Mega bed without a chamber

Scheme of a Polish megalithic bed without a chamber

The giant bed of Stralendorf, the largest of its kind

In Great Britain, non-megalithic long mounds and stone chamberless long cairns are referred to as giant bed without chamber , also chamberless giant bed or chamberless long bed . They can be found in a strip from Brittany across the British Isles , Denmark and the North German Plain to the upper reaches of the Vistula ( Niedźwiedź-type systems ) (NTT). Chamberless means that there is no or no lithic chamber.

The Passy-type enclosures of the Cerny culture in the French department of Essonne in the Paris basin have been known since the 1980s . However, these are not always megalithic systems .

Neolithic monuments are an expression of the culture and ideology of Neolithic societies. Their origin and function are considered to be the hallmarks of social development.

Total funnel cup culture

S. Rzepecki lists all sites (possibly several) chamber-less systems of the funnel beaker culture (TBK), regardless of whether they have a megalithic border or not:

13 Czech Republic
45 Denmark
161 Germany
144 Poland
1 Sweden

TBK giant beds in Germany

In the area of the TBK, the chamberless systems were classified in the megalithic category, as their mostly quite flat hills, mainly located on the lower reaches of the Elbe , Oder and Vistula , but also in the Jerichower Land, often have a border of only about one meter high megaliths. Due to their small dimensions, they were unsuitable for building chambers, which is why they lack the stone chamber made from large blocks. The borders (see Nordic megalithic architecture ) are trapezoidal or rectangular. Hans-Jürgen Beier highlights a maximum of 55 preserved systems (38 proven) in the area of the GDR. This number is increased by a little more than a dozen West German plants in Schleswig-Holstein (e.g. Hünenbett "Alter Hau" ) and Lower Saxony (e.g. Boltersen Tosterglope 2 , Niendorf 6 and 8 ). The Kritzow complex ( Ludwigslust-Parchim district ) has guard stones that are taller than a man . In addition to the plants in Gnewitz , Rothenmoor and Stralendorf examined by Ewald Schuldt in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania , there are five more in Region 11 and in the Sachsenwald. A group of three systems was only discovered in 1969 in "Alt Plestliner Holz", Vorpommern-Greifswald district . One of the bezels is 80 meters long. Five giant beds without chambers were examined in the 19th century by J. Ritter in the Hagenow district . In Saxony-Anhalt systems are identified ( Gehrden , Tryppehna 3 ) and 10 others (e.g. Büden , Dannigkow 1,3 and 5 , Leitzkau 2 , and Prödel ) belong / probably belonged to this type.

Wietrzychowice
The chamberless giant bed Wietrzychowice 3, Kujawien

All systems are characterized by delimited stone accumulations (paving), which are covered with pebbles under the mound of earth. In the Stralendorf complex ( Ludwigslust-Parchim district ), six such plasters, lying horizontally and lengthways, were housed in the 125-meter-long trapezoidal edging. Such plasters are sometimes found outside the borders or are found in or next to giant beds in which chambers are to be found, e.g. B. in two of the four giant beds of Grundoldendorf . The “Alter Hau 1” giant bed in the Sachsenwald is 154 meters long and is one of the longest structures in Nordic megalithic architecture .

The long bed of Tinnum on Sylt is a giant bed that has neither a chamber nor a megalithic border, but one made of stones the size of a head. It apparently represents a transition type.

If one includes systems without stone hill edging, the hills of which had a relatively unmarked past edging made of wooden stakes, then the circle of chamberless systems z. B. around the plants of Tinnum , Barkjær (in Djursland ) or Bygholm Nørremark (in Jutland). These systems, known as Konens Høj systems in Denmark, are represented in the TBK area east of the Oder as the “Niedźwiedź type” and are particularly common in central Germany as long hills .

