The landscape of the Late Bronze Age royal tomb of Seddin (NE Germany): linking geomorphology, archaeology, and historic evidence

Abstract

The monumental Late Bonze Age royal tomb of Seddin is located in the old morainic landscape of the Prignitz region, northeastern Germany. Together with other richly equipped burials and a row of stone pits in its direct vicinity, it provides evidence for the presence of an elite from the nineth to sixth centuries BCE in this region. Our map emphasizes the well-chosen location of the royal tomb in relation to the spatial arrangement of other archaeological monuments that together form an ensemble of a ritual landscape. We trace legacies of land use from the Bronze Age to the present against the backdrop of Late Quaternary landscape evolution. These include the Bronze Age landscape (re-)organization for ritual and economic purposes, its medieval use for arable farming, its economic use and settlement history in historic times, and modern times melioration of agricultural areas that together form the palimpsest of the present-day landscape.

Keywords

• late quaternary geomorphology
• human–environment interactions
• legacies of historic land use
• geoarchaeology
• peat record from late mis 3 (weichselian pleniglacial)
• royal tomb of seddin