Re: Jastorf - Przeworsk

M. Shchukin
Rome and the Barbarians in Central and Eastern Europe
1st Century B.C. - 1st Century A.D.

'Chapter V
The Przeworsk and Oksywie Cultures.

The Jastorf-Seedorf population had as its eastern neighbours the bearers of two similar cultures, the Przeworsk and Oksywie. These neighbours also lived in unfortified settlements and cremated their dead, burying them in large cemeteries. The Przeworsk burial ritual differed from the Jastorf (which employed burial urns) in that the vitrified bones were placed in a pit, and surrounded by vessels, objects and weapons (which were ritually "killed" by bending or breaking). The Oksywie ritual consisted simply of transferring the entire remains of a funeral pyre into a pit. The similarities between these rituals lead some scholars to amalgamate both cultures into a single "burial pit culture", but this term did not gain acceptance.
The sphere of Przeworsk and Oksywie monuments coincides approximately with the territory of present-day Poland. The settlements contain dwellings which are either small and irregular semi-dugouts or post-structured surface buildings. Small two-chambered surface buildings are characteristic of the northern Oskywie region. The number of settlements studied is not great.

The burial ritual suggests that the Przeworsk and Oksywie populations were very war-like. The burials often contain weapons, either long swords of the Celtic type or short one-sided swords with flat handles (the latter preferred by Oksywsian warriors), spear tips which are occasionally ornamented and sometimes flame-shaped, iron shield bosses, handles and metal bindings from wooden shields, and spurs. The range of ceramics is distinctive and includes cylindrical mugs with small handles, small but massive mugs with big handles, pear-shaped vessels with ears-handles, krause (big three-part vessels with elongated necks and X-shaped handles, reminiscent of Jastorf forms), and bowls. Many vessels are distinguished by facetted rims. The vessels have both polished or specially roughened (hropovaty) surfaces. The range is more limited with the Oksywie culture: there are no cylindrical mugs, the krause are few, and the forms generally more squat. The burials as a rule contain little pottery.

The coincidence of polished and roughened pottery, together with facetted rims and some other features does suggest similarities with North European La Tène. But overall the balance of Przeworsk-Oksywie artefacts is different from the Jastorf's examples: there are fewer belt hooks, pins are virtually absent, and weapons are much more frequent. However, the fibulae are identical with Celtic models of the mid- and late La Tène type (illus. 12).

The origins of the Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures pose a problem which cannot be solved at present. Here on Polish territory archaeological evidence clearly demonstrates to us the duality of historical development.

Roughly at the same time as Northern Germany witnessed the emergence of the Jastorf civilisation and Celtic civilisation developed in the subalpine zone, a fundamental change was taking place in Poland. This was the decline of the widespread Lusatian culture, a rich and influential formation spanning the late Bronze and early Hallstatt periods, and its disintegration into many local variants and groups. At its height the Lusatian culture extended from the Saale to the Western Bug and the upper Pripyat, and from the Polish Baltic coast to the foothills of the Carpathians.

It is hard to tell whether the strongly fortified 5th-4th century BC Lusatian settlements met their end because of Scythian attacks148, or because of population decline caused by climatic changes at the threshold of the subatlantic periods149, or due to a combination of factors150. But it is clear that many settlements perished in flames, that many cemeteries were abandoned, and that the fields so carefully cultivated with plough and bone hoes for millet, wheat and bean crops became covered with dense forest.151

This picture is however not without exceptions. Already during Hallstatt C (VII-VI BC) the Cassubian group of Lusatian culture, in the northern part of Poland gave rise to an East-Pomeranian or simply Pomeranian culture152. Its socio-economic structure (they did not build large fortified settlements and grew mostly rye) probably made them better able to adapt to change. Being expansionist from the start, this culture had by the early La Tène time occupied most of the previously Lusatian territory except for its western parts. The bearers of western Lusatia groups, especially the Billendorf culture became assimilated into the Jastorf civilisation. This must account for certain similarities between Jastorf and Pomeranian pottery.

A view exists that there was no seizure of Lusatian lands by the Pomeranians, but that the Lusatian tribes gradually adopted Pomeranian agricultural techniques and thereafter a range of other ways as well153. One possibility need not rule out the other, but even if both developments proceeded in parallel, there is no way to distinguish them on the basis of archaeological evidence.

The combination of Pomeranian and Lusatian elements, with the former predominating, gave rise in eastern Poland to the so-called "Podkleshowa burial" culture. This name derives from a ritual where the remains were covered by a large overturned "klesh" pot. The remains were placed in a smaller urn beneath the 'Klesh", so the internment resembled something like a bell - hence the German term Glockengräber (Bell Grave) for these burials. Other Pomeranians normally placed the urn in stone boxes. The Bell Grave culture is are interpreted either as an independent culture or as a variant of the Pomeranian.

