Monuments and Memories Set in Stone: a Cornish Bronze Age Ceremonial Complex in its Landscape (on Stannon Down)

2006 ◽  
Vol 72 ◽  
pp. 341-365 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andy M. Jones
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
China Clay ◽  
Single Column ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Middle Iron Age ◽  
The Bronze Age

Three seasons of archaeological fieldwork were carried out in 1998–2000 by Cornwall Archaeological Un within the Imerys Stannon China Clay Works, Bodmin Moor. The first two seasons involved the excavation of an Early Bronze Age cairn group and Middle Bronze Age and Middle Iron Age settlement activity. The third season on the Northern Downs involved the evaluation a number of cairns, field systems, and palaeoenvironmental sites.The cairn group consisted of three earlier Bronze Age ring-cairns and two ‘tailed’ cairns. One ring-cairn continued to be used as a ceremonial monument in the Middle Bronze Age and was reused during the Iron Age as a dwelling. An artefact assemblage including Bronze and Iron Age pottery and stonework was recovered. Two prehistoric beads one of faience, the other of amber, were also found.Ten Bronze Age radiocarbon determinations spanning 2490–1120 cal BC and two Iron Age determinations (370–40 cal BC) were obtained from three of the cairns. Two pollen columns on the Northern Downs were also dated. Significantly, a series of eight determinations was obtained from a single column, which provided environmental information from the Mesolithic through to the early medieval period. The radiocarbon dating showed that impact on the vegetation of the Down commenced during the Neolithic, with larger-scale clearance during the Bronze Age. Widespread open grassland was established by the Middle Bronze Age.It is suggested here that use of space within the cairn group was structured and that the cairns formed a monument complex which was part of a wider landscape cosmology, involving groupings of particular monument types and the referencing of rocky outcrops and tors.The investigations on Stannon Down were important as an opportunity to study an Early Bronze Age ceremonial landscape and reconsider how later Middle Bronze Age and Iron Age peoples on Bodmin Moor might have engaged with and interpreted the materiality of earlier prehistoric monuments.

Hot Stone Technology at Bucklers Park, Crowthorne, Berkshire: The Use and Re-use of a Persistent Place During the Bronze and Iron Ages

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-30
Author(s):  
Helen Chittock ◽  
Robert Masefield ◽  
Enid Allison ◽  
Anne Crone ◽  
Derek Hamilton ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Organic Material ◽  
Remote Area ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Middle Iron Age

Archaeological investigations at Bucklers Park in Crowthorne have revealed a window onto a significant later prehistoric place, which was used and revisited over 1700 years between the Early Bronze Age and later Iron Age (c. 1800–100 bc). Activity on site was based around the heating of water using fire-heated flint, producing three mounds of fire-cracked flint and burnt organic material. These ‘burnt mounds’ are known across later prehistoric Britain and Ireland, but the ways they may have been formed are uncertain, and they are arguably under-discussed in southern Britain. Whilst water was initially drawn from a stream, a series of wells were established at the site between the Middle Bronze Age and Early Iron Age, one of which contained a well-preserved log ladder. These wells were revisited and recut over long periods of time and during the Middle Iron Age the site’s function shifted dramatically when a roundhouse was constructed. The long-term use of the site, its excellent organic preservation, dating, and its location in a remote area on the Bagshot Heath, make it significant. This paper summarises the findings from the excavations, discussing the formation of the site in the context of wider research on later prehistoric burnt mounds.

Bogs, Bodies and Burnt Mounds: Visits to the Soar Wetlands in the Neolithic and Bronze Age

2012 ◽  
Vol 78 ◽  
pp. 173-206 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan Ripper ◽  
Matthew Beamish ◽  
A. Bayliss ◽  
C. Bronk Ramsey ◽  
A. Brown ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Radiocarbon Dating ◽  
Violent Death ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Long Period ◽  
Animal Bones ◽  
The Bronze Age

The recording and analysis of a burnt mound and adjacent palaeochannel deposits on the floodplain of the River Soar in Leicestershire revealed that the burnt mound was in use, possibly for a number of different purposes, at the transition from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age. An extensive radiocarbon dating programme indicated that the site was revisited. Human remains from the palaeochannel comprised the remains of three individuals, two of whom pre-dated the burnt mound by several centuries while the partial remains of a third, dating from the Late Bronze Age, provided evidence that this individual had met a violent death. These finds, along with animal bones dating to the Iron Age, and the remains of a bridge from the early medieval period, suggest that people were drawn to this location over a long period of time.

scholarly journals On the influence of Vatin and Verbicioara cultures in the finds of the Gamzigrad cultural group

