Ritual theory and practice (Archaeology)

Abstract: The Saussurian adagio according to which linguistics is "le patron général de la sémiologie" is well known. To a certain extent, the verbal and non-verbal may be subjected to a common, semiolinguistic scheme of investigation. For instance, a fundamental phenomenon in the history of cult(ure)s – the transition of collective expression patterns from sacer ludus to ludus aestheticus – may be described in a semiological metalanguage. Thus, we intend to illustrate, by resorting to a choreographic corpus, the relevance of certain semiological concepts, traditionally applied to verbal objects:
·        “desemantization”/ “resemantization”: a relevant opposition, in our opinion, for the transformation of the choreographic language along with other structures of society;
·        “mutability” and “immutability” of the sign: a paradoxical condition for the subsistence of not only verbal, but also choreographic language;
·        the Saussurean principle of “alteration through continuity”;

    Key-words: dance, desemantization, gesture, (im)mutability, language, resemantization, ritual, sign, Saussure, theatre.the Saussurean concept of “shifting” the semiotic relation; in our opinion, shifting the original relation (ritualistic, magic-religious) between the choreographic significant and signifier is a symptom of the gradual “aestheticization” or “theatricalization” of choreographic “language”.

Drawing upon multiple lines of archaeological evidence, including mortuary ritual, faunal bone, ceramic effigy vessels, and rock art, I argue that birds were an important component of Fremont ideology. This " bird cult " was situated within a larger framework of Fremont ritual practice which incorporated a variety of worn or carried objects identifiable in the archaeological record. I place Fremont ritual use of birds in the context of sympathetic magic, fetishism, totemism, shamanism, and the impersonation of supernaturals. Fremont ideology and ritual practice requires additional research; however, this investigation suggests a ritual life as rich and varied as the elaborate rock art and figurines for which the Fremont are so well-known.

Bárta, M.
2016 "Dummy mummification" in the Old Kingdom: a new intact case from the 5th Dynasty , Abusir. In Rich and Great. Studies in honour of Anthony J. Spalinger on the ocassion of his 70th Feast of Thoth edited by R. Landgráfová and J. Mynářová, pp. 15-17. Czech Institute of Egyptology, Prague.

The study deals with the burial of priest Neferinpu from the 24th century B.C., reign of Nyuserra - Djedkara which was found in Abusir South. His burial demonstrates that at this period dummy mummification was not a rare case. The general characteristics of his burial arrangement shows valuable details pertaining to the symbolism and rituals of the Ancient Egyptians and their perception of the afterlife prerequisites.

The Grolier Codex is discussed in the context of the archaeoastronomy of the ancient Americas on pages 98-99 of the March 1990 National Geographic Magazine article "America's Ancient Skywatchers" by John B. Carlson. One of four known ancient Maya books, the Grolier Codex depicts different manifestations of the planet Venus; the column of glyphs on the left of each panel records days in a 104-year Venus almanac. These plaster-coated bark-paper pages, carbon-dated to the 13th century, represent only half of the 20-page original. A numbered photographic arrangement of the Grolier Codex depictes the author's discovery that Codex pages 10 and 11 are actually two parts of the same "page 10".  Carlson clarifies the identities of Venus deities depicted in the Grolier Codex from a comparison of images from the Cacaxtla murals and links the images of the Grolier Codex with ancient Maya astronomically timed ritual warfare and sacrifice. (Grolier Codex photographs: Enrico Ferorelli; Other photos: Bob Sacha)

This article has been posted on Academia.edu as part of the Grolier Codex Project of the Center for Archaeoastronomy under the directorship of John B. Carlson, Ph.D.  The Grolier Codex Project seeks to further advance the study of the Maya Grolier Codex.