It is quite possible that Lusatian islands continued to survive through the Pomeranian inundation. Polish scholars suppose that some such Lusatian groups survived, particularly in southern Poland which the Pomeranians did not effectively reach, for over 300 years up to the late La Tène period. Some believe that these groups were the basis from which Przeworsk culture was to develop154. These late Lusatian groups were very conservative and it is impossible to distinguish them, in their La Tène setting, from their Hallstatt ancestors.

It is therefore of course, impossible to prove the thesis, but otherwise one can not explain why Przeworsk ritual and pottery is nearer to ancient Lusatian parallels than to immediately preceding Pomeranian forms (i.e. urns with masks, stone boxes and "Klesh" vessels). The problem is far from being solved. We can, for now, speak in terms of a single Lusatian-Podkleschowa-Pomeranian milieu, from which developed the similar and related Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures.

This development, we believe, was preceded by some major social upheaval or the arrival of a new alien population, because in a short space of time the area occupied by relatively scattered late Pomeranian or Lusatian-Podkleshowa-Pomeranian settlements experienced the arrival of two distinctive and war-like cultures who bore little resemblance to their local predecessors. Their nature is so different as to suggest that these people either developed somewhere beyond Polish territory and arrived here with their own culture intact155, or developed locally under alien influences156. It is difficult however to speculate archaeologically on the origin of these newcomers and where their culture may have formed.

Recent studies tend to agree that the Przeworsk culture emerged in conditions of upheaval which simultaneously affected the local Pomeranian or Pomeranian-Lusatian population, the Celts and the newcomers from the west and north-west. However, the impact on all three groupings has been interpreted differently157. D.A. Machinsky, K. Godl/owski and others link the origins of this process to those events which further eastward account for the rise of the Poienes,t,i-Lukashevka and Zarubintsy cultures in Moldavia and the Dnieper regions respectively. It is unfortunately impossible to dwell here on the arguments of all these authors regarding the origins of Przeworsk culture. The comments which follow are only intended to add some nuances to the debate, without aspiring towards the presentation of any broader hypothesis.

The problem of Pomeranian-Przeworsk relations is compounded by the very nature of the archaeological evidence. The upper chronological limit of Pomeranian monuments can not be fixed reliably because Pomeranian sites yield few imports and the variants of early La Tène fibulae of Duchcov type are few in number. The earliest Przeworsk artefacts are the "segmented" or "disjointed" mid-La Tène fibulae variant A after Kostrzewski. The origins therefore coincide with the beginning of NELT, and we have already touched on the unclear character of the dating problems associated with the early stages of NELT.

There is a certain gap between the latest fibulae of the Pomeranian culture and the earliest Przeworsk variant A brooches, but Polish scholars have noted a strange feature of relevance. The occasional Pomeranian elements, for example, some forms of ceramic found in Przeworsk culture appear suddenly in mid- rather than late-NELT158. It would appear that Przeworsk and Pomeranian groups co-existed rather like pieces on a chessboard, during the early NELT, only coming into cultural contact towards the middle of the period. This is plausible, but hard to prove until some Pomeranian monuments can be reliably dated to that time.*

Most Polish archaeologists do not doubt that the Przeworsk and Oksywie populations are in part descended from the bearers of Pomeranian culture. The arguments in favour of this depend less on the similarity of form between Przeworsk and Pomeranian utilitarian objects (knives, axes, spear tips, razors, buckles and some pottery)159 than on the following two considerations.


1) Where there are no Pomeranian monuments, there are also no Przeworsk monuments.160 It is however necessary to note that the topography of Przeworsk monuments differs from that of the Pomeranian: the former are found nearer the water's edge161, which may be a result of either climatic or economic change.162

2) A number of Przeworsk and Oksywie burial groups began as Pomeranian ones. These include Blonie, Wymysl/owo, Zadowice, Nowa Wies´, Bystrzec and some others. The Oksywie cemetery at Bystrzec contained Oksywie materials beneath a "Klesh".163 The Wymysl/owo cemetery is a most representative example of a Przeworsk monument.164 In addition to 336 Przeworsk burials found here, there were 18 Pomeranian burials in stone boxes, six "Klesh" and two Lusitanian burials. It would seem that here is clear proof of continuity linking the three cultures. But it transpires that both Lusitanian burials date to the early stage of that culture and were nowhere near the Pomeranian in time; also, there is no early Przeworsk evidence from this cemetery.165 So no continuity can be demonstrated, although its absence can not be fully discounted either. The problem remains unsolved.

