Battlefield in the Tollensetal

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Tollensetal (Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania)
Tollensetal
Tollensetal
Location of the site in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania

As a battlefield in Tollensetal one is an archaeological find site from the Bronze Age in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern referred. The site extends in the valley of the Tollense along the river and is east of Weltzin, in the area of ​​the municipalities of Burow and Werder in the Mecklenburg Lake District . Based on the findings , a major armed conflict in the Northern European Bronze Age can be reconstructed for the first time .

Research history

A volunteer ground monument pfleger announced in 1996 the discovery of a human humerus with integrated lanky arrowhead from flint , which he had discovered from a boat out at low tide in the Waterside area of Tollense. In the same year, the first archaeological investigations were carried out in the vicinity of the site, where bones of animals and humans were found. In the following years a club made of ash wood , a hammer-like striking weapon made of sloe wood and other skeletal remains were discovered.

The area has been systematically investigated since 2007 under the direction of the State Office for Culture and the Preservation of Monuments , the Lower Saxony State Office for the Preservation of Monuments and the University of Greifswald . Divers from the State Association for Underwater Archeology systematically searched the bottom and bank area of ​​the Tollense, and further skeletal remains were found. The research into the find area and the finds was carried out in 2009 by the Ministry of Culture of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and has been funded by the German Research Foundation since 2010 . The focus of the on-site investigations is the exploration of the extent of the site and the uncovering of the main site under a layer of peat about one meter thick . For this purpose, archaeological excavations were carried out in the meadows of the Tollensee lowlands. An area of ​​more than 400 m 2 was uncovered at the main site alone. Voluntary monument conservationists undertook several site inspections with metal detectors. Most of the excavation was examined that had been deposited on the bank when the Tollense was dredged.

The Geographical Institute of the University of Greifswald is carrying out investigations into the development history of the Tollensetal and to determine the former course of the river. The surface of the site was recorded using laser scanning . The skeletal remains were examined at the University of Rostock .

terrain

The Tollense near Burow

The site extends over several hundred meters on both sides of the river. The Tollense meanders here in a, compared to the entire course, relatively narrow valley between moist meadows. In the last millennia there have only been relatively small changes in the course. During the Bronze Age, the river landscape was relatively open. The human influence was little.

Results

When the skeletal remains were examined, at least 83 individuals were identified by early 2011. By February 2015, a minimum individual number (MIZ) of 125 was determined based on the thigh bones; by 2017 there were already 140 out of 12,000 human bones. Most are the remains of young men. The number of deaths is estimated at around 750 to well over 1,000. Through radiocarbon dating was confirmed that the bones of v in the period around 1300-1250. Are to be classified. Of more than 40 human skulls found, some bear traces of combat injuries. There is a bronze arrowhead in one. Several arrowheads of this type, contrasted with finds of flint and wooden clubs, suggest that two differently equipped groups came into conflict here. The total number of fighters could have ranged from 4,000 to more than 5,000. Swords have not been found at the battlefield so far, but near the Tollense near Golchen and Wodarg near Werder (near Altentreptow) . When examining the human bones, however, many cuts and cuts were found, which were apparently made by swords. At least some of the combatants were mounted, as the bones of at least four horses show. The position of the arrowhead in the humerus that was found first suggests that an archer fighting on foot wounded a rider here. Since almost no other finds apart from individual arrowheads were discovered in the find layer between the bones, it can be assumed that the dead were thoroughly pillaged after the fight. The fallen were likely to be thrown into the river by the victors. Since the remains are no longer in the anatomical association, they were probably displaced by the river until they were covered by a layer of peat in the flow- poor edge zone, and their remains were partially preserved. During investigations in 2016, divers from the Tollense found a complex with 31 objects that are attributed to the personal belongings of a warrior. This included an ornate belt box, three dress pins and arrowheads. Because of the items, the warrior could come from southern Germany and there are increasing indications that some of the warriors come from southern central Europe. According to prehistoric Thomas Terberger from the University of Göttingen, this is "the first discovery of personal items on the battlefield that ... give insight into the equipment of a warrior".

