Duvensee paddle

The Duvensee paddle

The Duvensee paddle in the permanent exhibition

The Duvensee paddle (Helms-Museum inventory number MfV1926.112: 182) is the preserved part of a Mesolithic paddle that was found in 1926 during excavations in the Duvenseer Moor near Klinkrade in the Schleswig-Holstein district of the Duchy of Lauenburg . The find is the second oldest paddle in the world after the Star Carr paddle and is considered to be one of the earliest evidence of the use of watercraft in the Mesolithic. The find is shown in the archaeological permanent exhibition of the Archaeological Museum Hamburg in Hamburg-Harburg .

Find

The former Duvenseer Moor is located directly west of the village of Duvensee in a young moraine landscape and had an extension of 3.5 km in north-south and 1.2 km in west-east direction. Originally it was a shallow open lake that gradually mossed up and then largely silted up. Since the late 18th century, the moor has been drained with drainage ditches to make it usable for agriculture. The peat of the bog was extracted as fuel . A small residual lake existed until the 19th century, which was finally completely drained together with the surrounding area. During mapping work in the Duvenseer Moor, the geologist Karl Gripp accidentally discovered a Mesolithic settlement site in 1923. In the years that followed, the site was thoroughly archaeologically investigated. In the years 1924–1927 Gustav Schwantes , 1946 Hermann Schwabedissen and finally 1966–1967 Klaus Bokelmann carried out archaeological excavations in the moor, and numerous residential areas were documented. In addition to numerous stone artefacts, the excavations yielded very few wooden tools, including the paddle found in Schwante's excavation campaign in 1926, which was located in a former bank zone in the area of residential area 2. The Duvensee paddle is one of the outstanding finds from the Duvenseer Moor. Location: 53 ° 41 ′ 57 ″ N , 10 ° 32 ′ 50.6 ″ E Coordinates: 53 ° 41 ′ 57 ″ N , 10 ° 32 ′ 50.6 ″ E
53.699171 10.54739

More finds

The elementary school teacher Ernst Bornhöft, who teaches in the nearby Schiphorst , found two more paddles before 1925, which he initially incorporated into the prehistoric collection of his school. However, both paddles went to the museum in 1925. One of the large-leaved oak paddles measures 790 × 182 × 35 mm and weighs 613 g and is still in the museum's collection. It was dated in 2008 by means of ¹⁴ C dating at 1121 ± 22 Before Present (around 829 AD ± 22 years) in the transition period from the Early to the High Middle Ages. The second paddle is missing today, only a few written records and a photo of the find exist. The paddle, which is probably also made of pine wood, is said to have had an incised decoration on the shaft, which, however, cannot be seen in the photo. Both paddles were recovered from Bornhöft without considering the context of the find.

Findings

Side view of the Duvensee paddle with scale

The paddle was broken several times when it was found, but except for a few imperfections it was extremely well preserved , which was due to the permanently damp environment in the sediment of the former bank area . The only thing missing from the paddle is the end of the handle and one corner of the blade has broken off in steps. The present paddle now has a length of 520 mm, a width of 100 mm and a thickness of 35 mm. The long, rectangular blade with rounded corners is about 260 mm long and merges asymmetrically into the shaft. The weight of the paddle is now 331 g. The paddle was carved from the trunk of a pine tree, with three branches on the shaft being processed and smoothed. After the recovery, the paddle was preserved with a waxy substance that was not precisely documented . Another treatment of the find with the then newly developed plastic Celodal , a urea-formaldehyde resin , was discarded in 1940 for reasons of conservation.

Dating

The first dating was typologically based on the stone artifacts found such as blade remains, microliths and arrowheads, as well as pollen analysis to the Mesolithic. A radiocarbon dating carried out in the 1980s on several hazelnut shells and pieces of wood from the living space resulted in an averaged dating of around 7390 ± 80 BC. The radiocarbon dating of two samples from the Duvenseer paddle using accelerator mass spectrometry ( ¹⁴ C-AMS) in 2008 resulted in calibrated ages of 8477 ± 49 BP and 8261 ± 38 BP, i.e. data around 6527 ± 49 years before Chr. And 6311 ± 38 years before Christ. What is striking here is the clearly different ¹⁴ C age of the samples from the settlement findings.

