Copper find from Neuenkirchen
The copper find from Neuenkirchen in the Mecklenburg Lake District was recovered in 1998 in the course of investigations on the route of the Federal Highway 20 . The four items from Neuenkirchen are:
- the fragment of a flat ax ,
- a fragmentary dagger ,
- an arm spiral
- a small sleeve formed from a spiral band.
That at the beginning of the 4th millennium BC The ensemble to be dated to BC was discovered in a pit 60 cm in diameter. All parts were fragmented at the time of the resignation. The upper part of the findings was destroyed. As a result of centuries of plowing, the pit only had a remaining depth of 25 cm. It could not be clarified whether a shattered vessel found next door was originally part of the hoard.
In Denmark , the Bygholm Nørremark hoard was salvaged in a gravel pit near Horsens as early as 1924 . Nearby, another copper was found in the gravel at Årupgård in 1967 . The objects had been deposited in a jar of the funnel beaker culture (TBK). The Bygholmfund opened the way to the allocation of further individual finds in the early European metal age (4500 to 3750 BC). Small metal finds (gold and copper) also came to light in the megalithic complexes in Denmark, Mecklenburg and Pomerania . This was the reason why the flint spectrum of the funnel beaker people created shapes that could not be explained without the metal models.
interpretation
The finds from Neuenkirchen were intentionally deposited. The objects originate from production centers in Bohemia / Moravia and in the Carpathian region, as can be demonstrated by the metallic composition . Both places are occupied by further finds in the Baltic Sea area. The metals must have been imported via the Oder . There are no ore deposits for copper or gold in the entire Baltic Sea region . The Neuenkirchener finds fit seamlessly into the spectrum of these imported finds and close the gap in this area.
literature
- Friedrich Lüth : The first metal in the north - a 6,000 year old copper treasure from Neuenkirchen district Mecklenburg-Strelitz In: The A20 motorway - Northern Germany's longest excavation. Schwerin 2005, ISBN 3-935770-11-1 , pp. 43-46.