Prehistoric pottery from caves in Saxon Switzerland

In the Saxon Switzerland (a rocky landscape on both sides of the Elbe on the border between Bohemia and Saxony) there are numerous caves, some of them with finds of prehistoric pottery. Pottery is next to flint artefacts the only kind of finds occurring here.
In a conceivable remote and inaccessible situation is located on the north-western slope of the mountain Kleiner Winterberg a small cave. Her mouth hole is 6 m height in a vertical rock wall. Here stood 5 meters away from the entrance on a pedestal-like, 0.5 m high stone a vessel –slightly sloping– against the cave wall was leaning. It is  a coarse beaker of the Bell Beaker culture with four handles below the rim, which is dated in the final phase of the Bell Beaker culture, thus into the 21st century cal BC.
Under a rock shelter in Fuchsbachtal valley near Rosenthal, close below the upper edge of the canyon, loose parts of a prehistoric vessel were found at a depth of up to 0.75 m, distributed in the rubble of the soil, in addition to younger shards. This was a great high cup with three weak grip strips from the Unetice culture, and indeed from the medium (»classical«) phase (19th or 18th century cal BC). The location of the site is to be seen in connection with an alleged prehistoric way, 2 km away.
At the slope of Elbe valley opposite the hamlet Schmilka, 40 m high above the Elbe, the opening of a small cavity beneath a rock slab, with some potsherds, was exposed when felling of roots. Fortunately, the discovery was immediately reported and so the place could be investigated archaeologically. Under the originally horizontal roof of a small cave from boulders once stood a single complete vessel on a projecting, 40 to 50 cm high stone. In addition to this was charcoal in the sand, probably of an accompanying sacrificial fire. The vessel was a large egg-shaped pot from the Middle Bronze Age Tumulus Culture (16th–mid 14th century cal BC).
From the period of the Lusatian culture of Late Bronze Age (13th–9th century cal BC) there are cave discoveries in the immediate area of the mountain Pfaffenstein, where of its time was a fortified hilltop settlement and a place of worship on the highest plateau region. These have been published elsewhere in connection with a template of all the finds from the Pfaffenstein.
At the foot of the Nonnenstein near Weißig, a 18 m high, near the Elbe isolated towering rock, a small prehistoric shard was discovered below a small cave next to medieval shards: The lip fragment of a small dish with diffuse inner facets of the late Urnfield period, the final phase of the Lusatian culture in the 9th century cal BC. This relic goes back on a libation.
The Franzosenhöhle cave below the mountain Lilienstein yielded an inventory of shards that span an entire millennium, from the 13th until the 3rd century cal BC. These finds have been published elsewhere and together with other finds they may create the image of a kind of cult area, a »Temenos« that surrounded the whole rock Lilienstein.
Between Schmilka and the mountain Großer Winterberg a small cave unfurls below the rock Kipphorn at the foot of a group of small rocks at the moderate hillside towards the Elbe Valley. Besides Medieval pottery were found here two prehistoric shards from the early La Tène period (5th–4th century cal BC), a fragment of a large, weakly S-shaped profiled, cylindrical pot with a wave band at the base of the neck and a shard from the lower part of a vessel with coarse vertical fissures.
On the slope of the valley of Biela, south of the mountain Quirl near Königstein, come from a flat small cave, filled with a loamy sand layer, coarse crooked pottery, bulbous wall shards, including a piece with a simple, edge lip. They lay just beneath the topsoil and belong to the migration period, maximum still in the times of the early Slavs. This is the 5th–8th century AD (probable the second half of this period), and thus a period only very sparsely certified by finds in whole of Saxony. Important are also the find geographic implications regarding the oldest Slavic immigration in Saxony alongside the Elbe, which perhaps took advantage of a nearby prehistoric way. Not far from this site, the Diebskeller cave at the Quirl, charcoal and potsherds were discovered, undated and missing today.
Besides finds from caves there are a number of crevices, which are related to the caves in their find topography.
From section of the climb on the southwest side of the rock Lilienstein, there are finds of prehistoric shards from a long time (13–4th century cal BC), apparently associated with the former role of the striking rock as »Holy Mountain«. At least for some of these ceramics is certain that she was intentional and from the foot of the rock laid down in one of the columns, which cleave the otherwise so unapproachable and monolithic rocks here. Important are fragments of a steep sided small bowl with an Omphalos from the late West Hallstatt environment, specifically the Czech Bylaner culture (HaD3; second half of the 6th century cal BC). How the freshly broken edges of the thin-walled shell residue demonstrate, the delicate vessel was once entrusted intact the ground. It was exposed to the fire before its disposal. In addition, there are further shards as further testimonies of former victims in columns (for sizes, good condition, close to their finding-places the clefts of the rock). The washing out of shards from these columns and their distribution over the slope was probably a side effect of the assumed deforestation during the existence of a medieval castle on the Lilienstein.
High above the deep carved Elbe valley the Schrammsteine rocks lie, a towering group of rocks. Immediately at the Großes Schrammtor here rises the Osterturm rock amidst stunning natural scenery. In a crevice of him climbers discovered on a pedestal into humus rich sand an almost completely preserved vessel, a situla-like shoulder pot with smooth, retracted upper part. He belongs in the early La Tène period (5th–4th century cal BC).
The spatial distribution of these sites shows three principles. Since caves are evenly distributed throughout the landscape, a conscious choice by the people of that time must be hidden behind. In the majority these sites are located in immediate vicinity of Elbe Valley and can be reached by a short way from the Elbe. The river –a former major route of Europe– provided the opportunity relatively easily from Saxony or North West Bohemia to traverse the Saxon Switzerland. For the second are the caves at Pfaffenstein and Quirl an own group, not too far away from the Elbe valley, but probably even more likely related to a nearby prehistoric way of regional character that connected the former settlement areas of Pirna and Děčín. So the origin of the finds from caves in the Elbe Sandstone Mountains is to seek in some cases in the north, in other cases, to the south of him. Entirely explained by this way is probably the site of Rosenthal. It belongs to a third category–as well as the cave at the Kleiner Winterberg (Ostrau I), for which, despite its accessibility from the Elbe Valley from the apparently deliberate isolationism is not to disregard.
Into the chronological sequence of the finds still finds from the adjacent Bohemian Switzerland are included, a cup of older Unetice culture (21–20th century cal BC) from a rock shelter in the Tisovské stěny rocks, an amphora and a shard from a rock shelter in a cliff high above the River Elbe, south of Dolni Žleb (HaB1; 11th century cal BC) (they were interpreted as cultic in the first publication, for remains of a Late Bronze Age sacrificial food), the remains of a small spherical bulbous pot with a bent collar edge of the Augustan and early Imperial period (late 1st century BC–1st century AD) from Ostrov at the headwater of Biela valley between boulders at the foot of a cliff. Of utmost importance –not only because of its cultural and historical value– is silvered bronze jewellery, a bangle and a fibula, which date from the early migration period and were recovered in a small cave at Hřensko near the Elbe. This victim context from the 5th century stands beside the somewhat younger one from the vicinity of the Quirl (Königstein).
As a result therefore shows in the Elbe Sandstone Mountains from the end of the Neolithic period to today an unbroken succession of cave finds. Over these periods there are a stable spectrum of finds and finds situations (always complete clay pots or residues of such). Chronological culminations of the central European cave using (periods of increased cultic activities) are recognizable as such also in the Saxon Switzerland. But otherwise poorly documented periods are also represented with finds (e.g. HaC). Here regional patterns play a role. Causes of such continuity are the adjacency of Elbe and the relative proximity to permanently densely populated areas on both sides of the mountains, another causes the high number of caves and the unusual quality of the Sandstone Mountains in the sense of a »sacred landscape«.
With the exception of the Franzosenhöhle only once and never repeated sacrifices were observed at each site. The discovered individual, often originally intact vessels are single victims and not the remains of collective religious practices. They reflect a very narrow subject selection. This indicates food offerings, whose »packaging« the vessels were. Their installation in niches and on stone blocks increases indicate sacrifices, situations with echoes of an altar. Background of all this are magical rituals to securing adequate food volume, a fertility cult.

The Grolier Codex (Codice Maya de Mexico, CMM) is discussed in the context of the archaeoastronomy of the ancient Americas on pages 98-99 of the March 1990 National Geographic Magazine article "America's Ancient Skywatchers" by John B. Carlson. One of four known ancient Maya books, the Grolier Codex depicts different manifestations of the planet Venus; the column of glyphs on the left of each panel records days in a 104-year Venus almanac. These plaster-coated bark-paper pages, carbon-dated to the 13th century, represent only half of the 20-page original. A numbered photographic arrangement of the Grolier Codex depictes the author's discovery that Codex pages 10 and 11 are actually two parts of the same "page 10".  Carlson clarifies the identities of Venus deities depicted in the Grolier Codex from a comparison of images from the Cacaxtla murals and links the images of the Grolier Codex with ancient Maya astronomically timed ritual warfare and sacrifice. (Grolier Codex photographs: Enrico Ferorelli; Other photos: Bob Sacha)

This article has been posted on Academia.edu as part of the Grolier Codex Project of the Center for Archaeoastronomy under the directorship of John B. Carlson, Ph.D.  The Grolier Codex Project seeks to further advance the study of the Maya Grolier Codex.