It is impossible to understand the rise of Przeworsk culture without taking into account the role of those Celts who in the course of their "historical expansion" during the late 4th- early 3rd centuries BC, occupied parts of the depopulated late-Lusitanian areas around present-day Wroclaw in lower Silesia. There are no historical sources for this expansion. But archaeology shows that early Przeworsk monuments, which yield variant A fibulae (per Kostrzewski), occur specifically in those areas where Celtic presence and strong influence is demonstrable along the course of the ancient Amber Route (Middle and Lower Silesia, eastern Great Poland and Kuyawia).166

"Northern Galatia" in Lower Silesia was a small island of Celtic civilisation in a relatively desolate land, far from the basic concentration of Celtic tribes. Being so distant, this Celtic group was apparently unaffected by those socio-economic changes in the basic Celtic population which led to the "economic society" characteristic of the latter's late stage and to oppida civilisation. By the C2 stage, the Celts of Lower Silesia has disappeared and were replaced by the Przeworsk population.167

The Celts, bearers of "middle European consolidation" and oppida culture also appeared in Poland and in other parts of the country, including Upper Silesia (the Nowa Cerekwa settlement), the Cracow region (Iwanowicy, Krakow-Mogila, Tyniec), and the Celtic presence there coincided with the emergence of Przeworsk culture.

There are 28 known Celtic B1-C1 sites in Lower Silesia: these include two cemeteries at Sobocisko and Glowin and 90 individual burials.169 In addition, there is the Kietrz cemetery in the Glubczyce Plateau: this includes 30 Celtic inhumations datable to La Tène B1 and B2 among the Lusatian burials (datable to La Tène A).170

These small Celtic groups brought with them all the achievements of Celtic civilisation, both technical and spiritual: no matter how provincial they may have been in the Celtic context, these achievements were much greater than those of the surrounding Lusatian-Pomeranian-Podkleshowo milieu. Those achievements were demonstrated in the Celtic long swords, graceful spear tips, grey wheel-turned pottery, bracelets, torques and fibulae of the plastic style, bracelets of sapropelite and glass, bronze chain-belts and much else (Illustration 11-I). The Celts also brought inhumation burials (although later they did use cremation, as was common for the surrounding tribes) and the ritual of placing weapons with the deceased. But most important of all, the Celts brought with them stratified social organisation (perhaps even taking caste form) which separated warriors, craftsmen and priests. One of their sanctuaries has been found on S´le,z.a hill: the finds there include stone carvings of a bear, a boar, a "woman with fish", phallus-shaped figurines, and the remains of large stone structures forming concentric circles.171 Apparently the Celts also minted coinage.172 Their existence was isolated, lacking in much contact with either the neigbouring Pomeranian culture or the distant larger Celtic world. Only rarely do we come across early La Tène fibulae. But the Przeworsk culture was demonstrably and heavily influenced by the Celts: their weapons and fibulae are straightforward copies of Celtic models, while the pottery is stamped by a Celtic style (even if the forms do not copy Celtic ones). Yet the Przeworsk population was by and large descended directly from the Lusatian-Pomeranian-Podkleshov milieu. What caused this population to change its culture so radically at the turn of the 3rd-2nd century BC (stage C1), simultaneously with the disappearance of the isolated Celtic group in Lower Silesia?

K. Godl/owski suggests that the beginning of NELT can be dated to the turn of the 3rd-2nd century BC; Hachmann, Tackenberg, Machinsky, Babes, Godl/owski and others suggest that the same period witnessed a movement of the eastern variant of Jastorf from Brandenburg, Saxony and Luzyca further eastward through Silesia, around the Carpathians and into Moldavia.173 Accepting this, the following dramatic development can be hypothesised.

The Pomeranian-Podkleshov-Lusatian milieu must have been disrupted by the movement of those Jastorf forces part of which were to reach the lower Danube around 220 BC and are known to us as newcomer Bastarnae. A part of that broad milieu must have been stirred up and borne along by the eastward Jastorf movement. Quite possibly kinship relations fragmented as a result, leading to the emergence or further development of a "military democracy" social structure. As the Jastorfers, and the Pomeranians accompanying them began to move, they first clashed with the Silesian Celts, who were well advanced socially and economically and had evolved a proto-state organisation. It is hard to discern how the confrontation evolved into conflict and how the sides were drawn up. But it is important to remember that the Celts were a small and isolated group. The course of events must have differed from what happened on the Upper Elbe, where matters did not go beyond border clashes and frontier trade between the two large ethno-cultural entities. For the Silesian Celts, armed resistance was probably hopeless. But the Celts did possess that social structure, preserved since their "heroic" era, which was needed by their local newcomer neighbours who were setting off on the warpath: Celtic weaponry and combat tactics were advanced, and their gods and priests most probably respected. The Celts were thus to act as the catalyst which, at the cost of their own existence, transformed the Lusatian-Pomeranian-Podkleshov milieu into the Przeworsk culture. The latter adopted Celtic weaponry and the habit of placing weapons in burials (although persisting with the cremation ritual). A professional warrior caste evolved. The S´le,z.a hill sanctuary continued to function in Przeworsk times. Jastorf features are rare in Przeworsk culture for the good reason that the bearers of that culture had moved on further eastward.** They do however occur in Poieanes,t,i-Lukashevka in Moldavia and partly in the Zarubintsy culture.

