Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 4663e4674 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Journal of Archaeological Science journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jas Dating the Trollesgave site and the Bromme culture e chronological fix-points for the Lateglacial settlement of Southern Scandinavia Anders Fischer a,b,*, Morten Fischer Mortensen b, Peter Steen Henriksen b, Dorte Rørbeck Mathiassen c, Jesper Olsen d a The Danish Agency for Culture, H.C. Andersens Boulevard 2, DK-1553 Copenhagen V, Denmark b The National Museum of Denmark, Danish Prehistory and Environmental Archaeology, Ny Vestergade 11, DK-1471 Copenhagen K, Denmark c Nordvænget 18, 2tv, DK-3520 Farum, Denmark d Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Ny Munkegade 120, DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark article info abstract Article history: The Bromme culture belongs to the Lateglacial, the period when people settled in the recently degla- Received 24 March 2013 ciated Southern Scandinavia. Until now there have been only a few imprecise fix-points relating to the Received in revised form chronological position of this archaeological culture. This situation can now be improved with the aid of 13 June 2013 research results from a Bromme culture settlement at Trollesgave in SE Denmark. Using pollen and plant Accepted 30 June 2013 macrofossil data, Lateglacial lacustrine deposits containing waste material from the settlement can be assigned to the end of the climatically mild Allerød period. A series of 14C dates establishes the age of the Keywords: settlement as c. 10 826 Æ 49 14C years BP (12 871e12 590 cal yr BP). By correlation with climate data from Late Palaeolithic Bromme culture the Greenland ice cores, the occupation can be assigned to the early part of the cold climatic zone GS-1, Allerød thus demonstrating that the global ice-core climate zones are not absolutely synchronous with the Younger Dryas regional division into biozones. Pollen analysis Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Climate change Southern Scandinavia 1. Introduction (Eriksen, 2002; Clausen, 2003; Pedersen, 2009; Petersen, 2009; Burdukiewicz, 2011; Riede and Edinborough, 2012). Whether it As the archaeological record stands today, the Bromme culture also extended over northern Poland and parts of England represents the northernmost human presence in Western Europe (Sørensen, 2010) remains unresolved (cf. Pedersen, 2009,19;Riede during the Lateglacial (Fischer et al., 2013). The culture was origi- et al. 2011). The culture is usually taken to be an expression of the nally defined on the basis of the flint inventory from the locality at first complete adaptation to, and year-round presence in, the Bromme, eastern Denmark (Fig. 1). This is characterised by only recently deglaciated landscape of Southern Scandinavia. An three types of tool with retouch: scrapers, burins and, not least, element in this adaptation was that the meticulous and economical robust tanged points (Westerby, 1946, 1987; Mathisassen, 1948; (in terms of raw material) flint technology that had been practised Fischer and Nielsen, 1987). Over time, as further finds assem- in the preceding and generally more southerly distributed blages have been discovered, it has become increasingly clear that Hamburg and Federmesser cultures was abandoned in favour of a the features common to the culture also include a characteristic significantly simpler, in technical terms, and markedly more prof- approach to the production of blades (Andersen, 1973; Fischer, ligate craft tradition. This change probably reflects the relative 1990; Madsen, 1992, 1996). abundance of large flint nodules of good quality to which the The territory covered by the Bromme culture comprises population gained access when they made their entry into the present-day Denmark, the southernmost part of Sweden, the Southern Scandinavian young-moraine landscape (Fischer, 1991; northern parts of the countries located south of the Baltic and the Petersen, 2009). adjacent, now sea-covered, parts of the Baltic and the North Sea Despite the fact that research has been carried out into the Bromme culture through several decades, it remains one of the most poorly-dated archaeological cultures of the North European low- * Corresponding author. The Danish Agency for Culture, H.C. Andersens Boule- fi vard 2, DK-1553 Copenhagen V, Denmark. lands. Signi cant cultural-historical questions therefore remain un- E-mail address: afi[email protected] (A. Fischer). resolved. For example: Did the culture emerge under the influence of 0305-4403/$ e see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2013.06.026 4664 A. Fischer et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 4663e4674 The present article presents a preliminary status with respect to the dating of the Bromme culture and attempts thereby to establish a foundation for resolution of some of the fundamental archaeo- logical problems associated specifically with the Lateglacial in Southern Scandinavia, as well as with the Late Palaeolithic epoch