-
- THE
AMBER ORNAMENT COLLECTION FROM DAKTARISKE 5 NEOLITHIC
SETTLEMENT
-
- Adomas
Butrimas,
- Vilnius
Academy Of Fine Arts (Lithuania)
-
- During systematic
archaeological investigations in the Zemaitijan Uplands
in Western Lithuania, especially in the Birzulis Lake
area (fig.l) in 1978-1993 fifty Mesolithic camps, and
Neolithic and early bronze-age settlements, grave sites
and find sites were discovered. The better part of these
(22 sites) was investigated by resident expeditions and
the rest were surveyed. A collection of several tens of
thousands of items of ceramic, flint, bone and horn,
amber, stone and wooden artefacts was made and almost
all of these are preserved in the archaeological
holdings of the Lithuanian National Museum in Vilnius.
Most of the Birzulis Basin material has been published
in catalogues, articles and broader studies devoted to
individual sites or site groups. Material has been
presented at conferences too.
- The large part of sites
excavated in this region are settlements and grave sites
in sand or gravel and hence conditions for amber
artefacts to survive are poor. Therefore only modest
collections of amber artifacts have been found in the
Neolithic settlements at Sarnele, Kalniskes 1 and
Daktariske 1 (Butrimas A. 1982, p. 11 andtable33:l-7;
Girininkas A. 1977p.57-65; Butrimas A., 1996 p.
174-191). These include pendants, beads, shaped beads,
amber trial pieces and raw material, which are found
most commonly in Lithuania's Neolithic settlements.
- The largest collection of
amber artefacts found in the area under investigation is
from Daktariske 5. This settlement was discovered in
1986 by Janapole High School pupils on the southern side
of the hill between Birzulis and Sterva Lakes, not far
from the village of Daktariske (Varniai District,
Telsiai Region). It was investigated by Vilnius Fine
Arts Academy archaeological expeditions in 1987-90. This
is one of the largest peat site stone-age monuments to
be researched in Western Lithuania. An area of 648 m2
was investigated. Approximately 9,440 potsherds of Narva
Ceramics mixed with organic material were found and more
than 1,590 potsherds of corded ware ceramics with added
mineral material were collected. The settlement was rich
in flint artefacts, and several dozen bone and horn
axes, gouges, hooks, net plummets screwed into birch
bark, pine bark floats, fragments of wooden artefacts
and many other finds were found.
- A collection of amber
artefacts was gathered at Daktariske 5 which differs
little that found in separate stone-age settlements in
the Sventoji and Sarnate Neolithic complexes in Western
Lithuania and Western Latvia, but the variety of
artefact types and certain unique amber artefacts make
this collection truly representative and it has a
special place compared even with Neolithic peat sites
settlements on the eastern Baltic littoral. Two cultural
layers were found in the site: an early cultural layer
with ceramic made with added organic components and a
later layer, with ceramic made with added mineral
components (Butrimas A. 1998, p.5-7; Butrimas A. 1990,
p.7-9; Butrimas A., 1992, p.8-11; Butrimas A. 1998, p.
107-131; Irsenas M., Butrimas A. 2000, p.125-138).
- In a small part of the
site archaeologists managed stratigraphically to
distinguish the lower cultural layer, which ought to be
attributed to the early stone-age period of Narva
culture , that is 5530±110 B.P. (Vs-808). In the
remaining part of the settlement there is a clear middle
Neolithic Narva culture layer dated to 4360±90 B.P.
(Vs-809) and an upper cultural layer which should be
dated to the later stone-age Pamariu (Rzucewo) culture
with a date, according to Vilnius and Leningrad
laboratories' radiocarbon dating, of 4l50±5 B.P.
(Le-4450), 4l00±40 (Le -4450), 4020±100 (Vs - 813).
Amber artefacts were found in the layers belonging to
the Middle and Late Neolithic and according to
uncalibrated radiocarbon dating could be dated to the
second half of the third quarter and the fourth quarter
of the third millennium BC, that is to the period
2350-2020 BC. As we have said, in some places
stratigraphy helped distinguish the settlement's lower
cultural level. It should be noted that no amber
artefacts were found there.
- Analysis of amber
artefacts
- The amber artefact
collection from Daktariske 5 comprises 132 items. These
are amber artefacts, trial pieces, pieces of raw amber
and production waste. Sixty eight items of amber pieces
and off-cuts were found, 18 pendants and fragments of
the same, five beads, five disks, one amber large ring
and one double button-shaped bead. (Fig.2) Some of these
finds are decorated with incisions. More than half the
finds are raw amber and production waste (fig. 8).