Simultaneously with these developments, the Celtic tribes of Moravia, Slovakia and the Czech lands underwent consolidation and social restructuring in association with the development of their commercial expansion. Groups of these Celts appear in Upper Silesia and the Cracow region. The dwellers of Moravian oppida were interested in reviving the ancient Amber Route: the route stretched from the mid-Danube to the Lower Vistula, had functioned actively during the Lusatian period but was abandoned in the Pomeranian phase. The revival of the Amber Route is confirmed by the discovery of amber stores during the excavations at the Staré Hradisko oppidum in Moravia174 and in Partyniczi near Wrocl/aw, where nearly three tonnes (2750 kg) of high quality amber were uncovered.175 The
revival of the Amber Route may well have helped consolidate the Przeworsk people.*** It is along the route - in Lower Silesia, eastern Great Poland and Kujawia - that we find the earliest Przeworsk sites and traces of Celtic presence, including inhumation burials and Celtic wheel-turned pottery.176

It seems that during early NELT the territory of Poland was a mosaic of different populations. Isolated groups of Celts existed in upper Silesia, near Cracow, and possibly also in Kuyawia and Przemysl; late Lusatian settlements survived here and there; the Gubin group occupied the Oder-Neisse basin; a group of newcomers from the Baltic region with their specific cremation ritual appeared, probably in Lower Silesia; Jastorf populations were present in Western Pomerania; and the Western Baltic tumulus culture dominated the north-eastern region. There are a number of regions, in addition, whose sites remain to be studied. These include the Lublin area, the Vistula-San basin, the Rzeszow area, the upper Pilica basin, the Cze,stochowa district - and the Cassubian plateau in Middle Pomerania so far as the Oksywie culture is concerned.178 If early NELT sites are discovered here, they will help confirm or amend the hypothesis just presented.

The development of the Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures was completed in the early part of the middle NELT time (probably the mid- or even late-2nd century BC), when other groups experienced Przeworsk-Oksywian acculturization. The stimulus for this may have come from the military activity of the Cimbri and Teutons, who were moving southward along the Oder route. However, as mentioned previously, no strict archaeological data exist for the precise dating of the transition from early to middle NELT and from its phase "b" to phase "c". This makes it difficult to trace connections with any known historical events.

The developments and processes just described occurred in the period between the early or middle 2nd century BC and the first half of the 1st century BC. It is not possible to date them more precisely within this period, or even to determine their sequential order. Recent Polish research does, however, suggest the following general course of events as a possibility.

The Przeworsk population became especially active politically during the middle NELT. Groups of them penetrated far westward, in certain instances up to the Main, although this movement took place apparently in the final part of the period and may be connected with the events of the late NELT period. Przeworsk influence may have helped bring about the transformation of the Podmokly group in Czech lands into the Kobyly group.179

Simultaneously or slightly earlier, at the turn of NELT "a" and "b", the Jastorfers in Western Pomerania were either displaced by or assimilated into the culture of their eastern Oksywie neighbours.180 This had the effect of drawing the Oksywie culture closer towards Jastorf forms.

Until this time, the Oksywie and Przeworsk cultures were developing under the same influences, as discussed above, and were virtually indistinguishable.**** The development of Oksywie culture was catalysed largely by the interaction of the early Przeworsk group near Chelmno on the Lower Vistula and the Jastorfers of Western Pomerania (Illustration 13). Middle Pomerania, previously deserted, was settled towards the close of the mid-NELT. The cemeteries at Drawsko, Gostkowo, Byl/ow, Warszkowo and Niemica. This, according to R. Wol/a,giewicz, is how the Oksywie culture evolved.181

Controversy surrounds the sites of Western Pomerania. Whilst Wol/a,giewicz sees them as part of Oksywie culture, Godl/owski argues that they represent a distinct western Pomeranian, or Lubieszewo group.182

The Przeworsk influence spread northward, extending to Denmark, where the Kraghede cemetery has yielded pottery very similar to the Przeworsk. This was once believed to indicate that the Cimbri and Teutons had originated somewhere near Kraghede, whence they brought to Poland some elements later to be incorporated into Przeworsk culture. However, the reverse is more likely183, and even if Kraghede was a Cimbri burial ground, it must have been left by peoples who had returned home to Denmark from afar. There is no reason for dating it to pre-Przeworsk or even earlier times; the cemetery definitely belongs to the middle and late phases of NELT.184

All of this does not solve the problem of northern elements in Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures. There is no archaeological evidence to support this, although the Cimbri migrations are a known historical fact. Apparently the powerful influence of La Tène culture meant that assimilated Nordic influences faded quickly, and that Nordic newcomers adopted La Tène culture quickly, thus leaving virtually no discernible traces of their presence.185

