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Thorsberg moor

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View of Thorsberg moor
4th-century Germanic tunic found on Thorsberg moor
Trousers with attached socks found on Thorsberg moor
Two wooden round shields (3rd century AD)

The Thorsberg moor (German: Thorsberger Moor, Danish: Thorsberg Mose or Thorsbjerg Mose, South Jutlandic: Tosbarch, Tåsbjerre "Thor's hill") near Süderbrarup in Anglia, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, is a peat bog in which the Angles deposited votive offerings for approximately four centuries. It is the location of important Roman Iron Age finds, including early Elder Futhark runic inscriptions such as the Thorsberg chape, a Roman helmet, a shield buckle, and an early example of socks (attached to trousers). The finds are of similar importance as the contemporaneous finds from Illerup and Vimose in Denmark.

Name and etymology

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In South Jutlandic, the local forms of the name are Tosbarch and Tåsbjerre. The bog is called Thorsbjerg Mose or Thorsberg Mose in Danish and Thorsberger Moor in German. The name refers to Thorsberg, a hill near Süderbrarup in northern Germany. The Danish bjerg means "hill" or "mountain", while mose means "bog".[1]

Although Thorsbjerg has been interpreted as "Thor's hill", the name alone does not establish that the Iron Age offerings in the bog were dedicated to the god Thor. Interpretations of the place name have differed.[2][3] The Danish archaeologist Helvig Conrad Engelhardt, who excavated the bog in the nineteenth century, noted a symbol he called "Thor's hammer" on several finds. He cautioned that similar motifs also appeared in other cultures.[4]

Excavation

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The moor was excavated in 1858–1861 by a teacher from Flensburg, Helvig Conrad Engelhardt.

History of deposition

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People placed objects in the Thorsberg moor near Süderbrarup, in what is now northern Germany, at different times during the Iron Age. The earlier offerings, from the later pre-Roman Iron Age and early Roman Iron Age, included pottery, wooden vessels and brooches used to fasten clothing.[5]

Later, people deposited military equipment on three major occasions. Archaeologist Ruth Blankenfeldt dates the first to the beginning of the later Roman Iron Age. The largest deposit dates to about 210–250 CE, and the last to the first four decades of the fourth century, about 300–340 CE.[5]

Blankenfeldt interprets the military equipment as war booty. She found that some objects had been damaged in fighting, while others were broken in a systematic way before they were placed in the bog. It is not known to whom the offerings were made.[5]

Discoveries

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The deposits are clearly votive in nature.[6][7] However, it is doubtful that they were dedicated specifically to Thor. The placename may reflect worship of Thor there by Danes during the Viking Age rather than by Angles during the Roman Iron Age. And as Engelhardt noted, although the 'Thor's hammer' symbol occurs on several finds from the site, it is a motif that can be found in many non-Germanic contexts, even on Native American artefacts.[4]

They include early examples of clothing, both Germanic and Roman, in particular the footed trousers, which are commonly dated to the 4th century but which now appear to be no later than 300 AD;[8][7] objects of Roman workmanship including two phaleræ, military decorations in the form of richly decorated gold discs 13.2 cm (5.2 in) in diameter made in the 3rd century in the workshop of Saciro, thought to have been near Cologne, which have the image of a seated man with a spear, possibly a representation of Mars;[9] and objects of Germanic workmanship, notably the Thorsberg chape, a piece of a scabbard bearing one of the earliest inscriptions in runes.[10]

Some of the Germanic fibulæ and shield bosses of ultimately Roman origin appear to be from Germanic tribes in Greater Germania, who were in closer contact with the Romans than the Angles.[11] After approximately 200 AD, the deposition of weapons increased, possibly as a result of conflict between tribes such as the Marcomannic war (166 to 180 AD).[12] Many of the objects deposited, especially the weapons, have been made useless by breaking, bending, etc.[13] It was common practice among Celtic peoples to ritually "kill" such weapons.[14]

In addition to the weapons and other man-made objects, the deposits in the bog include isolated bones.[15] Just outside the moor is an Iron Age tumulus with a stone circle.

Exhibition

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The objects recovered by Engelhardt are on exhibit in the state museum of archaeology at Gottorf Castle; another 500 finds are on exhibit in the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen.

