Non-megalithic long mounds

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Nichtmegalithische long hill ( English non-megalithic monuments ) are a monument group similar as hunebeds without chamber in a strip of France over England until after Poland can be detected, but the East of England are represented virtually dominate and occasionally in Scotland. The hills, which are particularly concentrated in Yorkshire and around Stonehenge, are made of earth, so they are tumuli ( English barrows ). The Scottish variety, the Long Cairns (Dalladies, Lochhill, Slewcairn ) are often not very common in Scotland, however.

The use of wood, chalk and peat to build burial spaces covered by mounds of earth became similar to the spread of unmegalithic and megalithic structures in the Funnel Beaker Culture (TBK) area, solely through the availability of resources and the absence of Stone Age resources determined stones to be worked.

Better are hills called the data for these also "Earthen Long Barrows" in the UK dated than the under the name plants of the type Konens Høj combined hill in Denmark ( Barkjær ) and the plants from Niedźwiedź type in Central Europe for uses from about 4000 BC Is shown. In both regions, a connection with or a continuation of the long hill and megalithic tradition can be observed a little later , as is evident in the Clyde and Cotswold Severn types . The assessment of this phenomenon is still pending in part .

The north hill from Gussage down

Southern england

The spread of certain materials and shapes created a pattern in the British Isles that made it possible to address the type of plant, which apart from a few exceptions only occurs in the eastern half of the island, as an independent one. Three groups of "chamberless systems" are distinguished from the megalithic systems , which are mainly located in the eastern half of the island and in Ireland :

A very small group (e.g. Long Barrows from Mossthorn in Cumbria) consists of hills made of a mixture of earth and stones.

About 200 long hills survived in southern England, the greatest concentrations being in the counties of Dorset , Hampshire ( Grans Barrow , Knap Barrow ) and Wiltshire , all in Wessex . Accumulations can be detected within the area:

  • along the Dorset Ridgeway (21),
  • on the Cranborne Chase (38),
  • around Avebury (10 and 10 megalithic systems)
  • on the Salisbury Plain (82).
  • in the Sussex Downs (10)

The accumulation of the hills around Causewayed enclosures has led to later tribal areas being seen in these densifications. However, the lack of normal settlements renders the matter unsubstantiated. The earth and chalk mounds later suffered from agriculture and very few survive in their impressive original form. The trapezoidal hill of Pimperne at Blandford Forum, in Dorset, is one of the largest. It is 108 m long and at the east end, where it is 2.4 m high, 27.5 m wide. The height decreases towards the narrower west end. The largest mounds of earth are around 100 m long, but the majority are between 50 and 26 m. The orientation is mostly east-west. The east end is often wider and covers (where identifiable) the two-part burial space.

description

The chamber

Excavations of the mound yielded little useful information about the structure. The systems also differ in detail. However, the chamber always has an almost rectangular shape, which is defined by pits or posts on the front and rear walls. The well-preserved room at Haddenham , Cambridgeshire , is a long, closed wooden box with floor, side walls and roof, the large boards of which are supported by three rows of axial posts and side clay benches. This rather rare pattern can also be seen at Wayland's Smithy , in Oxfordshire . The room, partly made of stones, seems to have been covered like a tent here . The presence of a roof is often uncertain. The upper areas at Nutbane in Hampshire , probably also at Fussell's Lodge in Wiltshire , appear to have been roofless. The skeletal bones were covered by twigs or stones. If the roof could not be lifted off, the new access was made inept. At Thickthom Down , in Dorset , the room was made entirely of peat . The rooms are between two and six meters in length and are usually about one meter wide. The altitude is uncertain, but Haddenham was little more than three feet high.

The hill

The hill is usually defined by a surrounding wooden wall. Nutbane's hill, is small; most of the others are great. The wooden wall defines or stabilizes the hill. The walls usually consisted of a dense palisade. The depth of the base of the foundation indicates that it was high at the front. The mound was built from earth or chalk, which came from pits adjoining both sides. These are usually parallel to the hill. At Cranborne Chase they have been connected in a U-shape and sometimes they can completely surround the hill. The mounds themselves were carefully built and often also contain axial palisades, which served to maintain dimensional stability. The mound makes up the memorial because the presence of at least three cenotaphs or empty mounds under Wessex's longbarrows shows that they developed an independent meaning. Most of the Neolithic long mounds were 20 to 120 meters long. About half are between 30 and 60 meters, seven between 80 and 95 meters and two between 120 and 140 meters. The longer ones include:

  1. Maiden castle long barrow
  2. Trainford Brow; north of Lowther, Cumbria
  3. Pen Hill, Somerset
  4. Long Bredy, Dorset
  5. Broadmayne, Dorset

Facade porches

In some places, post holes in front of the facade show the presence of a third structure - a porch, which is also understood as a morgue. The shape of these buildings is different. With Nutbane, it's not in front of the facade, but behind it. An initially small square chamber was replaced by a larger one with a gable roof. The post structure at Fussell's Lodge and Wayland's Smithy was trapezoidal. Wor Barrow appears to have had a square porch. At Haddenham, there were two lines of posts like Anten in front of the facade. The interpretation of this post structure as vestibules, free-standing towers or extra facades is uncertain. Their function is unknown, but it may be related to body exposure. However, this element is only characteristic of southern Great Britain. The burials in the Longbarrows in southern England are often very well preserved and are the best evidence of burial rituals in Great Britain.