The Przeworsk culture fully permeated Mazowia during mid-La Tène. This was caused both by the transformation of local Pomeranian groups into Przeworsk ones, and the influx of population from other Przeworsk territories. A number of new cemeteries emerged, including Karczewec, Kleszewo, Bieliawa, Gliadzjanuwek and others.186 The migrants apparently included bearers of Oksywie culture. They brought G/H variant fibulae (per Kostrzewski) which are quite rare in the Przeworsk context but common in Pomerania, as well as the custom of burying men and women in separate cemeteries, as practised in Mecklenburg, Denmark and the Elbe region. In Dobrzankowo all 35 burials proved to be male, while in Kleszewo all but two of the 400 burials proved either female or of children.187 Occasionally there are stone stelai, or more exactly simply large stones, placed on top of burials (as happens for example in Karczewec) in the North European manner.188 The occurrence of pottery in Oksywie-type burials decreases, and weapons manufactured in Mazowia came to be made of Oksywie iron, whose phosphorous content is lower than that of common Przeworsk metal.189

Oksywie culture did not just spread westward but also eastward to the right bank of the Vistula and into the cultural frontier between Pomerania and the culture of the Western Baltic barrows.190 The latter culture had previously occupied a territory to the east of Western Mazuria; this became depopulated and overgrown with forest.191

As the bearers of West Balt barrow culture abandoned the upper Wkra and Orzyc basins, they were replaced by a distinct Nidzica group of the Przeworsk culture, which assimilated a number of local elements. The inhabitants of this region continue to use stone in burial constructions and do not, in contrast to other Przeworsk populations, introduce weapons into their burial ritual.192

The following phase of change commenced around the middle of the 1st century BC. This is clearly illustrated for the south-west regions of Poland by the distribution of fibulae variants D/E, K, F, G/H, mid-NELT, and the M-O variants of late NELT which has been mapped by Godl/owski.193 He has demonstrated that this period saw the disappearance of the Gubin group and the abandonment of the Lubuch lands around present-day Frankfurt an der Oder as well as the Silesian ones north of Wroclaw. The Przeworsk cemetery at Nosocicy contains some mid-NELT burials but none of later NELT; new burials appear here only in the Roman period. This pattern is repeated in Brandenburg, Mecklenburg and Altmark: it is demonstrated by the demise of the Kobyly group in the Czech lands and the abandonment of many oppida in Thuringia, Moravia, and the Czech region. It is possible that some part of the Przeworsk population had been caught up in the great German advance on Celtic and Roman territories during the mid-1st century BC. Some may well have been a part of the tribal federation headed by Ariovistus. Traces of their influence can be discerned in the Grossromstedt culture which emerged in course of the German advance, specifically in its custom of placing weapons in burials.

There is some evidence to suggest that Przeworsk military activity had been directed southwards. In Slovakia, faint indications of Przeworsk and Oksywie warriors can be deduced from isolated finds of weapons (swords and ornamented spear tips) and the Cifer burial. This burial contained a single-edged northern type sword, a shield boss with large rivets, and an early example of a late La Tène fibula. I. Bona argues that northern warrior bands entered Slovakia during the conflict between the Boii and Dacians around 60 BC. However, this assertion is not entirely convincing, given the uncertainty in dating the Cifer burial (it probably falls somewhere between the middle and beginning of the late NELT).

The middle of the 1st century BC marks the disappearance of that Celtic group which had probably migrated here from Moravia during LT B1 (the settlement at Nova Cerekva, etc.).195 There may be a connection between the disappearance of this group and the Przeworsk expansion westward and southward, but the absence of clear upper dating for the Celtic sites of Upper Silesia precludes any confident assertion of such a connection.

A different relationship emerged between the Przeworsk people and the Celts who settled in the Cracow area during the second half of the 2nd century BC. A hybrid Celto-Przeworsk population, the Tyniec group, developed here during the 1st century BC.197

Even the Przeworsk peoples who did not take part in these migrations were experiencing cultural change. For example, the Wymysl/owo cemetery reveals a complete transformation in the range of ceramic forms uncovered there.198 The pottery is distinguished by a ribbed effect and the funnel shape of the lower body. The overall forms resemble those imitations of Celtic earthenware and bronze models which were evolving in southern Germany and the Czech lands, where the Celts and Germans were in contact. Fibulae variants from J to O (per Kostrzewski) and then a little later open-work scabbard platings began to appear, these also being of south-western derivation.199*****

The Oksywie culture was less affected by these changes, which manifested themselves only in the elaborate ornamentation of pottery (although this did at times metamorphose into pictograms).200

The situation in Mazowia during late NELT was more complex. Some population groups were unaffected by the cultural changes of the time, as can be seen in the case of the Wilanowo cemetery which had existed since the start of NELT. Other groups did experience change, as is well illustrated by the Karczewiec cemetery. Here the pottery loses its facetted rims, the cylindrical necks disappeared, the pear-shaped vessels and cylindrical mugs; bodies; instead ribbed forms came to prevail and bowls become higher in profile. The pottery inventory changes into one characteristic of early Roman times.202

At the same time as this innovative change, there was a certain revival of old Pomeranian-Lusatian traditions. In general, though, every site in Mazowia is distinctive and marked by its own particular rhythm.203 This may indicate a fragmentation of Mazowian cultural unity and a break-up of the population into small self-reliant communities. The consequences of this would become apparent in Mazowia during Roman times.

