Blaubeuren Museum of Prehistory
 Holy Spirit hospital construction |
|
| Data | |
|---|---|
| place |
Blaubeuren , Baden-Württemberg 
|
| Art |
Archaeological collection ;
since 2012 : Branch of the Archaeological State Museum Baden-Württemberg |
| architect | unknown (around 1424) |
| opening | 1965 , redesign: 2014 |
| Number of visitors (annually) | 60,000 (2017 and 2018) |
| operator |
Foundation for Prehistoric Museum & Gallery 40,000 Years of Art Blaubeuren
|
| management |
Managing Director: Stefanie Kölbl,
Scientific Director: Nicholas Conard |
| Website | |
| ISIL | DE-MUS-022911 |
The Prehistory Museum Blaubeuren (URMU) at Kirchplatz 10 in Blaubeuren is the central focus museum for Paleolithic art and music in Baden-Württemberg . It has been a branch museum of the Baden-Württemberg State Archaeological Museum since 2012 .
The museum was founded in 1965 by Gustav Riek from the University of Tübingen . The city of Blaubeuren provided a room in the Hospital of the Holy Spirit for this purpose.
The sponsor of the museum is the foundation “Prehistoric Museum & Gallery 40,000 Years of Art Blaubeuren”. In 2014 the Blaubeuren Museum of Prehistory was redesigned and expanded.
Since July 2004 the Prehistory Museum Blaubeuren has been the information point of the UNESCO Geopark Swabian Alb .
presentation
In the museum, the central role of the Swabian Alb in the development of modern man in Europe is shown on 3000 square meters . The permanent exhibition has two floors. On the ground floor, visitors are introduced to the lifeworld of Ice Age humans, starting with the Neanderthals , in several rooms using experiment stations, media walls and tactile experiences .
The themed rooms on the upper floor are dedicated to the first appearance of art worldwide and the presumed intellectual background of these artefacts . Fauna and flora of the Swabian Alb in the Stone Age are presented as well as the regional circumstances of the Ice Age .
The Venus vom Hohle Fels has been a center of attraction of the Prehistoric Museum since 2014 . The approximately six centimeters high, made of mammoth - ivory carved Venus figurines , which in September 2008 in Hohle Fels in Schelklingen was discovered worldwide with their age of about 40 000 years ago the oldest woman representation.
The flute made from a wing bone of a griffon vulture was found in Hohle Fels. It is currently the most complete instrument and, at around 40,000 years old, is one of the oldest known musical instruments in the world.
The phallus from Hohle Fels was assembled from 14 fragments . The roughly 30,000 year old and almost 20 centimeter long work of art made of gray-green siltstone weighs 287 grams .
The original female statuette Venus vom Hohle Fels is exhibited here, as is the much younger Venus vom Vogelherd .
You can also see three relatively complete flutes , two from Geißenklösterle and one from Hohle Fels , which are among the oldest musical instruments in the world. The different ice age flutes of the Eight Valley are made audible in their diversity in the museum - conveyed through experimental archeology and sound recordings with replicas. The differences are due, among other things, to the material: one flute is made of swan- wing bone , the second is made of griffon vulture , and the third is made of mammoth ivory.
In total (up to 2016) there are finds and relics of up to 24 flutes from this period. The melody formation on the bone flutes takes place via a number of holes that are not absolutely fixed. The flutes were probably blown over the sharp edge of the shaft or a notch and sounded pentatonic .
Unique mammoth ivory carvings and stone works are shown in the museum from the spectacles cave , the Sirgenstein and other Stone Age sites in the Blaubeurer region ( Gansersfels , Great Grotto at Rusenschloss , Helga-Abri , Kogelstein , Schmiechenfels ) . This includes the oldest representation of a phallus , which was also found in the Hohle Fels.
Special exhibitions and museum education
Every year the museum presents a special exhibition on an overarching annual theme that illuminates various aspects of the Ice Age. The Prehistory Museum Blaubeuren offers a diverse museum educational program for children, young people and adults.
Research history
The Blaubeuren Museum of Prehistory ultimately secures the return of over 150 years of archaeological excavation and research history in the region. In the Blau- and Achtal the archaeological development of the Paleolithic begins in the 19th century with Oscar Fraas (1824–1897) and his excavations in 1871 in the Hohle Fels. The effort to create clean and meaningful archaeological methods was continued by Robert Rudolf Schmidt (1882–1950), who set new standards for his subject with systematic excavations on the Sirgenstein in 1906.
After the Second World War, Gustav Riek (1900–1976) carried out numerous excavations in the vicinity of Blaubeuren from 1955 to 1964 . Mention should be made of his work in the eyeglass cave from 1955 to 1963, then from 1958 to 1961 in the cave rock including the Helga Abri . In 1959 the Great Grotto under the Rusenschloss came into his field of vision. The Geißenklösterle as an archaeological site was only discovered in 1957 by Reiner Blumentritt , then a student.
Joachim Hahn (1942–1997) followed up on this and carried out extensive excavations from 1974 until shortly before his death in 1997, primarily in the Geißenklösterle and the Hohle Fels. Hahn published over 100 writings, which often refer to his work in the Akhtal Valley and which underline the international importance of the Alb caves for the Upper Palaeolithic in a European dimension. After Hahn's death, Nicholas J. Conard (* 1961) and his international teams took over the scientific excavation work in the Ach Valley. He made important discoveries and finds that caused a worldwide sensation. Claus-Joachim Kind (* 1953) carried out new excavations on the Kogelstein in 1987 and 1996 and in the Hohlenstein in the Lone Valley from 2008 to 2013 , which ultimately led to the re-evaluation of the lion man who found his place in the Ulm Museum .
All these steps, including the arduous intermediate steps, contributed to an overall picture of the Ice Age and Stone Age, which is now extensively presented in the Prehistoric Museum.
See also
- Society for Prehistory and Friends of the Prehistory Museum Blaubeuren
- Caves and ice age art of the Swabian Alb
- Prehistory of Baden-Württemberg
- Archäopark Vogelherd
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ S. Kölbl, B. Spreer, J. Wiedmann, G. Hiller: The new conception of the Urgeschichtliches Museum Blaubeuren . In: Communications from the Society for Prehistory . 24 (2015), pp. 225-237.
- ^ Ice Age archeology on the Swabian Alb. The sites in the Ach and Lone Valley and in their surroundings , ed. by Nicholas J. Conard , Michael Bolus, Ewa Dutkiewicz and Sibylle Wolf, Kerns Verlag Tübingen, 2015, p. 257, ISBN 978-3-935751-24-7
- ^ Susanne C. Münzel and Nicholas J. Conard, Sounds from distant times. The flutes of the Aurignacien from the Swabian Alb , in: The return of the lion man. History - Myth - Magic. Book accompanying the exhibition, Jan Thorbecke Verlag, Ostfildern 2013, pp. 98-103, ISBN 978-3-7995-0542-0
- ↑ The research history follows the explanations in: Ice Age Archeology on the Swabian Alb. The sites in the Ach and Lone Valley and in their surroundings , ed. by Nicholas J. Conard , Michael Bolus, Ewa Dutkiewicz and Sibylle Wolf, Kerns Verlag Tübingen, 2015, pp. 32–37, ISBN 978-3-935751-24-7