Bronze Age
The archaeology of Northern Europe studies the prehistory of Scandinavia and the adjacent North European Plain, roughly corresponding to the territories of modern Sweden, Norway, Denmark, northern Germany, Poland and the Netherlands.
The region entered the Mesolithic around the 7th millennium BC. The transition to the Neolithic is characterized by the Funnelbeaker culture in the 4th millennium BC. The Chalcolithic is marked by the arrival of the Corded Ware culture, possibly the first influence in the region of Indo-European expansion. The Nordic Bronze Age proper began roughly one millennium later, around 1500 BC. The end of the Bronze Age is characterized by cultural contact with the Central European La Tène culture (Celts), contributing to the development of the Iron Age by the 4th century BC, presumably the locus of Common Germanic culture. Northern Europe enters the protohistorical period in the early centuries AD, with the adoption of writing and ethnographic accounts by Roman authors.
The following is a refined listing of Northern European archaeological periods, expanded from the basic three-age system with finer subdivisions and extension into the modern historical period.
| Stone Age (to c. 1500 BC) | Palaeolithic | to c. 8000 BC |
| Mesolithic | c. 8000 – c. 3000 BC | |
| Neolithic | c. 3000 – c. 1750 BC | |
| Bronze Age | c. 1750 – c. 500 BC | |
| Iron Age (c. 500 BC – c. 800 AD) | Pre-Roman Iron Age | c. 500 BC – c. 1 AD |
| Roman Iron Age | c. 1 – c. 400 AD | |
| Germanic Iron Age | c. 400 – c. 800 AD | |
| Viking Age | c. 800 – c. 1066 AD | |
| Medieval | c. 1066 – c. 1500 | |
| Post-medieval | c. 1500 – c. 1800 | |
| Industrial/Modern | Industrial period | c. 1800 – c. 1917 |
| Modern period | c. 1917 – present | |
During the 6th millennium BC, the climate of Scandinavia was generally warmer and more humid than today. The bearers of the Nøstvet and Lihult cultures and the Kongemose culture were mesolithic hunter-gatherers. The Kongemose culture was replaced by the Ertebølle culture, adapting to the climatic changes and gradually adopting the Neolithic Revolution, transitioning to the megalithic Funnelbeaker culture.
The Pezmog 4 archaeological site along the Vychegda River (Komi Republic) was discovered in 1994. Pottery of early comb ware type appears there already at the beginning of the 6th millennium BC. [1]
Pit–Comb Ware culture appeared in northern Europe as early 4200 BC, and continued until c. 2000 BC. Some scholars argue that it is associated with the area of the Uralic languages.
During the 4th millennium BC, the Funnelbeaker culture expanded into Sweden up to Uppland. The Nøstvet and Lihult cultures were succeeded by the Pitted Ware culture
Early Indo-European presence likely dates to the early 3rd millennium BC, introducing branches of the Corded Ware culture (such as the Battle Axe Culture), later be followed by the Nordic Bronze Age.
The tripartite division of the Nordic Iron Age into "Pre-Roman Iron Age", "Roman Iron Age" and "Germanic Iron Age" is due to Swedish archaeologist Oscar Montelius.
The Pre-Roman Iron Age (5th/4th–1st centuries BC) was the earliest part of the Iron Age in Scandinavia and the North European Plain. Succeeding the Nordic Bronze Age, the Iron Age developed in contact with the Hallstatt culture in Central Europe. [4]
Archaeologists first decided to divide the Iron Age of Northern Europe into distinct pre-Roman and Roman Iron Ages after Emil Vedel unearthed a number of Iron Age artifacts in 1866 on the island of Bornholm. [5] They did not exhibit the same permeating Roman influence seen in most other artifacts from the early centuries AD, indicating that parts of northern Europe had not yet come into contact with the Romans at the beginning of the Iron Age.
Out of the Late Bronze Age Urnfield culture of the 12th century BC developed the Early Iron Age Hallstatt culture of Central Europe from the 8th to 6th centuries BC, which was followed by the La Tène culture of Central Europe (450 BC to 1st century BC). Although the metal iron came into wider use by metalsmiths in the Mediterranean as far back as c. 1300 BC due to the Late Bronze Age collapse, the Pre-Roman Iron Age of Northern Europe covered the 5th/4th to the 1st centuries BC.
