Zvejnieki burial ground
The Zvejnieki burial ground is located on a small elevation on the shores of Lake Burtnieki in northern Latvia , about 200 m from a settlement of the Narva culture . It is the best studied of the Baltic Mesolithic Narva culture. With over 300 Meso and Neolithic graves from the 7th to 3rd millennium BC At the same time it is the largest burial ground from this period in Northern Europe. It provides information on the cultural continuity from the Mesolithic through the Neolithic to the time of the corded ceramics in the 3rd millennium with its typical stool burials .
Funeral custom
The earlier dead were stretched, wrapped in furs and buried dusted with ocher . Collective graves with two to six dead on top of each other were found occasionally, as was the case with burials of the Dnieper-Donets culture . The grave goods consisted of pendants and necklaces made of boar, elk and deer teeth (Grandeln). Later pendants made of badger, fox, dog, marten and wolf teeth as well as pendants and beads made of amber were added. Carved sculptures from bones depict cows elk and birds. Bird bones found in the graves suggest that birds were placed in the grave of the dead.
Some graves were found under the houses.
Other burial grounds
In Narva No. 1, an adult and a child were buried under the floor. Skulls without skeletons were found in Sventoji No. 23. Here an amber pendant was discovered under the skull bones .
Excavation history
The area around the lake is rich in archaeological sites and plays an important role in the archeology of Latvia. The most important research project was the excavations of Francis Zagorskis (1929–1986) in the 1960s and early 1970s, which uncovered more than 300 burials. From 2005 geological and palaeoecological surveys were carried out to research the environmental history of the place. The focus of the archaeological excavation was on the relationship between the settlement and the burial ground. In 2005 and 2006, unexcavated areas were examined in order to identify layers of settlement, determine the time and locate and excavate new graves. While the majority of the burial ground had already been excavated, a part was not examined. From 2005 to 2007 13 new graves were discovered and examined according to contemporary standards.
literature
- H. Duday et al .: L'Anthropologie “de terrain”: reconnaissanceet interprétation des gestes funéraires. In: E. Crubézy et al. (Ed.): Anthropologie et Archeologie: Dialogue sur les ensembles funéraires. Bulletin et et Mémoires de la Societé d'Anthropologie de Paris. NS. 2, no 3-4, 1990, pp. 29-50.
- Liv Nilsson Stutz: Embodied Rituals and Ritualized Bodied. Tracing ritual practices in late Mesolithic burials In: Acta Archaeologica Lundensia , series in 8º, no 46. Lund 2003.
- Zagorska, I. 2006. The history of research on the Zvejnieki site. In: L. Larsson & I. Zagorska (Eds.): Back to the Origin. New research in the Mesolithic-Neolithic Zvejnieki cemetery and environment, Northern Latvia. Acta Archaeologica Lundensia, Series in 8 °, No. 52, pp. 5-24. Lund: Almqvist & Wiksell International. 2006
Web links
Coordinates: 57 ° 46 ′ 33.6 ″ N , 25 ° 13 ′ 33.6 ″ E