Bronze vessels reveal exciting insights into burial rituals

Over the past four weeks, two students from the Conservation and Restoration of Archaeological, Ethnological and Arts and Crafts Objects course at the Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart (ABK) have once again been guests at the NIhK. They continued the conservation and restoration work on the two bronze vessels from the stone concentration that was the focus of last year’s field campaign for the project »Rituals in a new light – Modern field research, documentation and visualisation strategies using the example of the burial ground of Nienbüttel«. 

While one of the vessels contained cremated remains and a few fragments of pottery as well as organic materials, including the remains of a wooden object or wooden container and leather remains, the other vessel was missing precisely these groups of objects and materials. Instead, a conglomerate of previously unidentifiable iron and bronze artefacts was uncovered, which were spatially very limited and so close together that they had presumably been deposited in an organic or textile container. This reveals an exciting facet of the Early Roman Iron Age burial ritual, in which complex selection mechanisms and spatial concepts evidently played a role. The work on the block excavations is due to be completed next autumn.