Page:Rude Stone Monuments.djvu/415

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Chap. IX.
PORTUGAL.
389

image of San Miguel turned the sacred stones of the pagans into a temple of the true God. It is difficult to say when Christianity penetrated into the Asturias—not, probably, before the time of Pelayo (A.D. 720); but even this would be too early for such churches as those of Cangas de Onis and Arrichinaga. They, in fact, seem to carry down the veneration for big stones to almost as late a date as the age indicated by the dolmen at Confolens (woodcut No. 123), and bring the probable erection of some of them at least, if not of all, within the historic era.

Portugal.


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162.
Dolmen at Arroyolos. From Kinsey.

Only one drawing of a dolmen in Portugal has as yet, so far as I know, been published. It is situated on a bleak heath-land at Arroyolos, not far from Evora. Mr. Borrow describes it as one of the most perfect and beautiful of its kind he had ever seen. "It was circular, and consisted of stones immensely large and heavy at the bottom, which towards the top became thinner, having been fashioned by the haul of art to something like the shape of scallop-shells. These were surmounted by a very large flat stone,