Human skeletal remains and multi-phase partial burials of the Aunjetitz culture in the northern foreland of the Harz mountains (Lower Saxony)

Abstract

Cut-up burials and incomplete skeletons in settlement pits are well-known for the Younger Bronze Age and Early Iron Age in Central Germany. In the Braunschweiger Land a cemetery of the Aunjetitz culture with more than 20 individuals at Watenstedt (Lkr. Helmstedt) was found, providing evidence for a multi-phase burial rite for as early as the Early Bronze Age. The anthropologic analyses allow an insight into how deceased were treated and bones were deposed. The consideration of finds from cemeteries as well as from settlements indicates that already in the Aunjetitz culture some dead were buried in the ground only after a multi-phase funeral ritual.