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Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The Menez-ar-Plour Calvary is a composite monument, combining a prismatic granite base (called lech) probably dating from Protohistory. This type of erect stone, typical of Celtic cultures, was initially used as a funerary or territorial marker. The faceted shape and lack of decor suggest an ancient origin, prior to the Romanization of the Armoric.

The christianization of the site later occurred, probably around the ninth century (high Middle Ages), by the addition of a monolithic cross at the top of the stele. This practice of symbolic re-appropriation of pagan stones was common in Brittany, where the Church sought to anchor its presence in already sacralized places. No trace of sculpted decoration remains, which distinguishes this ordeal from later (XVth–XVIth centuries) works often adorned with biblical scenes.

Ranked a Historical Monument in 1933, Calvary illustrates the superposition of the Breton cultural layers: a protohistoric substrate on which a medieval Christian symbolism is grafted. Its location in Plounévez-Lochrist, in Finistère, is part of a landscape dense in ancient megaliths and crosses, testimony to the ritual continuity of these territories since the Iron Age.

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