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Kultura strzyżowska w świetle znalezisk grobowych

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Bargieł B.

Wiadomości Archeologiczne

2006

vol. LVIII

issue 58

65-99

Publishing his monograph on the Strzyżów Culture in 1968 J. Głosik had at his disposal materials obtained from 18 sites located in 14 towns from the Lublin Region, among which there were seven cemeteries. The insufficient knowledge about the cultural situation in phase I of the Bronze Age in mid-eastern Poland resulted in including all these features into that culture. Today, we know that they should be divided between the Strzyżów and Mierzanowice Cultures. Cemeteries and individual graves typically located at hills do not represent the actual original set-up. Hence, they often differ in size today, which is also connected with the extent to which the individual features have been excavated. The recorded form of burials at all cemeteries are flat (at discovery) inhumation graves, which are sometimes arranged in rows and contain human remains of different state of preservation. The bodies were mainly laid in a supine position and were oriented along the E-W axis. The gender and age were determined for 56 individuals (42 graves), which included 41% of women, 34% of men, while the rest were children and adolescent individuals. Among 20 women, the greatest death rate was noted in the age groups adultus (35%) and maturus (45%). Among men, the majority of deaths occurred at the age group maturus (92.9%), with a minimal fraction of the individuals who died at the age of 20 (7.1%). The average lifespan for men in the society of the Strzyżów Culture is 41.6 and it is 33.8 for women. The burial furniture deposited in 76 features (88.3%) is diverse and comprises mainly artefacts made of clay, flint, stone, copper, bone, shell and faience. The most common are vessels which have a unique character, which is easily detectable from materials of other cultures. These are, among others, such characteristic features as rich ornamentation in the form of densely arranged impressions of rope with less numerous other features (stamps, engraved lines) and strong wiping with a bunch of straw of the surface of the vessel before burning. Among the flint materials, which are copiously represented at cemeteries and made solely of the Volhynian flint, one can distinguish a few groups. The first one, and the most numerous group includes subtriangular sickle-shaped knives with sharply ended top, lenticular axes, heart-shaped arrowheads, individual ‘spearheads’. Artefacts of stone other than flint are represented by an individual battle axe On the other hand, copper artefacts include earrings and bracelets. The burials also contained bone and faience beads, pendants made of antlers and halved tusks of a wild boar. Among the materials constituting the furniture of the graves 30 types of artefacts were distinguished. Most of them were noted in Husynne Kolonia 6 and in Raciborowice-Kolonia II. It seems, that elements which could be unequivocally attributed to one of the genders are missing in the structure of grave furniture. The relation between the type of grave goods and gender or age could be analysed on the basis of 49 burials. In 22 female graves, a richer and more varied furniture was noted – 26 types of artefacts (the indicator of an average furniture 3.3). In male graves, 15 types of artefacts were found with an average coming close to the female ones (3.2). Much poorer are the burials of children and adolescent individuals (indicator: 0.8). An analysis of the inventories of the Strzyżów Culture leads us to the conclusion that the burial “richness’ does not closely reflect the relation between gender and age of the dead, and hence, the ritual does not fully reflect (?) the internal social structure of the group. We also do not understand the reasons why the grave of two adolescent individuals (Raciborowice-Kolonia II, grave 7) was honoured with the most rich furniture. The absence of C14 dating for the assemblages of the Strzyżów Culture and for the stratification layers makes it quite difficult to posit the chronology for this unit. Most probably, the Strzyżów Culture can be synchronised with the classical phase of the Mierzanowice Culture, developing at the territory of Little Poland. At Volhynia, this corresponds to the disappearance of the so called Gródek-Zdołbice Culture constituting a counterpart of the early phase of the Mierzanowice Culture.

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1 Wiadomości Archeologiczne

1 Bargieł B.

1 2006

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Kultura strzyżowska w świetle znalezisk grobowych