The stone alignments want a concrete file. Engaged for years in a quest for recognition by Unesco, the alignments of Carnac (Morbihan) continue to hope to integrate in a few years the closed circle of the world heritage of the United Nations Organization. Their file is entering a “final sprint” announced the mayor of Carnac Olivier Lepick. The realization of this request could end in 2025 or 2026, according to the elected official, who is also president of the association Landscapes of Megaliths carrying the registration project.
The Unesco study area extends over 27 municipalities and has 540 sites, from the Ria d’Etel to the Rhuys peninsula, according to a press release. The 27 mayors of the perimeter met Friday morning in Vannes for the “symbolic kick-off” of the management plan. Over the next 18 months, the project will be presented in the municipalities of the four areas in the framework of public meetings and workshops.
“It is the first example of monumental architecture of Humanity”
The UNESCO World Heritage listing file had been initiated “at the end of the 1980s” then had “stayed in limbo for years” before being relaunched in 2012 with the creation of the association Paysages de Megaliths, according to the mayor. The association has set up an international scientific council to support it in drafting the application file, chaired by paleoanthropologist Yves Coppens. “The scientific quality of the dossier is indisputable. It is the first example of monumental architecture of Humanity, ”assures the mayor of the town.
Inscribed on the indicative list of Unesco since 1996 with a view to a candidacy for world heritage, the alignments of Carnac are one of the high places of megalithism in the world, with some 3,000 menhirs stretching over nearly four kilometers, old 6,000 years old.