Bearing in mind the fact that a considerable amount of
finds are trial pieces and that we have found raw amber
and production waste, we might conclude that amber
production took place at Daktariske 5 itself.
- Having analysed plans of
the finds of amber artefacts, raw material and
production waste found at Daktariske 5, we see that most
of the amber finds, especially the raw amber, were
discovered in the centre of the settlement, where, amber
production most probably took place there (fig.3).
Undoubtedly the amount of amber finds, especially the
quantity of raw material and its relation to finished
artefacts do not allow us to suppose that objects
produced here were connected with larger amber trade. We
might only assert that amber artefacts were produced in
the site to meet local needs and that the spread of
artefact production waste takes up an area of only circa
100 m2, which is less than a sixth of the total
settlement area.
- Amber pendants and trial
pieces
- Pendants are most commonly
made from naturally flat pieces of amber resin which
solidified between the bark of the trees that produced
the resin (Katinas V. 1986, p.00). They comprise the
best part of the artefacts; we found 34 items which make
up 26 per cent of all amber finds (diagram, fig.2).
These are trial pendants, prepared pendants and
fragments of pendants. A large part of the fragments is
made up by pendants that are broken near the hole made
for stringing the bead.
- Trial pieces Two clear
types of trial pieces have been found. The first is
trapezoid with both patina ends broken off, with a
square cross-section and sharp side edges; these are
flat. The top is cut quite evenly, is wrinkly, and the
artefact has not begun to be polished (fig.4:19). The
amber is brownish in colour (fig.9). The second type is
also trapezoid, but the lower edge is concave towards
the centre and two sections stick out like wings. The
surface is cut roughly and the edges of the side are
rounded, the cross-section lenticular, and no polishing
work has been begun on the artefact (fig.4:20).
- Trapezoid pendants
- The type of pendant found
most commonly in amber manufacturing centres in the
coastal areas of what is now Lithuania and Latvia is
trapezoid in form. At least six better preserved
examples have been found in this site (fig.4:l, 5-7, 12,
14; fig.10). Most likely several smaller chips should be
classified as parts of pendants (fig.4:7, 9-11, 13).
Some pendants were made from irregular off-cuts of amber
that are slightly polished and have holes for stringing.
Their form is similar to a rough trapezium (fig.4:2-4).
The latter examples would show that raw amber was highly
prized in this settlement and sometimes amber ornaments
would be made from very poor pieces of amber which would
be polished a little and pierced with a hole for
hanging. As the cross-sections of these and the pieces
mentioned earlier show, the holes were drilled from both
sides. Such barely polished and / or completely unworked
pendants have been found in other stone-age settlements
in western Lithuania too at Sarnele, Daktariske 1 and
elsewhere (Rimantiene R. 1996, fig.l79:21, Butrimas A.,
1982, table 33:1-4).
- Pendants with wavy side
edges form a separate small group. Two clearer fragments
of this type of pendant were found in this site
(fig.4:15-21). This type of pendant is not found at all
in coastal Neolithic settlements and grave sites in the
Baltic, nor were they found in the Schwarzort
(Juodkrante) Hoard although they are found in Eastern
Latvian amber workshops (Loze I. 1974:53, table) and it
is from there that they spread with other pendants
typical of this region to Eastern Lithuania (Girininkas
A., 1990, fig. 11 5). It seems that forms typical of
this amber production centre reached the Zemaitija
Uplands too.
- Beads with a regular round
cross-section broadening out towards the bottom and
having three holes for hanging (fig.4:16), that are
carefully polished and of brownish amber also belong to
the type of amber bead that is not found in coastal
Baltic settlements. Closer analogies are found only in
the Lubana amber artefact manufacturing centre (Loze I.
1975, fig.6), but we do not have a bead that
typologically identical with this artefact and it could
be classified as a unique artefact type.
- One fragment of a
key-shaped decorated pendant has been found (fig.4:17;
fig.11). The surviving part of this pendant has a hole
for hanging. On the lower, lost part of the ornament
there would have been a ring. The length of the stem for
hanging is 2.6 cm and its breadth 1 cm; it is 0.5 cm
thick. The edges are decorated with short slits. The
amber is made from good-quality yellow amber and it is
carefully polished. The four oldest known key-shaped
pendants were found in the second half of the nineteenth
century on the Curonian Spit and were published by R.
