Great stone grave in Wartin

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Great stone grave in Wartin
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Great stone grave in Wartin (Brandenburg)
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Coordinates 53 ° 15 '34.5 "  N , 14 ° 6' 55.6"  E Coordinates: 53 ° 15 '34.5 "  N , 14 ° 6' 55.6"  E
place Casekow , Brandenburg , Germany
Emergence 3500 to 2800 BC Chr.
Sprockhoff no. 575

The large stone grave Wartin was a megalithic grave complex of the Neolithic funnel cup culture near Wartin , a district of Casekow in the Uckermark district ( Brandenburg ). It was destroyed between 1940 and 1944 when an airfield was built . An archaeological investigation was carried out during construction under the direction of Otto Kunkel and Hans Jürgen Eggers . The finds made during the excavation ended up in what was then the City Museum in Stettin and are only partially preserved today. The grave bears the Sprockhoff number 575.

location

The grave was located west-northwest of Wartin, directly on the state border with Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania . It was part of a necropolis in use from the Neolithic to the Iron Age .

description

The grave consisted of several components, some of which cannot be clearly related to one another due to the inadequate documentation. It is the oldest Neolithic cultural layer , on which a barn bed was built. A stone burial chamber was sunk into this, and several secondary and subsequent burials were found in the immediate vicinity . In the Iron Age, a burial mound was built on the burial chamber .

The lowest culture layer

The oldest cultural layer probably came from a settlement. It had an average thickness of 5 cm and was interrupted by the deep burial chamber. Four post holes were also found under the burial chamber, for which it is unclear whether they were made when the chamber was built or whether they still belonged to the settlement.

The culture layer contained numerous mostly undecorated ceramic shards, flint tools (blades, scratches), bone tools and animal bones. The finds can be assigned to the early funnel beaker culture.

The giant bed

The mound bed was slightly trapezoidal and oriented east-west. The minimum width in the west was 3.3 m and the maximum width in the east was 5.3 m. According to Eberhard Kirsch, the length was 22 m, while Hans Jürgen Eggers and Kazimierz Siuchniński stated that it was 35 m. The enclosure consisted of relatively small stones. The eastern end of the megalithic bed was badly damaged by later installations. Whether the narrow side there was bordered with larger boulders, as suspected by Siuchniński and also adopted by Ernst Sprockhoff , cannot be proven with certainty.

Due to the later renovations, it is not clear whether the giant bed had a stone burial chamber in the first construction phase. Human bones and fragments from three vessels were discovered 1.5 m west of the hill that was built later. Siuchniński interpreted this as the primary burial. It was a grave with no stone protection. In its original construction phase, the facility could thus be described as a chamberless giant bed . The vessels were two funnel beakers and a collar bottle that can be assigned to the early funnel beaker culture. It was not noted in the excavation documentation whether it was grave goods or relocated finds.

Further finds come from the mound of the barren bed, the original origin of which is unclear. They can come from the original cultural layer, from the cleared stone burial chamber, from other destroyed graves or graves not recognized by the excavators, or they can represent offerings. These finds are mostly decorated ceramic shards, fragments of two stone axes, flint material, hollowed millstones , processed and unprocessed animal bones as well as a "crow stone ". The determinable finds are to be assigned to the Havelländische Kultur .

The burial chamber

A stone burial chamber was subsequently sunk in the eastern part of the Hünenbett and encased in an oval stone-earth mound. The chamber was oriented east-west and consisted of three stone slabs each on the long sides and one stone slab each on the narrow sides. The slabs were made of granite and sandstone . The chamber was 3 m long and 1.3 m wide. The entrance was in the eastern half of the southern long side. There were two wall panels in front of it. The corridor was 0.7 m long. A threshold stone was set between the corridor and the chamber. The floor of the chamber was paved with small stone slabs. No stone cover plates were found that spanned the entire width of the chamber. Instead, the excavators came across several smaller slabs, which they interpreted as covering a non-preserved wooden ceiling. According to Kirsch, however, this interpretation does not agree with the findings.

Ernst Sprockhoff classified the chamber as a small passage grave of subtype Holstein Chamber , Hans-Jürgen Beier , however, as submegalithische passage grave box .

