Indigenous or not?
Wyszomirski, Mark
Fornvännen 1979(74), s. 47-52 : ill
http://kulturarvsdata.se/raa/fornvannen/html/1979_047 Ingår i: samla.raa.se
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Indigenous or not?
This a r t i d e comments on W. Wojciechowski's work (1976) on Scandinavian type daggers from western Poland.
I n 1973, when sending my a r t i d e on Scan- dinavian daggers from the East and South Baltic area (Wyszomirski 1973—1974) to the printer, I was convinced that all dagger speci- mens from northern Poland were mentioned in the catalogue.
However, Wojciechowski's a r t i d e lists many additional finds and mainly unpublished ones, kept in various local museums in Poland.
Although I could not personally visit the Polish museums, I know the difference not to be too great (about 10 stray finds).
However, Wojciechowski does not mention other specimens, e.g. finds from Swochowo, Slupsk distr. (Wyszomirski B. & M . 1970, pp.
68 f.; Wyszomirski 1973—1974, p . 8 0 ) , Koniewo, Kamieri Pomorski distr. (Wojtasik
1959, p p . 569, pp. 569 f., Fig. 2) etc.
In connection with these two artides, it is important to summarize the information on contact between southern Seandinavia and central Europé during the Late Neolithie Period (LN) and Early Bronze Age, and to discuss other views held by Wojciechowski.
Classificalion into types
T h e dassification of Late Neolithie flint daggers worked out by S. Muller (1902) and Forssander (1936) and, above all, the latest dassifications for D e n m a r k by Lomborg
(1973), enable chronological estimates of all dagger types. According to Wojciechowski, all Scandinavian types and most of the variants dassified by Lomborg, are found in Poland. T h e author construds his own typo- logieal dassification, in which types I and I I
correspond to Forssander's typology. Subtypes are designated with small letters to differen- tiate them from Lomborg's dassification.
Wojciechowski's dassification is worked out only for flint daggers from western Poland and at the same time he claims their pro- venience to be beyond doubt Scandinavian
(pp. 41 ff.).
T h e dassification can be identified with Lomborg's types (Fig. 1), but Wojciechow- ski's dassification is precarious. For the sake of chronology and type estimations no new type dassification is needed. I n this case it only duplicates the Danish dassification a n d does not d u c i d a t e any new problems but, on the contrary, creates difficulties.
Within the area of interest for Wojcie- chowski, there is a find from the Stargard district (Schroeder 1951, p . 129, Table 3 , p. 171; Wyszomirski 1973—1974, no. 6, p . 78, Fig. 8, p. 9 7 ) , which cannot be fitted into the Scandinavian dassifications. I t is a spe- cimen with a thin and rounded-off shaft and a bent profile, a typical so-called 'pseudo- G r a n d Pressigny' blade. Such blades occur in the north of Germany (Struve 1955, p . 130, Table 33) and Mecklenburg (Berlekamp 1956, p p . 7 ff., Figs. 1—2). They are core implements as opposed to 'Grand Pressigny' blades from northern France, B d g i u m , Hol- land and southwcstern Saxony, which are m a d e of large and strong blades. ' G r a n d Pressigny' and 'pseudo-Grand Pressigny' bla- des are older than our Late Neolithie daggers and are dated to the Middle Neolithie
(Struve 1955, p . 130; Wyszomirski 1973—
1974, p . 8 5 ) . Technique, distribution and dating of north G e r m a n 'pseudo-Grand Pressigny' blades indicate their connection
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Forssander 1
II III
IV
V VI
Lomborg IA IB IC ID IE1 IE2 IAB Ix IIA IIB INA IIIB IND mc
IHE III F IVA IVB IVC IV D IVE VA VB VIA VIB VIC
Wojciechowski la Ib Ic
II Illa Illa
lllb IVa
IVb IVb Va Vb VI
H e emphasizes that many lancet-shaped specimens bear traces of secondary sharpening
(at the edge) or of shaping (Wojciechowski 1976, p . 39). If this is the case, it is difficult to reconstruct the original shape of the dagger. Not all daggers with different shapes than the Scandinavian ones, bear traces of secondary working. I n my opinion a certain proportion of these are imitations of imported daggers manufaclured in Poland (Wyszomir- ski 1973—1974, p p . 84 and 98) and the manufacture probably depended on imported raw flint or the so-called 'Baltic' flint, pri- marily transported from Seandinavia during the Ice Age.