Starinar ◽  
2009 ◽  
pp. 53-69
Author(s):  
Aleksandar Kapuran
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Small Area ◽  
Ceramic Materials ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Cultural Elements ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Middle Iron Age ◽  
The Bronze Age

The Timocka Krajina region has not been sufficiently investigated archaeologically, which coupled with the fact that a very small number of metal finds and remains have been discovered, makes the reconstruction of the start and end of the Bronze Age that much more difficult. Identification work in the area around Romuliana on two occasions in 2001 and 2008 led to the discovery of another 10 predominantly multi-layered sites dating back to the Bronze Age, of which 7 are highland settlements while 3 are lowland settlements located in the immediate vicinity of the Timok river or its tributaries. The discovered sites 1. Varsari, 2. Djokin Vis, 3. Kravarnik, 4. Mustafa, 5. Nikolov Savat, 6. Njiva Zore Brzanovic, 7. Petronj, 8. Potes-Petronj, 9. Strenjak and 10. Zvezdan; bare the characteristics of the material culture of the ?Gamzigrad group? of the Middle Iron Age. Besides known ceramic forms and characteristic ornamentation of this culture, there is a visibly strong influence of the Vatin (Crvenka-Cornes?i) and Verbicioara elements to a greater extent, and Paracin cultural elements to a lesser extent. Given that this material was collected during identification work, we are now aware of the stratigraphic relations between these elements, and have devoted more attention to common characteristics and interconnections from which certain conclusions can be drawn. Based on the finds from archaeological sites that have been excavated it can be concluded that the distribution of sites with Gamzigrad cultural characteristics is limited to a very small area, i.e. only to the vicinity of the Crni Timok river. Nearly at all sites, both highland and lowland, Vatin and Verbicioara elements are strongly visible on the ceramic materials. The geographic position of the Crni Timok, which is located in the area where the Paracin, Vatin and Verbichoar cultures connected and overlapped, could contribute to shedding light on the origin and characteristics of this phenomenon of the Middle Bronze Age in Eastern Serbia.

scholarly journals Emberi ábrázolás a Változások korában, 4000 és 2000 BC között

2014 ◽  
pp. 113-144
Author(s):  
Tünde Horváth
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Middle Age ◽  
Late Phase ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Copper Age ◽  
Cultural Impacts ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Archaeological Cultures ◽  
The Bronze Age

Our survey should by necessity begin earlier, from the close of the Middle Age Copper Age, and should extend to much later, at least until the onset of the Middle Bronze Age, in order to identify and analyse the appearance and spread of the cultural impacts affecting the Baden complex, their in-teraction with neighbouring cultures and, finally, their decline or transformation. Discussed here will be the archaeological cultures flourishing between 4200/4000 and 2200/2000 BC, from the late phase of the Middle Copper Age to its end (3600 BC), the Late Copper Age (ending in 2800 BC), the transi-tion between the Copper Age and the Bronze Age (ending in 2600 BC), and the Early Bronze Age 1–3 (ending in 2000 BC), which I have termed the Age of Transformation.

The first religious buildings: ‘sacred huts’

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte R. Potts
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Hot Springs ◽  
Central Italy ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Religious Activity ◽  
Neolithic Period ◽  
Religious Buildings ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
The Bronze Age

The votive assemblages that form the primary archaeological evidence for non-funerary cult in the Neolithic, Bronze, and early Iron Ages in central Italy indicate that there is a long tradition of religious activity in Latium and Etruria in which buildings played no discernible role. Data on votive deposits in western central Italy is admittedly uneven: although many early votive assemblages from Latium have been widely studied and published, there are few Etruscan comparanda; of the more than two hundred Etruscan votive assemblages currently known from all periods, relatively few date prior to the fourth century BC, while those in museum collections are often no longer entire and suffer from a lack of detailed provenance as well as an absence of excavations in the vicinity of the original find. Nevertheless, it is possible to recognize broad patterns in the form and location of cult sites prior to the Iron Age, and thus to sketch the broader context of prehistoric rituals that pre-dated the construction of the first religious buildings. In the Neolithic period (c.6000–3500 BC), funerary and non-funerary rituals appear to have been observed in underground spaces such as caves, crevices, and rock shelters, and there are also signs that cults developed around ‘abnormal water’ like stalagmites, stalactites, hot springs, and pools of still water. These characteristics remain visible in the evidence from the middle Bronze Age (c.1700–1300 BC). Finds from this period at the Sventatoio cave in Latium include vases containing traces of wheat, barley seed cakes, and parts of young animals including pigs, sheep, and oxen, as well as burned remains of at least three children. The openair veneration of underground phenomena is also implied by the discovery of ceramic fragments from all phases of the Bronze Age around a sulphurous spring near the Colonelle Lake at Tivoli. Other evidence of cult activities at prominent points in the landscape, such as mountain tops and rivers, suggests that rituals began to lose an underground orientation during the middle Bronze Age. By the late Bronze Age (c.1300–900 BC) natural caves no longer seem to have served ritual or funerary functions.