See also

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Notes

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  1. ↑ "Thorsbjerg Mose". Grænseforeningen (in Danish).
  2. ↑ "Vier og lunde". Gyldendal og Politikens Danmarkshistorie (in Danish). Lex.
  3. ↑ "Conrad Engelhardt: Thorsbjerg mosefund". Historisk Tidsskrift (in Danish).
  4. 1 2 Engelhardt, Conrad (1863). Thorsbjerg Mosefund: beskrivelse af de oldsager, som i aarene 1858-61 ere udgravede af Thorsbjerg mose ved Sønder-Brarup i Angel (in Danish). Copenhagen: Gad. p. 71.
  5. 1 2 3 Blankenfeldt, Ruth (2012). "Sacrifices of Military Equipment in the "Thorsberger Moor": 150 Years of Research and New Perspectives" (PDF). Inter Ambo Maria: Northern Barbarians from Scandinavia towards the Black Sea. pp. 31–32.
  6. ↑ Malcolm Todd, The Early Germans, Oxford: Blackwell, 1995, ISBN 0-631-19904-7, p. 261.
  7. 1 2 Möller-Wiering, Susan (2011). "Thorsberg". War and Worship: Textiles from 3rd to 4th-Century AD Weapon Deposits in Denmark and Northern Germany. Oxbow Books. pp. 40–80. doi:10.2307/j.ctvh1drvp.
  8. ↑ Graham Sumner, Roman Military Clothing (2): AD 200-400, Botley: Osprey, 2003, ISBN 1-84176-559-7, p. 35.
  9. ↑ Herbert Schutz, Tools, Weapons and Ornaments: Germanic Material Culture in Pre-Carolingian Central Europe, 400-750, Leyden/Boston: Brill, 2001, ISBN 90-04-12298-2, pp. 185-86.
  10. ↑ "Thorsberg (Süderbrarup, Schleswig-Flensburg, Schleswig-Holstein, D)". RuneS.
  11. ↑ Birkmann, p. 46.
  12. ↑ Matešić, Suzana. "Die militärischen Ausrüstungen". Das Thorsberger Moor. Vol. 3.
  13. ↑ Jensen, Jørgen. "Våbenofferet i Thorsbjerg Mose". Danmarks Oldtid (in Danish).
  14. ↑ Dragos Mandescu, "Killing the Weapons. An Insight on Graves with Destroyed Weapons in Late Iron Age Transylvania", Proceedings of the International Colloquium from Târgu Mureș, 7-9 October 2011, Killing_the_Weapons._An_Insight_on_Graves_with_Destroyed_Weapons_in_Late_Iron_Age_Transylvania.
  15. ↑ Herbert Jankuhn, Nydam und Thorsberg: Moorfunde der Eisenzeit, Neumünster: Wachholtz, 1983, ISBN 3-529-01603-9, p. 22 (in German): "Vereinzelt kamen . . . auch Tierknochen vor, so einige Pferdeknochen und ein Rinderhorn" (Animal bones also occurred in isolation . . . such as a few bones from horses and a bovine horn).

References

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  • Conrad Engelhardt. Thorsbjerg Mosefund: beskrivelse af de oldsager, som i aarene 1858-61 ere udgravede af Thorsbjerg mose ved Sønder-Brarup i Angel. Copenhagen: Gad, 1863. OCLC 249241131. Reissued with introduction by Mogens Ørsnes. Thorsberg Mosefund. Sønderjyske og funske Mosefund vol. 1. Copenhagen: ZAC, 1969. OCLC 256851199 (in Danish)
  • Michael Gebühr and Claus von Carnap-Bornheim. Nydam und Thorsberg: Opferplätze der Eisenzeit. Exhibition Catalogue. Schleswig: Archäologisches Landesmuseum, Verein zur Förderung des Archäologischen Landesmuseums e. V., Schloss Gottorf, 2000
  • Herbert Jankuhn. Nydam und Thorsberg: Moorfunde der Eisenzeit. Neumünster: Wachholtz, 1962 (in German)
  • Klaus Raddatz. "Der Thorsberger Moorfund-Katalog. Teile von Waffen und Pferdegeschirr, sonstige Fundstücke aus Metall und Glas, Ton- und Holzgefäße, Steingeräte". In Offa-Bücher 65. Neumünster: Wachholtz, 1987. ISBN 3-529-01165-7 (in German)
  • Klaus Raddatz. Der Thorsberger Moorfund: Gürtelteile und Körperschmuck. Neumünster: Wachholtz, 1957 (in German)
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54°38′24″N 9°46′12″E / 54.64000°N 9.77000°E / 54.64000; 9.77000

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