The Iron Age in northern Europe is markedly distinct from the Celtic La Tène culture south of it. The old long-range trading networks south–north between the Mediterranean cultures and Northern Europe had broken down at the end of the Nordic Bronze Age and caused a rapid and deep cultural change in Scandinavia. Bronze, which was an imported alloy, suddenly became very scarce; and iron, which was a local natural resource, slowly became more abundant, as the techniques for extracting, smelting and smithing it were acquired from their Central European Celtic neighbours. Iron was extracted from bog iron in peat bogs, and the first iron objects to be fabricated were needles and edged tools such as swords and sickles. The rise of iron use in Scandinavia was slow: bog ore was only abundant in southwestern Jutland and it was not until 200–100 BC that iron-working techniques were generally mastered and a productive smithing industry had evolved in the larger settlements. Iron products were also known in Scandinavia during the Bronze Age, but they were a scarce imported material. Similarly, imported bronze continued to be used during the Iron Age in Scandinavia, but it was now much scarcer and mostly used for decoration. [6]
Funerary practices continued the Bronze Age tradition of burning corpses and placing the remains in urns, a characteristic of the Urnfield culture. During the previous centuries, influences from the Central European La Tène culture had spread to Scandinavia from north-western Germany, and there are finds from this period from all the provinces of southern Scandinavia. Archaeologists have found swords, shield bosses, spearheads, scissors, sickles, pincers, knives, needles, buckles, kettles, etc. from this time. Bronze continued to be used for torcs and kettles, the styles of which were continuous from the Bronze Age. Some of the most prominent finds from the pre-Roman Iron Age in northern Europe are the Gundestrup cauldron and the Dejbjerg wagons, two four-wheeled wagons of wood with bronze parts.
The cultural change that ended the Nordic Bronze Age was influenced by the expansion of Hallstatt culture from the south and accompanied by a changing climate, which caused a dramatic change in the flora and fauna. In Scandinavia, this period is often called the "Findless Age", due to the lack of archaeological finds. While the archaeological record from Scandinavia is consistent with an initial decline in population, the southern part of the culture, the Jastorf culture, was in expansion southwards. It consequently appears that climate change played an important role in this southward expansion into continental Europe. It is debated why cultural innovation spread geographically during this time: whether the new material culture reflects a possibly warlike movement of Germanic peoples ("demic diffusion") southwards or whether innovations found at the Pre-Roman Iron Age sites represent a more peaceful trans-cultural diffusion. The current view in the Netherlands is that Iron Age innovations, starting with Hallstatt (800 BC), did not involve intrusions and featured a local development from Bronze Age culture. [7] Another Iron Age nucleus considered to represent a local development is the Wessenstedt culture (800–600 BC).
The bearers of this northern Iron Age culture were likely speakers of Germanic languages. The stage of development of this Germanic is not known, although Proto-Germanic has been proposed. The late phase of this period sees the beginnings of the Migration Period, starting with the invasions of the Teutons and the Cimbri until their defeat at the Battle of Aquae Sextiae in 102 BC, presaging the more turbulent Roman Iron Age and Migration Period.
The Roman Iron Age (1–400 AD) is a part of the Iron Age. The name comes from the hold that the Roman Empire had begun to exert on the Germanic tribes of Northern Europe.
In Scandinavia, there was a great import of goods, such as coins, vessels, bronze images, glass beakers, enameled buckles, weapons, etc. Moreover, the style of metal objects and clay vessels was markedly Roman. Objects such as shears and pawns appear for the first time. In the 3rd and 4th centuries, some elements are imported from Germanic tribes that had settled north of the Black Sea, such as the runes.
There are also many bog bodies from this time in Denmark, Schleswig and southern Sweden. Together with the bodies, there are weapons, household wares and clothes of wool. The prime burial tradition was cremation, but the third century and thereafter saw an increase in inhumation. Great ships made for rowing have been found from the 4th century in Nydam Mose in southern Denmark.
The Gudme Hall complex, a ruling elite residence and cult site, was built in Denmark in the 3rd century. [10] [11] [12] In Norway the large chiefly hall at Borg (Lofotr) was built around 500 AD. At Upkåkra in Sweden, the largest Iron Age settlement in Scandinavia developed from c. 200 AD onwards. [13] [14] A wooden temple was built at Upkåkra in the 3rd century and continued to be used and rebuilt over 600 years, into the early Viking Age. [15]
Through the 5th and 6th centuries, gold and silver become more and more common. This time saw the ransack of the Roman Empire by Germanic tribes, from which many Scandinavians returned with gold and silver. A new Iron Age had begun in Northern Europe, the Germanic Iron Age.