The Przeworsk people also migrated south-eastward, into the upper Dniester basin, towards the close of late La Tène and at the threshold of the Roman period. Their traces can be discerned in isolated finds and the Luczki burial which yielded a sword whose scabbard was decorated with an open-work bronze plate; spurs; a late La Tène fibula variant O (per Kostrzewski); and two items of early Roman time - an Almgren 67 fibula and a long open-work buckle.204 (See Illustr. 8 of the second part of the work).

In recent years Ukrainian archaeologists working in the Lvov and Volyn areas of the Western Ukraine have discovered a number of settlements containing Przeworsk artefacts datable to the late La Tène time. These artefacts consist of pottery fragments and are not sufficient for their absolute dating.205 They share similarities with the pottery of the middle and late phases of the Karczewiec cemetery. But the NELT period lasted in Poland until the mid-1st century AD, and it is very possible that this Przeworsk movement took place sometime during the first half of the 1st century AD. The most recent finds from the Luczki grave give credence to this idea.

Who then were the ancient inhabitants of present-day Poland whose history we have tried to reconstruct above on the basis of archaeological evidence? This question can not be answered with full certainty today. Indeed, the pursuit of the answer has not been helped by the debates, often tinged by unscientific and emotional nationalist feeling, between Polish and German scholars during the first half of the 20th century. We shall not delve into those debates, which on occasion still reverberate today.

German scholars have identified the bearers of Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures as East Germans, because of the perceived similarities between the late La Tène culture of Poland and a host of Germanic cultures near the imperial borders. Thus Przeworsk culture is sometimes called Vandalic culture, while Oksywie culture is similarly called Burgundian. German archaeologists have made a great effort to determine the areas of settlement and migration routes of the Vandals, Silings, Burgundians and Goths.207

The presence of these tribes on Polish territories was mentioned clearly enough in written sources and has not contested by Polish scholars.208 But the methods used then to deduce ethnic identity from archaeological evidence will not suffice today. There is no need for us to delve into the methodological shortcomings of Gustav Kossinna and his school, who would identify an archaeological culture directly with an ethnos, and an ancient ethnos directly with a modern people.
A great number of works exist criticising the Kossinna school, and these have been conveniently summarised by L.S. Klein.209 According to J. Werner, the Kossinna method today seems nothing more than "archaeology's nursery".210 The proponents of that school often strained the evidence in an effort to place all tribal origins in Scandinavia: their arguments often rested only on apparent similarity between names, i.e. the Goths and Gotland, Burgundians and Bornholm, Vandals and Vendsyssel. The principle of making comparisons between strictly contemporaneous written and archaeological sources was often neglected.

Today there can be no doubt about the close link between the bearers of the Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures and their western neighbours. But were they Germans? Bear in mind the uncertainty of using the terms "Germans" and "Germany" in relation to this period. These terms tend to extend to all lands and tribes east of the Rhine and north of the Danube, without allowance for their origins, languages, dialects and cultures. We should recall groups X, Y and Z who spoke various Indo-European dialects and subsequently became assimilated, depending on circumstances, into the German, Baltic, Slav or Romance peoples.

Classical authors had only a vague understanding of the language and ethnos, and indeed location, of the inhabitants of distant regions.
We shall see below that the names found in written sources and those derived from the study of archaeological sources do not readily coincide when efforts are made in particular cases to show that they are one and the same. Modern and ancient perceptions often differ significantly when it comes to writers assigning names. Some known ancient tribes do not appear to have archaeological parallels, some archaeological groups do not correspond to any tribe mentioned in written sources, and only occasionally does evidence from both kinds of source prove complementary in identifying the same entity.

For the Kossinna school such complementary convergence was essential, and if it was not obtainable, then some exponents of the school were not above forcing the evidence. The theories of the Kossinna school were sometimes used in offical Nazi propaganda, which of course caused hostility among Polish archaeologists, linguists and historians. The Poles were concerned to show that the Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures were Slavic: the archaeologists labelled this in its entirety as the Venedian culture. Three lines of argument were developed as proof of the Slavic connection.