Klebs with the whole hoard. The author called them “gestielte
Ringanhangsel” (Klebs R. 1882, p.25-26, table VIII:
8-10, 12). Typologically the ornament we found, like the
Juodkrante examples, belongs to the same type of
key-shaped pendants with a large ring on its lower part.
Pendants of this type are not found in modern Polish
territory, nor are they found in the Sventoji and
Sarnate sites in Western Lithuania and Western Latvia
respectively. Lower sections of key-shaped pendants,
that are disk-shaped with a small hole, have been found
in Eastern Latvia, but there is no hanging hole in their
stems. Many examples of this type of pendant have been
found at Abora 1 Settlement in the cultural layer and in
the grave sites belonging to this settlement (Loze I.
2000, p.70-72). A key-shaped pendant was found at
Daktariske 5, which in its form is much closer to the
pendants found in the Juodkrante collection. I. Loze
sees the origins of this type of pendant between the
Northern Balkans and the Carpathians and also on the
eastern coasts of the Aegean and in Anatolia, where gold
and copper pendants of similar form have been
discovered.
- Amber beads
- Another type of amber
ornament that is widespread in the eastern Baltic Region
is button-shaped beads (fig.5:1-15; Fig.12). Eighteen
button-shaped beads and fragments thereof were found in
Daktariske 5. The dominant form of ornament has a
lenticular cross-section with a hidden V-shaped double
drill hole on the under side. Investigations of
Neolithic grave sites shows that this type of
button-shaped bead was sewn onto clothing and they could
have been worn strung on a necklace together with pipe
beads, but their delicate form means that they could not
have been used a buttons. The button-shaped beads that
have been found were carefully polished. The width of
beads from Daktariske 5 ranges from 0.8 cm to 2.3 cm.
Larger beads are rare in other sites too. Such beads are
found in all West Lithuanian sites and the Juodkrante
Hoard contained oval beads up to 4.5 cm wide and even
decorated beads. The beads are found throughout the area
where Narva Culture spread and in the Nemunas Culture
they have been found only at the Cedmaras settlement.
This type of bead spread throughout Polish territory
where they are found in the Globular Amphorae, Zlota and
Rzucewo (Pamariu) cultures as the most common type of
amber artefact (Mazurowski R. F. 1983, p.26). In
Late-Neolithic Rzucewo Culture they are found in all
sites (Nida, Daktariske 1, Butinge 1 settlements) but in
cross-section they are not lenticular but segmented or
oval. One button-shaped bead found at Daktariske 5 is
not oval but quadrangular (fig. 5:6). This is
characteristic mostly of the Late Stone Age but it is
also found in the Juodkrante Hoard (Klebs R. 1882, table
ii).
- Amber beads are not
commonly found in settlements; one trial pipe (cylinder)
bead was found (fig. 6:1), as were one fragment of a
pipe-bead (1.9 cm long) with a carefully polished
surface with marks of a drilling hole (fig. 6:2), half a
round lenticular-cross-section bead 1.8 cm wide, with a
hole for hanging drilled from both sides (fig. 6:3), and
one miniature, neatly polished round bead, lenticular in
cross-section with a diameter of 0.7 cm (fig. 6:4).
Fragments of other smaller beads have been found too.
- Cylindrical beads form one
of the most important types of amber ornament. They very
commonly have thin sides, like the examples we found,
and are of various length. The beads found in the
Juodkrante hoard and Narva culture settlements have
somewhat broader sides while those found in Rzucewo
culture settlements at Sventoji, Daktariske 1 and Nida
have thinner sides. Cylindrical beads are found in
almost all Rzucewo culture settlements, including those
already mentioned in Western Lithuania, the Kaliningrad
Region and Polish Pomorze around Gdansk, Suchacz,
Tolmicko, Oslonino, Zulawy (Zurek J. 1954: 37; Kilian L.
1955: 56-57; Mazurowski R. F. 1984, p. 5-60; Krol D.
1992, p. 291-299). This form of ornament is made by
exploiting naturally icicle-shaped pieces of amber
resin.
- Polished beads with a
hanging hole, lenticular cross-section and various
diameters are known from the Zlota and Rzucewo cultures
in Poland, but are rare in Lithuanian coastal regions;
single examples are known from the Juodkrante Hoard and
in Latvia they are found at Sarnate (Vankina L. V. 1970,
p. 105-114) and the Abora 1 settlement in the Lubana
Lowlands (Loze I. 1979, fig: 3-4).
