Lietuvos istorijos institutas

The article aims to discuss the chronological phases of the Roman-period cemeteries at Žviliai and Šarkai (Šilalė District) and the artefacts attributed to them as a form of cultural expression during certain periods. L. Vaitkunskienė published material from Žviliai in a separate monograph (Vaitkunskienė, 1999), but unfortunately that scholar’s insights into chronological issues have not received a broader response in academic discussions. This article uses statistical methods to return to the question of dating the Roman period burials in Žviliai Cemetery. Roman-period burial assemblages from Šarkai Cemetery have been added to the database in order to clarify the context of the grave-good types from the earliest group of Žviliai burials, which is less numerous. Artefacts typical of certain phases of these cemeteries are analysed over as broad an area as possible, not just the Balt context. The end of the article discusses the cultural unity and specificity of the communities which left the Žviliai and Šarkai Cemeteries in respect to the neighbouring Balt cultures and more distant areas of the European Barbaricum.

The chronology of the Lithuanian Iron Age has up until now been based exclusively on the typology of the finds, usually discovered at burial sites, but the effort to successfully employ typology in dating burial complexes is hindered by a great lack of reference points based on absolute dates. An attempt to fill this gap was made by the scientific project ‘Turning-points in the Iron Age East Lithuania (on the basis of AMS dating)’ during which 30 burials in East Lithuanian barrows were dated using the AMS 14C method. The obtained dates are being published in this article. In selecting the samples, an effort was made to cover all of the chronological horizons of the East Lithuanian barrow culture, as much barrow and burial construction diversity as possible, and as many artefact types as possible. 11 inhumations and 19 cremations were dated. Many of the radiocarbon dates seemed surprisingly old even in those instances where the typology dating is hardly questionable and is clearly connected with European typology schemes. This phenomenon should probably be explained by the freshwater reservoir effect. In order to verify these premises and to evaluate the possible significance of the effect’s impact and the possibility of eliminating this effect, additional investigations need to be conducted.