4 early medieval spears, together with one so finely adorned that it might be of princely origin, have been recovered from the mattress of Lake Lednica. Dendrological evaluation and radiocarbon relationship discovered that the spears date to the second half of the tenth and first half of the eleventh century.
A Piast dynasty stronghold was positioned on Ostrów Lednicki, an island on Lake Lednica. Greater than 280 army artifacts, together with 145 axes, 64 spearheads, and eight swords, from the reigns of Piast dynasty kings Mieszko I (r. ca. 960-992) and Bolesław the Courageous (992-1025) have been recovered from the lake mattress, the most important assortment of early medieval weaponry ever found at a single website.
Scientists have two main theories as to why so many weapons ended up within the lake. They could have fallen into the lake through the battles for the Lednica stronghold, fought on the bridges through the invasion of Poland by the Czech prince Bretislaus within the 1130s. The second speculation, a ritual one, posits that the weapons have been positioned within the water as an providing to deities or spirits.
“Such practices are recognized from earlier intervals in lots of locations in Europe. Water was perceived as a gateway to the world of the lifeless, and throwing a beneficial object into it was a gesture with profound symbolic that means. It’s doable that the arsenal gathered on the backside of the lake is an echo of each turbulent historic occasions and historical beliefs,” the [Museum of the First Piasts in Lednica] stated.
The 4 spears found this season are very totally different from one another and have their very own distinctive options. The smallest spearhead is rhomboidal in form and was discovered nonetheless mounted to its wood shaft. The shaft is fabricated from ash and survives in a number of items totalling roughly 2.1 meters (6’11”) in size. Solely two spears from Lake Lednica have such a well-preserved shaft, and they’re longer exceeding three meters in size. The tip has a hoop fabricated from antler, a function by no means discovered earlier than in a medieval spear.
The second spearhead is longer and slender and is formed like a willow leaf, a typical design in early medieval weaponry. It too has a piece of surviving shaft. The spearhead is adorned with a serpentine line of wolf tooth on either side. A number of examples of spearheads of this kind have been present in Lake Lednica, indicating they might have been manufactured domestically.
The third spearhead is the longest of the 4 and has a triangular profile. It was made utilizing a welded approach that repeatedly solid collectively tender, low-carbon iron alloys with exhausting, high-carbon alloys for added energy. This was the apex of fight forging know-how in Europe on the time. It too is adorned with the wolf tooth design. Only some fragments of the wood shaft have survived.
The fourth is probably the most spectacular of all of them. It’s adorned alongside the blade with spiral and triskelion motifs and set in a socket that’s adorned with the identical motifs. There are wings adorned with braided designs mounted to the socket. The ends are pointed, and should characterize stylized claws or beaks. Rows of small dots fill within the house between the woven braid edges. The remnants of bronze plating are nonetheless seen, however researchers discovered traces of no fewer than six metals within the spearhead: silver, gold, copper, tin, zinc, lead and alloys thereof. Three examples of spears with related ornamentation have been discovered within the lake, however none of them have this specimen’s unbelievable panoply of treasured metals. That is so distinctive an object that it could have been the insignia of royalty or the Aristocracy somewhat than a use weapon, or maybe had a ritual objective.
The found artifacts, particularly the richly adorned princely spearhead, require additional analysis. This can assist decide the manufacturing know-how. Isotope analyses of chosen metals discovered on the princely spear are additionally deliberate to find out their origin, which might assist decide the origin of this prestigious merchandise.
When conservation is full, the spearheads will go on show on the Museum of the First Piast Dynasty in Lednica.
