Folkl­o­re says the Blood­sto­ne was a sacri­fi­ci­al altar whe­re gro­oves would drain blood away. Read about the myste­rious rock, and the past asso­ci­a­ted with it, here

GPS: 55.5398522, 11.3508128

Par­king: The­re are no real par­king options clo­se by, but the road lea­ding up to the field (Vest­mar­ken) is not very heavily traf­fi­ca­ted, so it is pos­sib­le to pull asi­de and not be too much of a bot­her to other dri­vers

Good To Know: If pos­sib­le, ask the inha­bi­tants of the near­by farm if you may cross their field, espe­ci­al­ly when the­re are cro­ps growing

Near­by Attra­ctions: The Sna­re Hill Dol­men, The Cross At Con­ra­di­ne­s­lyst

The Blood­sto­ne is a 5 x 5,2 x 1,5 meter lar­ge, flat gla­ci­al erra­tic rock, pos­sibly an over­lay from a hid­den dol­men. It is loca­ted in the mid­dle of a pri­va­te field near The Sna­re Hill Dol­men, clo­se to an old Bron­ze Age sett­le­ment. On the top of the sto­ne are over 50 cup­marks dat­ing to the Bron­ze Age, engravings that arche­o­lo­gi­sts in the past have typi­cal­ly con­nected with fer­ti­li­ty and fema­le aspects. The Blood­sto­ne also has some lar­ge and very distin­ct gro­oves run­ning from the sur­face down its sides. The sto­ne is all in all one of the most remar­kab­le of Den­mark’s giant rocks.

The Blood­sto­ne is cal­led such becau­se of the long attri­bu­tion that locals have made to it, as being a sacri­fi­ci­al sto­ne. The idea is that it was once used for sacri­fi­cing ani­mals (and per­haps humans?) with the cup­marks and gro­oves having the pur­po­se of col­lecting and lea­ding away the blood of victims in the ritu­als. It must be noted that this is all based on imag­i­na­tion, but it is not hard to see why the notion exists, espe­ci­al­ly when taking the bro­a­der history of the area into con­si­de­ra­tion.

Sour­ces

  • Jør­gen Mogen­sen – Langs Lan­de­vej 255 (Vol. 11)
  • Mads Lide­gaard – Dan­ske Sten Fra Sagn og Tro