Neues zum Fürstinnengrab von Vix: Untersuchungen zur Entdeckungsgeschichte

Abstract

On 5 January 1953, Maurice Moisson uncovered the mesmerizing Gorgon-headed handle of an enormous bronze crater; it was the opening scene at the theatre of discovery of a major Celtic site known today as the burial of the “Lady of Vix”. The circumstances of its discovery and the conditions of the excavations of the time have severely affected any scientific results that could be expected from the investigation of an intact wagon burial. For this reason, even now many questions remain unresolved. The archival documentation
(some 60 previously unpublished photographs) passed on by the heirs of René Joffroy, the director the original excavation, and the re-examination of certain published elements have allowed the author to propose some new interpretations and to provide more detail concerning the sequence in which the findings were made, which so far had been quite hazy. The author was also able to clarify the plan of the burial, the vehicle it contained, the architecture of the burial mound and its archaeological context. All these elements, once sorted out, enable us to look afresh at this most famous of excavations. The author has also sought to outline a hermeneutic approach to the developing myth of the Lady of Vix and what she took into the afterlife. In this context it is quite surprising to read that André Breton, that top dog of surrealism, promoted the humble digger Maurice Moisson to the rank of alchemist.