Die Gräber der frühen und mittleren Bronzezeit in der westlichen Münchner Schotterebene unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der frühen Bronzezeit

Abstract

After the last investigation of Early Bronze Age burials in Southern Bavaria has been made in the late 1970’s five newly discovered cemeteries west of Munich’s township provided an opportunity to examine a small scaled landscape in this certain period regarding the burial customs. These analyses had been undertaken within the scope of my final thesis for M.A. degree at the Ludwigs-Maximilians-University of Munich. Because there was one cemetery in which the transition from Early to Middle Bronze Age could be apprehended it seemed useful to widen the chronological range to gain new knowledge about the dynamic processes within such grave fields. Not like the small scaled old digs the large excavation areas of Freiham and Maisach-Gernlinden opened new insights in the settlement zones and the connected burial places. The amount of graves was too small for making a new chronological order so the focus in this thesis was set upon the analysis of the burial practices and the associated specifics in the gravel plain. Most of the skeletons were examined anthropologically and so some unresolved questions could have been cleared while looking at the burial customs. New types of features, like small buildings erected over graves, give evidence of far-reaching cultural contacts and give us the opportunity to revaluate old findings.