Dolmens of the Krasnodar Territory. Where and how to see stone structures

Translated from Breton, "dolmen" means "stone table". The ancient structures, built of large stone slabs, outwardly really look like a table - two vertical slabs and one horizontal. But there are structures of five or six slabs, shaped like houses with a flat roof. The secret of construction and purpose has not yet been fully disclosed. In terms of age, many of them are much older than the pyramids.

These mysterious structures are found in different corners the globe- in Europe, America, Africa, India, Indonesia. It is surprising how people who have absolutely no connection with each other could build structures that are similar in appearance. There are many hypotheses regarding the purpose of dolmens, both scientific and mythological.

The most popular scientific theory has been put forward by archaeologists. They suggest that dolmens were intended for burial burials - like mounds or Egyptian pyramids. The remains present in some structures, as well as shards, ancient amulets and jewelry found nearby, serve as arguments. Opponents of this theory argue that burials are not found in all dolmens. In addition, when considering specific dolmens, it turns out that their age is much greater than the age of burial. These facts indicate that the dolmens were originally intended for other purposes.

Another popular hypothesis claims that the purpose of the dolmens was cult-religious. Its supporters explain the presence of a round hole in the vertical slab as the creation of a symbolic original gate in other world... As an argument, the fact is given that it is the image of the gate that is carved on some plates with holes. But if the purpose of the dolmens is religious, then why weren't sacrificial objects found nearby, there are no ancient settlements?

A lot of dolmens have been found in the Caucasus region, especially in Krasnodar Territory... Some of them are believed to be more than five thousand years old. Looking at dolmen map Black Sea coast, you can see that their largest concentration is located in the area of ​​Gelengik, Novorossiysk, Tuapse, Sukhumi. Researchers studying dolmens in the Gelendzhik area have put forward an interesting theory. They noticed that the dolmen model was similar to the “absolutely black body” model, and suggested that ancient structures were used as an information receiver and transmitter.

Quartz sandstone is the material from which dolmens Krasnodar Territory, widely used in radio engineering. It has the ability to generate electric current and emit waves when subjected to mechanical stress. Researchers believe that dolmens were used as a prototype of the Internet, only information was transmitted at the subconscious level - one person near the dolmen transmitted visual and mental images, the other immediately accepted them near another dolmen.

Some guidebooks for the Krasnodar Territory provide interesting legend about giants and dwarfs. In ancient times, only two tribes lived in these parts - huge, stupid giants and small, but cunning dwarfs. The giants lived on good lands in the valley, while the dwarfs were forced to huddle in dark mountain caves. The dwarfs practicing witchcraft managed to get the giants to build comfortable stone houses from stones for themselves. Such dwellings served as reliable protection, because no one could get into the round small holes except the dwarfs themselves.

Long-term studies have not yet answered the question of why ancient people built dolmens, and this secret has yet to be discovered.

The average size of dolmens is 2 meters wide, 2 meters high and 3 meters long. The hole diameter is about 40 cm. The weight of each slab is from 3 to 8 tons, the weight of the plug is about 100 kg. The word "DOLMEN" comes from the Breton (Kola) word, in which tol means table, and men means stone.

Adygs, for example, call them "ISPUI" - the house of a dwarf. Their legend says that giants and dwarfs lived in ancient times. The giants were big and often offended the dwarfs, and the dwarfs were small and cunning. Therefore, the dwarfs, with the help of cunning, forced the giants to build dolmens for themselves from huge slabs. They felt safe in these houses. The dwarfs rode on hares and jumped right on top of them through the hole in the front slab. Cossacks called dolmens heroic huts.

Archaeologists estimate the time of the beginning of the construction of some Caucasian dolmens as the end of the third millennium BC. This means. What dolmens ancient pyramids! They classify them as burial structures, because they find the remains of human burials in them. But neither the builders of the dolmens themselves, nor their other contemporaries left any records with the answers to our main questions.

When, in the middle of the 17th century, a Dutch priest first began to examine the structure of huge stone slabs he had found, he came to the conclusion that it was built by giants.

There was no other explanation for how stones of this size could be stacked on top of each other for a long time.