Wojciechowski does not completely disre- gard this opinion and stresses, quite strongly, the Scandinavian provenience of the daggers (Wojciechowski 1976, p. 4 0 ) . Daggers with secondary working are mainly found in Pome- rania. However, they do not occur in the Gdarisk region, the Soviet Baltic republics, Finland, nor in Czechoslovakia. I believe this to be a local element and agree with the opinion on local manufacture.
Fig. 1. Forssander's, Lomborgs, and Wojciechow- ski'» dagger dassifications. — Forssanders, Lom- borgs och Wojciechowskis indelning av flintdolkar.
with southern Scandinavian Middle Neolithie flat-hewn halberds (Fig. 2 ) , on the one h a n d , and with British Bell Beaker daggers on the other.
Besides the above-mentioned specimen from the Szczecin district in Pomerania, there is one more specimen (stray find) of a 'pseudo- G r a n d Pressigny' blade: from Trzciano, Ni- dzica district (Gaerte 1929, Table 19, Fig. b, 3 1 ; Wyszomirski 1973—1974, no. 63, p. 8 1 , Fig. 9 : 7 ) but it is situated outside of the lerritory described by Wojciechowski.
T h e manufacturing of the daggers
Wojciechowski takes into consideration the manufacture and shaping of different speci- mens, which according to him often strongly differ from Scandinavian types I and I I , above all from the lancet-shaped specimens.
Use
A great number of the Polish daggers (mainly types I a n d I I ) have been frequently published as heads of throwing weapons
(spear- or lanceheads). Wojciechowski dis- agrees with this and considers them to be daggers, which is also my opinion. However, I do think that some of the lancet-shaped Scandinavian daggers were used as halberd- heads also (Wyszomirski 1973—1974, p. 8 6 ) . Similar opinions are held by some Scandi- navian researchers (Björn 1933—1934, pp. 2 ff.; Hinsch 1951—1953, pp. 49 ff; Janson 1936, p. 71). It is difficult to show the corre- lation between Late Neolithie daggers a n d the leaf-formed Middle Neolithie halberds
(Fig. 2 ) , in spite of the fact that manufactur- ing techniques and distributions are similar for both forms.
Leaf-formed halberds are never found in passage graves or Late Neolithie graves in Sweden. I n Långelanda on the island of Orust in Bohuslän county, a depot was found consisting of a halberd and a blank, presum-
Fig. 2. Middle Neolithie halberd heads. Scania, a.
L U H M 13 674, b. L U H M 12 024, c. L U H M 345, d.
L U H M 641, e. L U H M 22 4 8 1 . — Bladformiga dolkstavar från mellänneo- litikum, samtliga påträffade i Skåne.
ably of a thin-butted axe (Göteborgs arkeo- logiska museum no. 6612).
Some of the described daggers from Po- land can be assumed to have been transverse- shafted halberds. T h e cultural origin of these has been recently determined: they belong to the Unétice culture, more specifically the Plonia phase of the latter with distind local Corded Ware Culture components (Wyszo- mirski 1973—1974, chapter 2.4, p p . 81 ff.).
Wojciechowski also c o n n e d s the daggers with the Unétice culture and the Plonia-Grobia- Smiardöw complex, which I consider a phase or a local group of the Unétice culture. It can be clearly seen that the distribution of daggers in Poland coincides with the distri- bution of the Unétice culture and that it is
the same in Czechoslovakia (Zapotocky 1961, pp. 172 a n d 175).
Bronze halberds occur within Polish lerri- tory only in Pomerania and north-western Great Poland (Sarnowska 1969, Fig. 2 3 ) , i.e.
in the centres of occurrence of flint daggers.
Chronology
Wojciechowski (p. 37) says that flint daggers in Poland "were in use during a short time, but in spite of this show remarkable typo- logieal differences, which charaderise their rapid development within a very short time . . .". This is stränge, since the daggers of different types could not have come to Poland during the same period, and the assumption, that specimens of different types
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50 45 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5
'/.
Denmark Poland
I II IV VI
Fig. 3. Percentage distribution of daggers of all types. — Procentuell fördelning av samtliga dolk- typer.
could be accumulated during a longer period, is not corroborated by the material.