scholarly journals Bronze Age “pristinity”, Iron Age anthropization and Medieval intensification of human impact around Lake Montcortès (southern-central Pyrenees): a possible mid-elevation pattern and its significance for the definition of the Anthropocene

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valentí Rull ◽  
Teresa Vegas-Vilarrúbia ◽  
Juan Pablo Corella ◽  
Blas Valero-Garcé
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Human Impact ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Human Pressure ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Central Pyrenees

Abstract The varved sediments of Lake Montcortès (central Pyrenees) have provided a continuous and well-dated high-resolution record of the last ca. 3000 years. Previous chronological and sedimentological studies of this record have furnished detailed paleoenvironmental reconstructions. However, palynological studies are only available for the last millennium, and the vegetation and the landscape around the lake had already been transformed by humans by this time. Therefore, the primeval vegetation of Montcortès and the history of its anthropogenic transformations remains unknown. This paper presents a palynological analysis of the interval between the Late Bronze Age (ca. 1100 BCE) and the Early Medieval period (820 CE), aimed at recording the preanthropic conditions, the anthropization onset and the further landscape transformations. During the Late Bronze Age (ca. 1100 BCE to 770 BCE), the vegetation did not show any evidence of human impact. The decisive anthropogenic transformation of the Montcortès catchment vegetation and landscape started at the beginning of the Iron Age (770 BCE) and continued during Roman and Medieval times in the form of recurrent burning, grazing, cultivation, silviculture, hemp retting and other human activities. Some intervals of lower human pressure were recorded, but the original vegetation never returned. The anthropization that took place during the Iron Age did not cause relevant changes in the sediment yield to the lake, but a significant limnological shift occurred, as manifested in the initiation of varve formation, a process that has been continuous until today. Climatic shifts seem to have played a secondary role in influencing catchment vegetation and landscape changes from the Iron Age onwards. These results contrast with previous inferences of low anthropogenic impact until the Medieval Period, at a regional level (central Pyrenees). The intensification of human pressure in Early Medieval times (580 CE onwards) has also been observed in Lake Montcortès, but the overall anthropization of its watershed had already commenced a couple of millennia before, at the beginning of the Iron Age. It could be interesting to verify whether the same pattern – i.e., Late Bronze “pristinity”, Iron Age anthropization and Early Medieval intensification of human pressure – may be a recurrent pattern for mid-elevation Pyrenean landscapes below the tree line. This pattern complicates the definition of the “Anthropocene”, as it adds a new dimension, i.e., elevational diachronism, to the anthropization of mountain ranges, in general.

scholarly journals Sten som betydelsebärare i den förhistoriska föreställningsvärlden

AmS-Varia ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 77-86
Author(s):  
Marianne Lönn
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Migration Period ◽  
Basic Change ◽  
Late Iron Age ◽  
Similar Appearance ◽  
The Bronze Age

This article discusses the meaning of stones and the practice of gathering stones, in graves, clearance cairns and stone-covered hillocks. The emphases are on stone-covered hillocks and their long-term usage (up to 1500 years), analyzed using the concept of longue durée. In this paper I propose that the stones in themselves have a cultic meaning as well as the actions, i.e. the remodeling of hillocks and the placing of clearance cairns among graves. In this, I see a connection between stone-covered hillocks, graves and clearance cairns. The underlying concept is a stable, but slowly changing, prehistoric religious tradition that lasted from the Bronze Age to the Migration Period and possibly also through the Late Iron Age. A basic change in this does not take place until the coming of Christianity in the Medieval Period. The reason that Medieval and later clearance cairns were placed together with graves is probably due to their similar appearance.

scholarly journals Formation And Development Of Military Architecture In Fergana (Antiquity, Early Middle Ages)

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 106-109
Author(s):  
Dedakhanov Bakhodir
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Evolutionary Development ◽  
Historical Period ◽  
Military Architecture ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Characteristic Features ◽  
The Bronze Age

The article reveals the problem of the development of military architecture in the territory of ancient Fergana, based on the long-term research of archaeologists of Uzbekistan. It identifies the main factors that have contributed to the improvement of this architecture. In each separately taken historical period, starting from the Bronze Age, the author defines the characteristic features of the fortification architecture of Fergana cities based on specific examples. At the same time, a comparative analysis with neighboring historical and cultural regions (Sogd and Khorezm) is performed, and the issues of the continuity of traditions and evolutionary development in this type of structure are revealed using the examples of military architecture of the early medieval period.