Antropoloog Edine Bartels (2002) noemt goede hulpverlening ‘cultuurproductie’ en het ‘in cultuur brengen van de hulpvraag’. Zij stelt dat een bepaalde continuïteit in het leven van een patiënt noodzakelijk is om verandering in therapie mogelijk te maken. Verandering en continuïteit zijn beide onmisbaar in het leven van individuele mensen en van groepen mensen zoals families.
In dit hoofdstuk worden systemische concepties uitgewerkt om de wisselwerking tussen verandering en continuïteit te vertalen naar hulpverlening.
Patiënten in de GGz met een migratiegeschiedenis kampen regelmatig met klachtenpatronen zoals depressies, angststoornissen, psychoses en schizofrenie. In het ontstaan en beloop van de ziektegeschiedenis zitten in veel gevallen onverwerkte gevolgen van vlucht en migratie verborgen. In dit hoofdstuk wordt aan de hand van casusvignetten geïllustreerd hoe gevolgen van migratie, ook jaren later en intergenerationeel, op antropologische en systemische manier ontdekt, benaderd en behandeld kunnen worden.
In navolging van van Bekkum e.a. (1996) definiëren wij migratie als een transitie, een bijzondere levensfaseovergang met specifieke ‘gestapelde en liminele’ kwetsbaarheden. Gestapeld betekent dat patiënten tijdens levensfaseovergangen in meer soorten kwetsbaarheden terechtkomen.
Limineel betekent dat zij ‘zich bevinden tussen twee of meer werelden’. Verdrongen verliezen en breuken in familiecontinuïteit, ontstaan rond migratie, steken in veel gevallen bij nieuwe levensfaseovergangen opnieuw de kop op. Onverwerkte rouw kenmerkt veel klachtenpatronen van migranten in hulpverlening.
Hulpzoekende migranten kwamen en komen vanuit wij-systemen in Nederlandse ik-gerichte hulpverleningscontexten. Zij proberen om te gaan met zowel een decimering als een verstoring van de manier waarop zij familie- en sociale bindingen en netwerken onderhouden. Met concepten als ‘liminele kwetsbaarheid’ en ‘beschermjassen’ kunnen onverwerkte gevolgen in de migratiegeschiedenis van een patiënt en haar of zijn systeem effectiever in kaart worden gebracht. Verwante begrippen zijn culture shock (Oberg, 1958), acculturative stress (Berry & Anis, 1974) en third individuation (Akhtar, 1995).
Ondraaglijke gevolgen van migratie en vlucht kunnen voor migranten en vluchtelingen draaglijk worden met behulp van rituelen en van ‘beschermjassen’. ‘Beschermjassen’ is een nieuw concept (Tjin A Djie & Zwaan, 2007) dat interventies omvat die verlies van enveloppement (omhulling) van het familiesysteem tijdens en na migratie compenseren en draaglijker maken. Het herhalend betekenis geven aan verliezen en ‘herinbedden’ van de patiënt in een steunsysteem staan daarin centraal. Om de nieuwe wereld (fase) binnen te kunnen gaan, dienen oude verwachtingen en dierbare herinneringen losgelaten te worden. Hiervoor zijn herordeningen in binnen- en buitenwereld (transformaties) nodig van loyaliteiten, van bindingen en van emoties. ‘Transitionele ruimte’ (Winnicott, 1953) en ‘liminele ruimte’ (Turner, 1967) zijn ontwikkelingspsychologische, systeemtherapeutische en antropologische begrippen waarmee hulpverleners onverwerkte migratiegevolgen kunnen analyseren en bij hun cliënten helpen verwerken. Aan de hand van drie casusvignetten worden deze concepten uitgewerkt en geïllustreerd.

Offering tables have been neglected in the study of ancient Egyptian funerary ritual and have not been adequately handled as cultic/ritual artefacts placed within a mortuary landscape. This paper will apply theoretical approaches regarding the use, context and ritual significance of mortuary ritual artefacts to the analysis of offering tables in order to illustrate the difficulties in understanding such artefacts and identifying viable approaches to defining ancient Egyptian magical practice. It is proposed that offering tables or platters from Old and Middle Kingdom Egypt (ca.2600-1750 BCE) may reflect architectural and topographic features in their design, revealing essential information regarding their ritual use and context. Several such objects display, in miniature, entire canal systems thus indicating the life-giving forces that such irrigation systems transmitted to fields and pools from the inundating Nile water. The offering objects may therefore be ritual landscapes themselves, used as ritual theatres for activating the ka.

El litoral desértico de Taltal presenta decenas de sitios funerarios de los últimos períodos prehispánicos, cementerios cuyos objetos provienen de otras regiones como Tarapacá, el salar de Atacama, el río Copiapó y el noroeste argentino. Esto ha sido interpretado como el resultado del desplazamiento
poblacional o colonias multiétnicas, pero ante la ausencia de evidencia de movimientos poblacionales
en el presente trabajo exploraremos un modelo alternativo. La inusual distribución y número de objetos
y materias primas metalúrgicas desde la región de Copiapó, nos permite pensar que estos (al igual que
otros objetos) habrían circulado dentro de los requerimientos económicos del Tawantinsuyu. Mientras
aquellos de otras localidades pudieron ser obtenidos mediante movimientos costeros y relaciones de
alianza. El consumo ritual funerario debió comprometer la inversión de riquezas familiares, que dadas las
limitaciones impuestas a la posesión de bienes foráneos pueden ser considerados actos de generosidad
extrema, redistribución que permitió reproducir ideológicamente una estructura económica desigual.
Nuestro modelo abre la discusión respecto de procesos de complejidad y modos de producción comunal
entre los cazadores recolectores marinos, cuyas agencias contribuyeron a la intensificación económica,
intercambio y consumo ritual funerario.

Throughout history, the Druids have always been seen as sorcerers who had a strong bond with nature. Ancestral knowledge holders within Celtic society, directed all religious activity as the highest authority linked to the gods, practiced human sacrifices and festivals organized as Imbolc, Beltaine, Lugnasad or Samain, etc.. all aspects of which are discussed in this article.

Gods, deities, symbolism, deposition, cosmology and intentionality are all features of the study of early ritual and cult. Archaeology has great difficulties in providing satisfactory interpretation or recognition of these elusive but important parts of ancient society, and methodologies are often poorly equipped to explore the evidence. This collection of papers explores a wide range of prehistoric and early historic archaeological contexts from Britain, Europe and beyond, where monuments, architectural structures, megaliths, art, caves, ritual activity and symbolic remains offer exciting glimpses into ancient belief systems and cult behaviour. Different theoretical and practical approaches are demonstrated, offering both new directions and considered conclusions to the many problems of studying the archaeology of cult and ritual. Central to the volume is an exploration of early Malta and its intriguing Temple Culture, set in a broad perspective by the discussion and theoretical approaches presented in different geographical and chronological contexts.

