Dark Ages — Alles bleibt anders

Today individuality is more highly prized than ever before. In cultural studies, individuality has even been called a ‘megatrend’. What we eat and wear, what we watch and listen to, how we decorate our homes and spend our leisure time — all are meant to express our individuality.

In northern Europe, the sense of being part of a community long formed the centre of Neolithic people’s lives. Theirs was an ideology geared towards social equality. But something changed around 5,000 years ago and a higher form of individuality emerged. This shift is what we in the CRC 1266 are working to understand.

Stronger together

In the Neolithic age, rituals were a kind of glue that held communities together. Neolithic people worked together in the fields and lived communally in large houses. Such ritual activities as the building of megalithic tombs and the ancestor worship performed there ensured that the rules governing communal existence were passed on in the absence of writing. These rituals were the backbone of social life, providing meaning, cohesion and purpose over centuries. Megalithic tombs are particularly striking examples of this ideological orientation towards social equality.

Over many generations, they served as the final resting place of men and women, young and old — and the remnants of thousands of these tombs continue to be striking features across parts of the European landscape.

Flourishing communities, collapse and restructuring

During the Neolithic, nature was in constant flux. We were able to trace these changes in the ‘Oldenburger Graben’, a fjord which was separated from the sea and gradually became fresh water. Many communities settled around it, and they in turn altered the natural environment. The introduction of the plough, wheel and cart in the fourth millennium BCE did much to make agriculture, and hence life in general, easier. Higher agricultural productivity meant that more people could be fed, supporting villages with a population of up to one hundred. This was a time of growth.

Excursion

Megalithic tombs
In the Neolithic, tombs built from stone slabs known as ‘erratic boulders’ were a widespread phenomenon across the North European Plain. Some five thousand such monuments are still preserved today.
These megalithic tombs consist of several upright slabs supporting one or more horizontal slabs to form a chamber and then covered with a mound of earth. Most of these graves were built between 3600 and 3000 BCE. Bones were preserved in some of these chambers, allowing archaeologists to conclude that they served as the burial site for all members of a community.
Building these tombs required a great deal of labour and a high degree of organisation. It is likely that people from several settlements cooperated in the building work. Funeral offerings for the deceased included amber jewellery and often sumptuously decorated clay jars.
Our analyses have revealed that these vessels would once have contained primarily beef, in addition to dairy and vegetarian foodstuffs.

We wanted to see for ourselves how a megalithic tomb might have been built: Building a megalithic tomb at Kiel University.

grave mounds

The earliest fields used to grow plants were clearings in the primeval forest. Using a simple scratch plough or ‘ard’, grooves were made in the soil in which seeds were then sown. Megalithic graves often stood on ground that had previously been used for cultivation.
Building a megalithic grave required considerable manpower and a high degree of organisational talent.
The megalithic tombs were places of memory that were visited for generations. As large monuments in the landscape, they allowed people to visibly maintain their connection with their ancestors.
Burials in megalithic tombs took place regardless of age and biological sex. The funeral offerings placed in the chamber were mostly richly decorated vessels, while few weapons have been found.
Changing attitudes are reflected in the design of megalithic tombs. Here, the tomb was enlarged for the burial of one person and a stone façade added.
Burials in megalithic tombs were independent of age and gender. Mostly elaborately decorated vessels were deposited in the chamber and weapons only in small numbers.

The changing social structure

Around 3000 BCE, however, life changed. Living together in large villages led to conflict and the old ideology with its emphasis on equality came up against its limits. Meanwhile, the climate was changing. The situation worsened as summers grew cooler and harvests smaller.

Settlements were now protected by fences, and some people began to show off their power by openly bearing arms. As the old order collapsed, more and more people were buried not in their ancestors' megalithic tombs but in graves of their own.

#Individuality

Around this time, more and more people were migrating to northern Europe from other regions. They too favoured individuality over community. This is evident from a new style of burial, in which bodies were buried individually and according to strict rules.

People lived in small groups whose male chiefs bore arms. Shining rock axes and stone clubs were symbols of power, leaving no doubt that these leaders were read to use violence.

