Venus of Bierden

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Venus of Bierden

The engraved anthropomorphic representation of a woman's body on an early Mesolithic stone device from a find near Bierden in the district of Verden is called Venus von Bierden . The stone tool was found in 2011 during construction-accompanying archaeological prospecting before the laying of the Northern European Natural Gas Pipeline (NEL). Following a common terminology for this type of representation of the female body, she is addressed as Venus . The engraving is on a 5 × 7 cm sandstone . The time of origin of the artifact , which originally served as a retoucher for stone tools, can be traced back to around 9000 BC based on the find situation . To date. The engraving on the stone represents the oldest representation of women in northern Germany to date .

Reference

The site is about 1,600 meters from the current course of the Weser on a slightly elevated alluvial sand ridge in the lower terrace of the river valley. It is located between a former dune area and the Geest on the edge of the river valley. This area was subject to human use through settlements and burial grounds that can be dated to the Stone Age , the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age . In the Stone Age, the elevated point near the river offered hunter-gatherer groups as a storage place. It was protected from destruction by agriculture by a layer of ash that was up to 60 cm thick, which was applied over time .

discovery

Excavation manager Klaus Gerken discovered the stone device with the Venus von Bierden in Bierden .

Before the North European Natural Gas Pipeline (NEL) was laid, the Lower Saxony State Office for Monument Preservation carried out extensive prospecting measures on the natural gas route , for which up to 13  excavation companies carried out archaeological investigations on the site. In the summer of 2011, an excavation team excavated the remains of a Bronze Age settlement near a railway embankment near Bierden on a large area of ​​almost 5000 m² . In order to identify other findings, such as post depressions , the layers of the recent , medieval and Bronze Age soil were removed down to the late glacial Holocene sand subsoil. In this soil horizon there was an area of ​​around 60 m² with a wide range of flint artefacts , which are not to be seen in the Bronze Age context, but have an older, Stone Age origin. Several thousand artifacts were recovered during the excavation, including burins , scratches, blades and microliths . In addition, the remains of a fireplace with burned animal bones were found, including wild horses and beavers , which confirmed the assumption of a Stone Age camp. The found material also included several retouchers from metamorphic rock . Among them was a quartzitic sandstone found by the excavation manager Klaus Gerken with intentionally set incised lines that gave the excavation team the impression of a stylized woman's body. Based on the pipeline abbreviation NEL , this find object was initially nicknamed Nelly , which briefly changed to the name Venus von Bierden . Sometimes the term "Nelly, the Venus von Bierden" is used. A similar site was archaeologically examined around 50 meters from the site. Both sites in Lower Saxony represent significant Mesolithic sites with further research potential, which so far could only be investigated to a limited extent within the framework of the pipeline laying.

Stone and engraving

Engraving of the sandstone

The sandstone used as a retoucher was used to chop off the edges of other stone artifacts. It was also obviously used to smooth soft materials. The stone shows three activity phases with different uses based on its scratches, grinding and polishing traces. After the engraving , it was less used in its original function for processing stone material.

The engraving consists of two converging incised lines that appear to represent the leg and body of an undressed woman. The left side of the body is pronounced. At first glance, it appears to be a frontal view of a woman. Like other Stone Age depictions of women, the representation shows neither head nor feet. The pubic area between the legs is indicated as a notch. There is a small depression in the area of ​​the belly button , although it is not yet certain whether it is intentionally set or whether it is a trace of use on the retoucher. The lines could also be a multidimensional view, in which the more curved line represents the side view of a woman with pronounced buttocks . Such buttocks-emphasizing depictions are well known from the Stone Age. Likewise, the more pronounced line in the side view could represent the belly of a pregnant woman.

Dating and interpretation

The sandstone with the engraving was found in a preboreal layer context in the area of ​​flint artifacts, which technologically and typologically stand between inventories of the penknife groups (12,000-10,800 BC) and inventories of the early Mesolithic (from 9600 BC). Dating using the radiocarbon method , which was carried out on the charcoal remains of the fireplace, resulted in a time between 9200 and 8800 BC. Since the sandstone is stratigraphically and contextually secured, its period of use is documented in the early Mesolithic. Similar stylized representations of people are already known from the Magdalenian period (18,000-12,000 BC).

presentation

The find was part of the special exhibition In the Golden Section - Lower Saxony's longest excavation between August 2013 and March 2014 in the Lower Saxony State Museum in Hanover. There it was not referred to as Venus von Bierden , but as a “retoucher made of sandstone with incised lines”, which, analogous to the Paleolithic finds, shows the oldest representation of women in northern Germany. The theme of the exhibition was the excavations carried out between 2010 and 2013 on the NEL's natural gas route . The excavations represented the largest archeology project in Lower Saxony to date and, with around 150 sites, led to the discovery of largely unknown settlement sites and burial grounds . Since the Lower Saxony State Office for the Preservation of Monuments is endeavoring to make the finds from the NEL route available to local museums, the Venus von Bierden could in future find its place in the canon house , the historical museum in Verden .

