Posts: 354 Location: Dijon
Tue 25 Apr, 2006 7:40 pm
I got the opportunity to think about river-found weapons during the course of my studies. And here's something worth taking notice :
For my MA I studied a group of river-found weapons, about 25 of them in total, saved from dredging capaings int he Seine river in the early 20th century. I compared them with the better-known examples found in the Saône river near from my birthplace.
And the fact is that for the early medieval period (and before - stretching back to the Bronze Age), there is hardly a ford that did not yeld a weapon of any sort :
seaxes, axes, spears...
And suddenly, from the 10th-11th cent. on, it just stops. You don't get as many weapons as before.
So, there
is definitely a possible 'ritual' environment on the earlier weapon deposits in rivers, and there
is a change of sorts that happens at some point, about a thousand years ago - though it can aslo be a mere 'surface' effect, linked to what the dredge operatos would decide to keep or reject (actually, the Seine river-find yelded over 800 iron weapons - and only the 25 I studied survived, while the rest was sold as scrap).
Another thing worth noticing :
La Tene swords were found in their scabbards. Early Medieval seaxes were sometimes accompanied by miniature axe heads. Spearheads were sometimes IMHO totally unpractical as weapons (weighing well ofer 5 lbs).
Late medieval swords were apparently used.
Though there are a few exceptions (the Castillon find is a good example).
Ah well. This has been the subject of many a talk on another forum, and will hopefully be one of my research main lines in the future, if things go well.
For those interested in Bronze Age river-found weapons, Dr Stefan Wirth will lecture about thel in the next HEMAC event in Dijon (next week, that is - eep ! )
Fab