The fourth known pre-Columbian Maya codex—the only one discovered in the 20th century—was found by looters in the mid-1960s. First exhibited in New York in 1971, what has come to be known as the Grolier Codex is half of a hybrid-style 20-page, 104-year Mesoamerican divinatory Venus Almanac. With new radiocarbon dates that place it in the 13th century CE, it is likely to be the oldest surviving book on paper from the Americas as well as the only ancient Maya codex now residing in Mexico. Although most Mayanists have accepted it as authentic, based in part on the author’s 40 years of research,* it remains an unacknowledged Mexican national treasure as it has never been officially recognized except in the State of Chiapas. Mesoamerican Venus Almanacs were widely used in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica to regulate practices of sacred warfare and ritual sacrifice, the goal of which was to obtain captives whose blood was shed to invoke the personified forces of rain and fertility. The Grolier Codex offers unique images of 10 of the 20 manifestations of Venus (named in the Maya Dresden Codex), greatly enriching our knowledge of these traditions documented in four other pre-Columbian codices as well as numerous archaeological and ethnohistoric sources. This article is a summary of the talk given on November 7, 2014 to the Pre-Columbian Society of Washington DC and includes a brief history of accounts of the discovery of the Grolier Codex and allegedly associated artifacts; photographic history; outlines the author’s comprehensive program of research, including several new scientific discoveries leading to an interpretation of the Codex—based on the Dresden Codex and other sources; and offers a new Latinized name that recognizes that the “Codex Mayano-Mexicanus” is an authentic ancient book deriving from the Maya culture and now properly residing in Mexico.

          *See <http://umd.academia.edu/JohnBCarlson>.

Also utilized as part of the November 7, 2014 talk are TWO 1983 historical STUDY GUIDE documents which can be viewed at the following academia.edu links:

• GROLIER CODEX Page Study Guide: Pages 1-9 and Reconstructed Page 10/11 (1983): 

https://www.academia.edu/7911420/GROLIER_CODEX_Page_Study_Guide_Pages_1-9_and_Reconstructed_Page_10_11

• GROLIER CODEX Comparative Study Guide (1983): Grolier pages 1-9 and reconstructed page 10/11 with Maya Dresden Codex Venus Almanac page numbers 48/1 – 50/2 with Venus Station and Directional Associations; Names (on Dresden Rows 17 & 22) of the associated Venus Impersonators; and Initial (1983) interpretations of the Grolier Codex scenes & iconographic interpretations. Over the three decades since 1983, some of the glyphic and iconographic interpretations have changed, as discussed in the presentation. The details are in press:

https://www.academia.edu/9208071/GROLIER_CODEX_Comparative_Study_Guide_1983_

*****

This article has been posted on Academia.edu as part of the Grolier Codex Project of the Center for Archaeoastronomy under the directorship of John B. Carlson, Ph.D.  The Grolier Codex Project seeks to further advance the study of the Maya Grolier Codex.

This study explores the multifaceted Maya Deluge Myth, from its pre-Columbian origins to current fantasies about a great world-destroying flood at the 13 Baktun period ending of the Maya Long Count on 21 (or 23) December 2012. No such flood is prophesied in any Maya records for this date, and the famous scene on Dresden Codex page 74 is discussed in its context as a symbolic depiction of the annual world-renewing downpours at the onset of the rainy season in springtime in the Maya world. The presiding gods of warfare and blood sacrifice were the agents of fertility and the regeneration of nature, and not the agents for the destruction of the Maya in a world-ending deluge. The misinterpretation of Dresden page 74 has propagated, unchallenged, for over a century of Maya scholarship and found its way into “new age,” fringe, and popular culture. This research helps to set the record straight along with providing a history of the meme.

This thesis develops a new perspective on Late Bronze Age (LBA) Ireland by identifying and analysing patterns of ritual practice in the archaeological record, as well as determining how distinct ritual practices relate to each other, their immediate environment and wider landscape, and the social contexts within which they were carried out. Ritual practices find expression in a range of contexts which can be studied separately; however, they belong in, and thus require, an over-arching, integrated ritual system to contextualise and attempt to understand their broader purpose. Consequently, this project centres on the question: Can an investigation of the practices of ritual feasting, death ritual, ritual deposition and fertility ritual, as situated within their broader socio-cultural contexts, yield fresh perspectives on the Irish LBA socio-cultural system? A more nuanced understanding of the social context of LBA ritual practice in Ireland is thus developed, thereby putting a human face on a body of scholarship previously dominated by studies of monument and artefact types. By applying anthropological analysis and a contextually focused theoretical framework to the large body of data this thesis examines aspects of LBA ritual practice and society not consistently engaged with by previous studies.

"This book will be invaluable to those researching animal bone deposits. Its data sets will be a starting point for many future studies. I would also recommend Morris’s readable and lucid explanations of taphonomy and butchery to non-archaeozoologists seeking to understand the reports set before them."
The Archaeological Journal 2012

"Morris’ book represents an excellent aid to approach this type of archaeology [animal burials] within a new theoretical framework and should be on your bookshelf"
Environmental Archaeology 2012 17:2

In recent years, zooarchaeology has started to move beyond the purely economic towards social interpretations. In particular, these ‘social’ interpretations have often concentrated upon complete or partial animal burials rather than upon the disarticulated and fragmented faunal remains more commonly recovered from archaeological sites. This book presents a study of these associated bone groups from the Neolithic to late Medieval periods of southern England and Yorkshire. Not only does it present data on over 2000 deposits, it also discusses their interpretation, arguing that most are based on generalised period-based assumptions. It is proposed that a biographical approach to these types of deposit allows the investigation of the specific above ground actions behind their creation, moving away from generalisations towards individual interpretations. The study shows the value of not only utilising specialist data, but integrating such knowledge with other archaeological evidence and theoretical approaches.

The book is divided into three main sections. The first two chapters discuss the history of associated bone groups in the archaeological record and how they are created by human and natural actions. The second section consists of detailed chapters (three to nine) discussing the evidence from each region by archaeological period. The third section discusses trends in the data and the problems with how they are interpreted. It outlines and tests the use of a biographical approach and discusses the implications of these findings for wider research.

