Gutenstein sword scabbard
The sword scabbard by Gutenstein is a splendidly decorated sword scabbard of a spathe from the 7th century, which was found in today's Sigmaringen district of Gutenstein in the grave of an Alemannic warrior . The peculiarity of this sword scabbard is the rare representation of animal warriors or people with animal masks in the 7th century , which has few parallels in Europe.
Discovery story
In 1887, during construction work in the immediate vicinity of Gutenstein's St. Gallus Church, the row graves of two men were found. In one of the graves there was, among other things, the silver scabbard. The Sigmaringen building supervisor Eduard Eulenstein (1841-1896) probably acquired the find from the pharmacist and early and early researcher Hieronymus Edelmann (1853-1922), who lived in Ebingen (now Albstadt ), later in Sigmaringen and Munich . After Eulenstein's death, the valuable exhibit with inventory number II c 2830/31 came into the possession of the Museum of Prehistory and Early History in Berlin . In 1945 the Red Army Trophy Commission confiscated Gutenstein's sword scabbard , along with other exhibits from the irreplaceable category . Since then, it has been in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow as a cultural asset or looted art brought to it during the war . The actual whereabouts of the sword scabbard was uncertain for many years, as no information about it came from Moscow. Only with the preparations for the exhibition Merovingian Age - Europe without Borders in the Pushkin Museum was the whereabouts officially clarified.
Replicas of Gutenstein's sword scabbard are in the Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum (RGZM) in Mainz , in the Landesmuseum Württemberg in Stuttgart and in the Archaeological Museum Colombischlössle in Freiburg im Breisgau .
Description and interpretation
The sword scabbard consists of thin silver plates which are fixed to a wooden base with bronze fittings. The silver plates have embossed ornaments and decorations. The front of the scabbard is divided into three superimposed fields by two horizontal, riveted bronze bands.
In the top row, a person with an animal head mask turned to the right or an animal warrior , a so-called wolf warrior, is depicted, who probably has his role model from pagan mythology . He wears calf-length clothing, holds a lowered lance in his right hand and a ring sword in a decorated scabbard in his left hand. The head or mask has the characteristics of a stylized wolf. A small braided ornament in animal style I has been inserted below the stand horizon . The field below is divided vertically in the middle by an ornament with gold-plated rivets . In these two fields there are six ornaments arranged in pairs in shapes that are also typical of animal style I. The lowest field is filled with an animal vortex, a round swastika with stylized animal heads. Swastics are a decorative motif that can often be found in prehistoric and early historical finds, which due to their tradition are interpreted as pagan symbols up to the times of syncretism . Only in later Christian, sacred art was the swastika reinterpreted as a cross . With its symbolism, which can still be addressed as pagan, such as the animal warrior and the animal vortex, Gutenstein's sword scabbard is a valuable testimony to the times of radical Christianization among the Alemanni.
Similar images of animal warriors as on Gutenstein's sword scabbard can be found in the aristocratic graves of Obrigheim in the Palatinate , Sutton Hoo in England and Valsgärde in Sweden . Typologically , the representations can be assigned to the end of the 7th century.
Individual evidence
literature
- Julius Naue: The silver sword scabbard from Gutenstein (Grand Duchy of Baden). In: Communications from the Anthropological Society in Vienna. Volume XIX (NF Vol. IX), Vienna 1889, pp. 1-7.
- Friedrich Garscha: The sword scabbard from Gutenstein. In: Badisches Landesamt für Denkmalpflege (Ed.): Volk und Vorzeit. Popular booklets for Upper Rhine prehistory and early history. Karlsruhe 1/1939, pp. 1-11.
- Friedrich Garscha: The Alemanni in South Baden. Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 1970, pp. 82–83 and plate 31.
- Wilfried Menghin , Klaus Goldmann : Schliemann's Gold and the Treasures of Old Europe - From the Museum of Prehistory and Early History. A documentation. (State Museums in Berlin - Prussian Cultural Heritage). Ph. Von Zabern, Mainz 1993, ISBN 3-8053-1641-0 .
- Marion Bertram (Hrsg.): Merovingians: the antiquities in the museum for prehistory and early history / museum for prehistory and early history, State museums in Berlin - Prussian cultural property. Verlag Ph. Von Zabern, Mainz 1995, ISBN 3-8053-1701-8 .
- Wilfried Menghin, Marion Bertram (ed.): Merovingian time - Europe without borders. Archeology and history of the 5th to 8th centuries. Ed. Minerva, Wolfratshausen 2007, ISBN 978-3-938832-18-9 .
- Heiko Steuer : Lost since 1945, recently re-emerged - the sword scabbard from Gutenstein on the Upper Danube. In: Förderkreis Aräologie in Baden eV (Hrsg.): Archäologische Nachrichten aus Baden. Issue 76/77 (2008), ISSN 0178-045X , pp. 74-75.