The end of the lake-dwellings in the Circum-Alpine region

261 Pages·2015·6.353 MB·English

by  Francesco Menotti (editor)

The End of the Lake-Dwellings
in the Circum-Alpine Region
Edited by
Francesco Menotti
Oxbow Books
Oxford & Philadelphia
Published in the United Kingdom in 2015 by
OXBOW BOOKS
10 Hythe Bridge Street, Oxford OX1 2EW
and in the United States by
OXBOW BOOKS
908 Darby Road, Havertown, PA 19083
© Oxbow Books and the authors 2015
Hardcover Edition: ISBN 978-1-78297-860-2
Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-78297-861-9
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The end of the lake-dwellings in the Circum-Alpine region / edited by Francesco Menotti.
pages cm
Summary: “After more than 3500 years of occupation in the Neolithic and Bronze Age, the many lake-dwellings around the
Circum-Alpine region ‘suddenly’ came to an end. Throughout that period alternating phases of occupation and abandonment
illustrate how resilient lacustrine populations were against change: cultural/environmental factors might have forced them to
relocate temporarily, but they always returned to the lakes. So why were the lake-dwellings finally abandoned and what exactly
happened towards the end of the Late Bronze Age that made the lake-dwellers change their way of life so drastically? The
new research presented here draws upon the results of a four-year-long project dedicated to shedding light on this intriguing
conundrum”--Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-1-78297-860-2 (hardcover) -- ISBN (invalid) 978-1-78297-861-9 (digital) 1. Lake-dwellers and lake-dwellings-
-Alps Region--History. 2. Human settlements--Alps Region--History. 3. Bronze age--Alps Region. 4. Iron age--Alps Region.
5. Alps Region--Antiquities. 6. Human ecology--Alps Region--History. 7. Social change--Alps Region--History. 8. Alps
Region--Social conditions. 9. Alps Region--Environmental conditions. I. Menotti, Francesco.
GN785.E53 2015
392.3’6093722--dc23
2015016507
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission from the publisher in writing.
Printed in Great Britain by Latimer Trend
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Oxbow Books is part of the Casemate group
Cover image by Sarah Ommanney
Contents
Acknowledgements v
List of Contributors vii
List of Figures ix
List of Tables x
List of Maps x
1. The lake-dwelling phenomenon: myth, reality and … archaeology 1
Francesco Menotti
2. Bronze Age lacustrine settlements in the Circum-Alpine region: chronology,
architectural styles, occupational patterns, and much more 15
Joachim Köninger
3. Dendrochronology and Bronze Age pile-dwellings on both sides of the Alps:
from chronology to dendrotypology, highlighting settlement
developments and structural woodland changes 68
Andre Billamboz and Nicoletta Martinelli
4. Climatic variations in the Circum-Alpine area during the period
4500–2500 cal BP, as reflected by palaeohydrological changes 85
Michel Magny
5. Micromorphological studies of wetland site formation processes: additional
help for a better understanding of the lake-dwellings’ final disappearance 101
Philipp Wiemann and Philippe Rentzel
6. Vegetation history and plant economy in the Circum-Alpine region Bronze Age
and early Iron Age environments: stability or major changes? 125
Marlu Kühn and Annekäthi Heitz-Weniger
iv Contents
7. Animal husbandry and hunting activities in the Late Bronze Age
Circum-Alpine region 179
Barbara Stopp
8. Bronze Age trade and exchange through the Alps:
influencing cultural variability? 211
Benjamin Jennings
9. The 3500-year-long lake-dwelling tradition comes to an end:
what is to blame? 236
Francesco Menotti
Acknowledgements
This volume stems from a large international project funded by the Swiss National Science
Foundation, in connection to the SNF-Professorship the editor was offered in 2009.
Therefore, my sincere gratitude (and that of all the members of the project) goes to the Swiss
National Science Foundation (with a special thanks to Inés de la Cuadra for her prompt
availability when help was needed) for its invaluable support throughout the duration of
the project!
There are also a number of people/colleagues to whom I am particularly grateful for their
invaluable help during the writing/editing of this volume. First and foremost a special thank
you goes to the project team members: (in alphabetical order) Annekäthi Heitz-Weniger,
Benjamin Jennings, Marlu Kühn, Philippe Rentzel, Barbara Stopp, Philipp Wiemann,
and most recently also José Granado. The authors of Chapter 3 would also like to thank
Joachim Köninger for the stimulating discussions; the authors of Chapter 5 are very grateful
to the Archaeological Services of Zurich and Zug, the Laboratory of Dendrochronology
and Underwater Archaeology of the City of Zurich, and the Soprintendenza per i Beni
Archeologici del Piemonte for their support and generous availability in providing the
samples for this study – they would also like to say thank you to Kristin Ismail-Meyer and
Christine Pümpin for their kind assistance; and finally, the authors of Chapter 6 are very
much indebted to Örni Akeret, Christoph Brombacher, Stefanie Jacomet, Bigna Steiner
and Lucia Wick for their help.
The entire IPAS (Integrative Prehistory and Archaeological Science) at the University
of Basel has been very supportive throughout the duration of the project and the writing
up of this volume; special thanks to Jörg Schibler, Stefanie Jacomet, Angela Schlumbaum,
Renate Ebersbach, Kristin Ismail-Meyer, Brigitte Heiz Wyss and Viviane Kolter.
I am also indebted to a number of people not necessarily involved in the project directly,
but who have contributed greatly to the development of this volume: Sandy Hämmerle for
translating Chapters 5, 6 and 7, and Jamie McIntosh for translating Chapter 2 (all from
German); Marc-Antoine Kaeser for the permission to publish two images, Urs Leuzinger
for his support and useful insights; and to the people at Oxbow Books (in particular Julie
Gardiner, Tara evans and Sarah Ommanney) for their invaluable help.
Last but not least, I am extremely grateful to the Department of Archaeology at the
University of Exeter (in particular Robert Van de Noort and Alan Outram) for kindly
vi Acknowledgements
hosting me as an honorary visiting professor during the writing up and editing of this
volume. Very helpful and exceedingly kind was also the support staff Jo Hatt, Lauren Ausden
and Phil Robinson. A warm thank you goes in particular to Anthony Harding and his wife
Cheryl for their kind friendship and succulent meals at their cottage, and to Bryony and
John Coles for the various interesting conversations (over a nice cup of tea) at the Royal
Albert Memorial Museum.
List of Contributors
Andre Billamboz Nicoletta Martinelli
Landesamt für Denkmalpflege Dendrodata s.a.s.
Baden-Württemberg Verona
Hemmenhofen Italy
Germany
Francesco Menotti
Annekäthi Heitz-Weniger School of Archaeological Sciences
Integrative Prehistory and Archaeological University of Bradford
Science United Kingdom
University of Basel
Switzerland Philippe Rentzel
Integrative Prehistory and Archaeological
Benjamin Jennings
Science
School of Archaeological Sciences
University of Basel
University of Bradford
Switzerland
United Kingdom
Barbara Stopp
Joachim Köninger
Integrative Prehistory and Archaeological
Janus-Verlag
Freiburg im Breisgau Science
Germany University of Basel
Switzerland
Marlu Kühn
Integrative Prehistory and Archaeological Philipp Wiemann
Science Archäologischer Dienst Graubünden
University of Basel
Chur
Switzerland
Switzerland
Michel Magny
CNRS
Laboratory de Chrono-Environnement
UFR des Sciences et Techniques
Besançon
France

