Heroldishausen (Unstrut-Hainich-Kreis) – Teil einer älterwartbergzeitlichen Siedlungskammer im westlichen Thüringer Becken

Abstract

Heroldishausen (Unstrut-Hainich-Kreis) – Part of an Older Wartberg Period Settlement Area in the Western Thuringian Basin
The site of Heroldishausen-»Schere« has long been known as a settlement with an extensive ceramic inventory within a Thuringian settlement chamber of the Late Neolithic Wartberg Group. The finds material displays resemblances to inventories of the Harz foreland, which are assigned to an older stage well before 3000 BC. The radiocarbon dates presented here provide the first absolute chronological dating to the period between 3450 and 3000 BC. On the basis of the pottery decoration of hollow knobs documented in Heroldishausen, new considerations on the period and, above all, the spatial and cultural context of the formation of the Wartberg Group are developed here.