In the materials published by VO, quite a lot of attention was removed to the history of bronze weapons, and this is not accidental. Indeed, in the history of mankind there was a whole Bronze Age, and this was the era of the first, in fact, globalization in the history of mankind, when people did not yet have a written language, but … but they traded with each other over great distances, which means they knew about each other … In Moldova, in the "Borodino treasure", they found jade from the Sayan Mountains, although the distance between these points on the map is enormous. Is tin necessary for smelting bronze? Its deposits are quite rare, which means that it was traded for many, many kilometers from the place of its production. No wonder the earliest bronzes contain arsenic and silver as ligatures. Well, there was not enough tin, and everything that was at hand was used! However, there was one of the readers who said that bronze is an alloy of copper with … aluminum (!), But let's leave such a bold statement on the conscience of its author (and Google will help him!), And we ourselves will pay attention to something else, namely - interesting evolution of the bronze blade.
Here they are - unique swords from Rorby.
I have already written here that the first swords in Europe were long "rapiers" for fencing with blades without handles. Knives and daggers were made in a similar way: only the blade itself was cast, which expanded in the back, where there were holes for rivets: 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. A cut was made in a wooden handle, into which a blade was inserted and then fixed with rivets.
Replica of a bronze knife from the Early Bronze Age. Apparently, this was how valuable bronze was saved, since archaeologists have found many treasures with defective castings, scrap and individual pieces of metal - that is, they hid everything that had at least some value.
Then there was more metal. But the inertia of people's thinking was such that daggers, for example, now continued to be completely cast in the form of old samples with separate wooden handles. Moreover, they reproduced the expansion of the rear part of the blade, for the most part, completely unnecessary, and rivets - all the more unnecessary, since now they no longer fastened anything and performed only a decorative function.
There are a lot of bronze swords and daggers, which indicates the widespread distribution of such items. And the showcase in the National Museum of Denmark is the best confirmation of this.
However, not only swords and daggers were weapons of the people of the Bronze Age, who lived at that time on the territory of Denmark. See how many bronze axes are on display in this display case!
However, there were also transitional samples. The handle was separately cast in them, the blade separately, and then all this was riveted together. But such daggers and swords were characteristic of the early Bronze Age. People quickly realized that why rivet, when you can cast. But, apparently, due to tradition, they could not refuse rivets at the junction of the blade with the handle.
A very beautiful dagger with a typesetting handle (and this is where the tradition of typesetting handles for prisoners' knives comes from ?!) and a blade riveted to it.
An amazingly beautiful and perfect solid bronze dagger from one private collection. Notice how simple and aesthetic it is at the same time. There is nothing superfluous in it, and at the same time, thin lines on the blade, massive rivets and a very simple handle give the impression of absolute completeness. To it, as they say, there is nothing to add and nothing to subtract from it. Well, its form is also traditional and serves as the best proof of the inertia of human consciousness.
Of course, archaeologists are greatly helped by the fact that the people of the Bronze Age were pagans and buried their dead with rich posthumous gifts. This is where the bronze was not spared. However, valuable products of ancient armourers are found not only in graves …
In the swamps of Denmark, not only bronze daggers are found, but also stone ones, that is, there was a Stone Age in the same way as in other places, but then it was replaced by the “Age of Metals”.
And it so happened that in 1952 the Dane Thorvald Nielsen dug a ditch in a small swamp in the town of Rorby in the western part of Zealand. And it was there that he found an ornamented curved bronze sword, which was stuck in the turf. The sword clearly belonged to the early Bronze Age, around 1600 BC, and was the first such find in Denmark. By the way, notice how similar both he and the dagger have in the above photograph of the handle, which suggests that this form of the pommel was widespread. The sword was donated as an exhibit to the National Museum in Copenhagen, but the story of the curved sword did not end there. In 1957, when another Dane named Thorvald Jensen was digging potatoes in about the same place, he discovered another such sword. The second curved sword was decorated like the first, but it also bore the image of a ship. This turned out to be the oldest depiction of a ship in Denmark!
For an archaeologist, a gift of fate is not an excavated ancient burial mound. As a rule, this is someone's burial, moreover, usually a burial of the Bronze Age. And here they were very lucky with Denmark. On its territory, about 86,000 prehistoric mounds have been discovered, of which about 20,000, according to experts, belong to the Bronze Age. Well, they are found everywhere on the territory of modern Denmark, which suggests that in the past it was densely populated.
