Gallery grave - Definition and Overview

A Gallery grave, also known as an Allée couverte tomb is a form of Megalithic chamber tomb where there is no divide between the burial chamber itself and the entrance passage. Two parallel walls of stone slabs were erected to form a corridor and covered with a line of capstones. The rectangular tomb was covered with a barrow or a cairn. Most were built during the fourth millennium BC, though some were still being built in the Bronze Age.

They are distributed across Europe and they are usually sub-divided by period, region and also into more generic types of chambered long barrows, chambered round barrows, chambered long cairns and chambered round cairns. Examples are known in Catalonia, France, the Low Countries, Germany, The British Isles, Scandinavia, Sardinia and southern Italy.

Sub-types include:

• Court Cairns
• Giants' graves
• Navetas
• the Peak District tomb group
• Severn-Cotswold or Cotswold-Severn tombs
• Seine-Oise-Marne culture allées couvertes
• Transepted gallery graves
• Wedge-shaped gallery graves

Example Usage of Gallery