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Nekropole Daudieck: Latest Posts

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Daudieck 5 (Round Barrow(s)) — Fieldnotes

taken from the information board of station 5:

Central burials in burial mounds

During the centuries from about 1500 to 1200 BC the dead were often laid in halved, hollowed out tree trunks, covered with wooden planks, and then a large mound was heaped up. The tree-coffins lay on field stone paving. Wedge stones came in the gusset between stones and trunk, so that it lay stable. On the soil freed from the topsoil, this arrangement gave an excellent rest. Why in later times cremation was the usual kind of burial is one of the interesting questions in our cultural history. Archaeological excavations have revealed, among other things, that during the earliest incinerations stone pavement and halved tree trunk were maintained. So there was an urn with the burnt ash in the coffin. The next step was to put the urn directly on a pavement, until one later renounced even the stone setting.
Nucleus Posted by Nucleus
13th July 2019ce

Daudieck 2 (Round Barrow(s)) — Fieldnotes

taken from the information panel of station 2:

Burial mounds

Burial mounds, which were built between about 1600 and 1200 BC, with diameters of 15 m to 20 m at a height over 3 m are not a rarity. Only a fraction of the original site are preserved. Most of them are not complete anymore. As with this mound almost always missing is the enclosure of large field stones or organic building material such as wooden posts or wicker, which can still be traced at the mound foot. Already during the Bronze Age around 1500 BC when the construction of burial mounds was custom, there must have been large heathland, because many mounds have been piled up with heath sods. Because heather, however, only occurs in a cultural landscape, we can conclude that humans have used large areas of land and brownfields already 3400 years ago.
Nucleus Posted by Nucleus
13th July 2019ce

Daudieck 9 (Round Barrow(s)) — Fieldnotes

taken from the information board of station 9:

Grave robbers

Plundering of the burial mounds was early on. Objects such as daggers, swords, arm and leg jewelry could have been reused after the robbery. However, no objects from the burial mound time in later centuries are archaeologically documented. Rather, the bronzes was melted again to re-produce the currently used things. Bronze as a raw material had to be always imported in this area, which is why it had a high value. Other grave robbers also used the mounds to extract raw materials: sand and stones are still mined and otherwise reused. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, there was an antiquarian interest in teachers and pastors who dug into the mound from above to retrieve the grave goods of the central burial. "Old pots", when found, usually were left broken in the overburden.
Nucleus Posted by Nucleus
13th July 2019ce

Steinkiste Horneburg (Cist) — Fieldnotes

taken from the information board of station 7:

Stone cist in the burial mound

Burial mounds with stone "cists" for the central tomb were rarer than tree-coffins. This type of funerals were probably at the beginning of the burial mound time the prefered manner. The principle is to build a stable, maybe permanent protection for the burial. 1000 years later, from 600 BC, urns were also places in stone boxes. The stone cist of this mound holds a special feature: located on the capstone are cup marks (bowls). Cup-marked stones can also be found at other places, but usually not as part of a tomb, but in its own function. Unfortunately, a convincing reason why there are cups drilled or pecked into the hard boulders are not found yet. Most assumptions refer to cultic actions.
Nucleus Posted by Nucleus
13th July 2019ce

Steinkiste Horneburg (Cist) — Images (click to view fullsize)

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13th July 2019ce
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