France has been occupied for a long time, and megalithic structures and monuments were built by those occupants starting back in the Neolithic (late Stone Age) and Chalcolithic (or Copper Age), over the period 4800-1200 BC.
Megalithic structures take a variety of forms. The dolmen is a common one — a large flat capstone forming a roof over an enclosed space. The capstone may be supported by large orthostats, upright stone pillars or panels.
Menhirs, or standing stone pillars, are also common.
Map of the development of megalithic architecture in Stone Age Europe, details at Wikipedia.
Saumur is a small city in the lower Loire River valley, between Tours and Nantes.
Megalithic structures were built here around 3000-1200 BC.
One very dramatic one is the large dolmen of Bagneux, formerly a village but now an outlying district of Saumur.
It's some 23 meters long, built from large slabs of the local sandstone.
It's built from 15 huge monolithic slabs, weighing a total of 500 tons or more.
The vertical stone seen here in the interior is not a support unit, it is the remains of an interior partition wall. The large capstones span across the orthostats forming the side walls.
The largest of the four capstones is 7.6 meters long and weighs 86 tons.
Dolmen dimensions:
17.3m long
5.4m wide
3.1m high
There are so many monuments mégalithiques in France that Michelin has a symbol for them on their excellent maps. The symbol looks like a tiny dolmen.
There are three megaliths immediately around Gennes, a small town about 15 kilometers down the Loire, west from Saumur.
The first is a relatively large dolmen along the west side of the D 69 road just south of Gennes.
The second is a smaller dolmen about 400 meters north of a small lane leading to the settlement of Bouchet.
The third is a menhir or free-standing stone pillar along the D 751 road northwest of Gennes heading to Coutures and on toward Angers.
Here's the first of those, the dolmen along the D 69.
It's about 12 meters long and 5 meters wide.
As you head south out of Gennes, the road climbs a hill.
The dolmen is very obvious off to your left as you reach the top of a hill out the south side of Gennes.
This gets called the La Madeleine Dolmen.
GPS:
47.331 N
00.234 W
The dolmen was used in the mid to late 1800s as a bakery.
The 19th century bread oven is still there.
History of an entirely different scale!
The second dolmen is about 400 meters north of a small lane. The lane leads through a farming area between Gennes and the small settlement of Bouchet.
There is a sort of track back toward the dolmen between to crop fields, but it quickly gets muddy and quite soft.
Park along the road and walk in!
GPS:
47.3134 N
00.2796 W
I've seen this referred to as the Avort Dolmen, although Avort is a small settlement significantly to the southwest along the D 70 road, while this is off a small lane well off to the side of the D 70.
The third megalith is a menhir or free-standing stone pillar along the D 751. It's just outside the northwest side of Gennes, across from a cement plant.
I've seen this called the Menhir du Bois Gilbert. Presumably that's the Bois Gilbert to its south.
This is the north side of the menhir, facing the road.
The menhir is almost 4 meters tall.
A view to the west, parallel to the road.
GPS:
47.3449 N
00.2483 W
Looking east, parallel to the road.
The south side of the menhir, the side away from the road.
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