The philological argument drew on the comparative linguistic study of Indo-European languages. The origins of the Indo-Europeans, their movement and settlement, and the division of their common language into separate ones - these problems are far from resolved even today. Polish scholars cleared these problems by relying on a single thesis, claiming that the Lusatian culture was Slavic by nature. Few modern linguists would try to defend this theory. It is hardly plausible to discern a variety of Indo-European dialects, and to suggest which was used by what group in the far-distant past. The linguist Lehr-Splawin´ski and his school developed a theory identifying the Vistula-Oder area as the original Slavic homeland.210 This theory is not without faults, but has its adherents and opponents, and continues to stimulate linguistic debate.212 The debate has helped crystallise novel approaches and conceptual systems which have put a new perspective on the interrelationship and development of ancient languages, as well as on the origin of the Slavic homeland. This will be examined in more detail in the next chapter. However, it would be dangerous indeed for a contemporary archaeologist to rely on the linguistic theory of a Vistula-Oder homeland when trying to determine a ethnic nature of the Przeworsk and Oksywie cultures.

The archaeological argument was developed by the Poznan´ archaeological school headed by J. Kostrzewski and also centered on a hypothetical Slavic homeland in the Vistula-Oder region. A cultural continuity was posited spanning all cultures from the Lusatian to the early Slavic. We have shown above how difficult it is to demonstrate continuity between the Lusatian, Pomeranian and Przeworsk cultures. There are even fewer links between the late Przeworsk and early Slavic cultures on Polish territory. The changes and cultural transformations revealed by archaeology were so fundamental that a simultaneous linguistic continuity seems unlikely. It is much more reasonable to assume that every change in material culture was accompanied by changes of language or dialects, even if some bearers of the superseded language tradition did survive.

The historical argument began by merging the information about the Veneti-Venedae reported by Pliny, Tacitus and Ptolemy with that concerning the Veneti-Slavs found in the writing of Jordanes: all of this, it was concluded, referred to the territory of Poland, where the Venedian Przeworsk-Oksywie culture spread. Two basic tenets of ethno-geographical study were transgressed by this line of argument. First, evidence from non-contemporary written sources was merged indiscriminately: Pliny and Tacitus wrote about the 1st century AD, Ptolemy about the 2nd century AD and Jordanes about the 6th century AD. No attention is thus given to the changes which may have affected the Veneti and their name over this period of extreme historical change. Second, there was no attempt to draw systematic comparisons between strictly contemporary written and archaeological evidence. Besides, this theory has obviously been stretched to force the evidence into a "polonised" fit.

A more careful approach to the sources should result in an archaeological map of the lst-2nd century BC Europe which could be compared to the ethnic mapping contained in Strabo's "Geography".214 However, Strabo himself declares his ignorance of the lands between the Elbe, the "Ocean" and the Borysthenes-Dnieper.215

The reports of Pliny and Tacitus probably relate to the mid- or late part of 1st century AD. After completing our survey of the archaeological evidence for this period, we shall return to their writings in the hope of drawing some comparisons. Then we should see what these authors meant by the Venedae (possibly different tribal groups located east of the Vistula), and should discover that the Przeworsk culture of the 1st century AD most probably corresponds to the Lugii tribal federation mentioned by Tacitus. It remains unclear whether the Venedae mentioned by Pliny and Tacitus are in any way related to the Slavs. As for Ptolemy's ethnic mapping and the reports of Veneti-Slavs given by Jordanes, those unfortunately fall outside the scope of the present work.

...

* The chronological interrelation of the Pomeranian and Przeworsk cultures was specially studied by Z. Wozniak20. In the table drawn up by him the temporal hiatus between these two cultures is apparent. However, several cases are known where the Middle La Tène fibulae of Variant A -those very fibulae by which the earliest complexes of the Przeworsk culture are dated - were found in combination with objects of the Pomeranian culture. These cases are: Pit 333 at the settlement in Gniewowo and the destroyed grave in Warszawa-Dotrzyma. True, both these cases are doubtful. In Burial 40 of the cemetery Sokolowicy even a Variant B fibula was found, but Wozniak doubts that this cemetery belongs to the Pomeranian culture. So far, there is only one fairly reliable case of a combination of Pomeranian objects with a Variant A fibula, and that is the complex in Nowe Dobra21.


** A. Niewe,glowski, while studying the Przeworsk burial rite, has obtained some new data concerning the north-western elements in the Przeworsk culture . He has pointed out that the determining feature of the Przeworsk burial rite is the burning of the corpse of Type A, ie in round or oval pits not less than 75cm in diameter filled with very dark coal-and-ash substance, which is probably the result of some specific material being used in the burial pyre. Few calcified bones and numerous small bits of pottery are usually found in such burials, and more often than not it proves impossible to reconstruct whole vessels out of fragments. Almost always such burials contain assortments of bent or broken weapons.

The Przeworsk culture also has another rite of burning corpses in pits (Type B): with a light-coloured filling of a small oval or square pit, a large amount of burnt bones, and intact pottery vessels. More often than not these burials contain no weapons. Urn burials of various types, as well as single inhumations also occur in the Przeworsk culture. To a greater or lesser degree all these burial rites are also typical of the Jastorf, Pomeranian, and Celtic cultures, and it is only the pit graves of Type A that do not exist in either the preceding or neighbouring cultures.

