury Plain Training Area NMP and EH’s Stonehenge WHS Mapping Project. (7)
Details of Barrow Group on Pastscape
An early Bronze Age round barrow cemetery comprising 14 extant earthwork round barrows and one plough-levelled mound described by Colt Hoare as “non sepulchral”: each round barrow is recorded separately (see child records). The cemetery comprises disc, saucer and bowl forms in a compact linear group extending over an area measuring 375m east to west by 170m wide. Colt Hoare opened most of the barrows in the early 19th century. Some of the barrows suffered damage from military activity during the Second World War, after which a tree plantation covered the site. The trees were removed in the late 1990s. A Level 3 detailed analytical survey and investigation of the round barrow cemetery (at 1:1000 scale) was carried out by English Heritage in 2010 as part of its Stonehenge WHS Landscape Project. The survey suggests a relative stratigraphy for the central group of barrows, which appear to have an east to west progression. The earthworks are threatened by hawthorn scrub and burrowing animals.
Details of Barrow Group on Pastscape
A Bronze Age round barrow cemetery comprising eight bowl barrows and a pond barrow, most of which survive as earthworks although there is some substantial damage from ploughing. Several of the barrows were excavated in the early 19th century by Sir Richard Colt Hoare (1812). Four further mounds, probably of more recent origin, were recorded to the west by Grinsell (1957). The round barrows were surveyed at 1:1,000 in 2011 as part of English Heritage’s Stonehenge WHS Landscape Project. See individual barrow records for details.
Details of Barrows on Pastscape
(SU11554183) Tumuli (AT) (Two extant, one site). (1)
Barrow cemetery originally comprising of eight round barrows, of which only two are visible Amesbury 1 (SU 14 SW 431) Amesbury 2 (SU 14 SW 432) and each of which contained a primary cremation. Colt Hoare shows five very small barrows in the immediate vicinity, and in one of these, or Amesbury 3 (SU 14 SW 433) he found the “Stonehenge Urn”, probably the largest barrel urn in Britain. It was upright, contained a cremation and was sealed by a large triangular stone. It is now on display in Devizes Museum. Another one of these barrows contained a small socketed looped bronze spearhead found just below the turfline, it was wrongly identified by Thurnam as found in a barrow at Wilsford. The five small barrows had been destroyed before 1912. (2-3) Amesbury 1-2; barrows are extant. None of the remaining barrows can be identified on the ground which is under pasture. Published 1:2500 surveys revised. (4) The barrows are visible as an earthwork on aerial photographs, and have been mapped by both RCHME’s Salisbury Plain Training Area NMP and EH’s Stonehenge WHS Mapping Project. Details of each barrow are recorded separately. (7)
The five destroyed barrows appear to be those mentioned by Cleal et al as Amesbury 107-111. In terms of their relationship to Stonehenge, it is suggested that these barrows were located so as not to be visible from Stonehenge.
Details of Barrows on Pastscape
A Bronze Age barrow group comprising two disc barrows and a bell barrow with an outer bank. A bucket urn has been recovered from the bell barrow. The barrows are visible as earthworks on aerial photographs.
Stonehenge Visitor Centre under Construction
Image credit: Chance - Winter Solstice 2012
Remains of the Long Barrow with the Stonehenge Visitor Centre under Construction in the background
Image credit: Chance - Winter Solstice 2012