generally in the North European lowlands. The Trollesgave settle- ment plays a critical role in this investigation in that a compre- hensive body of archaeological and environmental evidence from this locality offers special opportunities to establish a relatively solid chronological fix-point. The material recovered from this lo- cality has now been brought out for analysis almost 40 years after it was excavated because, in the interim, no better basis has emerged for dating Late Palaeolithic settlements in Denmark. The sampling and analysis procedures were state of the art in the 1970s, but by today’s standards there is an unfortunate lack of loss on ignition and magnetic susceptibility data. 2. Material and methods 2.1. The Trollesgave site Soon after its discovery in the early 1970s the Trollesgave site was identified as a subject for further investigation, in part because it offered a hope of material being obtainable for scientific dating (Fischer and Mortensen, 1977; Fischer, 1990). The Late Palaeolithic settlements of the lowlands of western and central Europe are usu- ally associated with sandy, naturally drained sediments. Due to biological decomposition and leaching, as well as the abrasive effect of freeze and thaw processes, pollen, charcoal, faunal remains etc. e materials that could form the basis for scientific dating e are hardly ever preserved (e.g. Taute, 1968,19e27; Tromnau, 1975a, 1975b; Sulgostowska, 1989; De Bie and Caspar, 2000; Johansson, 2003; Bogen et al. 2003; Fischer, 2013). At Trollesgave, however, deep, waterlogged lacustrine deposits existed in the vicinity of the settle- ment area. By continuing the excavation out into these wetland de- posits, it proved possible to demonstrate the presence of cultural remains in an undisturbed layer which could then be dated with the aid of scientific methods. As will become apparent below, this exer- cise was associated with significant difficulties. The locality had e like most Late Palaeolithic lake-shore sites in NW Europe e been exposed to complex and extensive erosion and solifluction processes. In the following, a summary is given of the outcome of the archaeological-geological fieldwork carried out between 1973 and Fig. 1. The location of Holmegård Bog and the site of Trollesgave, relative to the 1975 on the basis of which the date presented below was estab- present-day geography and the extent of land, sea and ice cap in Southern Scandinavia lished. It included the excavation of the main SE trench (Fig. 2), during Middle to Late Allerød times (A). Other Bromme culture sites mentioned in the where intact lacustrine deposits were encountered containing a text are also marked on the map. Dots indicate sites that have been dated radiomet- small number of discarded flint artefacts from the Bromme culture. rically. The map of the Holmegård Bog area (B) gives the topographical location of the Trollesgave site and other well-defined Late Palaeolithic activity areas recorded during In the other excavation trenches in the wetland deposits, the intensive field-surveying along the shores of the former lake system. Geographical Lateglacial sediments were generally heavily disturbed or features drawn on the basis of M. Houmark-Nielsen 2012, Fig. 14e13 (A), and Fischer completely eroded away and none of them contained in situ Late 1985, Johansson 2003 (B). Palaeolithic material. the Allerød period’s mild climate and the rapidly improving ecological potential for a hunter-fisher-gatherer existence in South- 2.2. The stratigraphy ern Scandinavia (Fischer,1991; Eriksen, 2002)? Or did it first develop late in Allerød times in response to an ecological catastrophe which In principle, the stratigraphy of the lacustrine deposits at Trol- took place around 12 900 cal yr BP; i.e. when the Lacher See volcano lesgave represents a standard succession from lake to bog to carr, spewed out colossal ash layers which then settled as a suffocating with gyttja deposits at the base, then fen peat and uppermost blanket across enormous areas further to the south (Riede, 2008; wood (alder) peat (for definitions of the stratigraphic terms Riede and Edinborough, 2012;cf.Sørensen, 2010)? Did the employed see Troels-Smith, 1955). The natural accumulation of Bromme culture (and humans in general) disappear from Southern organic sediments is, however, interrupted in several places by Scandinavia as a consequence of the extreme cold during the major erosive deposits of minerogenic material, resulting in a far Younger Dryas (Petersen, 2009)? What was the nature of the cultural from simple stratigraphy. This is demonstrated here by two sec- and demographic substrate from which the culture arose? And did it tions cut respectively parallel with, and at right angles to, the enjoy a cultural and genetic afterlife in subsequent periods? original lake shore (Figs. 3e5). A. Fischer et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 4663e4674 4665 Fig. 4. Section through the lake deposits running parallel to the original lake shore, seen from the west. Layers 2ae6 represent the period from Allerød times to the Early Preboreal.