20 
Chapter - 3 Prehistoric Minorca
21
Taulas
Taulas (literally 'tables'), enigmatic
symbols of a forgotten religion and unique to the island, occupy a central
and important position in the prehistoric settlements. There are no taulas
in Majorca, or anywhere else, so they could be called Minorca's trademark.
They are the oldest megaliths on
the island, with the exception of the navetas, and out of a total of thirty
taulas there are only seven still complete.
Each consists of a vertical monolith
as high as 4.20m and 2.75m wide, with a horizontal capstone of massive
proportions placed on top and widely overlapping its upper end. The front
surface of the vertical stone and the upper surface of the horizontal one
have been smoothly dressed with tools, while their opposite sides are rough
and untouched virgin rock. The edges of the capstone are carefully squared
and bevelled inwards, so that both stones together seem to make an extremely
high table, with a central pedestal leg. The mason's greater attention
to the capstone suggests a religious importance. The vertical monolith
is maintained erect by being sunk in a groove in the bedrock of the site
chosen, and the delicate balance of the capstone is sometimes aided by
a shallow chiselled mortice on its under surface.
A taula is usually surrounded by
a horseshoe-shaped circulo of massive stones, with remains of a lintelled
opening, usually towards the south. This gives the impression of a sanctuary,
thought to have been built some time after the taulas themselves. Good
examples of these sanctuaries can be seen at the prehistoric town known
as Torre d'en Gaumes (near Alayor), and at the taula and ancient village
of Torralba d'en Salort (on the road between Cala'n Porter and Alayor).
The largest taula is Trepuco on the outskirts of Mahon (approached by the
street named Cos de Gracia), and has the dimensions already quoted. The
engineering problem posed in raising and balancing these great masses of
stone in primitive times was a secret we can only guess about..
Near Torralba d'en Salort, an opportunity
should be taken to visit at the adjoining farm the ancient great stepped
well of Na Patarra, dating from about 700 BC. The mouth of this well measures
7.50m by 5m; its 199 steps are in nine flights, together with a stone handrail,
all hewn out of the rock.
It resembles ancient Palestinian
wells, and was probably used by the actual builders of the taula on the
site.
Talati de Dalt is another Bronze
Age village (just off the Mahon-Alayor main road) with a taula, talayots
and hypostyle courts.
This taula is unusual in having
an extra , oblique support.
The absence of metal tool markings
on the taula of Trepuco, Talati, Son Gatlar and one at Torre Llafuda suggest
that they are the oldest-probably Neolithic.
By contrast the taula at Sa Torreta,
near Es Grau and one of the few situated on the north coast, was built
about 1,000 years later. This indicates the extent of time during which
megalithic building took place.
The question of whether taulas had
a functional or religious purpose has been hotly disputed by amateur and
professional archaeologists for two hundred years. John Armstrong's book
A
History of the Island of Minorca contains an engraving of a taula,
which he refers to as a 'heathen monument'; he was convinced they were
used for human sacrifices. This is no longer believed. Nor is much credence
given to the theory that the taula was a centre post for a roof made of
wood and reeds. A theory propounded by Waldemar Fenn in 1950 suggesting
that they were some kind of astronomy computer has also failed to find
many adherents.
It is now widely believed that they
had a profound religious meaning, and the Spanish archaeologist J. Mascaro
Pasarius suggested in 1967 that the taula was a stylised representation
of a god-bull in which the horizontal capstone portrays the wide horns.
Analogies are made with the bull cult in Minos in Crete. This theory has
much to support it. Worship of the bull as the essence of strength and
fertility was common at this period throughout the Eastern Mediterranean.
The driving force which impelled
Minorcans - so small in numbers - to the gargantuan task of raising the
taulas could only have been a religious one, based on instincts for survival
and continuance of their race, strong in primitive man. These instincts
in Minorcans were frequently challenged by famine from failure of crops,
and by death from disease, so that we would expect them to take part in
the then current rites associated with the fertility of soil and man.
There is evidence of this
in the phallic symbols found on amulets in the vicinity of taulas, and
the remains of small horned animals (sheep and goats) commonly used in
sacrifices in Malta and Minoan Crete.
A second, and equally powerful, motivation
was the Minorcans' belief in an after-life, as suggested by their navetas
(communal graves). Sceptics may mock at their hopes of immortality, but
at least the work of their hands endures, apparently for all time. Too
much stress should not be placed, however, on the cyclopean stones, which
were but a fashion in building. In later ages the architects and craftsmen
who raised Europe's medieval cathedrals were expressing a similar if more
spiritually mature urge to build for the future, which is apparently inherent
in man.
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