1959.4.17

Collection type

Object

Description

Stone flake, light grey colour. [MJD 03/03/2014]

Geographical reference

Germany

Europe > Western Europe > Germany

Schleswig-Holstein Hamburg Stormarn Ahrensburg Meiendorf OR Stellmoor

Person

Field collector Alfred Rust

PRM source Armand Donald Lacaille

Date / Period

Archaeological period: Palaeolithic

Date collected

1934

Acquisition information

Donated: 1959

Materials and processes

Material Flint Stone, Process Flaked

Dimensions

Length: max 39 mm distal to proximal, Width: max 74 mm, Depth: max 8 mm

Object numbers

Accession number: 1959.4.17

Research and responses

Alfred Rust [1900 - 1983], a pupil of Prof. G. Schwantes, excavated the Meiendorf and Stellmoor hunting camps in the Ahrensburg tunnel valley between 1932 - 1936. It is not currently known from which of these two sites this object was excavated. Rust published both sites in two volumes; the first [1937] on Meiendorf titled Das altsteinzeitliche Rentierjägerlager Meiendorf, the second [1943] on Stellmoor titled Die air- and mittelsteinzeitlichen Funde yon Stellmoor. Both volumes were published by Karl Wachholtz [Neumünster]. [MN 28/07/2009]

In a 1996 paper Bodil Bratlund [DOI: 10.1007/BF02226070] states that excavation at Meiendorf apparently started in 1932 and Stellmoor in 1934. The locations of both sites are described on page 9; Meiendorf "is situated on the northern side of the Ahrensburgian tunnel" whilst Stellmoor is "on the southeastern side of the valley about 800 m northeast of Meiendorf. Here the excavations were limited to the meadows below the hill of Stellmoor (Stellmoor Hügel)". Full reference: Bratlund, B. 2005. Hunting strategies in the Late Glacial of northern Europe: A survey of the faunal evidence. Journal of World Prehistory Volume 10, Number 1: pp 1-48. [MN 28/07/2009]

Text provided by Alison Roberts for the Characterising World Archaeology project:

"The PRM holds a small collection of 32 unmarked flint artefacts ‘of the Ahrensburg culture’ from Germany, that are recorded as being collected by ‘Alfred Rust of Hamburg in 1934’ (1959.4.11–36). Before the present assessment, these were mis-identified in PRM records as being of Mesolithic age (‘Mesolithic Period I, Pre-Boreal Culture’), but were recognised during a review of the stores for the characterization project. The Ahrensburgian is a Final Palaeolithic industry of Northern Europe that is mainly associated with the Younger Dryas climatic phase of the Lateglacial, and is characterised by the presence of small tanged points. It is often seen as a precursor of the early Mesolithic, and it is presumably in this context that the PRM material was acquired. The material was donated by Armand Donald Lacaille of the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum in London, who seems to have become interested in Final Palaeolithic tanged point industries in relation to his work on the Mesolithic in the 1930s–1950s. Lacaille mentions the Ahrensburgian in his discussion of the origins of the ‘Magelmosean Forest Culture’ in his book on the Stone Age of Scotland (Lacaille 1954: 110–11). He also identified an Ahrensburgian point in the assemblage from Daylight Rock Fissure, Caldey Island, in his work on the Mesolithic of Wales (Lacaille and Grimes 1955). How Lacaille obtained the Ahrensburgian artefacts is unknown at present, but it is possible that he received them from Rust for comparative purposes. Alfred Rust (1900–1983) was a German archaeologist best known for his 1930s excavations of the classic Late Upper Palaeolithic sites of Meiendorf (1932–1934, Hamburgian) and Stellmoor (1934–1936, Ahrensburgian and Hamburgian) near Hamburg in northern Germany (Rust 1937, 1943). The assemblages from these excavations are held in the Archäologisches Landesmuseum in Schleswig, and have been the subject of recent research (Grønnow 1985; Bokelmann 1991; Bratlund 1996). As such, it is unlikely that the material now in the PRM comes from either of the two classic excavations. However, the Stellmoor site was first identified from surface finds, and it is possible that the collection date of 1934 might suggest that artefacts now in the PRM material were part of this material. The Wellcome Collection archive holds Lacaille's correspondence from 1932–1959 (WA/HMM/CO/Lac: http://archives.wellcome.ac.uk), and might contain some documentation about the acquisition of the material. Without a clear provenance the material is useful for teaching and comparative purposes only." [Dan Hicks 04/10/2012]

Search terms: Tool, Flake