This study aims to understand and explain prehistoric funerary practices from the perspective of Finnish Stone Age hunter-gatherer and early pastoralist earth graves located in mainland Finland. These structures date primarily from the Late Mesolithic to the end of the Middle Neolithic (ca. 6800–2300 cal BC) and represent a unique challenge to archaeological research. This is because unburnt bone material — including human remains — along with other perishable materials are generally not preserved in the acidic soils of Finland. Accordingly, the only feature that marks a Stone Age earth grave is the presence of ochre or stained soil, sometimes together with grave goods typical for that period.

This thesis presents a compilation of material remains and archival information from Stone Age earth grave sites and research material as a whole. This approach aims to demonstrate that, whilst Finnish Stone Age earth graves primarily lack human remains and other perishable materials, we can still gain important new insights into Stone Age funerary practices. Consequently, the objective of this thesis lies in systematically studying the earth grave materials, attempting to understand the rituals behind them, and using these data to interpret mortuary practices and cosmology.

Based on the results described and discussed in this thesis, the Stone Age mortuary tradition in the Finnish territory represents a complex set of practices that includes not only the archaeologically visible earth grave tradition, but also other means of ritually disposing of the dead body. Accordingly, when we refer to Stone Age mortuary practices in the Finnish territory, we are not speaking of ‘inhumations in simple pit graves’, but of the material remains of complicated rituals that give meaning to and place death within the cosmology of those people. Indeed, the systematic archaeological research conducted in this thesis revealed that both adults and subadults were given earth graves, a tradition also known from better-preserved Stone Age cemeteries in nearby regions of Finland. Similarly, Stone Age people used — and did not use — certain artefacts or raw materials in their funerary practice, in clearly ritualised ways and, for example, to emphasise the identity of the community.

When comparing the data in this thesis to other ritual practices known from that specific period and region, Finnish Stone Age earth graves seem to encode an animistic–shamanistic cosmology. Indeed, similar to, for example, prehistoric rock art sites, the Stone Age hunter-gatherer cemeteries are also situated next to topographic features possibly connected to supernatural powers, whilst the graves themselves were furnished with objects that might have been considered living. Simultaneously, an intentional connection to past generations was also sought by positioning new burials amongst older ones or by reusing old cemeteries. To conclude, even if the Finnish Stone Age earth graves primarily lack human remains and other perishable materials, the graves are not as poorly preserved as one might assume. On the contrary, when the earth grave material was investigated as a whole and subjected both to new analyses and theoretical understanding, we gain important new insights into Stone Age mortuary practices and cosmology.

Ritual baths (miqwa’ot) built adjacent to winepresses and olive-presses have been unearthed at about twenty sites dating to the Second Temple period, most of them in Judea and the environs of Jerusalem. While much has been written in recent years on the form and function of ancient ritual baths in general, little scholarly attention has been paid to miqwa’ot found in agricultural contexts.
The presence of these miqwa’ot suggests that the ritual purity of the wine and olive oil processed in these installations was of particular importance. The fact that these ritual baths were situated adjacent to winepresses and olive-presses suggests that agricultural laborers made use of these miqwa’ot immediately prior to commencing work in these installations, a practice which accords with the Pharisaic concept of tevul yom. These finds thus provide rare archaeological evidence for the observance of ritual purity laws based on the Pharisaic system of halakhah.

The interpretation of prehistoric finds from Pfaffenstein rock in Saxon Switzerland