And even now in the history of dolmens, as these stone foundlings were later called, there are many white spots, despite the fact that they are found in different countries on different continents and have been studied by scientists of all stripes for more than three hundred years.

Origin story

Dolmens - "stone table" translated from Celtic- belong to the culture of megaliths, that is, tribes who used huge stones in buildings. Nothing is known about these peoples, nothing is left of them, except for these huge structures.

Ancient dolmens were found on the territory of the modern Krasnodar Territory and Adygea, then the territory of their appearance resembles a vicious circle: North Africa- Spain - Portugal - France - Holland - northern Germany - along the Danube to the Balkans - Western coast of the Black Sea.

Perhaps the tribes of the megaliths roamed or migrated along this path. But how then to explain the existence of dolmens in India or even Japan - scientists do not know.

Most often dolmens – these are structures made of giant stone slabs, which are either folded in the form of a round hut, or composed in the form of the letter "P", or represent the same "stone table" when four vertically standing slabs are covered on top of the fifth.

Such dolmens can be found in the Krasnodar Territory.

Dolmens of Gelendzhik and southern Russia

The largest accumulation of dolmens has been preserved near Gelendzhik, although individual antiquities are found almost throughout the Northwestern Caucasus.

There are about 2500 of them here. Almost all Caucasian dolmens are of the tiled type, but all of them are unique, and none of them is similar to the other, this is why they are interesting to world science.

Regularities in their buildings have not yet been identified.

However, there is one feature that distinguishes the Caucasian dolmens from all others: a round hole in the frontal slab with a diameter of about 40 cm.

Human burials and household items were found in dolmens, which allowed scientists to draw a conclusion about the purpose of dolmens.

On the one hand, these were tombs, in some of which several people were buried. On the other hand, there are religious buildings, monumental, powerful, associated with astronomical laws.

Traditional theories today have many critics who believe that the few burials in dolmens indicate that these buildings had a different purpose.

Mysteries of the prehistoric era

The most interesting feature Caucasian dolmens is their invulnerability to natural disasters. Located in the mountains, where avalanches and destructive mudflows often descend, dolmens never get in the way of sweeping streams.

There were cases when a mudflow passed a few meters from the dolmen, but did not touch it. How did the ancients define such safe places- is still a mystery. Dolmens are destroyed only by people - during the construction of roads, houses, during logging.

Another theory associated with the mysterious dolmens concerns the stone itself. All stone slabs were cut from rocks containing quartz. This mineral has some interesting properties, for example, when compressed, quartz generates an electric current, and under the influence of current, quartz crystals are able to generate ultrasound.

On the basis of these data, a theory has developed that dolmens under certain conditions could be a source of frequencies that are not perceived by a person's ear, but have a certain, often negative, effect on his brain. It is assumed that this property could be used against enemy troops or ill-wishers.

Many inhabitants consider dolmens to be "places of power" or even portals to other dimensions.... Scientists believe that the pilgrimage of just such lovers of mysticism and esotericism destroyed a significant number of ancient monuments.

Where and how to see stone structures

Scientists have established that initially there were about 7 thousand dolmens in the Caucasus, now there are just over 150 .

Most of them are located in the area of ​​the cities of Gelendzhik and Tuapse.

Near Gelendzhik, the largest accumulation of stone structures is located in the area of ​​the Shirokaya Shchel farm, on the Nexis mountain, on the Zhane and Pshady rivers, on the Tsygankovaya mountain.

There are several ways to look at this miracle of human history:

On one's own... There are enough maps on the Internet with the location of dolmens. Following them, it is quite possible to find and explore these sights without outside help. About two dozen of them are located near Gelendzhik, and the path to them is not difficult.

Excursions... In this case, an amazing variety awaits the tourist. Excursions are available in groups, the price of the excursion is about 300 rubles plus 100 rubles at the entrance to the protected areas or individual from 500 rubles. per person. You can choose a walking trip to the dolmens or the most comfortable one - by bus or even an all-terrain vehicle.

Among the inhabitants of the Black Sea coast, there are truly enthusiastic people who plot their routes based on books about dolmens or their own observations. Such enthusiasts sometimes organize two- or three-day hiking or cycling trips to the most interesting dolmens. Payment is negotiable.

