Denmark: Mesolithic Landscapes Submerged

TY - CHAP

T1 - Denmark: Mesolithic Landscapes Submerged

AU - Bailey, Geoff

AU - Andersen, Søren

AU - Maarleveld, Thijs

PY - 2020/4/10

Y1 - 2020/4/10

N2 - Denmark has the richest concentration of underwater Stone Age finds in the world, thanks to a combination of factors that include favourable conditions of preservation and a long tradition of professional and amateur interest in underwater prehistory. The majority of finds are from the central areas of the Danish Straits and date back to about 8500 years ago, when rising sea level finally created a marine connection between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. Most are in shallow water, c. 2–5 m in depth, but sites at greater depth have also been identified. Most fall within the Ertebølle period, between 7400 and 5900 years ago, and include excavations at shoreline settlements such as Tybrind Vig, Ronæs Skov and Møllegabet II. These sites have yielded large assemblages of material including wooden artefacts such as remains of fish weirs, dugout canoes, bows, spear shafts and leister prongs, as well as remains of fibres and woven fabric. These materials owe their excellent state of preservation to the deposition in fine-grained marine sediments alongside settlement areas located on the shoreline, and to subsequent sea-level rise because of marine inundation, which has maintained the material in permanently waterlogged and anaerobic conditions. This chapter examines the conditions that have given rise to this unusual concentration of underwater sites, provides an overview and illustration of some of the most distinctive finds, discusses their wider significance and addresses future challenges.

AB - Denmark has the richest concentration of underwater Stone Age finds in the world, thanks to a combination of factors that include favourable conditions of preservation and a long tradition of professional and amateur interest in underwater prehistory. The majority of finds are from the central areas of the Danish Straits and date back to about 8500 years ago, when rising sea level finally created a marine connection between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. Most are in shallow water, c. 2–5 m in depth, but sites at greater depth have also been identified. Most fall within the Ertebølle period, between 7400 and 5900 years ago, and include excavations at shoreline settlements such as Tybrind Vig, Ronæs Skov and Møllegabet II. These sites have yielded large assemblages of material including wooden artefacts such as remains of fish weirs, dugout canoes, bows, spear shafts and leister prongs, as well as remains of fibres and woven fabric. These materials owe their excellent state of preservation to the deposition in fine-grained marine sediments alongside settlement areas located on the shoreline, and to subsequent sea-level rise because of marine inundation, which has maintained the material in permanently waterlogged and anaerobic conditions. This chapter examines the conditions that have given rise to this unusual concentration of underwater sites, provides an overview and illustration of some of the most distinctive finds, discusses their wider significance and addresses future challenges.

KW - Boats

KW - Fish weirs

KW - Submerged settlements

KW - Shell mounds

KW - Wooden artefacts

KW - Mesolithic

KW - Kongemose

KW - Ertebølle

M3 - Chapter (peer-reviewed)

SN - 978-3-030-37366-5

T3 - Coastal Research Library

SP - 39

EP - 76

BT - The Archaeology of Europe's Drowned Landscapes

A2 - Bailey, Geoff

A2 - Galanidou, Nena

A2 - Peeters, Hans

A2 - Joens, Hauke

A2 - Mennenga, Moritz

PB - Springer

CY - Cham, Switzerland

ER -