In the Saxon Switzerland, a rocky landscape on both sides of the river Elbe in the border area between Bohemia and Saxony, on and around the Table Mountain Pfaffenstein unusual sites of the Late Bronze Age are located. They date from the early to older Urnfield and belong to the Lusatian culture. At the foot of the towering rocks a settlement was enclosed by a wall. The wall was discovered in the late 19th century and 1961, after the discovery of shards, examined by an excavation. He proved to be a wood and earth wall with a stone facade, 3 m thick, 4 m high and 200 m long. In this excavation, a high population density on the interior side of the wall was detected. The wall-construction –by the way the oldest fixing of the Lusatian culture in Saxony– shows influences from the South.
Of special character are relics that were discovered on the summit plateau since the end of the 19th century. They appeared on the occasion of the establishment and operation of a restaurant. Here smaller archaeological excavations took place in 1896, last in 1967. These finds and features were difficult up now for attempts at interpretation. They are unusual and not in context with colonization. Much of significance has been overlooked or forgotten, as always, if the research does not lie in the hands of experts. It is reported by »fire pits« with burned brick sides, one of them with the considerable length of 40 m. In addition, from the plateau we know features of fire places, large, round fire pits, and other smaller fire pits. In such a pit was found a bronze knife in 1966. These pits were filled with charcoal, shards and other finds.
Of finds a paired set of bronze bracelets is mentionable. They came to light in a little pit between stones and are complete jewellery set which symbolized a woman who must have originated from the upper class. A bronze knife was found »in a fire pit«. Only the blade was obtained. Urnfield knives are almost always broken intentionally in hoards and in graves.
An undamaged Bronze Age flint fire Pounder. Sandstone, drilled on both sides, in the form of a spindle whorl, with diameter 9.0 cm, 6.0 cm high. Comparative examples are in contemporary tombs of the Lusatian culture. It could have acted as mace heads, ceremonial tools or served as a killing tool for animal or human sacrifices (sceptre of a priest?). A stone with cup marks. Numerous small round discs, usually made of pottery shards, respectively one made of sand stone and bone, which were usually amulets with sun symbolism.
Moreover Rock implements, a flat adze and four axe blades of hornblende, served with a small shoe last adze from hornblende and a large axe blade made from quartzite, together with Bronze Age shards. They belong partly to the early Neolithic to Middle Neolithic, partly from the Late Neolithic. They were displaced in the Bronze Age from elsewhere here. The axe blade made from quartzite appears to be a replica of the Late Bronze Age (larger, frowsy processed, asymmetrical), a model of a axe made from sandstone without practical value, for example, a consecration gift. Overall, these things perhaps in the cult were used as tools for killing.
20 to 25 hand mill stones: No other site of the Lusatian culture in Saxony has provided nearly as many millstones. A lower millstone in situ, on which lay a small rondel made from a shard. Mostly intact mills, often upper stone and lower stone together. This is known from cultic context, often it is combined with roasted grain and offerings (leavings of mush and bread). Millstones, which were used for preparing food offerings, had to then remain on the place of worship. The material in this hand mills –mostly bedrock from the edges of the Elbe valley lowland of Dresden– reveals the origin of its users.
Much ceramic of high quality, more like from graves and not from settlements. The predominance of cups and bowls is obvious – a reference to Libations and food offerings? Residues of pottery sieves probably symbolize the importance of the food production. A goblet-like foot shell remained intact. It was a cultic utensil, an incense burner to burn herbs, at funerals, but also in ritual grain milling and baking bread victims. Several vessels were intact buried upright in the ground. Some of them are absent the vessel bottoms. Storage vessels, how they are common in settlements (also behind the wall at the foot of the rock Pfaffenstein itself) lacking here.
All parallels of the same age clearly force a cultic interpretation: the place of sacrifice on the former confluence of the rivers Havel and Spree in Berlin-Spandau, the stronghold Goldkuppe on the Elbe near Diesbar-Seußlitz, cult caves near Bad Frankenhausen, Totenstein near Görlitz, places in Eastern Bohemia (Velim near Kolín) Moravia (Cezavy near Blučina not far from Brno) and Upper Austria (Berglitzl at Gusen). The themes are food offerings, vessels for »food of the gods«, remains of fertility cults, and rituals of »thanksgiving«. The topography of the site uses natural podiums on the highest part of the rocky plateau – to this parallels exist, mainly from southern Germany (locations in the manner of an »Acropolis«).
The fortified settlement at the foot of the rock and the place of worship on the plateau, existing at the same time, only had a short life and formed a single unit. It was not a regional principal place of a settlement chamber; because the surrounding region was uninhabited. This situation in a no man's land, accessible by a regional prehistoric way, is typical of sanctuaries, which also exist in the early ancient Greece. Such were maintained jointly by the adjoining settlement areas, were neutral refuges while the war and an essential condition for unthreatened travel. On the other hand, the fortification here shows the connection of a stationary cult with political control and establishment of authority. The facility has been replaced by principal places (partially fortified) and cult places that now lay in the middle of the country, populated of that time.
In addition to bizarre rock formations on and at the rock there was probably a special trigger for cultic activities: Two unique small tarns on the plateau. They were free of finds, because the Lusatian culture did not victimised in the aquatic environment, and probably they were symbolic of prosperity guarantee, depending on good or bad harvests (see »Nilometer« in Egypt). Traditions of myths from the Middle Ages could still an echo of Bronze Age cult be (motif of the »Virgin«).
Directly at the foot of the rock there are several caves with finds from the same period and of identical type (bronze dagger, partly complete grain mills, complete vessels [cup, double cone], shards). It shows a saint district with a juxtaposition of two cult exercises: A jointly-official (on the plateau) and individually-private worship (at the foot of the Rock). On the summit, great annual feasts took place, the »official« cult along the feast calendar of the community, even to bloody sacrifice (slaughter a lamb or bull through to human sacrifice). Such combination of sanctuaries with individually-private, probably bloodless sacrifice also existed in ancient Greece.
The large amount of finds during a short life of the facility may indicate not a small circle of persons involved – probably emissaries of the former inhabitants of the Elbe Valley of Dresden in Saxony and of Děčín in north-western Bohemia. Some of the finds are probably not offerings, but also »instrumentalities« of sacrifice, sacred waste. Pavements for sealing surfaces above places full of »ritual garbage« were observed.
The characteristics of circumstances of ritual relicts apply to the evidences from Pfaffenstein plateau and its environment. These attributes include features, which are neither tombs nor settlements, a particular arrangement of finds, screening of finds by selection criteria. The repetition and uniqueness of deposition in a way, non-explainable from everyday circumstances, serve as proof of religious rituals.
The donation of sacrificial offerings was the most important form of communication between humans and gods: subordination, gift, and bribe in one. The intent of a exchange was the main idea, the intention to get back much more than was given. The disappearance of goods in flames, earth or water made the gift irrevocable and inviolable for people. Growth and prosperity should be secured by always repeated ritual ceremonies, which kept going the cycle of day and night, of summer and winter. Sowing and harvest and solstices were occasions for such celebrations.
Fire rites had central importance (fireplaces, the vitrified long trench, and the Fire Blast stone) and are typical of this phase of the early Urnfield period. Addressee was probably a sun-god, perhaps related to Apollo, which appeared at the same time in ancient Greece, with his Central European origin. In the Lusatian culture, the sun had greatest importance because of their role in the cult of fertility and good harvests.
Even without the Pfaffenstein is the Saxon Switzerland full of traces of prehistoric cult exercise, shards or complete vessels in caves and crevices, stone axes as river finds, and individually buried bronze objects. Related cult places we find on adjacent rocks near the Pfaffenstein. It is the unique, sometimes even bizarre quality of this landscape, which have turned a region like the Saxon Switzerland into a veritable cult landscape. She was as a narrowly bordered region with unique, partly anthropomorphic natural endowment (e.g. Barbarine rock) and so a predestinated terrain to exercise earlier magical religiosity. Other regions in Europe have the same cultic qualities, next time the Bohemian Uplands, immediately adjacent to the Saxon Switzerland.

The cave Franzosenhöhle, a prehistoric place of worship on Lilienstein, in Saxon Switzerland (Germany)