List of Figures
1.1 Geographical location of the Circum- 3.2 Oak dendrotypology north and south of
Alpine region the Alps between 2200 and 1300 BC
1.2 Particular ‘utensils’ used to collect lake- 4.1 Geographical map of the Circum-Alpine
dwelling artefacts from the lake shores area
1.3 The lake-dwellings as advertising means 4.2 Palaeohydrological records reconstructed
to promote commercial products north of the Alps
1.4 Schematic depiction of the 4.3 Sites documenting a widespread climate
Pfahlbauproblem change around 3600–3300 cal BP
1.5 Chronology of the three main lake- 4.4 Quantitative estimates of climatic
dwelling occupational hiatuses in the parameters with confidence interval
Circum-Alpine region reconstructed for the period c. 3500–
2.1 Chronology tables and Culture groups of 2500 cal BP
the Circum-Alpine region 4.5 Comparison between palaeohydrological
2.2 14C dates of the early EBA lake-shore records reconstructed south of the Alps
settlements from the Bodensee region, at Fucino, and the lake-level fluctuations
and the Zürichsee in west-central Europe north of the Alps
2.3 Bodman beaker from early EBA lake- 4.6 Comparison between the periods of lake-
shore settlements, ceramic lids from Bell- dwellings and wetland villages north and
Beaker culture sites, and early EBA sites south of the Alps, and palaeohydrological
2.4 Iron Age pile-dwellings records
2.5 Foundation timbers from LBA lake- 4.7 Comparison between the number of
settlements archaeological sites in Franche-Comté
2.6 Unteruhldingen-Stollenwiesen from the Neolithic to the early Iron Age,
2.7 Lake-settlement ground plans in the and palaeoclimatic oscillations
northern Circum-Alpine region 5.1 The sites studied in Chapter 5
2.8 Late EBA lake-settlement ground plans 5.2 Depiction of the stratigraphical sequence
in the northern Circum-Alpine region of a lake-dwelling site
2.9 Late Bronze Age lake-settlement ground 5.3 Micromorphological studies – the
plans in the northern Circum-Alpine region Zurich-Opéra site
2.10 Settlement plans of the lake-shore 5.4 Microphotographs from Zurich-Opéra
settlement in northern Italy 5.5 Diagram showing a possible cultural
2.11 Siedlung-Forschner 1 biography of a single-phase house
2.12 Hypothetical territoriality and fortified 5.6 Zurich-Alpenquai
complexes 6.1 Swiss sites: ubiquity of cultivated plants,
3.1 Map of the sites mentioned in Chapter 3 per chronological period