- Only one double
button-shaped bead with a neatly polished surface, and
two side edges decorated with short oblique-ish
incisions has been found (fig. 6:5). The closest
analogies, including one almost identical one, come from
the Juodkrante Hoard (Klebs R. 1882 taf. l:17, 22). This
form is almost unknown in other Polish, Lithuanian and
Latvian stone-age sites.
- Amber disks and rings
- Amber disks of two types
have been found at Daktariske 5: lenticular
cross-section disks with a small hole through the middle
(fig. 7:1,2) and hole-less disks with a broad groove
carved on the edges is reminiscent in form, of a double
button (fig. 7:4:6).
- A very interesting disk is
3.6 cm wide. On one side the artefact is divided into
four unequal parts by a triple lightly drilled cross of
indentations (fig. 7:1; fig. 14, 15); on the object's
borders with broken single and double lines of
indentations one, two and four triangles are formed on
each of the four parts. It appears that in certain
indentations there are marked remnants of dark resin. In
the smallest quadrant formed by the cross a triangle of
two indentations was made. Next to this in the next
quadrant (clockwise) two triangles are formed by a
double line of indentations, and the same is the case
with the next quadrant, and in the final quarter, which
is the largest in size, there are four triangles of
which two are formed of a double line and two of a
single line of indentations. Because of this composition
in each of the four areas divided by the cross the
triangles are made up a different number of
indentations, increasing in number as one moves
clockwise. The smallest number of indentations in a
quadrant's triangles is 25, the largest 50 with the
triangles of the middle quadrants having 37 and 38
indentations. On this side the decorative elements are
set out according to the principle of rotating symmetry
(Adomonis J. 1994, p. 92-111). What such decoration
could have been intended for, or whether it had some
sort of calendrical or other function, we cannot say at
present. The other side of this artefact is also
interesting. Its edges are decorated too but not with
indentations but by another technique - eight triangles
of varying size were made by short incisions. However,
the varied number of incised lines in these triangles is
not marked by any more clearly expressed symmetry.
- Amber disks of similar
type and form began to be made in Lithuania only in
settlements of the Middle Neolithic; the earliest known
specimens are from Sventoji Settlement 3b. The symbol of
a cross within a wheel is typical of disks found in
Globular Amphorae Culture graves in Poland. A very close
analogy to our disk is found in an amber disk from
Swarcenowo (Torun woj.). In this Globular Amphorae
Culture grave we find a disk with a cross in a wheel and
on the borders there is a single line of triangles, but
unfortunately the fragmentary state of the object is
such that we cannot say how many triangles there were.
Another disk almost identical to ours comes from
Stauchwitz-Augusthof (Ortelsburg district) (Sturms E.
1956, vol. IV:2). R. Mazurowski dates these disks to
2500-2200 BC and this agrees in part with the date set
for the Daktariske 5 settlement's cultural layer at
2360-2020 BC. In form, cross-section and size there is
another completely analogous, undecorated disk with a
neatly polished surface from the same Daktariske 5
settlement (Fig. 7:2; fig. 12). It is 3.4 cm broad.
- A further three disks
reminiscent of double buttons are made from transparent,
yellow amber (fig. 7:4; fig. 7:4-6). The diameters are
3.3 cm, 1.9 cm and 1.8 cm. This type of disk is found on
the Latvian coast at Sarnate and others were found in
the Juodkrante Hoard, while there is a large ring of
similar cross-section from the Globular Amphorae Culture
graves in Poland.
- Only one amber large ring
has been found (fig. 7:3; fig. 16). It is especially
daintily wrought of good quality yellow amber with its
whole surface carefully polished on both sides and its
side edges decorated with small incisions from both
sides and through the middle. The cross-section is like
a continuous, thin lens. An amber large ring is a
frequent find in both Rzucewo and Globular Amphorae
cultures. They are also a common find in Eastern Latvia
but there the cross-section is a clear square (Loze I
1979, vol. lix: l-2) and this shows that there they were
made without respect to form from shale large rings.
Thus, in Dakrariske Settlement 5 amber large rings are
connected with Globular Amphorae and Rzucewo Culture
areas.
- One incompletely finished
amber disk was found (fig. 7:7). One side is carefully
polished and the cross-section is lenticular. In size
(its diameter is 6.7 cm) this article differs from the
whole of the Daktariske 5 amber artefact collection.
