Club heads from Knowth
The stone club heads of Knowth ( English Stone mace heads ) belong to a genus Fund, up to Europe and beyond spread Mesolithic debris lobes back and lasted until in historical time. Decorated club heads, on the other hand, are rare and primarily known from the Bronze Age Egyptian rulers ( Narmer , Scorpio II ). They are represented, if not in this perfection, by two examples from Hill 1 from the megalithic complex of Knowth in Brú na Bóinne in County Meath in Ireland .
The so-called mortar club, about half of which has been preserved, was made from rhyolite , a volcanic rock. It was found in the west grave of Hill 1 (main hill) on an ash deposit just outside the only chamber. Its surface was polished after molding. The end that is preserved is arched and widens outwards a little. The body, which is roughly oval in cross section, has a cylindrical perforation. The shape of the mortar club on Knowth has also been found in or near the passage tombs of Isbister and Taversoe Tuick on Orkney .
The other club head is roughly cuboid, but strongly rounded and more elegant. It comes from the ground at the entrance to the right niche of the east tomb of Hill 1 (main hill). It weighs 324.5 g, is 79 mm long and made of two-tone flint . Both ends are convex and the greatest width is close to the end opposite the strongly eccentric, cylindrical shaft hole at the narrow end. The cross-section is almost square. The six surfaces are decorated. The two (impact) ends are covered with fields of worked-in narrow-diamond-shaped depressions. Both slightly convex sides are decorated with a spiral made up of three turns, the outer curve of which continues to the sides of the shaft. They consist of three parallel lines. On one side of the shaft hole, two triple bands form a U-shaped design. The main motif on the other side of the shaft hole, which is formed by double bands, consists of an inwardly rolled double spiral that corresponds to an eye design. This side approximates a stylized human head. This club head has no parallels in Ireland, but it has parallels in the Mawsmawr type , which occurs in a few specimens across Great Britain. One specimen is from Ormiegill North in Caithness .
literature
- Eogan George: Knowth and the passage-tombs of Ireland . Thames and Hudson, London 1986, ISBN 0-500-39023-1 (English).
- DDA Simpson: The Stone Maceheads of Ireland In: The Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland Vol. 118 (1988), pp. 27-52
- Eric Biermann: Old to Middle Neolithic club heads and drill core finds. Possible clues to potential production centers? In: Hans-Jürgen Beier (Ed.): Varia neolithica . tape 4 . Beier & Beran, Langenweissbach 2006, ISBN 3-937517-43-X .