From the history of Main-Spessart (7): Most of the barrows have been cleared. But in a grave near Stetten a skeleton was found with a clue as to what the man died of.
In Main Franconia and especially in our district there are numerous striking evidence of prehistoric settlements. But while most ?? often until today ?? are hidden undetected in the ground, the burial mounds of the Bronze and Celtic ages stimulate posterity again and again to reflect and research. Although they were worn away by wind and rain after almost 4,000 years or covered by forests, they are still often clear landmarks in our region.
Two areas are particularly noticeable here and are also looked after by local homeland or history associations: On the Steinberg between Stetten and Karlstadt there are still 17 burial mounds today, of which only twelve are recognizable as such. There are almost 50 between Steinfeld and the Erlenbacher Höfe on the Franconian plate.
Between 1600 and 1200 BC, Bronze Age Celtic groups settled here, who, according to the tradition of the time, buried their deceased in barrows. For a good 3500 years, nobody took any notice of the up to three meter high structures. At the beginning of the 20th century, however, historical interest also arose in Stetten and digging began.
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The graves were dug up and largely cleared by 1918. Bronzes were found that are typical of the Middle Bronze Age, such as wheel needles and arm spirals, but hardly any ceramics. Remnants of these finds are exhibited in the Museum für Franken in Würzburg. Traces of settlement have been discovered under some hills, and Bronze Age settlement remains can also be found in the vicinity. Unfortunately, there is only insufficient excavation documentation, so that further findings are no longer possible.
Wooden burial chamber inside
A burial mound could have a diameter of 20 meters and be around three meters high. Usually there was a wooden burial chamber in the center, which was covered by a stone packing. This was followed by a pouring of earth, the foot was often limited by a surrounding stone wreath, in the Hallstatt period (800 to 450 BC) seldom also by postings or surrounding trenches.
While in the Middle Bronze Age burials were usually done in a stretched position, in the early Hallstatt period people began to burn the dead, probably in full costume, and then erected the burial mound in the same place without first collecting the corpse in an urn. At the end of the Hallstatt period, there was a return to body burials. It was not uncommon for there to be multiple burials in a burial mound at the same time or at a later time.
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The burial from what was once the largest hill in Stetten is very interesting. It contained the skeletons of two people under a stone package. A bronze arrowhead was stuck in the upper arm of one of the skeletons. Since the bone shows no signs of healing, this injury does not seem to have been survived; there may also have been other injuries that are no longer detectable.
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A bronze bracelet and a bronze needle, which are typical for men’s graves from around 1500 BC, were added to the dead man’s grave. The other burial probably received no grave goods. However, there are other finds from the burial mound, such as a bronze bracelet, an arrowhead made of flint and ceramic shards, which unfortunately, like all records of these finds, have been lost since 1945.
More than ten years ago, citizens interested in history met in Stetten and founded the “Stetten History Friends” association. In addition to other activities related to local history, the history lovers, together with the State Office for Monument Preservation, sponsored the local barrows. These were not only mapped exactly according to satellite images, but also numbered and largely cleared of ground herbs, so that a nearly 3.5 kilometer long circular route with a good dozen information boards was created here.
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The centerpiece and starting point of the route, however, has recently been the original-size model of a barrow, in which chairman Georg Riedmann in particular has invested a lot of work. The replica is located directly on the “Grenzweg” between Karlstadt and Stetten, which is heavily frequented by hikers and is only a few hundred meters away from the tourist magnet “terroir f”.
50 grave mounds near Steinfeld, Hausen and Waldzell
Another focus of barrows in the Main-Spessart district is the villages of Steinfeld, Hausen and Waldzell. A total of about 50 burial mounds and eight prehistoric settlement sites are known there, in the Hausener Forest alone there are today 25 burial mounds in several groups. The dimensions of the hills largely correspond to those in Stetten. Here too, interest in local history arose at the end of the 19th century and in this case it was the local pastor Link who opened a hill on the “Kohlplatte” in 1873 and removed a bronze needle from the Middle Bronze Age (1500 – 1300 BC) . The find is in the archive of the Museum für Mainfranken in Würzburg. It cannot be seen there; but there is a drawing of it.
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Here the local history and history association has taken on the prehistoric testimonies in an exemplary manner and created an extremely interesting 3.5 kilometer archaeological hiking trail on which ten boards provide information. You can also read more about it on the website of the Heimat- und Geschichtsverein at https://www.hgv-steinfeld.de/arch-wanderweg.html.
Otherwise barrows are hidden in numerous places in the district. For example at Trennfeld or on the Grenzweg between Büchold and Obersfeld. Usually, however, these are barely recognizable overgrown by the forest, leveled by the plow or, unfortunately, plundered by grave robbers.
Bronze age
The Bronze Age can be divided into three parts in Central Europe: Early Bronze Age (approx. 2200 to 1500 BC), Middle Bronze Age (approx. 1500 to 1300 BC) and Late Bronze Age (better known as Urnfield Age, approx. 1300 to 800 BC) . Chr.). Most of the information we have about the Bronze Age in Central Europe comes from graves. In the Early Bronze Age, the dead were buried in the so-called stool position with knees drawn up to the chest. In the Middle Bronze Age, burial mounds were poured over the coffins. And in the Late Bronze Age, people began to burn the dead and bury their ashes and bones in urns in the open field.
In isolated cases splendid “royal tombs” with rich additions have been found. This indicates that there were pronounced differences in rank between a small, powerful upper class and the common people in Bronze Age societies. This is also typical for other Bronze Age cultures, for example in Greece or Egypt .
The Bronze Age was replaced by the Iron Age. Bronze (a mixture of 90 parts of copper and 10 parts of tin) has been preserved to this day as a material for cult and everyday objects. But above all weapons and tools were made from the much harder iron from then on.
Those: Wikipedia
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