Speaking of the warrior tombs of the Przeworsk culture… – History

Interestingly related to yesterday’s post: excavations of the Przeworsk culture cemetery in Kazimierzhawielka, 100 miles northeast of Glinka, revealed a warrior grave containing not only traditional iron weapons but also an extremely rare Roman bronze urn (situla). Based on its type, it dates to between the 1st and 2nd centuries BC.

The vessel is classified as Eggers 18 and contained the ashes of the deceased. The vessel is decorated with dolphin-shaped accessories and is intact and in excellent condition. These were expensive objects imported from the Roman Empire and are extremely rare in Poland. Only seven such vessels have been found in the area where the Przeworsk culture settled, and only four of them were used as urns.

The excavation found weapons next to the urn: a sword, a shield, and two spearheads. The weapons had been ritually bent and burned, consistent with the cremation practices of the Przeworsk culture seen in the Glinka burial.

The Przeworsk cemetery is unusual in that it contains both cremation burials and full-body burials. Cremation was the standard burial method for the Przeworsk culture, but this cemetery far outnumbers cremation. Since excavations began three years ago, archaeologists have uncovered four cremation burials, 23 full-body burials and 12 quadrilateral tombstones.

The burials were all oriented north-south, with the heads facing south. The bodies were lying on their sides, in a squatting position. Jewelry, clothing fragments and ornaments found with the skeletons indicate that most of the dead were women. One of the burials unearthed this year contained a female skeleton wearing a double necklace of glass, stone and bronze beads, a belt pendant and a barrel pendant made of bronze and iron. Two identical bronze brooches were also found, one on the breastbone and one above the head. The pattern of the fibula dates the burial to the late 2nd century, making it the youngest object found in the cemetery.

Some of the burials were missing bones from the upper body, while the rest of the skeleton was intact, suggesting the bones were removed intentionally, a previously unknown practice that involved reopening new graves and removing certain bones after soft tissue decay.