Курган ямной культуры на южном берегу р. Егорлык

2020 ◽  
pp. 10-31
Author(s):  
Erdni A. Kekeev ◽  
◽  
Maria A. Ochir-Goryaeva ◽  
Evgeny G. Burataev ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Transition Period ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Eastern Slope ◽  
The North ◽  
North Eastern ◽  
Excavation Work ◽  
The Bronze Age

The article presents materials from the excavation work of the mound 1 from the Egorlyk group. The mound was formed over two burials of the Yamnaya culture of the early Bronze Age era. The only inlet burial was placed in the center of the mound during the transition period from the late Bronze Age to the early Iron Age. The discovery of this monument is significant because it is the first monument of the Bronze Age explored on the north-eastern slope of the Stavropol height, in-between the rivers Egorlyk and Kalaus and bounded from the east by the lake Manych.

Archaeological Investigation of the “Lozianska Mogila” Barrow located near the Village of Boyanovo, Municipality of Elkhovo, in South-eastern Bulgaria

2015 ◽  
Vol 90 (1-2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniela Agre
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Stratigraphic Sequence ◽  
Archaeological Investigation ◽  
Relative Chronology ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Burial Rites ◽  
Bronze Ancien ◽  
The Village

Es werden die Ergebnisse der Ausgrabung an einem Grabhügel „Lozianska Mogila” in den Jahren 2007 und 2009 vorgestellt. Insgesamt 21 Gräber wurden darin entdeckt, die sich auf drei stratigraphische Schichten verteilten. Der erste Hügel barg zehn Bestattungen, die in die frühe Bronzezeit datieren. Vier Gräber wurden während der mittleren Bronzezeit in diesen Hügel eingelassen. Über sie wurde eine weitere, die zweite Aufschüttung errichtet. In sie wurden die weiteren sechs mittelbronzezeitlichen Gräber eingetieft. Eine längere Zeit wurde der Grabhügel danach nicht mehr belegt. Erst in der Eisenzeit wurde ein weiteres Grab errichtet, das mit einer dritten und letzten Aufschüttung überdeckt wurde. Jede Bestattung wird innerhalb eines Kataloges in dem Artikel beschrieben.Die Kennzeichen der Bestattungssitten und der Grabkonstruktionen werden zusammen mit den Beigaben getrennt für die frühe und die mittlere Bronzezeit besprochen. Von besonderem Interesse ist dieCet article présente les résultats de fouilles entreprises en 2007 et 2009 dans le tumulus de « Lozianska Mogila » sur le territoire de la Bulgarie moderne. Vingt-etune sépultures et trois niveaux stratigraphiques ont été découverts. Le tumulus le plus ancien contenait dix sépultures du Bronze Ancien. Quatre sépultures du Bronze Moyen ont été insérées dans ce tumulus. Un second niveau a recouvert ces quatre sépultures et six autres sépultures du Bronze Moyen ont taillé ce niveau. Une sépulture datant de l’âge du Fer fut ajoutée après une longue période d’abandon et ensuite recouverte d’une troisième et dernière couche de terre. Chaque ensemble funéraire fait l’objet d’une description détaillée et les aspects caractéristiques des sépultures du Bronze Ancien et Moyen, leur construction, les rites funéraires ainsi que l’inventaire du mobilier sont présentés. Une datation radiocarbone obtenue pour la tombe no. 14 est d’intérêt particulier : une date de 2888–2676 cal BC nous permet de l’attribuer à la phase Bronze Ancien II (en termes de chronologie relative bulgare). Nous accordons aussi une attention particulière à la dernière sépulture du tumulus, datée de la première moitié du IVe siècle av. J.-C. sur la base de trouvailles semblables en Bulgarie méridionale.The results of excavations in 2007 and 2009 of the “Lozianska Mogila” barrow in present-day Bulgaria are presented here. Twenty-one graves were discovered in the barrow and a stratigraphic sequence of three layers was observed. The earliest barrow contained ten graves dated to the Early Bronze Age. Four burials of the Middle Bronze Age were dug into this early tumulus. A second layer was then heaped on these four graves and six other graves dating to the Middle Bronze Age were cut into it. After a longer period of disuse another grave was built in the Iron Age and then covered by the third and last layer. The article contains a detailed description of each grave complex. Characteristic aspects of the burial rites and grave construction as well as the inventory of the Early and Middle Bronze Age complexes are discussed in turn. The radiocarbon date obtained for grave no. 14, with a time span of 2888–2676 cal BC is of particular interest and corresponds to its archaeological attribution to the Early Bronze Age II (in terms of Bulgarian relative chronology). Special attention is also given to the latest grave in the barrow, which parallels in southern Bulgaria would date to the first half of the 4

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