Megalithic beds in Mecklenburg (list from 1899)

Wittenburg group

1. Power. 40 m long, 8 m wide. Cross layer of stones 7 m from the east end. In the smaller half vessel shards and coal; in the larger one a fire pit and the remains of a buried person with a piece of amber.
2. Goldenbow. 33 m long, 5.5 m wide. Two vessels
3. Goldenbow. 24 m long, 5.5 m wide. No content
4. Goldenbow. 12.25 m long, 6 m wide. Shards, at the western end a stone circle with a granite block on stepped stones.
5. Püttelkow. 33 m long, 8.5 m wide. severely disturbed .
6. Perdöhl. 25 m long, 3.5 m wide. Two cross layers. In the middle section there is a skeleton with no additions, otherwise coal and broken glass.
7. Perdöhl. 16.5 m long, 5 m wide. No content
8. Helmet. 11.5 m long, 6 m wide. By transverse layers in three sections, two of which are divided into three chambers each. Capstone-like blocks on the surface. Contents: flint knife and shards of vessels.
9. Wittenburg. 7.4 m long, 6 m wide. Flint wedge and chisel.

Others

10. Siggelkow near Parchim. Oval shape (very rare), 39 m long, 1.3 to 2.6 m wide; double transverse wall 2.5 m from one end; in the smaller section two flint wedges and shards.
11. Siggelkow near Parchim. Divided into two roughly equal halves. Vessel.
12. Brüsewitz near Schwerin. 30 m long, 4 m wide. A cross layer that divides a department into two chambers. Calcined flints and coal.
13. Rosenberg near Gadebusch. 7 m long, 3.5 m wide. Flint knives and wedges, amber pearls with recent admixtures. Badly disturbed?
14. Lübow near Wismar. Shape unclear. Horse bones, partly burned. 5 vessels, 2 flint wedges.
15. Garvsmühlen near Neubukow. not specified
16. Zarnewanz near Ticino. not specified

TBK giant beds in Poland and the Czech Republic

East of the Oder , the barren beds are often trapezoidal or triangular with a rounded tip, with (Hill 9 from Sarnowo , Poland ), but mostly without zone-separating transverse rows (megalithic and unmegalithic). A considerable number of giant beds without a chamber are known from western and southern Poland, a few from Bohemia and Moravia. The greatest concentration is in Kujawy . They are often found in groups of two or three, and occasionally, as in the long hill of Sarnowo , in larger numbers (9). Most are between 25 and 40 meters long; about 40% are between 60 and 80 m long. The longest, Wietrzychowice in Kujawia, reaches 130 m and is relatively narrow. They are usually between three and 11 meters wide on the wider of the short sides (the face), with the narrower side being considered the end. The access openings have been found on the front. The main orientation in about 70% of the systems examined is east-west or north-east-south-west.

British Islands

Hill systems with a border of wooden stakes are in any case the approximately 200 British (earthen) longbarrows (the non-megalithic long hills and the non-megalithic round hills ). They are particularly common in Wiltshire and Yorkshire . Three plants are in Scotland , one on the Isle of Man . The hills were built over wooden chambers. In the east of Scotland there is another chamberless and megalithless variant, the “chamberless cains”, around 50 cairns without chambers, which in England (12) are only represented in Cumbria and Northumberland .

France

The mounds or tumuli of Brittany and the Landes de Gascogne are premegalithic like the "tertres allongés". They are low, flat, flat hills 15 to 35 meters wide and 40 to 100 meters long. They are rectangular or oval and contain fixtures made of dry masonry for corpse burns and additions. Oversized mounds of earth, such as the Tumulus St. Michel in Carnac , which have box-like fixtures, emerged from the early megalithic period . A newly discovered hill of this type is located in La Trinité-sur-Mer .

Hill systems with frames made of wooden stakes (without stone) are the partly sperm-shaped Middle Neolithic enclosures of the Passy type , which can be ascribed to the Cerny culture . Such hills with wood or palisade edging can also be found in the area of the early funnel cup culture . Systems of the Konens Høj type can be found in Denmark, systems of the Niedźwiedź type in central Germany and Poland.

