Bad Dürrenberg burial
The Bad Dürrenberg burial is a 9000 year old Mesolithic double burial of a woman and baby discovered in 1934 near Bad Dürrenberg, Germany.
The grave was discovered on 4 May 1934 on the grounds of a spa garden near the town of Bad Dürrenberg, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany.[1][2] It was encountered by workmen cutting a trench for a fountain water pipe.[1][3] It was excavated in one day directed by W. Henning, a conservator at the Halle State Museum of Prehistory. No photographs were taken of the burial due to time pressure. The only records are written descriptions and a sketch plan which do not record the exact positioning of the bodies and objects.[1]
The double burial contained the skeletal remains of an adult woman aged 30–40 years and a 6-8 month old infant. Radiocarbon dating of human and animal bone yielded a date of 7000-6800 BC, placing the interment in the Mesolithic period.[4] The woman was buried in a sitting position with flexed arms and legs. The baby was positioned between her legs. The grave was filled with powdered red ochre. It contained an "exceptional number" of grave goods, including 50 pierced animal teeth, and microlith blades stored in a crane bone. The woman has been interpreted as a shaman, based on the presence of a portion of roe deer skull with antlers that was presumably attached to headwear.[2]
The woman had an incompletely formed atlas vertebra and associated malformations of the foramen magnum and vertebral arteries. This may have caused neuropathological conditions, such as abnormal sensations, ataxia, or induced rapid eye movement (nystagmus) or double vision.[5]
Genetic analysis revealed she likely had a "relatively dark skin complexion, dark, straight hair and blue eyes".[6] The baby boy she was buried with was found to be a fourth or fifth degree genetic relative with a shared mitochondrial haplogroup; she may have been a direct relative, such as his great-great-grandmother, or she may have been an aunt or cousin several generations removed.[6]
References[edit]
Citations[edit]
- ^ a b c Orschiedt et al. 2023, p. 125.
- ^ a b Porr & Alt 2006, p. 396.
- ^ Curry 2023, p. 39.
- ^ Orschiedt et al. 2023, p. 127.
- ^ Porr & Alt 2006, pp. 398–399.
- ^ a b Orschiedt et al. 2023, p. 133.
Works cited[edit]
- Curry, Andrew (2023). "The Shaman's Secrets". Archaeology. Vol. 76, no. 2. pp. 38–43. Retrieved 10 December 2023.
- Mykhailova, Nataliia (2019). "'Shaman' burials in prehistoric Europe. Gendered images?". In Koch, Julia Katharina; Kirleis, Weibke (eds.). Gender Transformations in Prehistoric and Archaic Societies (PDF). Leiden: Sidestone Press. pp. 341–362. ISBN 978-90-8890-823-1. Retrieved 7 December 2023.
- Orschiedt, Jörg; Haak, Wolfgang; Dietl, Holger; Siegl, Andreas; Meller, Harald (24 November 2023). "The Shaman and the Infant: The Mesolithic Double Burial from Bad Dürrenberg, Germany". In Meller, Harald; Krause, Johannes; Haak, Wolfgang; Risch, Roberto (eds.). Kinship, Sex, and Biological Relatedness : The contribution of archaeogenetics to the understanding of social and biological relations. Propylaeum. pp. 125–136. ISBN 978-3-96929-259-4.
- Porr, M.; Alt, K. W. (2006). "The burial of Bad Dürrenberg, Central Germany: osteopathology and osteoarchaeology of a Late Mesolithic shaman's grave". International Journal of Osteoarchaeology. 16 (5): 395–406. doi:10.1002/oa.839. Retrieved 9 December 2023.
Further reading[edit]
- Meller, Harald; Michel, Kai (2022). Das Rätsel der Schamanin: eine archäologische Reise zu unseren Anfängen (in German) (Originalausgabe ed.). Hamburg: Rowohlt. ISBN 9783498003012.