Gold hat
As gold hats headgear is called thin gold sheet.
Gold hats of the Schifferstadt type
The four cone-shaped gold hats of the Schifferstadt type found in Europe so far are artefacts from the late Bronze Age , more precisely the Urnfield Age , and are made of thin gold sheet . It served as the outer decoration of a long-shafted headgear with a brim , which was probably made of organic material and mechanically stabilized the thin sheet of gold on the outside. This unique group of finds forms an important document on the religious history of the Bronze Age.
The following four gold hats are known so far:
- Golden hat from Schifferstadt , dated from 1400 to 1300 BC. Chr., Location Schifferstadt, Rhein-Pfalz-Kreis, southern Germany
- Gold hat from Ezelsdorf / Buch , dated from 1000 to 900 BC BC, location Ezelsdorf-Buch, Middle Franconia / Upper Palatinate, southern Germany
- Avanton's gold cones , dated around 1000 BC. BC, site near Poitiers, western France
- Berlin gold hat , dated from 1000 to 800 BC BC, presumed to be found in southern Germany or Switzerland
Cultural context and dating
The conical gold hats of the Schifferstadt type were found in southern Germany ( Berlin gold hat , Golden hat from Schifferstadt , gold hat from Ezelsdorf / Buch ) and France ( gold sheet cone from Avanton ) in a more or less good state of preservation in the 19th and 20th centuries . They can be seen in the cultural context with a number of similar, dome-shaped sheet gold crowns that have been found in southwest Ireland ( Comerford Crown ) and on the Spanish Atlantic coast ( gold bowls from Axtroki , gold helmet from Leiro ), of which only the Spanish finds have survived. The Berlin gold hat is the best preserved example of the group. The finds date from the late Bronze Age and were made between approx. 1400–1300 BC. BC (Golden Hat from Schifferstadt, Cone d 'Avanton) and 1000–800 BC (Berlin gold hat, gold hat by Ezelsdorf / Buch).
Not only chronologically, but also geographically, the four well-known gold hats can be assigned to the urn field culture, which is the direct forerunner of the Celtic-South Germanic Hallstatt culture. This is also supported by the French site, which was in the area of the pictons, which came from the Hallstatt region. The Indo-Europeanist Wolfram Euler therefore takes the view that those who wore the gold hats would have “certainly spoken an Indo-European idiom, in view of the places where they were found, most likely a pre- or early form of the Celtic ” . The similarity of the hats “presupposes some kind of cultural context” , but the question of whether the wearers share a common religious, cultural or modern ethnic identity has “at least not yet been answered” .
function
Some researchers now assume that the gold hats served as religious insignia of gods or priests of a sun cult that was widespread in Central Europe in the late Bronze Age . This view is underpinned by the pictorial representation of an object interpreted as a cone hat on a stone slab from the grave of Kivik in Skåne, southern Sweden, in a clearly religious and cultic context.
After partial “decoding” of the ornament canon of the conical gold hats, some now ascribe far-reaching calendar properties to the sheet gold cones in addition to a possible representative cultic function.
calendar
The sheet gold cones are ornamented over the entire length with horizontal decorative and frame bands made of similar stamp imprints , whereby the older examples (Avanton, Schifferstadt) have a more modest ornament canon than the younger ones.
According to one of Wilfried Menghin's hypotheses , the conical gold hats of the Schifferstadt type show a systematic sequence in the number and type of ornaments used in the individual ornamental bands . Based on investigations on the completely preserved Berlin gold hat, it was assumed that astronomical calendar functions based on a lunisolar calendar system are mapped on the gold hats . Due to this lunisolar character, a direct reading of time periods in lunar or solar units would be possible.
Since the precise knowledge of the solar year was of particular interest for determining times of cultic significance such as the summer or winter solstice , the astronomical knowledge deposited on the gold hats was of great importance in Bronze Age society .
The functions published in 2005 include the option of counting time periods up to a maximum of 57 months . By simply quadrupling these values, however, it is also possible to display periods of time that are larger in scope, e.g. B. the Metonic cycle possible.
One character or a single circular ring of a symbol represents a day. In addition to ornamental rings with symbols with different numbers of circular rings, special characters and symbols appear in so-called "switching zones" which have to be added or omitted from case to case when calculating the above-mentioned time periods.
In principle, starting with the zone i, using an appropriate, contiguous portion of adjacent n zones ornament Z_i..Z_i + n is a summation performed. If necessary, the number of symbols of one or more switching zones occurring in the area of this section is subtracted from this sum in order to arrive at the corresponding value in solar or lunar time notation.
The illustration on the left shows the solar imaging mode, on the right the reading scheme for the synodic (moon) months. The fields from zones 5, 7, 16 and 17 shown in red or blue represent 'switching zones' of the calendar system, with which time periods of different lengths are shown.
The values assigned to the respective fields are the product of the number of symbols in the respective ornament zone and the number of circles or circular rings occurring in the predominant individual symbol. The special symbols in zone 5 are assigned the numerical value "38" according to their number .