Further on, A. Niewe,glowski has noted that in the early NELT phase the sites for which only the burial rite of Type A, without any admixtures, is characteristic, are situated in a limited area: in Lower Silesia and in the adjacent south-western part of Great Poland. These are cemeteries which were already excavated before the Second World War: Bartodzieje, Belcze Maly, Kajecin, Kotowice, Wierzbica, and certain single burials. Altogether, there are about fifty such graves23. Only thirteen of them - judging by their equipment - are the burials of women. It is not a very large group of sites, but it is striking in its monolithic uniformity. With its appearance the Celtic settlements of Lower Silesia ceased.

Type A pits are also known outside the noted region, for instance the cemeteries at Wymysl/owo, Domaradzice, etc. They spread in two directions, along the Oder to the north and to the north-east, and the further away they were from Lower Silesia, the smaller the percentage of these burials in cemeteries, compared with other types of graves. A similar picture is revealed when one analyses the spread in the Przeworsk culture of the swords of Celtic type, of Type I shield bosses (after D. Bohnsack) and of damask steel spearheads. Among the burials of the early NELT phase some were newly founded (the burial grounds in Silesia, in Wilanów), others were established on the sites of former cemeteries of the Pomeranian culture (Wymysl/owo). The latter category usually contains a smaller number of weapons, sometimes has no Type A pits; the former category has more of both.

The only place outside Poland where A. Nieweglowsky found the same rite of corpse-burning (pit graves with the same filling of black coal and ash as in the Silesian Type A) is the island of Bornholm, though the Bornholm burials contain no weapons, there are no types of pottery similar to those of the Przeworsk culture, and the burials are usually marked with a stone or a ring of stones24, which is unknown in Silesia. However, the links of the bearers of the Przeworsk culture with Jutland, Bornholm and the Baltic region are attested to by other categories of finds. They include the pin with a cross-shaped head from Zagorzyn, the fibula from Wszedzin, belt-hooks consisting of three parts, certain types of knives, specific forms of pottery, and, finally, crownshaped neckrings from Gmachów, Milez, Staw, Wybranowo, S´widnica, Dwikozy and Kloczew.

As for the urn burials and Type B pit burials, analysis of these has allowed A. Niewe,glowski to conclude that these rites are linked with the Jastorf circle of cultures, particularly with the Gubin group. Jastorf pottery was discovered in burials 31, 53a, 87 in Wilanów25, in graves 96, 103, 109 in Karczewiec26, and in burial 2 near Wola Szydlowiecka27.

As a result of Niewe,glowski's work the north-western component in the Przeworsk culture has acquired a more definite shape, and the picture of interrelation of its various components as outlined by D.A. Machinsky in 1965 at the First Congress of Slavic Archaeology in Warsaw28. has been made more concrete.

Possibly, it was the arrival of an active though small group of migrants from the north which started the transformation of the local cultural environment into the new Przeworsk culture, although far from every thing in that transformation is clear. The search must go on for the prototypes both of the Przeworsk pottery and of its ornamentation.


*** It should be noted that just as the above described processes were occurring, Aquileia, soon to become the centre of the amber trade, was founded in 181 BC at the other end of the Amber route29.


**** The theory that the Oksywie culture developed from the Pomeranian culture30, has been decisively revised in recent years31. It has been established that the possibility of ancestral relationship between these two cultures cannot be ruled out (though it is not proven either) in relation to the narrow strip along the lower Vistula. In the rest of Pomerania the Pomeranian culture ended with the disappearance of the fibulae of the Certosa type in the 5th century BC. The Oksywie remains first appeared no earlier than in the middle phase of NELT. Thus for more than two hundred years the territory remained uninhabited.


***** This cultural impact from the south-west may be connected with the return home of a certain number of participants in Ariovistus' trips. Of particular interest in this connection are the objects discovered by K. Godl/owski in the cemetery at Kryspinow near Cracow. Here, along with typical Przeworsk burials of Stages B1-B2 of the Roman time, K. Godl/owski uncovered some unusual structures, which, judging by the stratigraphy, preceded the Przeworsk burials, and which still survive as trenches about 1.5m wide and 0.3- 1.5m deep, forming squares with sides 3.4-7.0m. The filling of these trenches contains bits of coal, potsherds (sometimes doubly fired, as it were), small calcified bones, fragments of iron and bronze objects. The pottery is of Celtic painted and Przeworsk-type, i.e. the same combination as in the Tyniec group32.

Analogous structures, discovered in the Czech lands, are considered by K. Motyková-S^neidrová to be of the Celtic cultural heritage in the Marcomannian environment33. All the other analogies to these structures belong to the Celtic world. They are known in France - in Champagne and on the Marne, in Belgium - in the Waderath cemetery of the Treveri tribe near Trier, and in Britain34. It cannot be ruled out that this rite was brought along by some groups of Celts, who had fled to the East from conquered Gaul.'

NELT: Late La Tène or North European La Tène


Torsten