Lalonquette Gallo-Roman Museum, Lalonquette, France

Located in Northern Bearn in the Atlantic-Pyrenees, the gallo-roman museum of Lalonquette traced the history of a rural gallo-roman house build during the first century and which developed until the fifth century of our era. Supported by an elaborated museography depicting the restored mosaics and thanks to a playful approach illustrated by showcases of the collections, the museum offers to discover the specificities of the villa through several themes (day to day life, aristocratie, agriculture, architecture, etc.).

References:

musee-claracq.com

User Reviews

Xavier GABAS (10 months ago)
Perfect for young and old. The guide is captivating. The “excavation” workshop is great for kids.

Hervé Vauxel (12 months ago)
This archaeological site is of no interest. All that remains of the Gallo-Roman villa are rows of pebbles which materialize the imprint of the walls on the ground. All the remains of the site have been moved to the museum located a few kilometers away. So that there is no longer any link between the historic site and the remains discovered during the excavations, which makes the site lose all its interest.

Cedric Danos (13 months ago)
We didn't really know what this little museum would be. Surprise, the building is brand new. Second surprise the really cheap price. Third surprise, we are going to have a guide, an art history student. Top museography, nice and clear explanations. Never off-putting. The whole family, children (11 and 13), parents and grandparents, we all had a blast. Thank you. Then we tried to walk to the villa. There is progress to be made on the legibility of the path and the signs sometimes placed apart. In short, we reached the villa by car and here too it is great. Congratulations to this great achievement.

Manuela G (14 months ago)
Beautiful museum, interesting guided tour, very friendly staff, the only regret of the children: no archaeological workshop included in the guided tour. We will return with great joy to participate in the various workshops.

caro delamarche (2 years ago)
Great museum, the 2 guides we met today were adorable and a big thank you to the charming young lady who was able to adapt her speech to a very young audience

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Broch of Gurness

The Broch of Gurness is an Iron Age broch village. Settlement here began sometime between 500 and 200 BC. At the centre of the settlement is a stone tower or broch, which once probably reached a height of around 10 metres. Its interior is divided into sections by upright slabs. The tower features two skins of drystone walls, with stone-floored galleries in between. These are accessed by steps. Stone ledges suggest that there was once an upper storey with a timber floor. The roof would have been thatched, surrounded by a wall walk linked by stairs to the ground floor. The broch features two hearths and a subterranean stone cistern with steps leading down into it. It is thought to have some religious significance, relating to an Iron Age cult of the underground.

The remains of the central tower are up to 3.6 metres high, and the stone walls are up to 4.1 metres thick. The tower was likely inhabited by the principal family or clan of the area but also served as a last resort for the village in case of an attack.

The broch continued to be inhabited while it began to collapse and the original structures were altered. The cistern was filled in and the interior was repartitioned. The ruin visible today reflects this secondary phase of the broch's use.

The site is surrounded by three ditches cut out of the rock with stone ramparts, encircling an area of around 45 metres diameter. The remains of numerous small stone dwellings with small yards and sheds can be found between the inner ditch and the tower. These were built after the tower, but were a part of the settlement's initial conception. A 'main street' connects the outer entrance to the broch. The settlement is the best-preserved of all broch villages.

Pieces of a Roman amphora dating to before 60 AD were found here, lending weight to the record that a 'King of Orkney' submitted to Emperor Claudius at Colchester in 43 AD.

At some point after 100 AD the broch was abandoned and the ditches filled in. It is thought that settlement at the broch continued into the 5th century AD, the period known as Pictish times. By that time the broch was not used anymore and some of its stones were reused to build smaller dwellings on top of the earlier buildings. Until about the 8th century, the site was just a single farmstead.

In the 9th century, a Norse woman was buried at the site in a stone-lined grave with two bronze brooches and a sickle and knife made from iron. Other finds suggest that Norse men were buried here too.

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