Arbon culture
The Arbon culture is an archaeological culture of the early Bronze Age between 1800 and 1600 BC. BC, which was widespread around Lake Constance and neighboring regions of northern Switzerland , Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria . It is characterized by characteristic ceramics with zones covered with geometric patterns using scratching and engraving techniques. The name Arbon-Kultur was coined in 1987 by the Freiburg prehistorian Christian Strahm , while in 1992 his colleague Joachim Köninger spoke of the Arbon Group . It is also known as the Arbon culture . The eponymous site is the stratigraphic Horizont II of Arbon-Bleiche in Arbon, Switzerland .
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Dissemination and contacts
The Arbon-culture lakeside settlements on the shores of Lake Constance, on other lakes and hilly areas of northern Switzerland, on river terraces , on slopes and heights on the Danube and Neckar as well as on the northern edge of the Swabian Alb in Baden-Wuerttemberg and Bavaria hilltop settlements in the Associated with rivers Isar and Lech . To the east, the similar Straubing group followed. Both established settlements on trade routes, and since the Straubinger culture reached as far as the copper deposits in the northern Alps , the area of distribution and the distribution of the settlements are associated with the bronze trade. The two southern German cultures differ in their ceramic styles. The two cultural areas overlapped in the Munich area , in particular excavations on the Freising Domberg resulted in both ceramic finds in the A2 / B1 horizon that are assigned to the southwest German and Swiss Arbon tradition, as well as those of the southeast Bavarian Straubing styles.
There were trade contacts with the simultaneous Aunjetitz culture in Central Germany, Lower Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The Forschner settlement on Federsee in Baden-Württemberg itself has ceramic finds of the Aunjetitz culture type in the settlement area, but Arbon shards were also found on the lakeshore. The same applies to a hilltop settlement on the Veitsberg near Ravensburg .
Settlements and way of life
Individual settlements were protected by strong palisades made of oak planks ( Egg-Obere Güll on the island of Mainau , district of Konstanz and on Baldeggersee , canton of Lucerne ), others were open or had only small fences. The hillside settlement on the Sporn Waldi near Toos , Canton Thurgau, was protected by a stone wall over the only entrance.
The settlement in Bodman-Schachen , district of Constance , is particularly well preserved and examined . At the beginning of the Bronze Age it consisted of five to nine houses with a floor area of between 25 and 30 m², a hundred years later construction technology had advanced and the houses were built around rows of posts with three aisles and with areas of 42 m². On the banks of the lake, the houses were built on piles , and stone foundations were used at high altitudes. The walls were made of wickerwork around vertical poles and plastered with clay. Fireplaces were surrounded by stone slabs sealed with clay.
Grain residues could prove the cultivation of emmer , einkorn , barley and spelled , as well as the collection of wild food plants such as blackberry , hazelnut , sloe , wild apple and wild strawberry . Flax and poppy seeds provided oil seeds. Pigs and cattle were kept as pets, and there have been few finds of sheep or goats . Almost 50% of all bones found come from game , which suggests that hunting covered a large part of the meat supply.
Only needles made of bronze have survived from people's clothing ; large finds of elderberries, which far exceed the quantities that can be tolerated as food, point to textile dyeing.
As for tools, stone axes , whetstones , stone hammers, grinding stones, as well as awls and spatulas made from bone were known. Bronze was rare. Metal tools include awls, chisels, and axes . Other rarer finds include a single scraper made from a boar's tusk . Four bronze axes of various types, twelve daggers , two lance heads and four arrow heads were found in the eponymous site of Arbon-Bleiche II .
The burial form of the Arbon culture is unknown. There are no finds so far. It is therefore assumed that the dead were either buried in an archaeologically undetectable form or that places were chosen for burials that were basically covered by layers of earth several meters thick due to landslides or other events.
Cult objects
So-called loaf of bread idols were found in Bodman-Schachen , lightly fired or air-dried clay objects a few centimeters long and around two centimeters wide that were covered with patterns. Its purpose is unknown. Objects of this type are also known from parts of southern Germany, northern Italy, Austria, Romania, Serbia, Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary and prove a cultural exchange. The use as a pintadera has recently been considered.
literature
- Joachim Köninger: La Stratigraphie de Bodman-Schachen I dans le contexte Bronze ancien du sud de l'Allemagne. In: Claude Mordant, Olivier Gaiffe (ed.): Cultures et Sociétés du Bronze Ancien en Europe. (Section de pré- et protohistoire. Actes du Colloque Fondements Culturels, Techniques, Economiques et Sociaux des Débuts de l'Age du Bronze. 117e Congrès National des Sociétés Historiques et Scientifiques Clermont-Ferrand, October 27-29, 1992). Éditions du CTHS, Paris 1996, ISBN 2-7355-0330-5 , pp. 239-250.
- Ernst Probst : Germany in the Bronze Age. Farmers, bronze casters and lords of the castle between the North Sea and the Alps. Approved special edition. Orbis-Verlag, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-572-01059-4 , pp. 66 ff., 151 ff. (Partly online, with further references), reading sample .
- Christian Strahm: Le Bronze ancien dans le Sud-Ouest de l'Allemagne. In: Claude Mordant, Olivier Gaiffe (ed.): Cultures et Sociétés du Bronze Ancien en Europe. (Section de pré- et protohistoire. Actes du Colloque Fondements Culturels, Techniques, Economiques et Sociaux des Débuts de l'Age du Bronze. 117e Congrès National des Sociétés Historiques et Scientifiques Clermont-Ferrand, October 27-29, 1992). Éditions du CTHS, Paris 1996, ISBN 2-7355-0330-5 , pp. 251-268.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Stephan Möslein: The Straubing Group of the Danube Country Early Bronze Age In: Annual Report Bayerischer Bodendenkmalpflege Vol. 38 (1997), pp. 37-106 [57]
- ↑ Mark Bankus: The Freising Cathedral Hill and its surroundings. Freisinger Archäologische Forschungen 1, Rahden / Westfalen 2004, pages 108–151.
- ↑ Joachim Köninger: The Early Bronze Age Bank Settlements of Bodman-Schachen I. Findings and finds from the Tauchsondagen 1982 - 1984 and 1986 (= settlement archeology in the Alpine foothills. Vol. 8 = research and reports on prehistory and early history in Baden-Württemberg. Vol. 85 ). Theiss, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-8062-1738-6 .
- ↑ Monica Şandor-Chicideanu: New bread loafs from clay from the basin of the lower Danube . In: European Archeology - online. (Accessed November 27, 2013).