Finds

No grave goods were found and broken pottery is rare. The lifespan of a wooden building is relatively short. The expansion and replacement of the original chamber at Nutbane indicate a longer period of use.

End of use

The decision to end the use was made consciously and was final. In many cases the wooden chambers are burned and thus made inaccessible. This is particularly noted at Nutbane, where the hill's chalk was scorched because it was covered by smoldering timber.

Northern england

The northern English Long Barrow variant is represented by 54 preserved monuments. 14 are on the Lincolnshire plateaus , 30 are in Yorkshire including the greatest concentration around the Great Wold Valley, the rest are in Derbyshire and the Lake District .

Outwardly, there are hardly any differences between the North and South English Long Barrows. However, the excavations not only revealed special features in the facade design. There are also burnt bones in the chambers. The facades in the north are slightly concave and structurally separated from the hill. An increasing depth of the foundation trench towards the center indicates that the posts on the facade, on both sides of the entrance, were higher than in southern England. The concave facades define the forecourt more effectively than the convex or straight ones in southern England. There are seldom vestibules, however, three cases of post avenues were found. At the Kilburn facility, an internal roofless "morgue" was found behind the chamber. The forecourt remained a ceremonial space, but at Willerby Wold and Kilham, flints, bones and shards of pottery were piled up in front of the facade before it was set alight.

As in the south, the chambers are narrow, axial and defined by control pits. In Lincolnshire in particular, they are also located laterally and detached from the facade. They always have side walls or low benches. Groups of piles of bones, such as those from Wayland's Smithy, suggest that those closest to the entrance were most effectively burned, while those ended up just charred.

The entry of wood into the chamber and the regularity of the burning down of the facilities (10 of 14 examples on the Yorkshire plateaus) indicate that this was done on purpose, so that the places were ultimately crematoriums. However, the preliminary stages (suspension, fragmentation and landfill) were carried out as in southern England.

Some long hills in the Lake District were built using stones. In the Skelmore Heads Long Barrow near Ulverston, Cumbria , upright stones appear to imitate the posts of wooden chambers. This transfer of Long Barrow elements to stone structures is significant and is behind the development of many elements of the different types of megalithic structures that have axial galleries (in England, for example, the Clyde tombs, Cotswold Severn tombs ).

overview

The tradition evidently had an influence on the design of megalithic structures , although it did not use “large stones” . The often trapezoidal long hills are first erected in the northern and western peripheral areas of the linear ceramic follower cultures , a little later also by the funnel beaker culture in Denmark ( plants of the Konens Høj type ) and Poland ( plants of the Niedźwiedź type ) and especially by cultures in Great Britain . The discovery of the systems in the Paris basin near Passy-sur-Yonne ( enclosure of the Passy type ) shows that a clarification of the distribution area is not yet final.

The available radiocarbon data does not yet allow any conclusions to be drawn about where the systems were created. The data for the north Polish long hill of Lupawa point to the first half of the 5th millennium BC (cal. Bin-1814 5059-4846 BC [cal]). The dates of Les Fouaillages , on the Channel Islands , a complex that shows certain elements of the non-megalithic long hill in addition to stone constructions, fall into the 5th millennium. The same applies to the St. Michel tumulus in Carnac , Brittany , the data of which, however, are too imprecise. Also the out of the ordinary burial of "La Chaise", Malesherbes in the Paris basin with the elongated stone packing for a single grave could be in the tradition of the long hills (Ly-1797 5320-4847 BC [cal]). However, since these are mostly multi-phase cult systems, some termini post quem may conceal usage or construction values.

Spread of Long Barrows in Lincolnshire

  • Ash Hill, at Binbrook
  • Ash Holt, at Cuxwold
  • Beacon Plantation, at Swaby
  • Bully Hill , at Tealby
  • Burgh on Bain, at Burgh on Bain
  • Deadmen's Graves I + II, at Claxby St. Andrew
  • Giant's Hills I + II, near Skendleby
  • Hills Brough Farm, at Caistor
  • Hoe Hill I + II, at Binbrook
  • Spellow Hills, at Ulceby Cross
  • Tathwell, by Tathwe

See also

literature

  • Ashbee, Paul (1984). The Earthen Long Barrow in Britain: An Introduction to the Study of the Funerary Practice and Culture of the Neolithic People of the Third Millennium BC. Geo Books. ISBN 0-8609-4170-1 .
  • Timothy Darvill: Long Barrows of the Cotswolds and surrounding areas. Tempus Publishing 2004. ISBN 0-7524-2907-8 .
  • Frances Lynch: Megalithic Tombs and Long Barrows in Britain. Shire Publications Ltd. 1997 ISBN 0-7478-0341-2 p. 25 ff
  • Lionel Masters: Chambered tombs and Non-megalithic Barrows in Britain In: John D. Evans, Barry Cunliffe , Colin Renfrew (Eds.): Antiquity and Man. Essays in honor of David Glyn. Thames & Hudson, London 1981, ISBN 0-500-05040-6 pp. 161-176
  • Johannes Müller et al .: Non-megalithic mounds beneath megaliths: A new perspective on monumentality in North Central Europe In: M. Furholt, M. Hinz, D. Mischka, G. Noble, D. Olausson [Eds.]: Landscapes, Histories and Societies in the Northern European Neolithic (Bonn 2014), pp. 171–182