The Germanic Iron Age is divided into the Early Germanic Iron Age (EGIA) and the late Germanic Iron Age (LGIA). In Sweden, the LGIA (550–800) is usually called the Vendel era; in Norway and Finland, the Merovinger (Merovingian) Age.[ citation needed ]
The Germanic Iron Age begins with the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of the Germanic kingdoms in Western Europe. [21] It is followed, in Northern Europe and Scandinavia, by the Viking Age.
During the decline of the Roman Empire, an abundance of gold flowed into Scandinavia; there are excellent works in gold from this period. Gold was used to make scabbard mountings and bracteates.
After the Western Roman Empire fell, gold became scarce and Scandinavians began to make objects of gilded bronze, with decorative figures of interlacing animals. During the EGIA, decorations tended to be representational; the animal figures were drawn in more basic forms. In the LGIA, artistic styles became more abstract, symbolic, and intricate, including figures with interlaced shapes and limbs.
The LGIA in the 8th century blends into the Viking Age and the proto-historical period, with legendary or semi-legendary oral tradition recorded a few centuries later in the Gesta Danorum , heroic legend and sagas, and an incipient tradition of primary written documents in the form of runestones.
The Celts or Celtic peoples were a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia, identified by their use of Celtic languages and other cultural similarities. Major Celtic groups included the Gauls; the Celtiberians and Gallaeci of Iberia; the Britons, Picts, and Gaels of Britain and Ireland; the Boii; and the Galatians. The relation between ethnicity, language and culture in the Celtic world is unclear and debated; for example over the ways in which the Iron Age people of Britain and Ireland should be called Celts. In current scholarship, 'Celt' primarily refers to 'speakers of Celtic languages' rather than to a single ethnic group.
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three historical Metal Ages, after the Copper and Bronze Ages. It has also been considered as the final Age of the three-age division starting with prehistory and progressing to protohistory. In this usage, it is preceded by the Stone Age and Bronze Age. These concepts originated for describing Iron Age Europe and the Ancient Near East, but they now include other parts of the Old World.
A hillfort is a type of fortified refuge or defended settlement located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typical of the late European Bronze Age and Iron Age. Some were used in the post-Roman period. The fortification usually follows the contours of a hill and consists of one or more lines of earthworks or stone ramparts, with stockades or defensive walls, and external ditches. If enemies were approaching, the civilians would spot them from a distance.
The Hallstatt culture was the predominant Western and Central European archaeological culture of the Late Bronze Age from the 12th to 8th centuries BC and Early Iron Age Europe from the 8th to 6th centuries BC, developing out of the Urnfield culture of the 12th century BC and followed in much of its area by the La Tène culture. It is commonly associated with Proto-Celtic speaking populations.
The Lusatian culture existed in the later Bronze Age and early Iron Age in most of what is now Poland and parts of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, eastern Germany and western Ukraine. It covers the Periods Montelius III to V of the Northern European chronological scheme. It has been associated or closely linked with the Nordic Bronze Age. Hallstatt influences can also be seen particularly in ornaments and weapons.
The Jastorf culture was an Iron Age material culture in what is now northern Germany and the southern Scandinavian Peninsula, spanning the 6th to 1st centuries BC, forming the southern part of the Pre-Roman Iron Age. The culture evolved out of the Nordic Bronze Age.
The Nordic Bronze Age is a period of Scandinavian prehistory from c. 2000/1750–500 BC.
The Nordwestblock is a hypothetical Northwestern European cultural region that some scholars propose as a prehistoric culture in the present-day Netherlands, Belgium, far-northern France, and northwestern Germany, in an area approximately bounded by the Somme, Oise, Meuse and Elbe rivers, possibly extending to the eastern part of what is now England, during the Bronze and Iron Ages from the 3rd to the 1st millennia BCE, up to the onset of historical sources, in the 1st century BCE.
The Scandinavian Peninsula became ice-free around the end of the last ice age. The Nordic Stone Age begins at that time, with the Upper Paleolithic Ahrensburg culture, giving way to the Mesolithic hunter-gatherers by the 7th millennium BC. The Neolithic stage is marked by the Funnelbeaker culture, followed by the Pitted Ware culture.
The history of Scandinavia is the history of the geographical region of Scandinavia and its peoples. The region is located in Northern Europe, and consists of Denmark, Norway and Sweden. Finland and Iceland are at times, especially in English-speaking contexts, considered part of Scandinavia.
The prehistory and protohistory of Poland can be traced from the first appearance of Homo species on the territory of modern-day Poland, to the establishment of the Polish state in the 10th century AD, a span of roughly 500,000 years.