It is impermissible to visit the Gelendzhik region and not look at the real miracle and the main mystery of these places - the ancients are older Egyptian pyramids- dolmens.

Who did the Maykopites meet on the Black Sea coast? Who left behind one of the most remarkable in the entire Caucasus, Krasnodar Territory, one of the most mysterious ancient structures in the world - dolmens?

Maykop residents themselves could not do this. The development of their culture and beliefs could not lead to the emergence of such structures. Archaeologists have not found such monuments in the Caucasus at all that would be structurally close to dolmens and at the same time preceded them. Before setting out various hypotheses about the origin of dolmens and about the people who built them, it is necessary to talk about these structures themselves. Dolmens are usually referred to as megaliths ("big stones"). These are huge structures made of large blocks of wild or rough-cut stone, which are common throughout the world, except Australia, mainly in coastal areas. The word "dolmen" comes from the Breton language and means a stone table. But most of all, a dolmen looks like not a table, but a giant box or a beehive. The resemblance to a hive is reinforced by a round hole made in the front wall of the dolmen.

In the photo of dolmens in Gelendzhik, you can see their variety: some are made in a regular rectangular shape with a large entrance, others are more powerful buildings with a small round entrance, and still others look like pyramids.






















Anyone who has visited the dolms in the Gelendzhik region must have heard that in this mysterious place you can get new knowledge, is that so ?! - How to get knowledge, or rather information, or what is the technique for obtaining it next to megalithic structures?









Among the many secrets and artifacts left to us by the ancient antediluvian civilizations that existed on Mother Earth, dolmens stand out. A large number of these ancient structures are located on the territory of Russia, in the Krasnodar Territory.

• Megalithic structures

  Dolmens of the Krasnodar Territory come in a variety of sizes. There is a dolmen in the courtyard of the Tuapse Museum, which is comparable in size to a dog kennel, and only one slab of the Guzeripl giant dolmen measures 2.45 meters in length, 2.1 meters in height and 57 centimeters thick. A hole with a diameter of 48 centimeters was made in the stone and a stone plug is attached to it, which weighs about 100 kilograms.

