Dateline France, 26 June 1990 Report 24 On the second long weekend in May we decided to do some visiting in Brittany. We spent the first night at Vannes, on the Morbihan Gulf, about the middle of the south coast of the peninsula. The gulf was a river valley during the last ice age, and the gulf is full of islands created as the sea level rose when the ice receded. The old part of town is full of half-timbered buildings and is surrounded by ramparts from the 13th-17th century, parts of which we could walk along. The moat outside the ramparts is dry, and planted with floral designs. In town is St. Pierre cathedral, with parts from the 13th to 19th centuries. There are the remains of a cloister along one side. On the gulf side of town, the gates open out onto a harbor, which seems mainly to be used as a parking lot for sailboats. The reason for going to Vannes is that many of the best examples of prehistoric megalithic architecture are located in towns nearby. There were at least two distinct prehistoric civilizations here in the period 4500-2000 BC. Both erected megalithic structures and were agricultural cultures. Around 600 BC the Gauls showed up, followed by the Romans and then the barbarians from the East. Around 460 AD the Celts showed up from Britain, chased out by the Angles and the Saxons. Popular history has attributed the megalithic structures and monoliths to the Celts (just as Stonehenge is wrongly attributed to them), and the names of different kinds of monuments, such as `menhir' and `dolmen' are derived from the Celtic. (French anthropologists have other, preferred, names for the different kinds of structures.) I realize this comes as a great dis- illusionment to Asterix fans. Our first stop was the village of Lamour-Baden, where we watched several dozen skin divers head off diving in the gulf, and took a short boat ride out to the Isle of Gavrinis to see the tumulus there. The tumulus consists of a dolmen (tunnel made with post and lintel construction out of multi- ton slabs) covered by a mound of dry-constructed (no mortar) stone. Some tumuli turn out to be graves, but this one seemed to be some kind of temple. The walls of the tunnel are carved with marvelous scrollwork designs, and one can make out abstract depictions of the sun, people, hatchets, arrows, etc. The tunnel ends in a 8' x 8' room, whose roof is a enormous single slab. The most amazing thing about the slab was not discovered until 1984, when the mound over the dolmen was temporarily removed. There was carving on the upper side of the slab which showed it to be a portion of the same original piece as the top of the "Merchant's Table" dolmen 4 kilometers away. Those two pieces, along with a third, once were part of a single menhir (a single flat or cylindrical rock planted upright; official French scientist word: "stele"). What you learn from this is that the second megalithic civilization didn't attach much import to the constructions of the first civilization, beyond being a source of building materials, and, that the second civilization was capable of moving big rocks long distances. The latter point argues for their civilization having some kind of hierarchical ruling structures (as do the organization of some of their burial sites). The Gavranis Tumulus is relatively good condition, being isolated on an island. For many other tumuli, only the dolmen remains, the rest of the mound having served as a good source of wall building material for local farmers over the ages. Waiting for the boat to take us back to shore, the kids found a little beach that was excellent for shell hunting. We next went to Locqmariquer to see some megaliths there. We first went to see the Merchant's Table, mentioned above. It is a dolmen, probably a grave once. It was a tumulus once, but the dry rock covering was long since carted away. There are the remains of dwellings right by it, which are now being excavated. There are also the fragments of the Great Menhir, which once stood 64 ft. tall. It was toppled by an earthquake (likely), and fractured into at least four pieces, three of which remain. These sites were just north of town. Going into town, you can follow a path next to city hall, down a couple alleys, alongside someone vegetable garden, to get to the dolmen of Mare Rethual. This one is in the form of a long tunnel, with post and lintel construction. Sarah and Luke had a much easier time crawling down to the end than Kaye and I--low headroom. There is a bulge at the end, covered by a huge fragment of a stele. Our last explorations that day took place around Carnac, which has the most famous prehistorical sites in the region. We started at the museum in town, which is devoted to the prehistory of the area. What I really think are beautiful are the polished hand axes made of jadite. These come in all sizes. It wasn't clear to me if they were actually used as tools, or intended only as symbolic items for burying with people. From the museum, we drove over to the Tumulus of St. Michel, so named because of the chapel built atop it. This tumulus is almost completely intact. It was a grave site, but had no tunnels connecting the tombs to the outside. There are multiple tombs in in, all of which were intact when excavation began in 1910. There are still unexcavated tombs within. The tumulus now has tunnels in it so you can visit some of the burial sites, though most of the artifacts have been moved out to the museum. Unlike other tumuli, the tombs within seem to have been unconnected internally. The hypothesis is that it was a burial place for the leaders of a tribe over time, and whenever one died, a new tomb would be erected next to the current mound and then piled over with rocks. Outside of Carnac are the "alignments": menhirs in rows, stretching for kilometers, at times. We saw the ones at Menec (1099 menhirs), Kermario and Kerkscan. (About half the towns around there start with "ker".) Each of them has a cromlech at one end, which is a circular arrangement of stones. The alignments correspond generally with positions of the sun. Near Kermario we also hiked into the woods to see a large menhir standing by itself, surround by a low, rectangular wall. At Menec, the menhirs get smaller as you move