But besides the mounds, there are also swamps in Denmark. And now they have become a real treasure trove for archaeologists. And what is not found in them, for example, among the most interesting "marsh finds" are … bronze shields, which were made in central Europe in the period 1100 - 700 years. BC. Such bronze shields were known from Italy in the south to Sweden in the north, from Spain and Ireland in the west to Hungary in the east. It can be considered proven that shields made of such a thin metal could not have a military purpose. But for ritual purposes - as much as you like. Such shields were considered solar symbols and were closely associated with the worship of the gods and the forces of nature. In Scandinavian rock carvings, designs of round shields can be seen in connection with ritual dances, so their cult purpose is undoubtedly. But how were they found? It happened back in 1920, when two workers came to the editor of the local newspaper, Jensen, and brought two bronze shields, which they found in the Zorup Mose bog during the development of a peat bog. The largest shield was badly damaged by a shovel blow. The find was immediately reported to the National Museum, which began excavations. The workers reported that the shields were in the swamp vertically at a short distance from each other. Archaeologists found this place, but there was nothing else there.
In the development of peat in a small swamp at Svenstrup in Himmerland in July 1948, Christian Jorgensen made another fantastic find. It was a beautiful bronze shield from the late Bronze Age. He donated the shield to the museum, and received a good reward for it - enough money to pay for a new roof for his farm.
The experts immediately noticed that these shields were made from a very thin bronze sheet. Experiments with replicas of these shields have shown that they are completely useless in combat. Their thickness allows you to pierce metal anywhere, and if you strike a shield with the same bronze sword, it falls apart almost in half. This suggests that these shields were used exclusively for ritual purposes, but that at the same time people still tried to save bronze. After all, a thicker bronze sheet requires less work than a thinner one.
Here it is, this exquisite buckle.
And this is a Danish banknote on which the Danes placed its image and, it should be noted that many Danish banknotes were previously decorated with images of archaeological finds in Denmark dating back to the Stone and Bronze Age!
It should be noted that the ancient Danes (or what did they call themselves at that time?) Were foundry masters. For example, the National Museum of Copenhagen displays a belt plate dating from 1400 BC, covered with delicate spiral patterns. Found it back in 1879, again in a peat bog in North Zealand. Moreover, the employee who found it handed over his find to the owner, and he, not knowing her and other "coins" of the real price, threw them into the trash heap, where they were noticed by a policeman who accidentally looked at him. So the technology for making such a plate was very original: a spiral made of gold wire was inserted into a wax model, which was used to make a clay mold. Then it warmed up, the wax flowed out, and molten bronze was poured into it. Everything seems to be simple. But this plate was very thin, so it took real skill to fuse gold with bronze in this way.
"Horned" helmet from Vikse.
And then at Vicks in Zealand, one of the workers dug up two nearly identical horned bronze helmets made using the "lost shape" method. They were decorated with umbols, eyes, beaks and were made at the beginning of the first millennium BC. Again, these could not be battle helmets. They were used in religious ceremonies, and then simply drowned in a swamp as a sacrifice to unknown deities. Interestingly, one of the helmets was placed on a preserved wooden tray, which, by the way, is not surprising, since peat has excellent preservative properties.
Mummies of women from Scrudstrupf. As you can see, thanks to the peat, they are well preserved.
Both Vikse helmets and accompanying finds.
However, it is not entirely clear where these “Vikse helmets” were made. Perhaps on the spot, where they were found, or it is possible that it was in Central Europe or Northern Germany. In any case, the numerous rock carvings of people wearing horned helmets, especially from western Sweden, suggest that the cult of the “horned man” was very popular here. Well, the "life path" of the objects of this cult ended again … in a swamp!
Lurs were also thrown there - huge pipes cast from bronze in the form of bull horns (c. 1000 BC), of which 39 pieces were found in the same Denmark. And they are found only in swamps! That is, they were first made, consuming valuable bronze, then they were blown into them for a while, and then, together with shields, helmets and beautiful belt buckles, they were thrown into the swamp, and always in pairs.
Lur from Brudewalte. This is how this "pipe" looked, and it was … solid!
And here is their whole showcase!
All the detail of one of these swords is clearly visible here. This is clearly a ritual object, and quite massive. And here the question is - what did he portray? After all, this is clearly a sword, but it is also obvious that one cannot fight with such swords. Then why was he given exactly this shape?
But back to the swords from Rorby. Their shape is unique in that … they were originally made non-combat. After all, it can hardly be considered a combat sword, devoid of a point and without a sharpened blade. However, they did not save bronze on them, unlike shields. That is, the grace of ancestors or "swamp gods" was more important for the ancient inhabitants of Denmark than the price of metal, or they had it in abundance!
Former copper mine in Cyprus. Copper was mined here, and it was from here that all of Europe was supplied with this metal. But tin was mined in the British Isles, which the ancients called Pewter. And maybe that is why in Denmark, which lay on the path of the ancient routes of the metal trade, there was just so much bronze that items from it were not only placed in the graves of the dead, but also thrown into the swamps of the gods?