  The weight of the slab itself is about 40 tons. This is only the facade, and there are also walls, a floor and a stone roof of similar dimensions. It is estimated that one large dolmen had to be built by 150 people within two years.
  The slabs of the Caucasian dolmens are composed of sandstone. This stone contains little clay, absorbs less water, and over time, its surface gets stronger. This is facilitated by the rays of the sun, which, as it were, melt individual grains of sand. Scientists divide dolmens into 4 groups: tiled, composite, trough-shaped, and monolithic. The most common, beautiful and most difficult to build are tiled dolmens. They are also the most ancient. There are also composite, trough-shaped and monolithic ones. The composite ones are composed of smaller slabs, the trough-like ones are hollowed out in the rock and closed on top with one slab, and the monolithic ones are completely carved into the rock.
  Looking at such Cyclopean buildings, one is imbued with deep respect for the people who built them. At their disposal were only bronze tools, rollers for transporting slabs, the simplest levers and blocks for installing huge stones. But dolmens are often located high in the mountains. The number of dolmens is also striking. So on the territory from to the city of Ochamchiri in Georgia, there are 2038. And these are only found and described buildings. If we try to evaluate the work that the ancient builders spent on the manufacture, transportation and installation of stone slabs, then it can only be compared with the work on the construction of the Egyptian pyramids. But the main mysteries of dolmens are not related to the technology of their construction.
  First, it is surprising that all dolmens appeared on Earth at about the same time. It is unclear what caused the people who inhabited the British Isles to Far East, Thrace, the Iberian Peninsula, at the same time begin to build similar buildings.
  Secondly, there is still no consensus about the purposes for which the dolmens were built. If we assume that dolmens are burial structures, then why are the archaeological finds during their excavations so scarce? Why do most of the finds in dolmens belong to later archaeological cultures?
  Thirdly, it is not clear why the most ancient dolmens are the most progressive in their construction. Why buildings architecturally degraded from tiled to monolithic, and did not evolve.
  The wide distribution of dolmens all over the world and their attraction to the shores of the seas and oceans makes one think that the "idea" of the dolmen was brought to the Caucasus from outside. But where did it come from? It is clear that not from the side of the mountains. Maybe the ancient Caucasians could see dolmens during their sea voyages, or the dolmen builders themselves sailed to the Black Sea coast about 5000 years ago?
  It is known that in the III-II millennium BC. people have made long sea ​​travel on the many oars and sailing ships... The dolmen builders, setting out on a voyage, did not even know that the Caucasus existed somewhere, they accidentally landed on its shores and settled here. This hypothesis is supported by some facts. The closest features to Caucasian dolmens can be found in the ancient buildings of the Iberian Peninsula (Portugal, Spain), in Corsica and on the nearest Mediterranean islands, in North Africa, and Palestine.
  Dolmens are especially similar in the territory of prehistoric Thrace (Lalapasha). All these places are located along sea ​​currents... They go from Gibraltar along the northern coast of Africa and turn into the Black Sea, washing first the Caucasus. Apparently, these currents brought the builders of dolmens to our shores.
  There is one more line of ties between the Caucasus and the Pyrenees, which confirms this hypothesis. We are talking about the Basques. They now live mainly in Spain and southern France. This people, both in language and culture, is quite close to the mountain peoples of the Caucasus. In addition, archaeologists attribute to the ancestors of the Basques a special Basque-Catalan megalithic culture, among the monuments of which there are dolmens similar to those of the Black Sea coast. So it can be assumed that the ancestors of the Basques built dolmens on the shores of the Black Sea.
  Further, the builders of dolmens began to develop the coast, move into the depths of the mountains, compete for territory with the tribes of the Maikop culture. These were strong men, warriors who were looking for a new place to live, a place in which they could apply their strength.
  The winner in the migration process is always the strongest. But often the winners then “dissolve” in the defeated population. The descendants of yesterday's enemies begin to live together, perceive each other's culture and already feel themselves as one people. So it is quite possible that the peoples who now inhabit the Western Caucasus and which are customary to be attributed to the Abkhaz-Adyghe ethnos (Abkhazians, Adygs, Shapsugs, Circassians, etc.), originate from the tribes of dolmen builders.
  This version is also confirmed by the degradation of the building chronology of dolmen builders, which has been observed for thousands of years. Indeed, if the early slab dolmens were built by the aliens themselves, then the subsequent composite, trough-shaped and monolithic ones are already their descendants, who did not cross the seas and who were closer to the caves and grottoes of the Caucasus, which found their expression in monolithic dolmens.
  If the migration hypothesis partially explains how dolmens could have arisen in the Caucasus, then it is more difficult to get an answer to the question about the purpose of construction. What all researchers agree with is that dolmens are structures associated with ritual actions. The orientation of the dolmens on the ground speaks of the worship of their builders to the sun. Most of the studied monuments face south. Part - to the southwest and southeast. However, if the dolmen stands in a highly shaded area among high mountains or in a dense forest, then its facade faces a brightly lit spot - rocks, distant trees, even if it is actually the north side. Some dolmens bear solar and wave-like signs. So, maybe dolmens are a kind of idols and at the same time containers for deceased ancestors, magical tools that should increase the wealth of their creators? Quite possible.
  Some scientists associate dolmens with the pyramids of the Egyptians. They see the similarity in massiveness, tightness, inaccessibility of the contents to prying eyes. The first dolmens were built without manholes. Some of them contained burials. Perhaps the buried were priests, leaders or even gods of their tribes? It is also possible that after the holes appeared in the portals, the buried could be fed and visited. And it was possible to bury several people in one dolmen and worship them together. In addition, any conqueror considered it his own to Ruin the grave of the enemy, throw away other people's bones and prepare for himself a worthy place for the afterlife. For example, the Maykopites and later the Alans did the same.
  Numerous reburials and looting led to the fact that the archaeological finds in the dolmens are scanty, and the things found belong to different eras, it is impossible to establish exactly who was the first to occupy such an honorable place.
  At the beginning of the century, a version arose according to which dolmens were special funerary tables on which the ancients roasted their dead. The version is completely wild. Its only confirmation was seen in the fact that fire coals were found in some dolmens. Bonfires were apparently kindled to fumigate burial chambers. In any case, it is difficult to imagine to what temperature a giant stone must be heated in order for a human body to turn to dust.
  In addition to scientific and archaeological hypotheses about the origin of dolmens, there is a whole group of folk and mystical ones. The Adyghe people, who for 4000 years acted as the guardians of dolmens, call them "ispun", which means the house of isps (dwarfs). Remembering that all the megaliths scattered across the Earth are similar to each other, and given that on British isles there are many similar structures, it can be assumed that they were built by the legendary "small people" - hobbits, elves, dwarfs from English legends. The version seems quite insane, but it is interesting that a structure called "Psynako I object" was recently discovered near Tuapse, which, in terms of its characteristics, is closest to the famous cromlech Stonehenge.
  The Circassians, who appeared in the Caucasus later than the Circassians, say that these peculiar monuments were built by "giants" in order to shelter a small tribe of people who did not have enough strength to build a dwelling from the weather. People were so small that they used hares for riding. You see, the "little people" appear again.
  However, the most interesting and most mystical hypothesis arose quite recently. Its adherents believe that the dolmens were built not 4 thousand, but 10 thousand years ago. Moreover, they were built by other people, bearers of higher knowledge. A kind of Atlanteans. Their civilization was dying, and, realizing the inevitability of their own extinction, they decided to pass on knowledge to their descendants. At first, a man built a dolmen, and feeling the approach of death, he went into it still alive and closed the stone plug behind him. After death, the intellect was absorbed by the walls of the structure and changed the very structure of the stone. Now anyone who wanted to could walk up to the dolmen, put their head on its wall and enter into direct communication with the bearer of the highest knowledge. So each dolmen can be considered alive. Can you imagine what kind of torment a living brain experiences when tourists engrave their own initials on ancient stones?
  Since 1930, all dolmens in our country have been under state protection. When visiting them, try to treat these monuments of history and culture with due respect. No new inscription will be able to decorate an architectural structure, the age of which is comparable to the age of mankind itself.