British, French and Nordic plants have no connection whatsoever.

literature

Frances Lynch: Megalithic tombs and Long Barrows in Britain (= Shire Archeology. 73). Shire Publications, Princes Risborough 1997, ISBN 0-7478-0341-2 .
Seweryn Rzepecki: The roots of megalithism in the TRB culture . Instytut Archeologii Uniwersytetu Łódźkiego et al., Łódź 2011, ISBN 978-83-933586-1-8 .
Jürgen E. Walkowitz: The megalithic syndrome. European cult sites of the Stone Age (= contributions to the prehistory and early history of Central Europe. Vol. 36). Beier & Beran, Langenweißbach 2003, ISBN 3-930036-70-3 .

Individual evidence

↑ Rainer Kossian: Nichtmegalithische grave sites of the Funnel Beaker culture in Germany and in the Netherlands (= publications of the State Office of Historic Monuments and Archeology Saxony-Anhalt, State Museum of Prehistory. 58). 2 volumes. State Office for Monument Preservation and Archeology Saxony-Anhalt - State Museum for Prehistory, Halle (Saale) 2005, ISBN 3-910010-84-9 .
↑ Claude Constantin, Daniel Mordant, Daniel Simonin (eds.): La Culture de Cerny. Nouvelle économie, nouvelle société au Néolithique. Actes du colloque international de Nemours, 9-10-11 May 1994 (= Mémoires du Musée de Préhistoire d'Ile-de-France. 6). Association pour la Promotion de la Recherche Archéologique en Ile-de-France, Nemours 1997, ISBN 2-906160-13-X .
↑ http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/neolithic/index.html Quotation: “A salvage excavation determined that these lines were in fact man-made ditches dating to the Neolithic, some more than 600 feet long and terminating in circular areas ”
^ Johannes Müller: Neolithic Monuments and Neolithic Societies. In: Arbeitsgemeinschaft Neolithikum (Ed.): Neolithic monuments and neolithic societies. Contributions from the meeting of the Neolithic Working Group during the annual meeting of the North-West German Association for Ancient Research in Schleswig, 9. – 10. October 2007 (= Varia neolithica. 6 = contributions to the prehistory and early history of Central Europe. 56). Beier & Beran, Langenweissbach 2009, ISBN 978-3-941171-28-2 , pp. 7–16, here p. 15.

Web links

Description pol.

[1] Rainer Kossian: Nichtmegalithische grave sites of the Funnel Beaker culture in Germany and in the Netherlands (= publications of the State Office of Historic Monuments and Archeology Saxony-Anhalt, State Museum of Prehistory. 58). 2 volumes. State Office for Monument Preservation and Archeology Saxony-Anhalt - State Museum for Prehistory, Halle (Saale) 2005, ISBN 3-910010-84-9 .

[2] Claude Constantin, Daniel Mordant, Daniel Simonin (eds.): La Culture de Cerny. Nouvelle économie, nouvelle société au Néolithique. Actes du colloque international de Nemours, 9-10-11 May 1994 (= Mémoires du Musée de Préhistoire d'Ile-de-France. 6). Association pour la Promotion de la Recherche Archéologique en Ile-de-France, Nemours 1997, ISBN 2-906160-13-X .

[3] ttp://www.archaeology.org/online/features/neolithic/index.html Quotation: “A salvage excavation determined that these lines were in fact man-made ditches dating to the Neolithic, some more than 600 feet long and terminating in circular areas ”

[4] Johannes Müller: Neolithic Monuments and Neolithic Societies. In: Arbeitsgemeinschaft Neolithikum (Ed.): Neolithic monuments and neolithic societies. Contributions from the meeting of the Neolithic Working Group during the annual meeting of the North-West German Association for Ancient Research in Schleswig, 9. – 10. October 2007 (= Varia neolithica. 6 = contributions to the prehistory and early history of Central Europe. 56). Beier & Beran, Langenweissbach 2009, ISBN 978-3-941171-28-2 , pp. 7–16, here p. 15.