A Bronze Age Spear-head found in Methwold Fen, Norfolk

1934 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 395-398 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Godwin ◽  
M. E. Godwin ◽  
J. G. D. Clark ◽  
M. H. Clifford
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Research Committee ◽  
Satisfactory Method ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
University Museum ◽  
The University

Few regions have yielded so many bronzes as the East Anglian fens, yet accurate records of the circumstances of their discovery exist for a small fraction only of the finds. This is very regretable since this evidence is usually of far more importance been than the objects found. In the case of the Methwold spear-head it has to some extent recovered by the diligence of Major Gordon Fowler, F.S.A., who interviewed the discoverer, Mr. John Harrod of Methwold, and obtained the object for the University Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology at Cambridge. The only completely satisfactory method is an immediate visit to the site of a discovery, and in this the Fenland Research Committee, which is vitally interested in such finds, is always keen to co-operate.The site of the discovery may be found immediately below the “un” of Queen's Ground, Methwold Fen (Norfolk 6 in. sheet LXXXI, S.E., 1906 edtn.; Long. 0° 28′ 57″, Lat. 52° 30′ 29″). The spear-head itself (fig. 1) has loops at the junction of the socket and wings. Mr. Estyn Evans, F.S.A., to whom a photograph has been submitted, is of the opinion that this type marks the transition from the Middle to the Late Bronze Age in Britain, in which case it would date from approximately 1000 B.C.It would, perhaps, be more conventional to ascribe the spear-head to the end of the Middle Bronze Age.

Origin, evolution and paleoepidemiology of brucellosis

2010 ◽  
Vol 139 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. D'ANASTASIO ◽  
T. STANISCIA ◽  
M. L. MILIA ◽  
L. MANZOLI ◽  
L. CAPASSO
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Lumbar Vertebrae ◽  
Direct Analysis ◽  
Australopithecus Africanus ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
University Museum ◽  
The University ◽  
And Diffusion ◽  
Important Disease

SUMMARYBrucellosis is a worldwide disease. Although it has been eradicated in some countries, it continues to be an important disease in many farming areas. Previous works have described the evolution and diffusion of brucellosis in antiquity through direct analysis of ancient human remains collected by the University Museum of Chieti, Italy, and by using paleopathological and historical data. The earliest published case was reported in a skeletal individual dated to the Middle Bronze Age. However, our research group has diagnosed vertebral brucellosis in the partial skeleton of the late Pliocene Australopithecus africanus, demonstrating that this infectious disease occasionally affected our direct ancestors 2·3–2·5 million years ago. The frequency of brucellosis increased during the Roman period, when the disease would almost certainly have been endemic in Roman society, and during the Middle Ages. Most paleopathological cases involve adult male skeletal individuals, and lumbar vertebrae and sacroiliac joints are most commonly involved.

scholarly journals Etnesjøen – en førromersk landsby på Vestlandet

Viking ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 85 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Søren Diinhoff
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Settlement Area ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Western Norway ◽  
Top Soil ◽  
University Museum ◽  
The University

In the summer months of 2013, the University Museum of Bergen conducted an archeological excavation of a large prehistoric settlement area at Etnesjøen in Etne parish, Western Norway. By use of mechanized top soil stripping numerous buildings, inhumation burials, cooking pits and kilns were uncovered. The site dates from the Late Bronze Age to Early Medieval Period. The focus of the article is the discovery of a Pre-Roman Iron Age village, formed of up to six farms chronologically spanning up to five generations of continuous occupation. At the time of the excavation, this was only the second pre-historic village of its kind found in Norway, indicating a significant and important discovery. 

Toward the Reconstruction of a Sacred Landscape of the Judean Highlands

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-41
Author(s):  
Aaron A. Burke
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Sacred Landscape ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Landscape Features ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Divine Name

Abstract At least a dozen biblical toponyms for sites and landscape features in ancient Judah’s highlands bear divine name elements that were most common during the Middle and Late Bronze Ages. In light of archaeological evidence from many of these sites, it is suggested that they were first settled as part of a settlement influx in the highlands during the Middle Bronze Age (ca. 2000–1550 BCE), following a reemergence of urbanism and a return of economic development that occurred under Amorite aegis. The cultic orientation of these sites may be suggested by reference to ritual traditions at Mari during the Middle Bronze Age but especially Ugarit during the Late Bronze Age. Such evidence may also serve to elucidate the various enduring cultic associations that persisted in connection with these locations during the Iron Age, as preserved in various biblical traditions.

