The two giants' graves near Rolde

The two hunebeds in Rolde stand on the edge of the village. You will find them behind the church close to the cemetery. On old maps they are marked with the names ‘Reuzenstien’ (giant stone) and ‘Steenbergh’ (stone mountain). Countless children visited these stones on their school trips.

The hunebed twins behind the Rolder church

The ‘hunebed twins’ of Rolde are among the best known of all Drenthe hunebeds. They were probably written about as early as 1547. The Belgian canon Antonius Schonhovius was of the opinion that the piled-up stones nearby the church in Rolde were the remains of the Pillars of Hercules. He noted down, among other things, the following:

‘The separate stones, which form a large pile, are actually so large that no wagon or ship could have brought them here. Moreover, there are no stone quarries because the ground there is boggy, so the possibility exists that they were brought here by demons, which were worshipped there under the name of Hercules.’