Niche grave (archeology)

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In archeology, a niche grave is a burial in which one or more additional niches have been made in the wall of the grave pit. Often the niches contain grave goods . Such niche graves are known, for example, from different regions of the Roman Empire , but also from the early Middle Ages .

Roman Empire

The distribution of niche graves in the Roman Empire is not uniform. For example, they are quite common in Cologne , in the urban burial grounds of the ancient Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium ; They are also found in many smaller and larger cemeteries in the closer urban area. They are proven both in military facilities, such as the Bonn military camp, in smaller civil settlements ( vici ) and in manors . On individual grave fields, the proportion of burials with side niches can be over 25%. In other regions, however, such niches are largely absent, or their share in the total number of burials in a necropolis is very small.

Cologne and the Cologne area

Niche graves have been found in Cologne and the Cologne area since the 1st century AD, when cremation burials were initially common here. Since the end of the 2nd century, body graves have appeared in small numbers, and more frequently in the course of the 3rd century. In late antiquity , body burial became common. Burial niches can be traced back to the 5th century.

Niches belong to different types of cremation graves, such as busta , embankment graves or ash boxes . In the case of body graves, they were placed next to simple coffin burials , lead coffins and sarcophagi . One or more niches can belong to a grave. The location was evidently not determined in a binding manner, niches can be found on both the long and narrow sides of the graves. Occasionally the niches are set off from the grave shaft with a roof tile . Most of the time, the niches are located above the bottom of the grave, sometimes just a few centimeters, but occasionally a meter or more. If burials are only preserved to a shallow depth, it is often not possible to decide whether one or more niches have been destroyed undetected (e.g. by erosion ). Often, but not always, additions were found in the niches. In a few cremated burials, corpse fire has also been detected in the grave niches.

Early middle ages

In some early medieval burial grounds there are also niche graves, for example ten burials with side niches were found in Hemmingen .

Web links

literature

  • Waldemar Haberey : Wall niches in late Roman earth graves to Kings. Germania 18, 1934, pp. 274-279 [2] .
  • Hermann Friedrich Müller: The Alemannic burial ground of Hemmingen. Research and reports on prehistory and early history in Baden-Württemberg 7. Verlag Müller & Gräff. Stuttgart 1976. p. 126.