Causewayed enclosure

Mine works are landscape structures from simple or concentric ramparts combined with through narrow Erdbrücken interrupted, or successively applied pits that are so close together that they were long considered trenches. The wide access to the interior are partially protected by bastions complicated.

Mine works appeared in the Western European Late Neolithic, especially in the Michel Berger culture, Wartberg culture, the Chasséen, the English and Early Neolithic in the Funnel Beaker Culture ( TBK ).

German mine works

There are more or less round equipment and fixtures section as in Heilbronn- Klingenberg. From there, charred remains of a palisade are known.

Filling the trenches

The trenches are very rich fund especially near the Erdbrückenzugänge. They contain zerscherbte pottery, flint, rock artifacts, daub, human and animal bones and plant remains. In Heilbronn - Klingenberg einkorn, emmer, durum wheat and naked barley were detected, as well as peas, lentils, flax and poppy.

Mine works in the UK

In England earthworks were built during the local Early Neolithic ( Western carinated, formerly Windmill Hill Culture ). They are circular or oval-shaped earthworks, referred to initially as Causewayed camps and today as Causewayed enclosures. They are located on hills or in the plane and have diameters 12-225 m. One or more walls are surrounded by the corresponding number of concentric hole circles. The 70 known plants in England covering areas between one and 8.5 ha C14 data from Abingdon in Oxfordshire show a use between 4,930 BCE ( controversial dating) and 3210 BC onwards.

Bones, mainly of cattle, as well as pottery and flint were found in the trenches, even human bones before coming. There is no consensus regarding the use of Causewayed enclosures, but it seems that they are fulfilling a variety of social, economic and ritual functions in early Neolithic communities. It is believed now that the early Neolithic societies used the courts for barter, festivals and rituals.

Known mine works

• Germany: Calden, Halle- Dölauer Heath, Herxheim, Urmitz,
• Denmark: Sarup
• England: Coombe Hill, Hambledon Hill, Offham Hill and Windmill Hill, Abingdon Clacton Wyke Down and Hembury. Some called the Tor Cairn plants in the southwest of Britain - as the Carn Brea, showery gate and " Rough Tor " on Bodmin Moor ( Cornwall), Stowe's Hill and Whittor in Dartmoor - are held for lithic counterparts of the earthworks.
• France: Champ Durand, Chez Pure at Semussac, Diconche, La Coterelle, La Mastine and Pied- Lizet.
• Ireland: Done Gore Hill, County Antrim (disputed ) and Magheraboy, County Sligo.

Mine works of other time position

Earthworks from the Pottery were always therefore often regarded as a continuous grave rings and as fortifications. The earthworks at Herxheim near Landau and Rosheim in Alsace show that it is in this case to successively excavated and partly wiederverfüllte pits which do not satisfy any grave function, but appear in the magnetogram as a closed circular ditches.