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Den | Romania | History | Bronze Age | Urnfield

Bronze Age
Urnfield Period

Topics covered in this section:

Introduction

Although this period includes the Iron Age, it has been placed within the Bronze Age because bronze was still the most popular metal. It includes the four phases of Hallstatt A through D, but for all practical purposes A and B and much of early C belong to the Bronze Age.

Archaeologists generally call the Iron Age period of European pre-history between 1300 and 600 B.C. the "Urnfield Period." Unfortunately, this implies a period consisting primarily of European stereotypes. But that doesn't describe the period fully. As it turns out, the name provides little help in representing the extent of the actual variability found at the sites.

Note

This particular document does not cover the entire Unfield Period. It ends about 1000 B.C., when the colonization period began in Romania.

For various reasons, the Urnfield Period hasn't attracted the attention it deserves. There are no great stone monuments, like Stonehenge, to visit. There are few large burial grounds. And there are no extensive settlements to catch the eye of the public.

Perhaps the most important reason it has attracted little attention, however, is the fact that it's not possible to isolate events in a historical sense.

Period of Cremation

You might be wondering where the Urnfield Period got its proper name. Well, it has to do with the way people dealt with the dead during this period. In all the previous — and most of the later — periods of history, the most popular custom was to bury the dead in graves. During the Urnfield Period, however, we see an almost universal change from this pattern.

While grave burials continued to be used, especially in Romania, the vast majority of the West European dead were cremated and their ashes placed in ground pits or in funerary urns. This popular practice of cremating the dead and placing their ashes in urns has given the period its distinctive name. In fact the practice continued to be the most popular form of disposing of the dead throughout Europe during most of the subject period.

Common Patterns Emerge

Without grave sites, archaeologists are faced with all the problems typically associated with basing conclusions on sparse evidence. But in spite of this drawback, some common patterns emerge. The Urnfield Period was an age of industrial, social, military, and religious revolutions.

For example, we see a marked trend toward fortification, which is visible in the archaeological record beginning around 1100 B.C. In some cases, forts were strategically placed on hilltops and in other cases, stockades surrounded areas of settlement on lower ground.

We see a tremendous increase in the use of salt as a major trade commodity, bringing wealth to settlements fortunate enough to be located near salt mines. Many settlements in the Romanian lands, for example, fell into this category.

Indigenous Populations

Throughout Europe indigenous populations were already in place, although the continent still had an extremely low population density. Since there's no real reason to assume these indigenous people arrived just prior to recorded history, they were probably living there throughout the late Bronze Age, and perhaps earlier.

For example, the Celts were already established in central and western Europe. Illyrians had established their culture in the western Balkans.

Meanwhile, the great civilizations of Mycenaean Greece and of Hittite Anatolia had begun their gradual decline. Europe now came into its own.

Europe in 1300 B.C.

In 1300 B.C., Europe consisted of a mosaic of small-scale communities at different stages of social and economic development.

Class Distinction

We see the emergence of distinct social divisions or classes, where wealth was distributed across the community in unequal proportions.

The wealthy elite, for example, can be found buried with their hoards of goods alongside their bodies.

We see more and more evidence of a middle class consisting of tradesmen and craftsmen.

And at the bottom of the social ladder, we find the vast majority of people — the farm workers, herders, and peasants.

Daily Life

Daily life for most Europeans revolved around the tasks of the field and the workshop. Most of the villages that have been recovered were essentially agricultural communities.

Some villagers, especially those located near rivers, became middlemen in the growing trade business.

Principal Food Sources

As might be expected from a continent devoted primarily to agriculture, the principal food sources remained the domesticates, both plant and animal. But wild animal foods such as red deer, wild pigs, and even aurochs (wherever available, such as on the Hungarian plain), were also exploited.

Industrial Revolution

Of course, 1300 B.C. isn't a firm dividing line. Instead we see a somewhat continuous process of technological improvements from the past. In general, what followed after 1300 B.C. was more advanced technologically than what came before it.

Of course, metallurgy was far from being a new skill, but we see an apparent explosion — both quantitatively and qualitatively — of metallurgical activity at this time. In this case, therefore, the phrase "industrial revolution" is an apt one to describe the situation.

Metallurgy

An examination of metallurgy (bronze and, of course, the "new" metal, iron) along with the attendant industrial processes indicates that the Urnfield period witnessed many technological advances.

It's somewhat difficult to trace the passage of metal objects across the European continent. One factor contributing to this difficulty is the utilization of many regional sources of metals and alloys. Another factor is the mixing of metal stock used to produce an end product. But perhaps the biggest drawback is the often unreliable results obtained by spectrographic emission methods.

Metal was often disseminated in the form of various kinds of ingots. During the earlier period, ingots consisted primarily of neck rings. Later, ingots were flat on top and curved on the bottom, reflecting the shape they inherited from the bowl-shaped furnaces used by craftsmen.

Mold Inovations Introduced

Whereas most objects were previously cast using two-piece molds of metal or stone, now multiple-piece molds were commonly used.

Also we see an increase in the reliance on the lost-wax method, which unfortunately leaves precious few traces for the archaeologist.

In addition, the two main materials used for more permanent molds were clay or sand mixed with clay, two materials that don't often survive more than one use since they were regularly broken in the process of extracting the casting.

Importance of Mountainous Areas

Some villages, especially those located near metal resources, were also involved with industrial activities. We see evidence of metal being extracted from the Alps, the Carpathians, and other mountainous areas. Thousands of tons of copper were extracted and exported or else made into tools, weapons, or other objects.

Iron Age

During the several centuries bracketing 1300 B.C., the most important metallurgical processes were those involving copper and tin, which were alloyed to make bronze. After about 1000 B.C., iron became increasingly dominant.

Copper/Tin Exporters Suffer

The use of iron instead of bronze changed the technological world forever. For one thing, iron was much more plentiful than either copper or tin. Many of the regions into which copper and tin had previously been imported found themselves suddenly in possession of abundant supplies of iron ore nearby. Import demand dropped drastically.

Iron Requires New Technology

However, smelting of iron did require that the craftsmen change their oven designs. Iron ore requires a minimum temperature of 1100 degrees Celsius whereas the melting point of copper is the lower 1083 degrees Celsius.

Most iron smelting ovens were enclosed, clay-lined, shaft and bowl furnaces, which were driven by a bellows to extract the oxygen out of the iron oxide ores.

Glass

Raw materials such as amber and jet were crafted.

Beads of primitive glass had been known since the early Bronze Age. These beads, sometimes referred to as "faience" were actually a glass-like substance that had been fired to a rather low temperature. Only rarely did craftsmen achieve the higher firing temperature needed for the formation of true glass.

In Egypt and the Near East, where glass-making had been honed to a fine art, craftsmen produced elaborate glass objects during this same period. European craftsmen, by contrast, usually only managed to produce simple glass beads. Technology transfer from the Near East of glass working skills slowly arrived in Europe, beginning with the Mediterranean region.