  Dolmen - (Celtic) "tol" - table, "men" - stone. those. "Stone Table". They belong to the culture of "megaliths" - (from the Greek) "huge stones". The bearers of this amazing culture have not been precisely identified, but the monuments left by them are truly grandiose. The European name is not casual, dolmens are quite widespread. An interesting sequence of their distribution can be traced. Early dolmens are found on west coast The Black Sea, then the band of their distribution extends to Asia Minor, then the Middle East.

  Palestine - North Africa - Spain - Portugal - France - Holland - northern Germany - along the Danube to the Balkans - Western coast of the Black Sea. Thus, a closed loop is traced. Apparently, the carriers of the "Dolmen" culture migrated along this route. True, there are separate dolmens in Central Africa, India, and even Japan. Still, the most interesting for researchers were the dolmens of the Northwestern Caucasus. The name Stone table was not given for nothing - the presence of a massive lid, which crowns almost every dolmen, makes it look like a table. Almost all Caucasian dolmens are individual, although for decades archaeologists have not abandoned their attempts to find a certain mathematical regularity of their structure. But in the words of the famous Soviet archaeologist Markovin, a researcher of dolmens who devoted several decades of his life to them, this idea of ​​systematizing these stone monuments “art for the sake of art” is like medieval scholasticism. It is unlikely that the ancient builders suspected of some mathematical laws, under which their researchers tried to bring the dolmens. Rather, it is important to understand what their creators tried to show by building the dolmens.