From September 21, 2018 to January 6, 2019, the "Venus von Bierden" was shown in the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin in the exhibition Moving Times. Archeology shown in Germany , which took place on the occasion of the European Cultural Heritage Year 2018.

criticism

Doubts about the figurative representation

It is controversial whether the Venus von Bierden can even be interpreted as a representation of a human figure. It is certain that the sandstone used as a retoucher was modified by human hands and, due to the find situation, can be dated to the early Mesolithic. On various occasions, doubts are expressed as to whether the incised lines are to be regarded as figurative, since no similar representations are known from the north German lowlands of this period. The lack of such finds may be due to the poor conservation conditions in the decalcified, sandy soil of the lowlands. Organic materials such as bones , amber , leather and wood, on which such evidence can be expected, quickly perish in it. Furthermore, there are no caves in the lowlands with their favorable conservation conditions.

Controversial Venus name

Opening of the workshop on figural art from the Mesolithic site in Bierden by the prehistorian Thomas Terberger
Discussion event on women's representations of Ice Age art in the Lower Saxony State Museum

At the beginning of 2013, the British archaeologist Jill Cook initiated a discussion about the naming of Venus figurines at an exhibition on Ice Age art in the British Museum in London . The Venus von Willendorf shown there was declared a "sculpture of a woman" . Analogous to this, a debate about the long-established term technicus “ Venus ” developed around the Venus von Bierden . According to this, the term is based on the African Sara Baartman, who was exhibited as Vénus hottentote at the beginning of the 19th century, and as an art-historical genre term of the 19th century, it has a racist connotation. The cultural meaning of these objects with representations of the female body is still unclear. There are numerous interpretations, such as goddess worship , fertility symbol , ancestor cult or pin-up . The discussion led to a workshop in February 2014 with the participation of experts such as the prehistorians Svend Hansen and Thomas Terberger as well as Jill Cook from the British Museum and Christine Neugebauer-Maresch from the Austrian Academy of Sciences . The event under the tenor "New discovery of figural art from the Mesolithic site of Bierden 31 in the context of Stone Age depictions of women" was organized by the Lower Saxony State Museum and the Lower Saxony State Office for Monument Preservation in Hanover. Accompanying the topic “Stone Age pin-ups or mother goddess ?” There was a discussion event on women's representations of Ice Age art, moderated by the NDR journalist Margarete von Schwarzkopf .

literature

  • Klaus Gerken: In: Fundchronik Niedersachsen 2011 . (= News from Lower Saxony's prehistory , supplement 16). Theiss, Stuttgart 2013, ISBN 978-3-8062-2811-3 , pp. 232-234. ( Online )
  • Klaus Gerken: Late Paleolithic or early Mesolithic. The Venus von Bierden raises many questions. In: Reports on the preservation of monuments in Lower Saxony 32, 2012, Issue 1, pp. 39–40.
  • Klaus Gerken: Line girls on the route. In: Archeology in Germany 2012, issue 3, p. 50.
  • Henning Haßmann : Lower Saxony's longest excavation: a golden ratio. In: Babette Ludowici (Ed.): In the golden section. Lower Saxony longest excavation. Writing for the special exhibition in the Lower Saxony State Museum Hanover In the golden section - Lower Saxony's longest excavation . Petersberg 2013, p. 29.

Web links

Commons : Venus von Bierden  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bierdener Nelly had many girlfriends in kreiszeitung.de from February 16, 2012
  2. ↑ a b Nelly, the Venus von Bierden in the district of Verden
  3. ↑ The question of whether the incised lines on the sandstone represent the continuation of a long tradition or a coincidental parallel phenomenon must remain open; compare Klaus Gerken: In: Fundchronik Niedersachsen 2011, p. 234.
  4. ↑ Anke Ullrich Eliciting Age from the Stone Age Lady in Sunday Tip from September 11, 2011 and Eliciting Age from the Stone Age Lady in Kreiszeitung.de from September 11, 2011.
  5. ↑ Julia Voss: Very old masters. Ice Age in London in: FAZ from February 8, 2014
  6. ↑ Tina Hayessen: The Emancipation of Venus in Weser-Kurier from February 10, 2014.
  7. ↑ Stone Age pin-up or mother goddess? ( Memento of the original from February 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. in Archeology in Germany from February 6, 2014 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.aid-magazin.de
  8. ↑ Events in the State Museum
  9. ^ Reports on the preservation of monuments 2011/1

Coordinates: 53 ° 1 '24.8 "  N , 8 ° 59' 48.2"  E