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Süderbrarup - Kummerhy

Round Barrow(s)

Fieldnotes

taken from the on-site Historischer Kultur- und Natur-Wanderlehrpfad information board:
Burial mound Kummerhy

Burial mounds have shaped the landscape of northern Germany for thousands of years. Most of them are visible from afar on natural hills, some groups of burial mounds also follow the course of old path systems.

This burial mound called "Kummerhy" (Kummer = chamber, burial chamber; hy = hill) from the Younger Bronze Age (1100-730 / 720 BC) is situated west of the Thorsberger Moor. It is the last remaining burial mound of a dismantled group of three mounds and was examined as early as 1861 by the excavator of the Thorsberg bog finds, Conrad Engelhardt, and then covered. In 1927 the Süderbrarup Bürgerverein (citizens' association) excavated it again.

Originally the "Kummerhy" had a diameter of around 15 m, a height of 3 m and had two stone circles of around 6 m and 12-15 m in diameter. In the center was a very small stone cist made of two stone slabs (approx. 50 x 60 cm, ground and ceiling) and 14 small stones that formed the wall. Cremated bones and a bronze needle lay inside.

Outside the stone circle was a so-called "guardian stone", the side of which, provided with approx. 45 cup marks, faced the hill. In the inner stone circle was another dead man, his head laid on a stone in the border. This apparently included two stone steles (high, free-standing pillars). Today it is assumed that a subsequent burial took place here in the existing burial mound during the Viking Age. Two Viking Age corpses that came to light just a few meters west of the hill also fit in with this. The entire complex with the cup marks stone obtained the new larger stone circle after the two steles were set.

Conrad Engelhardt also reported on four urns that were in the mantle of the hill. Especially in the Younger Bronze Age people used existing mounds as burial places for the burned dead and buried in urns.

The current state of the reconstructed mound shows, all in all, its original appearance, only the stone with its cup mark front has been turned a little more to the east, towards the Thorsberger Moor.
Nucleus Posted by Nucleus
29th August 2020ce
Edited 29th August 2020ce

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