  Scientific research of the Caucasian dolmens begins at the end of the 17th century, when the famous Russian naturalist and geographer Pallas first made detailed descriptions these buildings, found by him on the Taman Peninsula. True, he somewhat belittled their age. Pallas discovered in one of the dolmens several objects of a later time than the burial structures themselves. Therefore, he dated them to the time of Greek colonization. Later, such scientists as Tebu de Marigny, Frederic Dubois de Montpere, Felitsyn, Veselovsky, etc. were engaged in the study of dolmens. From the middle of the twentieth century, archaeologists Teshev, Kondryakov, Autlev, Markovin were engaged in this problem. Thanks to their work, many issues related to dolmens have now been disclosed.
  The distribution strip of the Caucasian dolmens extends from Taman Peninsula to Abkhazia, 480 km long. Its width varies from 30 to 75 km. Dolmens are not haphazardly located, usually they can be found along river basins and near passes. The map of the distribution of dolmens, when combined with the map of the strike of the main rocks, showed that these buildings were always located where there was material convenient for their construction. In total, according to archaeologists, there are about 2500 dolmens in the Kuban. Local buildings, in spite of their certain similarity with European dolmens, have their own peculiarities, for example, practically all Caucasian dolmens have a hole made on the front side, usually of a round shape, the diameter of which ranges from 37 to 43 cm. Apparently, Caucasian dolmens are later than European ones. and this can be traced to their more correct form. According to Jessen, they date from about 2500 BC. AD the period of dolmen construction lasted for about 900 years, after which the traces of their builders disappear.
  The nature of the finds made in dolmens allows us to draw two conclusions - they were burial structures since In intact dolmens, the remains of human burials (usually bones sprinkled with red ocher) and items of burial implements were found. - the second conclusion is that these are undoubtedly religious buildings, as evidenced by their monumentality, astronomical orientation (some researchers conclude that the holes of the dolmens are directed to the place of sunset on certain days).
  Despite the fact that Vladimir Ivanovich Markovin rejected attempts at mathematical systematization, he himself and his colleague Pshemaf Ulagaevich Autlev systematized dolmens into five main groups.

  1. Tiled - the most widespread type of dolmens, about 90% of the total known. The name comes from the form, and the principle of construction. It was built of five massive stone slabs (hence the name), Four slabs made up the walls, the fifth - the ceiling. It has the shape of a truncated pyramid, the thickness of the walls is from 30 to 60 cm. With great care, V. I. Markovin, after thorough measurements, deduced the proportion of the ratio of the frontal, rear and equal side plates. It turned out that the builders of dolmens had a certain architectural module, i.e. unit of measure, by which the entire structure was repaired. This module is equal to 1/10 of the front plate. The overall proportion of most of the tiled dolmens was 10 x 12 x 8 (the ratio of the front, side, and rear sides, respectively, of the inner chamber of the dolmen).

  The slabs are massive, hewn and are not inferior in thickness to modern artificial panels. We must not forget that there were no cranes and tractors in the era of the construction of ancient structures.
  Dolmens in the full sense of the word are the work of human hands. Historians unanimously view them as oldest monuments architecture. It is with the description of megaliths that almost all educational courses in the history of architecture begin, because in works of architecture solutions of practically necessary utilitarian problems are inextricably combined with purely artistic creativity. Each epoch corresponds to its own architecture, the images of which actively influence the consciousness of a person's feelings. It should be added that architecture is not only a construction business or a purely artistic creation; it is a synthesis of both.
  The famous art critic Mikhail Vladimirovich. Alpatov, studying ancient megalithic monuments as architectural structures, wrote: "One can imagine with what sense of dignity and creative satisfaction people looked at these monuments, who by their efforts won the physical resistance of the stone." When building a dolmen, a person, in his words, “limits space by piling up material; for the first time, the bearing and resting parts are clearly opposed here; this opposition became the basis of architecture "From the inner space of the dolmen" the internal interior should have developed "-" In dolmens, the beginning of order is manifested, first of all, rhythm, the beginning of which in one form or another became the basis of the artistic language of architecture. " To these qualities can be added proportionality and scale, for they create a feeling of strength and grandeur. As a rule, the materials for the construction of dolmens were sandstones and quartzites. And the softer the stone was, the more regular shape the dolmens themselves and the slabs that made them up had. Archaeologists have reliably restored the technology for the construction of these tombs. First, a massive block of approximately suitable thickness was split off from the formation. A thin groove about 1 cm deep was knocked out along the contour of the future slab.After 20-30 cm, along the perimeter of the future slab (along the groove), through holes were drilled into which wooden wedges were tightly driven. After that, the gutter was poured with water, and after a while the tree swelled and the stone cracked. The result was a blank for the future dolmen slab.