Also Wojciechowski's chronological limits (see below) for daggers of different types c o n t r a d i d the above-mentioned assumption.
T h e percentage-distribution of flint daggers of all types is almost identical in Denmark and in Poland (Fig. 3 ) .
This means that the activity of manufac- turing daggers in the area of origin (southern Seandinavia) is paralldled by the distribution of flint daggers in peripheral areas and that they came gradually to Poland during the whole Scandinavian Late Neolithie and also during the Early Bronze Age.
Wojciechowski's chronology (pp. 77 ff.) of Polish dagger-finds is acceptable. I agree fully with his dating of the earliest daggers to the first period of the Bronze Age (Wyszo- mirski 1973—1974, p. 83) i.e. to the already developed Unétice culture (ca. 1700—ca.
1650 B . C ) . Wojciechowski also defines the limit for the latest daggers of type V I : by comparison to Scandinavian daggers whose age is known from C 14 datings, they can be dated to the first half of Bronze Age period I I in Poland. In this case the daggers can be connected with the pre-Lausitz culture
(ca. 1400 — c a . 1350 B . C ) .
Lomborg dated Czech daggers of type V to the classical phase of the Unétice culture (Lomborg 1973, p p . 142 ff.). T h u s Wojcie- chowski ascribes specimens of type V I to the pre-Lausitz culture, which is charaderized by distinct post-Unétice components. For comparison Wojciechowski cites C 14 datings from Sweden (p. 6 1 ) . Here he is wrong in criticizing M . Strömberg's type determination of one of the daggers from T å g a r p no. 5, ö . T o m m a r p parish in Scania (Strömberg
1971, pp. 44 ff., Fig. 22, p . 4 6 ) . Wojciechow- ski is not familiar with the material from personal examination, and the dagger is in fact of type I I I and not, as he claims, of type I V a according to Lomborg.
Wojciechowski's dating has on the whole no debatable points and can be accepted as a basis for cultural and chronological deter- minations for the Polish flint daggers that are of Scandinavian origin.
M a r k Wyszomirski
Lunds Universitets Historiska Museum Krafts torg 1
223 50 L u n d
References
Berlekamp, H. 1956. Spandolche und dicke Spitzen zwischen Recknitz und Peene. Jahrbuch fiir Bodendenkmalpflege in Mecklenburg. Schwe- rin.
Björn, A. 1933—1934. Arkeologiske misceller.
Universitetets Oldsakssamlings Arbok. Oslo.
Forssander, J. E. 1936. Der ostskandinawische Nor- den während der älteste Metallzeit Europas.
Lund.
Gaerte, W. 1929. Urgeschichte Ostpreussens. Kö- nigsberg.
Hinsch, E. 1951—1953. Traktbegerkultur-Megalit- kultur. Universitetets Oldsakssamlings Arbok.
Oslo.
Janson, S. 1936. En boplats från yngre stenåldern vid Rörvik i Kville sn. Göteborgs och Bohus- läns fornminnesförenings tidskrift. Göteborg.
Lomborg, E. 1973. Die Flintdolche Dänemarks.
Köbenhavn.
Muller, S. 1902. Flintdolkene i den nordiske sten- ålder. Nordiske Fortidsminder. Bd I. Köben- havn.
Sarnowska, W. 1969. Kultura unietycka w Polsce.
Bd. I. Wrociaw-Warszawa-Kraköw.
Schroeder, R. 1951. Die Nordgruppe der Oder- schnurkeramik. Berlin.
Struve, K. V. 1955. Die Einzelgrabkultur in Schles- wig-Holstein und ihre kontinentalen Bezieh- ungen. Neumiinster.
Strömberg, M. 1971. Gånggriften i Tågarp, ö . Tommarp. Simrishamn.
Wojciechowski, W. 1976. Sztylety krzemienne typu skandynawskiego w Polsce zachodniej (Ze stu- diöw nad kontaktami Polski zachodniej z potuniowa Skandynawi^ w pöznym neolicie i poczatk^ch epoki brazu). Studia archeolo- giczne. nr VII. Wroctaw.
Wojtasik, J. 1959. Odkrycia-Koniewo. Materialy Zachodnio-Pomorskie. Szczecin.
Wyszomirska B. & Wyszomirski M. 1970. Rzadkie znaleziska z okolic Slupska. Z otchlani wiekow.
nr X X X V I : 1. Warszawa.