Based on studies of the skeletal remains carried out at Aarhus University , it is assumed that they were members of two different groups of people. At times it was suspected that the fighters from one of the two conflicting parties did not come from the region because they partly ate millet . But the hypothesis that millet was not widespread in the north has now been refuted. With paleogenetic investigations of the genetic material and strontium isotope analyzes of the teeth, one wanted to determine the origin of the individuals more precisely, but according to the regional archaeologist Detlef Jantzen no reliable conclusions could be drawn about the origin of the fighters. However, the fact that up to 5000 mostly young fighters were organized, fed and led in a region with an average of perhaps five inhabitants per square kilometer, according to Jantzen, is an amazing achievement that can actually only be explained by the existence of a central rule in the region could. The residents might have blocked the archaeologically proven bridge over the Tollense and defended it against a force advancing from the west. According to one interpretation, a trade route could have led across the bridge, on which luxury goods and strategically important goods, such as tin for bronze production, were traded. The battle took place at a junction between land and sea routes in the critical phase of the late Bronze Age around 1250 BC. In which the metal in the north became scarce because long-distance trade apparently collapsed and in Mecklenburg, as in all of north-central Europe, the climate apparently deteriorated. In this situation of intensified conflict over resources, the forms of organization and power structures for a war were also fundamentally present in north-central Europe, even if it probably did not match the dimensions of the approximately simultaneous battle of Kadesh , the second known great battle of these years (1274 BC). , reached.

Metal finds

After a golden spiral ring was found on the Tollenseufer in 2010, a similar ring, 2.9 cm long and weighing just under ten grams, followed in June 2011. In August of the same year, in addition to four bronze spiral rollers, a typical form of jewelry from the Bronze Age, two further spirally wound rings made of four millimeter thick wire were found. The material was identified as tin by XRD analysis . Because of their importance as a raw material in bronze production and in view of the rarity of such finds, the two pewter rings are of particular importance. These are the oldest tin finds in Germany to date. The closest find from Hallstatt in Austria is around 600 years younger . So far, almost 50 bronze spout arrowheads have been found. Preserved remains of the wooden arrow shafts made it possible to date more than a third of the arrowheads to the same period as the bone finds.