Interpretation and meaning

The excavation results made it possible to reassess the Mesolithic cultural groups in northern Germany. For the cultural group discovered in Duvensee, Schwantes finally coined the name Duvensee Group , a cultural group that extends over Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg and parts of Brandenburg. After Schwantes' excavation, the Duvensee paddle was regarded as the oldest paddle in the world and at the same time as the oldest, albeit only indirect, evidence of the use of boats in the Mesolithic and widely published. This view was somewhat put into perspective by the discovery of the older Stare Carr paddle. The find not only attracted a great deal of interest from international archeology experts, the museum was asked for a real copy of the paddle for the 1936 Summer Olympics . In the 1990s, the municipality of Duvensee considered adopting the paddle in its new local coat of arms , which, however, was discarded after consultations with heraldists . On the occasion of the 2005 most beautiful village district competition , the community had a replica of Duvensee's paddle cast in bronze, which was placed in front of the community center.

literature

Mareike Jenke: Excavations in Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 9-78 (here pp. 48-49) .
Mareike Jenke: Duvensee, Duchy of Lauenburg district - new presentation of an old excavation . University of Hamburg, Hamburg 2009 (Master's thesis).

Individual evidence

↑ Subject area mobility, showcase No. 70.
^ Rüdiger Articus, Jochen Brandt, Elke Först, Yvonne Krause, Michael Merkel, Kathrin Mertens, Rainer-Maria Weiss: Archäologisches Museum Hamburg, Helms-Museum: A tour through the ages (= publications of the Archaeological Museum Hamburg Helms-Museum . No. 101 ). Hamburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-931429-20-1 , pp. 98 .
^ Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 10-12 .
^ Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 13-14 .
^ Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 11 .
↑ Archaeological Museum Hamburg Inventory number MfV1931.22: 001
^ ^A ^b Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 59-61 .
^ ^A ^b Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 61-62 .
↑ Archaeological Museum Hamburg Inventory number MfV1931.22: 002
^ Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 48-49 .
^ Mareike Jenke: Duvensee, Duchy of Lauenburg district - new presentation of an old excavation . University of Hamburg, Hamburg 2009, p. 17-20 (Master's thesis).
^ Mareike Jenke: Duvensee, Duchy of Lauenburg district - new presentation of an old excavation . University of Hamburg, Hamburg 2009, p. 31–32 (master's thesis).

Web links

When people paddled to the nuts on the Hamburger Abendblatt dated May 2, 2012 (accessed on May 29, 2012)

[1] Subject area mobility, showcase No. 70.

[2] Rüdiger Articus, Jochen Brandt, Elke Först, Yvonne Krause, Michael Merkel, Kathrin Mertens, Rainer-Maria Weiss: Archäologisches Museum Hamburg, Helms-Museum: A tour through the ages (= publications of the Archaeological Museum Hamburg Helms-Museum . No. 101 ). Hamburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-931429-20-1 , pp. 98 .

[3] Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 10-12 .

[Jenke13-14-4] Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 13-14 .

[5] Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 11 .

[6] Archaeological Museum Hamburg Inventory number MfV1931.22: 001

[Jenke59-61-7] A ^b Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 59-61 .

[Jenke61-62-8] A ^b Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 61-62 .

[9] Archaeological Museum Hamburg Inventory number MfV1931.22: 002

[10] Mareike Jenke: Excavations in the Duvenseer Moor, Duchy of Lauenburg district - For the reconstruction of an old excavation . In: Hammaburg NF . No. 16 , 2011, ISBN 978-3-931429-22-5 , ISSN 0173-0886 , p. 48-49 .

[11] Mareike Jenke: Duvensee, Duchy of Lauenburg district - new presentation of an old excavation . University of Hamburg, Hamburg 2009, p. 17-20 (Master's thesis).

[12] Mareike Jenke: Duvensee, Duchy of Lauenburg district - new presentation of an old excavation . University of Hamburg, Hamburg 2009, p. 31–32 (master's thesis).