Lietuvos archeologija

The research of the area between Lakes Amalvas and Žuvintas was conducted as part of the topic ‘Reconstruction of the Development of the Social Structure and Economic Activity in the Late Ice Age – Early Holocene (10th–1st millennia BC) society in the Trans-Nemunas region (Užnemunė)’ within the framework of the ‘Archaeolandscape’ scientific research project. The fertile top soils of the Dovinė basin encouraged the expansion of the farmed land and the adaptation of the area to farming. This caused the reconstruction of the hydrographic network, which occurred in the Amalvas and Žuvintas basins as early as the mid-19th century. The first news of isolated archaeological finds discovered in ameliorating Amalvas Bog reaches us from that time. The few stray finds did not receive any attention from archaeologists, the only investigated object in the microregion being Varnupiai hillfort, which was excavated by P. Kulikauskas in 1971. The complex investigation of the microregion, which included a pollen analysis of the sediments of Lake Amalvas, supported by abundant radiocarbon dates of the layers, and archaeological research, which were supported by a critical analysis of the sources, the precise location of long known and newly discovered stray finds, and the detection of new objects, created opportunities to look more deeply at the natural and cultural development in the microregion from the oldest times to historical times.

The article presents the Trzciniec culture (Trzciniec cultural cycle), an Early and Middle Bronze Age archaeological phenomenon in Lithuania. It analyses various aspects of the concept and chronology of the culture and presents a history of the research in the culture’s territory. Priority is given to archaeological pottery, the main indicator for cultural identification. The article gives the main distinguishing features of the ceramic vessels, their types, their ornamentation, and their attribution to either the East-Trzciniec or West-Trzciniec culture. Finally the article analyses the Bronze Age cultural situation in the Eastern Baltic region and raises the question of whether the Trzciniec culture existed in Lithuania and in what form.

The Daugava River has been one of the most important traffic arteries in the Eastern Baltic region. The establishment of more than 30 hillforts alongside this river reflects the importance of this waterway. Most of these hillforts are understudied. Thus, the bigger picture regarding the hillforts’ inhabitation patterns, chronology, environment, and function(s) remain unknown. As such, the INHILLDAUGAR project seeks to systematically analyze the river’s landscape on a macro scale by combining palaeoenvironmental, archaeological, and linguistic studies. This article presents the genesis of the INHILLDAUGAR project and preliminary results from the 2022 and 2023 field campaigns.