  archaeologists also found unused blanks for future slabs, and the tools with which these slabs were processed. A hole was punched in the front plate. After careful cutting and fitting, the slabs were transported to the assembly site (sometimes several kilometers away, given the mountainous and wooded area). The transportation took place apparently with the help of both human traction and the traction of oxen. The slabs were transported on log-rollers, alternately placing them under the movable slab (the famous Grom-Stone was transported in a similar way, for the monument to Peter in St. Petersburg). The place for the construction was not chosen by chance, not far from the water (usually along the banks of rivers), and on a hill, or on the slopes of mountains (usually, these are places where the sunset is clearly visible). A powerful stone foundation was laid out from two or three large stones, less often from one. For slab dolmens, grooves were knocked out at the joints of the slabs and their installation began. First, the front and rear plates were installed using props, and then side plates were attached to them from the sides. The joints were so tightly fitted that you cannot even push a sheet of paper through the surviving dolmens. Sometimes a temple was built around the dolmen, most likely intended for ritual sacrifices. After that, an earthen embankment was made on one of the sides of the building, and the top cover plate was rolled over it. The hole was closed with a mushroom-shaped stone plug. Based on the fact that the dolmen usually weighs several tons, according to the calculations of archaeologists, about 50 - 70 people took part in its construction. The dolmen did not immediately become a tomb. There are dolmens in which there have never been burials, this fact suggests that most likely the dolmen was not built for a specific person, but burial in it was carried out after a certain period, after its construction. All tiled dolmens have a “portal” ie. protrude 30-40 cm beyond the junction of the front and side plates. Some scientists associate the presence of the portal with the fact that the dolmen personified the transition to the other world. And the portal could thus represent the gate. Whether it is true or not, some dolmens have such a massive portal that they had to make additional supports for it. All dolmen slabs were trapezoidal in plan, but in general the slab dolmen has the shape of a truncated pyramid, which ensures the overall strength of the structure.

  Thus, the building expands towards the base and towards the "portal".

  2. The next type of dolmens - systematized by Markovin - is a composite dolmen, which is built not from five huge slabs, but from more smaller stones. Analysis of the study of these buildings showed that at first it was a necessary measure, since large stones might not be enough and they were replaced with smaller parts.
  Dolmens were found with three monoliths at the base and one of the walls made of several stone blocks. Later, a composite dolmen becomes an end in itself for its builders, and due to the greater plasticity of the architecture of these buildings, dolmens of the most unusual shape begin to appear.
  Even round in plan, although it should be noted that compound dolmens are relatively rare. There are several reasons for this. Firstly, due to their design features, they are less durable and less resistant to the elements and human barbarism. Secondly, due to the greater complexity of the technology, they were built less.

  3. No less interest was aroused by the so-called. “Trough” dolmens are the third type of dolmens identified by V.I. Markovin. In the very name of their clue, their features.
  A dolmen chamber was carved into a large stone block, and the outer part of the stone was bounded. A hole was punched in the front plate. Then a cover was mounted on the resulting "trough". These dolmens are also rare due to the more complex construction technology.

  4. Monolithic dolmens, which are much smaller than all the others, are even less common for “trough” and “composite” ones. The name itself speaks of their structure - they are hollowed out in a large block. At the same time, a "portal" is necessarily imitated, which speaks of their later origin than tiled dolmens. They are extremely rare.

  5. And finally, the fifth group includes “false portal” dolmens. Their name comes from a strange design feature. If in all dolmens with a portal the hole is located on the vertical axis of symmetry, then in the "pseudo-portal" dolmens the hole is either absent altogether, or is located in the rear or side slabs. What explains this feature of their construction, scientists have not yet undertaken to answer reliably. There are also very few of these dolmens, one might say very few. The closest to Anapa is located in the valley of the river. Janet.

  The finds of the primary objects put in the dolmens by their builders help archaeologists to answer some historical questions regarding the carriers of this material culture. For example, the fact that, despite the later period of the existence of the dolmen culture. Pottery and metallurgical production was at a level lower than that of the bearers of the "Maikop" culture. Also, archaeologists have not been able to find the remains of the settlements of the builders of dolmens, which is still unclear. Apparently, this bygone civilization embodied all its achievements in these grandiose structures, paying less attention to the everyday side of life. To this day, dolmens, their history, despite the enormous interest in them from both science and ordinary people, remain the greatest mystery of mankind.