literature

  • Thomas Brock: Archeology of War. The battlefields of German history . von Zabern, Darmstadt 2015, ISBN 978-3-8053-4875-1 .
  • Detlef Jantzen , Ute Brinker, Jörg Orschiedt , Jan Heinemeier, Jürgen Piek, Karlheinz Hauenstein, Joachim Krüger , Gundula Lidke, Harald Lübke, Reinhard Lampe, Sebastian Lorenz, Manuela Schult, Thomas Terberger : A Bronze Age battlefield? Weapons and trauma in the Tollense Valley, north-eastern Germany . In: Antiquity . tape 85 , no. 328 , 2011, ISSN  0003-598X , p. 417-433 , doi : 10.1017 / S0003598X00067843 (English).
  • Detlef Jantzen, Thomas Terberger: The battle in the Tollensetal and its significance for the history of the war. In: Matthias Wemhoff, Michael M. Rind (Ed.): Moving Times. Archeology in Germany. Exhibition catalog, Museum for Pre- and Early History Berlin, 2018, pp. 270–281.
  • Detlef Jantzen, Thomas Terberger: Violent death in the Tollensetal 3200 years ago . In: Archeology in Germany . No. 4 , 2011, p. 6-11 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Slaughter at the bridge: Uncovering a colossal Bronze Age battle. In: Science . March 24, 2016, accessed on June 2, 2016 (English, images of found objects).
  2. ↑ a b c Archaeological investigations. (No longer available online.) April 28, 2016, archived from the original on September 29, 2015 ; accessed on June 2, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phil.uni-greifswald.de
  3. ↑ a b c Discovery of the site and the course of the exploration. (No longer available online.) February 15, 2011, archived from the original on July 21, 2012 ; Retrieved August 26, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phil.uni-greifswald.de
  4. ↑ Diving prospecting. (No longer available online.) June 30, 2011, archived from the original on May 8, 2014 ; Retrieved August 26, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phil.uni-greifswald.de
  5. ↑ Tollensetal - Welzin. (No longer available online.) State Association for Underwater Archeology Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, archived from the original on May 29, 2011 ; Retrieved August 26, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.uwa-mv.de
  6. ↑ a b Site inspections with metal detectors. (No longer available online.) April 28, 2016, archived from the original on June 2, 2016 ; accessed on June 2, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phil.uni-greifswald.de
  7. ↑ a b Geoscientific and paleobotanical studies. (No longer available online.) June 30, 2011, archived from the original on May 8, 2014 ; Retrieved August 26, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phil.uni-greifswald.de
  8. ↑ a b Investigations of the human skeletal remains. (No longer available online.) February 23, 2015, archived from the original on September 24, 2015 ; accessed on December 14, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phil.uni-greifswald.de
  9. ↑ a b c Skull with bronze arrowhead recovered from the Tollensetal battlefield. (No longer available online.) Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania state portal, May 5, 2014, archived from the original on May 8, 2014 ; accessed on May 8, 2014 .
  10. ↑ a b Georg Beinlich: The First War - Battle in the Bronze Age. (No longer available online.) In: [w] how to know. August 29, 2013, archived from the original on June 1, 2016 ; accessed on June 2, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.daserste.de
  11. ↑ Jantzen, Terberger 2018, p. 277.
  12. ↑ a b More than 40 skulls found. Retrieved August 26, 2011 .
  13. ↑ Jantzen, Terberger 2018, p. 278.
  14. ↑ Beatrix Schmidt: Bloody Gold. Power and violence in the Bronze Age. Booklet accompanying the special exhibition. Ed .: State Office for Culture and Monument Preservation Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Schwerin August 2017, p. 23 ( regierung-mv.de [PDF; 11.2 MB ; accessed on March 1, 2018]).
  15. ^ Tollensetal Bronze Age battlefield: Warrior property recovered in Southern Germany from October 15, 2019
  16. ↑ Lars Fischer: The possession of a warrior at Spektrum.de from October 16, 2019
  17. ↑ In the luggage of a Bronze Age warrior at Wissenschaft.de on October 17, 2019
  18. ↑ Florian stark: The invaders may have come from the south at Welt Online on October 17, 2019
  19. ↑ Berthold Seewald: Long-distance trade provoked the greatest battle of the Bronze Age on welt.de , November 28, 2017
  20. ↑ Christa Herking, Julian Wiethold: Climate and vegetation during the Bronze Age - pollen analysis studies for the reconstruction of prehistoric environmental changes. In: Hauke ​​Jöns, Friedrich Lüth (Hrsg.): Myth and Magic: Bronze Age in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Archaeological treasures of the Bronze Age from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. (= Archeology in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Volume 3), State Office for Land Monument Preservation Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania 2004, pp. 18–23.
  21. ↑ Jantzen, Terberger 2018, p. 280 f.
  22. ^ The finds from the newly discovered site in the Tollensetal. (PDF; 1.0 MB) (No longer available online.) April 26, 2012, archived from the original on September 17, 2014 ; Retrieved April 28, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.uni-greifswald.de
  23. ↑ Oldest tin find discovered in Germany. (No longer available online.) April 26, 2012, archived from the original on September 13, 2012 ; Retrieved April 28, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.uni-greifswald.de
  24. ↑ Martina Rathke: Bronze Age battlefield with new finds. In: Nordkurier . April 27, 2012, p. 5.

Coordinates: 53 ° 44 ′ 35.3 "  N , 13 ° 18 ′ 38.9"  E