56267 S5006670

La Tene settlement in Upper Silesia:

An outline

Marek Bednarek

At the beginning of the Earty Iron Age Upper Silesia was inhabited by the Silesian group of the Lusatian cul-ture (Gedl 1975: 98-100). In the Hallstatt C period the group experienced rapid development, development which had begun already in the Bronze Age, as testified by the archaeological record. However, at the end of the Hallstatt C or in Hallstatt D the situation changed so radi-cally that one can talk about the collapse of the Lusatian culture (Gedl 1983: 281; 1985: 8, 9; Mierzwiński 1992: 72, map 6 and 7; 1994: 113). What factors influenced this collapse? Much research and even morę debate has so far come up with an agreed answer to this question. The majority of researchers believe that the downfall of the settiements was influenced by political events pro-voked either by an incursion or by a senes of incursions by invaders from the Carpathians who used weapons of Scythian type (Bukowski 1977:267-269; Gedl 1985:42). Probabły these events were followed by a number of socio-economic transformations (Woźniak 1971: 204, 207-208).

A situation similar to that in Upper Silesia, that is the abandonment of long-lasting cemeteries and settiements fbllowing the Hallstatt C period, took place in Moravia, in the area inhabited by the Lusatian culture (Meduna 1980: 160-162).

The collapse of the settiements was not linked to complete depopulation of the region. Discoveries madę at the cemetery site of Kietrz indicate that a part of the population survived until the finał phase of the Hallstatt period (Gedl 1983: 194—195); this much seems incon-testable. However, doubts have been raised by the sug-gestion that the group could have survived until the ar-rival to Upper Silesia of people related to the La Tene culture and that both they and the newcomers could have

coexisted for some time, and indeed right up to the La Tóne B phase (Mierzwiński 1994: 113, 131).

Thus, a late dating for the Lusatian culture is not with-out its problems. One must condude that the evidence currently available does not allow us to sustain daims for the existence of those that succeeded the Lausitz culture longer than La Tene A (Bednarek 1999). Upper Silesia has yielded artefacts produced just in this period as for example two Maskenfibeln or zoomorphic fibulae found respectively at Kietrz and Malerzowice Małe. As with other examples, we can daim these as imports into the Lusatian culture area, related to the La Tene culture but found far from the area inhabited by the population which madę them (Woźniak 1979: 218 pl. 124; Binding 1993). The view has also been advanced that such finds were carried by newcomers — at least in the case of that found at Kietrz — representing the La Tene culture, newcomers who from the beginning of La Tene B began to place graves within the already established cemetery (Woźniak 1981: 590). However, the first theory seems to be morę believable. A definite explanation of this is-sue conceming the survrval of at least some Lusatian groups into the La Tene period, at the time of the latter s earty development needs further intensive excavation; unsupported opinion is not enough.

Emergence of the La Tene culture in Upper Silesia did not result from local development but arose from settlement by a population that had arnved from the south. Anałysis of the funerai rite and assodated materiał from both cemeteries and settiements indicates not only the dose relationship of Upper Silesia to Moravia and Bohemia, but as well as distinct differences between Silesia and the Carpathian Ring or northem Austria (Woźniak 1970: 103-104; Meduna 1980: 162).