Second Thoughts on ‘Mycenaean’ Pottery in Ithaca

1949 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 307-312 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvia Benton
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Curtain ◽  
Contemporary Culture ◽  
Nearest Neighbours ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Determining Factor

When I wrote my report on the excavation of Polis, Ithaca, the leader of the expedition had suggested that in Ithaca, Early Bronze Age pottery had persisted till the closing phases of the Late Bronze Age, which meant that Ithaca was a backward little place well away from the broad stream of contemporary culture. I thought it possible that there was another lag after the Late Bronze Age, and I called certain vases ‘Mycenaean,’ taking fabric to be the determining factor. My paper was written in 1932, but not published till 1942, and long before then I was sure that we were both wrong. Mr. Heurtley wished to account for the presence of fifty Mycenaean sherds in an Early Bronze Age Settlement at Pilikata. It is true that no Middle Bronze Age settlement has yet been found in Ithaca. That may be our bad fortune, or the island may have been uninhabited in the centuries before 1500 B.C., as it was in the sixteenth century A.D. It seems simpler to admit disturbance by any later diggers of foundations or seekers of wells, than to postulate an iron curtain between Ithaca and both its nearest neighbours, Kephallenia and Leukas, in the Middle Bronze Age. After all, Early, Middle, and Late Bronze Age sherds were found together in Area VI at Pilikata, and no house plans have resulted; some disturbance seems inevitable.

The Later Bronze Age in Ireland in the light of recent research

1964 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 268-351 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Eogan
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Early Late ◽  
The Bronze Age

The term ‘Later Bronze Age’ is being used in this paper to cover that period of the Bronze Age in Ireland that started around 1200 B.C. and continued on until supplanted by iron-using cultures during the second half of the first millennium B.C. This term provides a means of escaping from the nomenclature that is applied to the period covering the last two centuries of the second millennium B.C. and the beginning of the first millennium B.C., a phase considered by some as a late Middle Bronze Age and by others as an early Late Bronze Age. Here both terms are being avoided and the period is called the ‘Bishopsland Phase’. This is followed by the ‘Roscommon Phase’ of roughly the 9th and a large part of the 8th centuries B.C. Finally comes the ‘Dowris Phase’. It is hoped that this new terminology will allow the Irish material to be more readily incorporated in any future overall scheme for the Bronze Age in Great Britain and Ireland. The Middle Bronze Age in Ireland is here restricted to cover approximately the 14th and 13th centuries B.C.

Cairnpapple Revisited: 1948–1998

1999 ◽  
Vol 65 ◽  
pp. 17-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gordon J. Barclay
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Phase 1 ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Phase 2 ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Phase 3 ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Middle Bronze Age

It is 50 years since Stuart Piggott excavated the prehistoric complex at Cairnpapple. At that time there were few excavated parallels in Scotland, and interpretation inevitably relied heavily on sites excavated in southern Britain. Much more locally relevant data are now available and the sequence at Cairnpapple can now be reassessed its regional context.Piggott identified five Periods, commencing with a stone setting, ‘cove’ and cremation cemetery of ‘Late Neolithic date’ around ‘c. 2500 B.C.’. Period II was a henge monument, consisting of a ‘circle’ of standing stones with ceremonial burials in association, and an encircling ditch with external bank – ‘Of Beaker date, probably c. 1700 B.C.’ Period III comprised the primary cairn, containing two cist-burials ‘Of Middle Bronze Age date, probably c. 1500 B.C.’ Period IV involved the doubling of the size of the cairn, with two cremated burials in inverted cinerary urns. ‘Of final Middle Bronze Age or native Late Bronze Age date, probably c. 1000 B.C.’ Period V comprised four graves ‘possibly Early Iron Age within the first couple of centuries A.D.’The present paper, using comparable material from elsewhere in Scotland, argues for a revised phasing: Phase 1, comprises the deposition of earlier Neolithic plain bowl sherds and axehead fragments with a series of hearths. This is comparable to ‘structured deposition’ noted on other sites of this period. Phase 2 involved the construction of the henge – a setting of 24 uprights – probably of timber rather than stone, probably followed by the encircling henge ditch and bank. The ‘cove’ is discussed in the context of comparable features in Scotland. Phase 3 saw the construction of a series of graves, including the monumental ‘North Grave’, which was probably encased in a cairn. Piggott's ‘Period III’ cairn was then built, followed by the ‘Period IV’ cairn. The urn burials seem likely to have been inserted into the surface of this mound, which may have covered a burial (since disturbed) on the top of the Period III mound, or may have been a deliberate monumentalising of it. The four graves identified as Iron Age by Piggott seem more likely to be from the early Christian period.The reassessment of Piggott's report emphasises the value of the writing of a clear, and sufficiently detailed account. While no report can be wholly objective it can be seen that Piggott's striving for objectivity led him to write a paper that is of lasting value.

scholarly journals Bronze Age and Iron Age Archaeology at Thainstone Business Park, Inverurie, Aberdeenshire

2021 ◽  
Vol 95 ◽  
pp. 1-39
Author(s):  
Sue McGalliard ◽  
Donald Wilson ◽  
Laura Bailey ◽  
H E M Cool ◽  
Gemma Cruickshanks ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Archaeological Excavation ◽  
Commercial Development ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Age Structures

Headland Archaeology (UK) Ltd was commissioned by Axiom Project Services to undertake an archaeological excavation in advance of a commercial development at Thainstone Business Park, Aberdeenshire. Excavation identified the remains of a Middle Bronze Age roundhouse and a contemporary urned cremation cemetery. Evidence of Late Bronze Age cremation practices was also identified. A large roundhouse and souterrain dominated the site in the 1st or 2nd century ad. Material culture associated with the Iron Age structures suggested a degree of status to the occupation there.

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