- Examples:
- Zone 12, as the predominant symbol, has a total of 20 type no.14 hallmarks, a circular disc symbol, which is surrounded by 5 circles in the edge area.
- The product of 20 and 5 = 100 results for this zone.
- The smaller ring circles present in the spaces between the main symbols are regarded as ornaments and are not taken into account for the calculation.
The hypothesis of the lunisolar calendar system enables direct reading or conversion into lunar or solar units.
For the representation of the solar or lunar maximum time segment with a yellow background in the tables and counting according to days, the values of the fields with a colored background in the column above must be added to a segment total. If switching zones with a red background appear here, the sum of these values with a red background must be deducted from the section total. This means that time periods with a maximum length of 12, 24, 36, 48, 54 and 57 synodic (lunar) months in the lunar system and 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 and 57 solar months (as the twelfth Part of a tropical year ) in the solar system.
- example
- To represent a 54-month cycle in the lunar system, the numerical values from zones 3 to 21 with a green or blue background are added. The total is 1739 days. The numerical values from zones 5, 16 and 17 with a red background are subtracted from the result. The result of 1739-142 = 1597 days corresponds quite exactly to 54 synodic months of 29.5305 days each.
The difference of 2 days to the astronomically correct value occurring in the calculation results from the Bronze Age observation accuracy of synodic and solar month lengths.
Manufacturing
The gold hats found so far consist of a gold alloy with approx. 85–90% gold , approx. 10% silver and traces of copper and tin (each <1%). They were made from one piece without a seam as a driving work and forged into wafer-thin works with wall thicknesses between 0.25 mm ( Goldener Hut von Schifferstadt ) and 0.06 mm ( Berliner Goldhut ).
Due to the tribological properties of the material, the material solidifies as the degree of deformation increases and then tends to crack . To avoid these cracks, a particularly uniform deformation was required during forging . In addition, the workpiece had to be annealed repeatedly to at least 750 ° C during the manufacturing process .
Due to the low melting temperature of the gold alloy (approx. 960 ° C), a very precise temperature control and isothermal heating of the component was necessary in order to prevent the surface from melting. For this process, the Bronze Age craftsman used a charcoal fire or a kind of pottery kiln , the temperature of which, however, could only be controlled within limits by means of a bellows-assisted supply of oxygen .
If you take into account the tribological characteristics of the material used and the modest technical means, the production of an undecorated component from such thin gold sheet alone represents a tremendous technical achievement.
As part of the further processing, the gold hat was provided with radial ornamental bands. For this purpose, the hollow inner body was filled with a suitable goldsmith's putty based on tree resin and wax , presumably for the purpose of stabilization - remnants of this could be found in the specimen from Schifferstadt - and the thin gold sheet from the outside by repeatedly pressing various negative marks and / or unrolling various roll marks in structured in the present form.
More sheet gold hats
Similar dome-shaped sheet gold crowns are:
- Comerford Crown , Ireland
- Gold bowls from Axtroki , Spain
- Gold helmet from Leiro , Spain
Comerford Crown
Axtroki
Leiro gold helmet
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See also
- Nebra Sky Disc , approx. 2100 to 1700 BC Chr.
literature
- Wolfram Euler , Konrad Badenheuer : Language and origin of the Teutons. Demolition of Proto-Germanic before the first sound shift. Verlag Inspiration Un Ltd., Hamburg et al. 2009, ISBN 978-3-9812110-1-6 .
- Anja Grebe (Red.): Gold and the cult of the Bronze Age. Verlag des Germanisches Nationalmuseums, Nuremberg 2003, ISBN 3-926982-95-0 (exhibition catalog, Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, May 22 to September 7, 2003).
- Wilfried Menghin : The Berlin gold hat and the golden calendars of the old European bronze age. In: Acta Praehistorica et Archaeologica. 32, 2000, ISSN 0341-1184 , pp. 31-108.
- Wilfried Menghin , Peter Schauer: The sheet gold cone from Ezelsdorf. Cult devices of the late Bronze Age (= the prehistoric and early historical antiquities in the Germanic National Museum. H. 3). Theiß, Stuttgart 1983, ISBN 3-8062-0390-3 .
- Peter Schauer: The gold sheet cones of the Bronze Age. A contribution to the cultural connection between the Orient and Central Europe. Habelt, Bonn 1986, ISBN 3-7749-2238-1 .
- Mark Schmidt: Of hats, cones and calendars or the dazzling light of the Orient. In: Ethnographic-Archaeological Journal. 43, 2002, ISSN 0012-7477 , pp. 499-541.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Euler 2009: 19.
- ^ Germanisches Nationalmuseum : Online object catalog Goldhut
Web links
- Golden hats in the Archaeological Lexicon (Landscape Museum Obermain Kulmbach)
- Gold hat from Ezelsdorf / book in the Germanic National Museum