away from the cromlech, which gives the impression of a giant rock farm with menhirs at different stages of maturity. Kaye's theory is that the alignments are remnants of ancient 5-lane highways and that the dolmens were toll booths. From Carnac we drove across Brittany to the north shore, the part called the Emerald Coast, and to see more modern sites (middle ages and later). To continue the history of Brittany. Charlemagne came and conquered the Celts. He made one of them, Nominoe, their governor, and he ruled from Vannes. This was the beginning of the kingdom of Brittany, which eventually split off from France. In 1491, Anne of Brittany (Brittany allowed female rulers, unlike France), married Charles VIII. They didn't have any offspring to unite France and Brittany. The next king, Louis XII, divorced his wife to marry Anne in 1499. Their first child was a daughter, Claude of France, who became queen of Brittany in 1514, but couldn't be ruler of France. Claude married the next king of France, Francois I, and Claude ceded Brittany to their son, bringing the two kingdoms together. We stayed a night at Dinan, which has a well-preserved old town, with lots of half-timbered building, the upper stories of some jutting out over wooden arcades. We visited the basilica of St. Saveur, of which parts date from the 12th century. It is unusual in that the nave is not symmetric--the right wall is further from the left wall than the left wall is from the right. (Not really. One side has a side aisle and the other doesn't.) We walked along the ramparts there, looking down at a river far below. The ramparts led to a castle, which we walked around, but didn't go into. There is also an interesting clock tower in the middle of the old town. We took the long way from Dinan to Dinard, to see some of the coastline. Along the way we visited the "Chateau d'eau", which turned out to be a bar on top of a water tower. Great view of the area, especially far away water towers. We were the only ones there during the day; it looks like there are live bands and dancing at night. Kaye's science quiz: If the bar is on top of the water tank, where do they get the water to flush the toilets? Dave's science quiz: Where does the water go when you flush? Dinard seems to be mainly a resort town for Parisians and Brits. A rocky promentory juts out into the sea from the middle of town, and we followed the Promenade du Clair de Lune around it to a beach a little east of town. The walkway has gardens and vines all along. At one point there is a shrine with a statue of Mary set into a small alcove in the rock. Next to it people have attached many "Merci" plaques thanking her for her help. The most unusual read "O vierge Marie -- J'etais impotent -- je marche -- J.L., Mai 1984." I would think J.L.'s wife should have had a plaque there too. We had summer-like weather, and the kids had a good time playing on the beach. The most interesting attraction on the beach was a young woman playing volleyball with her boyfriend. He was having a hard time returning the ball, I guess because he was trying to watch three things at once. We then stopped at St. Malo. The old part of the city is surrounded by ramparts, and lies right on the sea. It reminded me a lot of Valletta in Malta: a walled city with shipyards and a fishing fleet (cod) nearby-- and a hotel strip by the beach, just like Sliema. The buildings inside the ramparts were mostly destroyed in WWII, but everything has been rebuilt now (another similarity with Valletta, except this bombing was by the Allies and took place over two weeks). We walked the ramparts, and watched the tide come in (quickly) and isolate a little island offshore that was connected to the mainland by a sand bridge. Once it was cut off, we watched the reactions of people who had been walking around the island upon discovering they were stranded. Most ended up wading for shore. Our last night of the trip was spent on Mont St. Michel. MSM is a small village built on a huge rock just offshore. It is now connected by a causeway to the mainland, but in the past would be cut off at high tide during certain times of the month. The highest tides are 10s of meters and come in for 10s of kilometers. There was a somewhat high tide while we were there, but it was before dawn, so I didn't get up to see it. We stayed on the island for the night, in a wonderful room on overlooking the main (and only) street. We could look right out the window at the spire of the church, and there was a small loft right under the rafters for the kids. There had been a chapel on MSM since the 8th century when bishop Aubert of Avaranches had a vision of the archangel Michael there. Benedictine monks settled there in 966. The stayed until the revolution, but returned in 1966, to mark the 1000th anniversary of the founding of the monastery. The current church, built squarely atop the apex of the mount, was built between 11th and 16th centuries, with some repairs in the 18th and 19th centuries. The highest point of bedrock under the church rises to 260 ft., and it is about 500 ft. to the spire. We had a very good guide for our visit (in English, so we didn't have to translate all the big words for our kids). She was local, her mother having been born on the island. She took pains to point out that MSM is in Normandy and not Brittany, the traditional boundary being the Couesnon river, which swings just west of the mount. If it weren't for the causeway, a big rainstorm could easily put MSM into Brittany, the area being mainly flat marshes. She took us around the church, the underlying vaulting (of which you need a lot when you try to put a church on the point of a pyramid) and the connecting abbey. We saw a human-powered treadmill used to bring building material and food up to the abbey on drag-sleds that came up a 70 degree incline. Parts of the church and abbey fell down during the 100 years war, but the mount was never taken by the English. MSM has long been a destination for pilgrims, and we saw two groups walking in from the balcony in front of the church. We also saw a heard of salt marsh sheep, which later decided the grass was greener on the other side of the road just in front of us as we were leaving the island.