The Nordic Stone Age refers to the Stone Age of Scandinavia. During the Weichselian glaciation, almost all of Scandinavia was buried beneath a thick permanent ice cover, thus, the Stone Age came rather late to this region. As the climate slowly warmed up by the end of the ice age, nomadic hunters from central Europe sporadically visited the region. However, it was not until around 12,000 BCE that permanent, but nomadic, habitation in the region took root.
The European Bronze Age is characterized by bronze artifacts and the use of bronze implements. The regional Bronze Age succeeds the Neolithic and Copper Age and is followed by the Iron Age. It starts with the Aegean Bronze Age in 3200 BC and spans the entire 2nd millennium BC, lasting until c. 800 BC in central Europe.
The Elp culture is a Bronze Age archaeological culture of the Netherlands having earthenware pottery of low quality known as "Kümmerkeramik" as a marker. The initial phase is characterized by tumuli, strongly tied to contemporary tumuli in Northern Germany and Scandinavia, and apparently related to the Tumulus culture in Central Europe. This phase was followed by a subsequent change featuring Urnfield (cremation) burial customs.
In Europe, the Iron Age is the last stage of the prehistoric period and the first of the protohistoric periods, which initially meant descriptions of a particular area by Greek and Roman writers. For much of Europe, the period came to an abrupt end after conquest by the Romans, though ironworking remained the dominant technology until recent times. Elsewhere, the period lasted until the early centuries AD, and either Christianization or a new conquest in the Migration Period. Iron working was introduced to Europe in the late 11th century BC, probably from the Caucasus, and slowly spread northwards and westwards over the succeeding 500 years. For example, the Iron Age of Prehistoric Ireland begins around 500 BC, when the Greek Iron Age had already ended, and finishes around 400 AD. The use of iron and iron-working technology became widespread concurrently in Europe and Asia.
Human habitation of present-day Sweden began c. 12000 BC. The earliest known people belonged to the Bromme culture of the Late Palaeolithic, spreading from the south at the close of the Last Glacial Period. Neolithic farming culture became established in the southern regions around 4000 BC, but much later further north. About 1700 BC the Nordic Bronze Age began in the southern regions, based on imported metals; this was succeeded about 500 BC by the Iron Age, for which local ore deposits were exploited. Cemeteries are known mainly from 200 BC onward.
Poland in antiquity was characterized by peoples from various archeological cultures living in and migrating through various parts of what is now Poland, from about 400 BC to 450–500 AD. These people are identified as Slavs, Celts, Germanic peoples, Balts, Thracians, Avars, and Scythians. Other groups, difficult to identify, were most likely also present, as the ethnic composition of archeological cultures is often poorly recognized. While lacking any written language to speak of, many of them developed a relatively advanced material culture and social organization, as evidenced by the archeological record; for example, richly furnished, "princely" dynastic graves.
Iron Age Scandinavia was the Iron Age, as it unfolded in Scandinavia. It was preceded by the Nordic Bronze Age.
After the glaciers of the Ice Age in the Early Stone Age withdrew from the area, which since about 1000 AD is called Pomerania, in what are now northern Germany and Poland, they left a tundra. First humans appeared, hunting reindeer in the summer. A climate change in 8000 BC allowed hunters and foragers of the Ertebølle-Ellerbek culture to continuously inhabit the area. These people became influenced by farmers of the Linear Pottery culture who settled in southern Pomerania. The hunters of the Ertebølle-Ellerbek culture became farmers of the Funnelbeaker culture in 3000 BC. The Havelland culture dominated in the Uckermark from 2500 to 2000 BC. In 2400 BC, the Corded Ware culture reached Pomerania and introduced the domestic horse. Both Linear Pottery and Corded Ware culture have been associated with Indo-Europeans. Except for Western Pomerania, the Funnelbeaker culture was replaced by the Globular Amphora culture a thousand years later.
The prehistory of the Netherlands was heavily influenced by the region's constantly changing, low-lying geography. Inhabited by humans for at least 37,000 years, the landscape underwent significant transformations, from the last ice age's tundra climate to the emergence of various Paleolithic groups. The region witnessed the development of the Swifterbant culture, which was closely linked to rivers and open water, while the Mesolithic era saw the creation of the world's oldest recovered canoe, the Pesse canoe. The arrival of agriculture around 5000–4000 BC marked the beginning of the Linear Pottery culture, which gradually transformed prehistoric communities.
The Öland statuette of a woman has been interpreted as either a Roman deity, such as Venus and Juno, or possibly a Roman empress
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