Wyszomirski, M. 1973—1974. Sandinavian flint daggers in the southern and eastern region of the Baltic. Meddelanden från Lunds Universi- tets Historiska Museum. Lund.
Zapotocky, M. 1961. Severské zbrané a nastroje starsi doby bronzové v Cechåch. Pamåtky Archeologické. nr 1. Praha.
Sammanfattning
D e n n a uppsats kommenterar W. Wojciechow- skis arbete (1976) om dolkar av skandinavisk typ i västra Polen. I samband med förf :s u p p - sats om skandinaviska flintdolkar i östra och södra östersjöområdet (1973—1974) är det viktigt att summera uppgifterna om kontak- ter mellan södra Skandinavien och mellersta Europa under senneolitikum (SN) och äldre bronsåldern.
Enligt Wojciechowski förekommer i Polen alla skandinaviska dolktyper och många av de av Lomborg indelade varianterna. H a n skapar en egen typologisk indelning, där un- dertyper utmärks med små bokstäver för att skilja den från Lomborgs klassifikation. In- delningen kan identifieras med Lomborgs ty- per (fig. 1), men i denna punkt vacklar Wojciechowskis indelning. För kronologisk bestämning och för typbestämning behöver m a n icke skapa en ny klassifikation, då denna i detta fall endast dubblerar den danska in- delningen och inte belyser några nya problem utan tvärtom skapar svårigheter.
Ett fynd från Stargard-distriktet passar inte in i de skandinaviska indelningarna. Det är ett exemplar med tunt och avrundat skaft
och böjd profil, en typisk s. k. pseudo-Grand Pressigny-klinga. Dessa är kärnredskap i mot- sats till G r a n d Pressigny-klingor, som tillver- kats av stora och kraftiga spån. Båda typerna är äldre än SN-dolkar och dateras till mellan- neolitikum. De har förbindelse med mellan- neolitiska ythuggna dolkstavar från södra Skandinavien (fig. 2) å ena sidan och med den brittiska klockbägarkulturcns dolkar å den andra. Enligt Wojciechowski skiljer sig en del av dolkarna, framför allt de av ty- perna I och I I , i formen och många h a r spår efter sekundära vässningar eller formeringar.
I n t e alla dolkar med annorlunda form än de skandinaviska bär spår efter sekundär bear- betning. Min åsikt är, att en viss del av dessa tillverkats i Polen som efterbildningar av de importerade flintdolkarna.
Wojciechowski — i motsats till äldre åsik- ter — kallar alla dessa fynd för dolkar. J a g anser dock, att en del av de lancettformiga skandinaviska dolkarna även använts som spetsar till dolkstavar. En del av de beskrivna dolkarna från Polen kan antas ha varit tvär- skaftade dolkstavar. De polska dolkarna till- hör Unétice-kulturen, och snarast Plonia-
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fasen av denna kultur med tydliga lokala snörkeramiska komponenter.
Wojciechowski menar, att i Polen är flint- dolkarna i bruk under kort tid, men trots detta uppvisar de mycket stora typologiska skiljaktigheter, som kännetecknar deras has- tiga utveckling inom mycket kort tid (s. 3 7 ) . Detta är oklart, eftersom dolkar av olika ty- per ej kunde komma till Polen under samma period. Även hans tidsgränser för dolkar av olika typer motsäger den o v a n n ä m n d a åsik- ten. Den procentuella fördelningen av alla dolktyper är nästan identisk i D a n m a r k och i Polen (fig. 3 ) . Detta betyder att tillverk- ningsaktiviteten för dolkarna i kärnområdet h a r sin parallell inom de perifera områdena
av dolkarnas utbredning och atl dessa succes- sivt har kommit till Polen under hela skan- dinavisk SN och äldre bronsålder.
Wojciechowskis kronologi är helt accep- tabel (de äldsta dolkarna av I och I I till första perioden av polsk bronsålder — redan utvecklad Unétice-kultur -— och de yngsta dolkarna av V l - t y p e n till första halvan av I I bronsåldersperioden dvs. till förlausitz- kulturen vilken karakteriseras av tydliga post- Unétice-komponenter).
Wojciechowskis datering kan accepteras som kronologisk och kulturell bestämnings- grund för de polska flintdolkarna av skandi- navisk proveniens.