At the heart of Saxon Switzerland, a rocky landscape on both sides of the Elbe on the border between Bohemia and Saxony, rises high above the Elbe valley the Table Mountain Lilienstein. On its north side a small cave was discovered at the foot of the perpendicular falling rock in 1984. In her entrance appeared prehistoric finds in the sandy soil close to each other. In addition to more than 60 pieces of pottery, these were a flint artefact, a narrow blade-shaped flake of a small core stone. It is probably Mesolithic, as well as material, which is on the southern edge of the summit plateau of Lilienstein surfaced for decades. Significantly, natural fragments, flakes and devices made of flint have served of all things in the Late Hallstatt and Early La Tène often secondary as amulets – in that era so that is occupied by far the most extensively in this cave. Furthermore, a fragment of burnt fine white kaolin clay was found, which is interspersed with vegetable imprints (grasses, herbs, ferns?). Fern is occurrent in the Hallstatt period in connection with tombs – as today too. Maybe it served as a carrier for certain plant parts and possibly as a kind of ancient »chewing gum« – perhaps as part of possible ritual acts used. A definitive explanation is still pending.
The probably in a small pit in low depth buried shards are unexpectedly not a closed inventory, but occupy a period of not less than one millennium. Due to their selection and their condition, they are interpreted as collected vessel amulets which  – pars pro toto –  represent previous sacrificial rituals on the base of the vessels used in this connection and finally buried in a kind of Bothros. Particularly striking are obviously artificial scribbles on the surface of several of these fragments. With the ever reintroduction of congeneric find material even over a span of 1000 years of time proves the cave  – as quite some of that ilk –  as a unique place of worship. The deferred incentive for such resistant cultic tradition in front of such a small and inconspicuous cave could have offered a water outlet at the cave entrance, and thus the occurrence of two equally sacred nature phenomena  – cave and source –  at the same place. The change from run and drying up of this water is likely to have particularly obsessed sustainable symbolic power in forecasting impending drought or good harvest prospects. A today slightly tilted stone block in the center of the forecourt, also right next to the reference of which, may have been a former altar stone.
The sherds are almost consistently high-quality fine ceramics. It contains (formerly usually painted) white-ground and red engobed crockery and thin-walled, high-fired graphitized ceramic, some decorated with grading pattern, furthermore black varnish goods known by the Heuneburg way. Extensive cultural references are visible, mostly to Bohemia, also to southern Germany, East Bavaria, middle Danube region. The age determinations range from the early Urnfield period (BzD2 / HaA1) over the entire Hallstatt period up to the middle La Tène period (LtB2 / C1). The comparison of the appearance of finds from the cave with prehistoric finds from the rock Lilienstein itself (in units of vessels) clarified over the entire period of time a fluctuating precipitation of finds rotating in the same direction, with individual differences. The comparison of their use phases with the respective climatic development illustrates synchronicity too: Secular climate Optima are also the tops of the precipitate of finds. The most significant in the cave peak of its find precipitation at the beginning of the late Hallstatt period (Ha D1) falls in the middle Danube region just at the time when the Eastern Hallstatt culture collapsed under the attacks of the steppe-nomadic Scythians – events which also here, at the periphery of the Hallstatt world left their mark.
Together with the much more indigenous acting ceramic from the rock Lilienstein here revealed a »Holy Place«, bound to a dominant mountain / rock nature sanctuary, as it is typical of the Bronze Age and Iron Age Europe. Addressee of the local ritual events was probably a, the early Greek Artemis related, chthonic goddess. For this, seems a medieval legend of the »Bride on the rock Lilienstein« to fit quite a strange way – a strongly with religious significance charged story that is perhaps further evidence for the constancy of traditions, ranging from prehistoric times to the present day.

Rituals and games are two types of activities that, in archaeology, are very difficult indeed to distinguish.This in the past has led many, this author included, to support the view that these activities are very similar. Certainly it is true that both rituals and games are different ways to crystalise action. But I would now support further that we can distinguish between these two types of activity. In this chapter, I will compare the two and identify a number of differences which are symptomatic of one profound distinction between them: whereas participants in rituals have an overall passive ‘intention- in- action’, participants in games are constantly engaged actively. As will be argued,
both rituals and games are strong learning mechanisms; yet this difference in engagement affects the ways that the two function as such, and therefore also affects the ways in which rituals and games can be used.

For reviews, see:
https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/72A9BA6A452E5614FAED95CA8FEB7AF1/S0003598X16001137a.pdf/death_burial_and_ritual_in_iron_age_britain_and_the_netherlands.pdf

and: https://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php/germania/article/view/65919

This book is available at:
http://www.barkhuis.nl/product_info.php?products_id=199

Abstract:
The study of past ritual practices is an accepted part of archaeological research these days. Yet, its theoretical basis is still not fully mature. This book aims to contribute to the study of ritual practices in the past by firstly assembling a theoretical framework, which is tailored to the needs of archaeology, and which helps to identify and interpret the remains of rituals in the past.
This framework is then applied in a specific archaeological case study: the coastal area of the northern Netherlands, a former salt marsh area. People lived here on artificial dwelling mounds, so-called terps. Preservation conditions are excellent in this wetland area. This study makes use of the well-preserved remains of rituals in terps, in particular the terps of Englum and Ezinge, to examine the role of ritual practice in the societies of the pre-Roman and Roman Iron Age in this area. One of the conclusions is that human remains played an important part in ritual practice. Therefore, an important part of this study is devoted to the variable mortuary rituals that were practiced here.
The large number of finds, especially from Ezinge, makes it possible to trace changes in ritual practice, in relation to changes in the habitation history and the social organization throughout the research period.

The first installation to be identified as an ancient Jewish ritual bath (miqweh) was discovered by Yigael Yadin at Masada in 1963–4, and consisted of a stepped pool connected to an adjacent pool via a hole in the wall shared by the two installations. Yadin identified one installation as the immersion pool of the miqweh, and the second as an ’ôṣār (lit., ‘reservoir’), used to ritually purify the water in the immersion pool. Yadin’s explanation regarding the functioning of this double-pool ritual bath has gone unchallenged since it was first suggested almost half a century ago, and set the stage for future identifications of ’ôṣār installations found adjacent to other Second Temple period ritual baths. The present paper argues that the ’ôṣār is an innovation of the modern period, and that the commonly accepted view that an ’ôṣār was employed in ritual baths dating to as early as the Second Temple period is no more than an unqualified anachronism.

This article builds on recent archaeological theorizing about early complex societies to analyze the political anthropology of Neolithic and Bronze Age China in a culture-specific trajectory over the longue durée. Synthesizing the latest archaeological discoveries, I show that a series of successive declines, beginning around 2000 BC, took place throughout lowland China. This put an end to the lowland states of the Longshan period (2400–1900 BC) and provided the context for the constitution of the Erlitou secondary state (1900–1500 BC). Following the shift in “archaic states” studies from identifying “what” to investigating “how,” I focus on the strategies, institutions, and relations that undergirded and sustained the Erlitou secondary state. I explore how heterogeneous lowland populations were reorganized after collapse, how a new collective identity was created through ritual and religious performance at the household level at Erlitou, and how Erlitou’s ideologies, political system, and economic network were shaped by the upland polities and societies. Through a series of innovative practices, the Erlitou secondary state did not replicate the preceding Longshan states but instead pioneered a sociopolitical order that was repeatedly reenacted and referred to as a source of legitimacy in successive Bronze Age Central Plains polities.

H. Meller/R. Risch/K. W. Alt/F. Bertemes/R. Micó (Hrsg.), Rituelle Gewalt - Rituale der Gewalt / Ritual Violence - Rituals of Violence. 12. Mitteldeutscher Archäologentag vom 10. bis 12. Oktober 2019 in Halle (Saale) / 12th Archaeological Conference of Central Germany October 10-12, 2019 in Halle (Saale). Tagungsbände des Landesmuseums für Vorgeschichte Halle 22 (Halle [Saale] 2020).