In the earth-filled chamber, numerous grave goods were found that could be assigned to at least three different burials. Close to the entrance, directly on the pavement, stood a hanging vessel and an amphora , which, together with the fragment of a cauldron-shaped vessel and shards of other vessels, belonged to the original burial of the Havelland culture. A fragment of a stone ax , a bone sliver, a cross-edged arrowhead , a crow's stone , a pierced deer grandel, two or three pierced animal teeth, flint blades and splinters, and animal bones can also be assigned to this burial. At least five individuals were probably buried, as human bones were also found (including five lower jaws). However, the bones were not examined.

A spherical amphora , a double-conical cup and a conical wreath cup come from a burial of the spherical amphora culture . An undecorated beaker belongs to the older funnel beaker culture. Immediately outside the western narrow side of the chamber, a reburial of the end-Neolithic individual grave culture was found.

The monolith tomb

It is unclear whether a monolith grave 4.5 m east of the burial chamber should be regarded as part of the large stone grave . It consisted of a single burial under a boulder with a diameter of more than 1 m. Siuchniński interpreted it as the guardian stone of the eastern narrow side of the megalithic bed. However, further stones are missing between the monolith and the burial mound, which would prove a direct connection.

The grave contained a single north-east-south-west oriented burial in a left crouched position. The skeleton was badly preserved. The only grave object found was an undecorated jug, which, according to Eberhard Kirsch, can be assigned to the younger eastern funnel cup culture. Eggers and Siuchniński, however, assign it to the early Bronze Age. The jug ended up in the museum in Szczecin and is no longer preserved today.

The Iron Age burial mound

Directly above the mound that surrounded the stone burial chamber, another burial mound was piled up in the Iron Age and bordered with a stone wreath.

literature

  • Jan Albert Bakker : The Dutch Hunebedden. Megalithic Tombs of the Funnel Beaker Culture . International Monographs in Prehistory, Ann Arbor 1992, ISBN 1-87962-102-9 , pp. 76-77.
  • Hans-Jürgen Beier : The megalithic, submegalithic and pseudomegalithic buildings as well as the menhirs between the Baltic Sea and the Thuringian Forest. Contributions to the prehistory and early history of Central Europe 1. Wilkau-Haßlau 1991, p. 41.
  • Hans Jürgen Eggers : Pomeranian finds and excavations from the 30s and 40s. Table volume (= Atlas of Prehistory. Supplement 10). Hamburg Museum of Ethnology and Prehistory, Hamburg 1964.
  • Hans Jürgen Eggers: Pomeranian finds and excavations from the 30s and 40s. Text volume (= Atlas of Prehistory. Supplement 11). Hamburg Museum of Ethnology and Prehistory, Hamburg 1969.
  • Karl Kersten : The finds from the older Bronze Age in Pomerania (= Atlas of Prehistory. Supplement 7). Hamburg Museum of Ethnology and Prehistory, Hamburg 1958, p. 54.
  • Eberhard Kirsch : Finds from the Middle Neolithic in the state of Brandenburg. Brandenburg State Museum for Prehistory and Early History, Potsdam 1993, pp. 64–67.
  • Ingeburg Nilius : Two Neolithic stone boxes from the Neubrandenburg district. in: Ground monument maintenance in Mecklenburg. Yearbook 1978. 1979, pp. 20-21.
  • Kazimierz Siuchniński : Kurhan 60 z cmentarzyska w Wartin, pow. Angermünde (NRD). In: Materiały zachodniopomorskie. Rocznik naukowy Muzeum Narodowego w Szczecinie. Volume 2, 1956, pp. 7-40.
  • Kazimierz Siuchniński: Klasyfikacja czasowo-przestrzenna culture neolitycznych na Pomorzu Zachodnim. 1: Catalog źródeł archeologicznych. Muzeum Pomorza Zachodniego, Szczeciń 1969.
  • Ernst Sprockhoff : Atlas of the megalithic tombs of Germany. Part 2: Mecklenburg - Brandenburg - Pomerania. Rudolf-Habelt Verlag, Bonn 1967, pp. 91-92.

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