Hallstatt culture

Archeological map of distribution of the Celtic Hallstatt culture ca. 800–400 BCE.

A drawing by Johann G. Ramsauer (1795-1874) documenting one of his cemetery digs at Hallstatt.

Bronze Hallstatt culture tool, likely a spear head.

Hallstatt Amber Choker necklace.

19th century illustration of Hallstatt swords.

The Hallstatt culture was the predominant Central European culture during the local Bronze Age and preceeded the Iron Age throughout most of Northern and North-eastern Europe. Depending on the interpreter, the culture is linked to the Celts or to their predecessors. It is named for its type site, Hallstatt a lakeside village in the Austrian Salzkammergut southeast of Salzburg.

An eastern Hallstatt cultural zone including Croatia, Slovenia, western Hungary, Austria, Moravia region of the Czech Republic, and Slovakia can be distinguished from a western cultural zone which includes northern Italy, Switzerland, eastern France, southern Germany, and the Bohemia region of the Czech Republic.

The succeeding culture in much of Central Europe is the La Tène culture.

Hallstatt site

In 1846, Johann Georg Ramsauer discovered a large prehistoric cemetery near Halstatt, which he excavated during the second half of the nineteenth century. Eventually the excavation would yield 1,045 burials.

The community at Hallstatt exploited the salt mines in the area, which had been worked from time to time since the Neolithic period, from the eighth century to fifth century BCE. The style and decoration of the grave goods found in the cemetery are very distinctive, and artifacts made in this style are widespread in Europe.

Hallstatt culture

The Hallstatt culture, extending from about 1200 BCE until around 500 BCE, is divided by archaeologists into four phases: Hallstatt A and B correspond to the late Bronze Age (c. 1200–800 BCE), while Hallstatt C refers to the very early Iron Age (c. 800–600 BCE) and is characterized by the first appearance of iron swords mixed amongst the bronze ones. For the final phase, Hallstatt D, only daggers are found in graves ranging from c. 600–500 BCE. There are also differences in the pottery and brooches.

In the eastern Hallstatt cultural zone, a settlement at the Burgstallkogel in the central Sulm valley (southern Styria, west of Leibnitz, Austria) was a major center during the Hallstatt C period. Parts of the huge necropolis (which originally consisted of more than 1,100 grave hills) surrounding this settlement can be seen today near Gleinstätten. From this eastern zone a western Hallstatt zone can be distinguished which includes northern Italy, Switzerland, eastern France, southern Germany, and Bohemia.

Trade and population movements (very probably both) spread the Hallstatt cultural complex into the western half of the Iberian peninsula, Great Britain, and Ireland. It is probable that some if not all of this diffusion took place in a Celtic-speaking context.

Trade with Greece is attested by finds of Attic black-figure pottery in the élite graves of the late Hallstatt period. It was probably imported via Massilia (Marseille). Other imported luxuries include amber, ivory (Gräfenbühl) and probably wine. Recent analyses have shown that the reputed silk in the barrow at Hohmichele was misidentified. Red dye (cochineal) was imported from the south as well (Hochdorf burial).

In the central Hallstatt regions toward the end of the period, very rich graves of high-status individuals under large tumuli are found near the remains of fortified hilltop settlements. They often contain chariots and horse bits or yokes. Well known chariot burials include Býčí Skála, Vix and Hochdorf. A model of a chariot made from lead has been found in Frögg, Carinthia.

The defended sites frequently include the workshops of bronze-, silver-, and goldsmiths. Typical sites are the Heuneburg on the upper Danube surrounded by nine very large grave tumuli, Mont Lassois in eastern France near Châtillon-sur-Seine with, at its foot, the very rich grave at Vix, and the hill fort at Molpir in the Slovakia.

The arts include elaborate jewellery made of bronze and gold, and stone stelae, like the famous warrior of Hirschlanden.

The material culture of Western Halstatt culture was apparently sufficient to provide a stable social and economic equilibrium. The founding of Marseille and the penetration by Greek and Etruscan culture after ca 600 BCE, especially in trade relationships up the Rhone valley to kep Hallstatt settlements resulted in social and cultural transformations north of the Alps, with the emergence of powerful chiefdoms, which controlled the redistribution of elite goods from the Mediterranean world that is characteristivc of La Tène culture.

Bibliography

• Barth, F.E., J. Biel, et al. Vierrädrige Wagen der Hallstattzeit ("The Hallstatt four-wheeled wagons" at Mainz). Mainz: Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum; 1987. ISBN 3-88467-016-6
• Bichler, P. (ed.) Hallstatt textiles: technical analysis, scientific investigation and experiment on Iron Age textiles. Oxford: Archaeopress; 2005. ISBN 1-84171-697-9
• Eibner, A. Music during the Hallstatt period. Observations on Music as depicted on Iron Age circumalpine vessels. Paris: Maison des sciences de l'homme; 1996. ISBN 2-7351-0577-6
• Potrebica, H. "Some Remarks on the Contacts Between the Greek and the Hallstatt Culture Considering the Area of Northern Croatia in the Early Iron Age." Oxford: Archaeopress; 1998. ISBN 0-86054-894-5
• Pydyn, A. Exchange and cultural interactions: a study of long-distance trade and cross-cultural contacts in the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age in Central and Eastern Europe. Oxford: Archaeopress; 1999. ISBN 1-84171-026-1
• Rom, W. "AMS 14C Dating of Equipment from the Iceman and of Spruce Logs from the Prehistoric Salt Mines of Hallstatt," from Radiocarbon 41, #2; 1999: 183 (16 pp.) ISSN 0033-8222