The Department of Archaeology at the FF UHK also participates in the rescue excavation of a Bronze Age cemetery near Vojenice in the Podorlicko region (participation of students in the form of field practice in the years 2014-2016, financial support for the processing of finds in the form of internal grants). We participate in the processing, evaluation, and publication of the finds in cooperation of other institutions – the Museum of the Eagle Mountains in Rychnov nad Kněžnou, the Faculty of Arts of Charles University, and the Faculty of Arts of Palacký University in Olomouc.
We have managed to discover numerous graves with ceramic vessels at this cemetery, which is being damaged by ploughing. The most important discoveries include the remains indicating that apart from the barrows preserved in a nearby wood, also other, seemingly destroyed barrow mounds used to stand at the cemetery. These used to cover not only the graves themselves, but also vestiges of burial ceremonies and other cultic activities taking place at the burial ground, perhaps in order to pay homage to dead ancestors – possibly feasts and dances whose participants stamped potsherds from vessels from which they had (together with souls of their ancestors ?) eaten and drunk into the ground. From the methodological viewpoint, also documentation of how exactly are cremation graves gradually being damaged by ploughing is quite interesting to archaeologists.
CONTACT
PhDr. Zuzana Bláhová, Ph.D.
e. zuzana.blahova@uhk.cz
t. +420 493 331 273