"This PhD thesis deals with the transformation of imported vessels of Roman origin in Germania Magna during the Roman Iron Age, 1-400 AD. The concept of transformation in this context refers to the various ways these objects were interpreted, physically altered and consequently changed with regard to their function and meaning. Roman vessels in Germanic contexts are often regarded as evidence for Rome’s economic and socio-political influence on the tribes beyond the imperial boarders. Some scholars interpret them as an imitatio imperii, that is, as expressions of a Romanized lifestyle among the local elites. In this thesis, however, it is argued that these objects must be studied using perspectives that acknowledge interpretation and transformation as important elements in cultural interaction. Influenced by theoretical studies within anthropology and other social sciences, particularly the theories of practice and structuration, this thesis explores what happens when a category of foreign objects is appropriated by a society, what happens in the encounter between local traditions and new social situations and new material culture, and what those encounters result in.

The thesis revolves around three case studies. The first one, on ritualization, investigates how vessels of Roman origin were utilized in Germanic funerary rituals. It analyses the funerary context as a field of social practice through which significance is generated and transformed, thus illuminating the structuring influences this context had on the rituals and the vessels themselves. The second case study on hybridization focusses on the combination of actual Roman vessels or vessel forms with local stylistic features, resulting in new expressions in the material culture. The objects studied are a small number of silver vessels that were produced locally and thus traditionally interpreted as imitations or forgeries of Roman vessels. Using this as a point of departure, the study deals with the question of authenticity in material culture and how external impulses are refracted and rearranged through the encounter with local structures, and then fused together with these to create new forms. The third study deals with the fragmentation of glass, more exactly, the intentional deposition of glass fragments in graves, either on the dead person (e.g., in the mouth or in the clothes), together with the grave goods, or in the grave fill. Based on this physical transformation the study explores the biography of the glass vessels, the encounter between Mediterranean rituals and indigenous traditions of ritual destruction, and the convergence of different regimens of value. "

About prehistoric finds on the rock Königstein in the Saxon Switzerland

On the rock Königstein, situated elevated above the river Elbe in the center of the Saxon Switzerland and because of its fortress well known, few remains of prehistoric ceramics have been discovered. Together with similar finds on the neighboring rocks they consolidate the imagination of the landscape on both sides of the Elbe in the border area between Bohemia and Saxony as a sacral region in the Bronze Age and Iron Age.
Partly the finds comes from the surface, partly the pieces were recovered in addition to large amounts of late medieval material and such of modern age during archaeological excavations of the Saxon State Office for Archaeology.
Specifically, can be detected to finds today: a shard from the outwardly drawn funnel rim of a cup from the middle Urnfield period with parallels especially in northwestern Bohemia, a series of eight wall shards from the same vessel (including a shard from a vessel shoulder with the approach of a eyelet handle) probably from the first half of the Urnfield period, a large bottom change shard of a large precipitous, according to style probably early to older Iron Age vessel. A completely preserved late Hallstatt cup from the end of stage HaD2 which was held by the Museum of the Fortress Königstein, must be here considered abducted hither. After the strong traces of smoke at its lower part it comes from a grave. A thick ink blot in its interior proves a secondary use as a quill pen container. The vessel shows impact of the Osthallstatt culture as it repeatedly encounter in the middle HaD in Saxon Elbe Valley and east.
None of the finds was discovered in situ. The lip shard is a surface find from the plateau, at the edge of a path on the southwestern edge of the forest of fortress. The not far away also salvaged on the Plateau series of eight wall shards comes out of substrate which has been displaced in the 19th century or thereafter. The large bottom lip shard was found at the foot of the fortress in a dark humus-containing young age waste backfilling that filled a narrow crevice directly under the edge of the plateau.
For the natural plateau of the rock Königstein a thick layer of in the glacial period by windblown dust (loess) is after numerous indications presupposed, as also found in the vicinity of the Königstein. Therefore, an extensive supply of external soil material, with this the finds came here, is less likely. The originally much fissured south side of the rock has been altered considerably while the construction of the fortress from the 16th to the 18th century. From crevices, that were thereby eliminated here, filling earth of them could have come, which the findings contained, which later found themselves on the plateau. One of these cracks was the former main entrance to the plateau. At the upper end of this ascent now the two prehistoric sites are situated, which we know from the plateau. Perhaps this topographic relationship is not accidental but an indication of a more than small-scale displacement of the prehistoric fragments.
A comparison to the rock Lilienstein on the opposite side of the river Elbe, shows that the finds from Königstein are likely to integrate in a context of cultic-religious events. The finds itself, among other things, with traces of secondary fire, reaffirm this. The middle Urnfield period (HaA2 / HaB1) as suspected temporal focus of the find precipitate from the Königstein was in the Saxon Switzerland a phase in which both sides of the river Elbe in the western part of the territory show a number of sites that have no settlement or grave character and which connect to the settlement area of the Elbe valley lowland of Dresden that range to east to Pirna. This finds are gold wire spirals, bronzes and sparse pottery shards from crevices or of isolated rocks.
This supports an interpretation of the findings from the Königstein as remnants cultic rituals, which classifies these rocks under the "Holy Mountains" in its vicinity. In those one encounters much more unmistakable in the south adjacent northwestern Bohemia, where particularly the Bohemian Central Highlands has now found the focus of archeology as a prehistoric sacred landscape. Here are religiously motivated depositions on summits or slopes detected since the Neolithic period - a phenomenon in which, in his time far ahead of time, the archaeologist Milan Zápotocký has already pointed out in 1969. The Czech National Mountain Říp, further south in the center of Bohemia brought lying on its summit forth ritual depositions of Urnfield (ceramics and bronzes) and the Neolithic (rock implements). In this way, it resembles the Pfaffenstein in Saxon Switzerland, just a few kilometers from Königstein, as well as its counterpart, the Kvádrberk (Quaderberg) lying on the southern edge of the Elbe sandstone near Děčín (Tetschen) by the river Elbe. The latter is especially noticeable with a far and wide not occurring volume of bronzes, but also of gold wire spirals out of the ordinary frame. One knows from here hundreds, sometimes exceptional bronze artifacts from once perhaps a dozen  treasures. These seem uniformly descended from the middle Urnfield period as well as the findings from Königstein and close in time to the Pfaffenstein, whose Late Bronze Age place of worship was apparently replaced by the Kvádrberk. The parallels between the two places are striking: sources at the summit as an absolutely rare phenomenon that was the center of the find concentrations at the same time, scorch marks, Bothroi, grain hand mills, stone tools, rondels made from a shard, pottery sieves. This includes a closer environment, which was characterized in both cases by a network of other individual depositions.
These relationships allow to see in the discoveries of today's fortress Königstein authentication of prehistoric religion.