Viereckschanze

As Viereckschanze or Keltenschanze is called the encountered mainly in southern Germany remains of a square, sometimes rectangular area with a surrounding wall and ditch. Your interpretation is not yet clear. More recent studies, however, is certain that some of the Viereckschanzen were permanently inhabited Celtic Manor houses or center of a rural community. On the other hand, it is not excluded that the Celts also surrounded their chapels with square enclosures. For most Viereckschanzen no or only sparse studies are so general statements about its purpose are not yet possible.

Distribution and dating

The main distribution area of Viereckschanzen is located in southern Germany. There are also Viereckschanzen in Switzerland, in Austria, in Bohemia and in northern France between the Seine and the Dordogne. In southern Germany and adjoining areas are known to date more than 300 plants. The find material is dated to the late La Tène period, in the 2nd and 1st century BC. Dendrochronological studies point in the same time.

Location and appearance

Viereckschanzen almost never are in exposed locations, but often on easy slopes and plains, especially in the agriculturally suitable soils. Some are in Celtic settlements involved ( such as in Bopfingen ), and sometimes can be found in their vicinity Latène grave mound. Almost half of all plants in Southern Germany is close to a river or creek. In the neighborhood there is sometimes a second hill at a little distance, very rarely double jumps occur (as in the Viereckschanzen Nordheim ).

Viereckschanzen are grave sites with a square or rectangular in plan, which is sometimes distorted rhombic or trapezoidal, with side lengths between 80 and 140 meters. On the inside of the trench is the built with the excavation wall. The hills have only one access, which was apparently never in the north. Usually it is located in the middle one of the three other sides. Sometimes a gatehouse was present, with a wooden bridge over the moat, which ran through the door area. Recent excavations that in the interior of the plant often a recurring design scheme occurs: The largest building is located respectively on the side opposite the entrance, while the smaller buildings are in the corners; remains an undeveloped open space in the center. Fountains and sunken into the ground pit houses, which probably served as workshops, are not always available.

History of Research

In the 19th century, the hills were interpreted as military installations of the Romans. The excavations in the Viereckschanze of court Stetten in the Neckar - Odenwald-Kreis by W. Conrady and K. Schumacher brought in 1896 for the first time numerous finds from the late La Tène period, the 2nd and 1st century BC The term " Viereckschanze " goes back to Paul Reinecke, who held the grave sites in 1910 for Celtic fortifications; around 1920, he interpreted it as a fortified Celtic farms.

Friedrich Drexel published in 1931 an essay in which he interprets the Viereckschanzen by comparison with archaeological finds from the Mediterranean as late Celtic sanctuaries. This interpretation prevailed as doctrine by, because the results of the first major excavation of a Viereckschanze - around 1950 in Holzhausen in the district of Munich by Klaus Schwarz - seemed to support this interpretation: The floor plan of a wooden building reminiscent of a Roman temple; three up to 35 meters deep shafts were interpreted as victims shafts of a sanctuary ( fanum ), and also the retracted position of the jump was used as an argument.

Excavations were only since the 1980s in Bavaria and Baden- Württemberg again made ​​to study now with an effort, the entire system completely. Under the leadership of Dieter Planck was detected in Fellbach- Schmiden that it is well with the presumed victims shafts. 1980, made ​​in one of these fountains a sensational discovery: three about 90 cm high, carved from oak wood animal figures. This under a two-meter- thick layer of manure hidden in the well shaft figures have so far been the only findings that can be seen in a religious context.

Siegwalt Schiek examined in 1984 in Ehningen for the first time the entire interior of a plant. He discovered the plans of seven wooden buildings of two consecutive phases and also the Fund amount spätlatènezeitlicher ceramic was considerable. The rampart thus had no sparsely built-up interior.

The large area between 1989 and 1992 examined Viereckschanze at Bopfingen in Ries confirmed the findings Ehninger. Krause and Günther Wieland found the floor plans of three arranged in the shape of a triangle wooden buildings, two on either side of the gate entrance and the third opposite the entrance. Around the plant was found a short distance from the floor plans of more than 120 houses in Celtic times, who were older than some of the hill. So the Viereckschanze was not deposited, but was part of a rural settlement.

Frieder Klein found in the vicinity of the 1991-1997 excavations at Viereckschanze to Riedlingen on the upper Danube extensive remains of a La Tène settlement and traces of a fenced previous system. Here is a longer settlement activity is apparent. In addition to the remains of large buildings in a symmetrical arrangement Frieder Klein was able to prove several smaller granary and two sunken into the ground pit houses. Forge slag, an iron Tüllenmeißel and a bone device for the decoration of ceramic proved craft activity inside a Viereckschanze.

The interpretation of the Celtic Viereckschanzen as places of worship is also provided by the large-scale excavation of the two Viereckschanzen Nordheim in question. The unusually large settlement typical fund portfolio speaks for an interpretation of the Viereckschanze as Celtic Manor, on which it of course was a place for ritual acts.

Most archaeologists consider the Viereckschanzen today as " fenced rural homesteads ," inhabited by " fairly well-off farmers," but Martin Kuckenburg adds: "It is quite possible that the late La Tène Celts from traditional and religious reasons both their rural Homesteads and their chapels with square enclosures surrounded to them prominently distinguished from the surrounding ... "