Excursion

What were the technological innovations of the Neolithic?
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Scratch plough (ard) marks (3550 BCE), criss-cross scoring of the soil by an ard, find-spot: Flintbek, Schleswig-Holstein

The Neolithic is the era when human beings began to engage in arable and livestock farming. Initially, small, garden-like fields were tended with digging sticks. This changed around 3600 BCE. The ard now allowed larger areas to be cultivated.
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Wooden cart axle (2450 BCE). Find-spot: Pfahlweg (wooden trackway) PR7, Lower Saxony

Although scratch ploughs might in theory have been pulled by domesticated animals, such as pigs or cattle, we have so far been unable to confirm that this was actually practised. Contemporary images do, however, suggest that cattle were used for another purpose, beginning around 3450 BCE, by which time the wheel had been introduced and animals were used to draw carts.
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Cart tracks (3400 BCE), gauge 1.1—1.2 m. Find-spot: Flintbek, Schleswig-Holstein

The world’s oldest archaeological evidence of cart tracks was found in northern Germany, under a grave mound at Flintbek near Kiel. They date from approximately 3400 BCE.

Another innovation was metal, which was introduced to the north in the form of copper axe.
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Copper hoard (3800 BCE), dagger, flat axe, spiral bracelet, spiral tape, sheet copper.

At first, however, the new material did not become established, and imports seem to cease around 3300 BCE. Not until 2300 BCE does metal regain its former importance — this time irreversibly. By adding tin, copper became bronze and a new era began — the Bronze Age.
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The raw material used in Neolithic copper objects was mined in a number of European regions (1. Find spots, 2. Tin mining; 3. Copper mining).

Our researchers have found that the copper used in the objects found in northern Germany and southern Scandinavia was mined in south-eastern Europe and the Alpine region. This has allowed us to reconstruct trade and exchange routes covering more than one thousand kilometres.

How to gain direction in life — and at what cost?

These changes did not take place overnight. Some groups would maintain their tradition of “stronger together” for several generations longer than others. Yet they found themselves increasingly behind the times. A new way of life based around small groups and individualistic practices took hold, leaving the old values to decline into insignificance. A new idea of society emerged.

In times of change and uncertainty – then as now – people seek orientation and direction. They found them in a form of society organised by strict rules but founded on inequality. But what is our solution?

Landmarks of the North

Megalithic tombs and Bronze Age burial mounds

Excavation

Alder and birch logs were used to build trackways across moorland (2450 BCE/Pfahlweg PR 7, Lower Saxony).
The route of this trackway is tested by sinking rods (2450 BCE/Pfahlweg PR 7, Lower Saxony).
Settlement site on the Baltic coast with artefacts preserved in wet soils (2900–2600 BCE, Schleswig-Holstein).
A hunting ground on the river Hunte (2450–2250 BCE, Hunte 4, Lower Saxony).
A settlement site among the former fjords and lagoons on the Baltic coast (3300–2600 BCE, Oldenburg 293, Schleswig-Holstein).
Moorland settlement site (2700–2500 BCE, Duvensee, Schleswig-Holstein).
Settlement site with houses and palisade (2450–2250 BCE/Hunte 1, Lower Saxony).

Dark Ages today

Finding the I in we

Where individualism and community spirit collide — whether now or 5,000 years ago — individuals find themselves having to reconcile their desire for autonomy with the interests of the community. Wanting to belong is a key aspect of our humanity and finds expression, just as it did thousands of years ago, in cultivating family ties or seeking out connections with like-minded people. At the same time, we seek to express our individuality, our own unique personalities, and we may do so using objects like cars, houses or smartphones, or activities such as travel or sports.

And no less so than 5,000 years ago, we are made all the more aware of this tension as we are confronted with climate change or conflict. They challenge us not least by demanding a collective response and confronting us with the question of whether and how to place limits on individual rights. Human beings must face these collective challenges by working together as societies.

Jan Piet Brozio is an archaeologist who has been researching the Neolithic at the Institute of Pre- and Protohistoric Archaeology, Kiel University, since 2009. In spite of his own discoveries and the knowledge accumulated in over one hundred years of research in the field, he finds that there is still much to learn about the Neolithic in northern Germany.

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