Human-Horse Burials in Lithuania in the Late Second to Seventh Centuryad: A Multidisciplinary Approach

Abstract

Contemporary Lithuania, an area of the Balt cultures, is the northernmost region where burials, dated from the late second to the late seventh century ad, have been found with selected parts or whole bodies of horses. This study presents new information about these burials based on a multidisciplinary—archaeological, zooarchaeological, and chronological—approach. Our aim is to reconstruct the funeral rites and the human-horse relationships in Lithuania from the late second to the late seventh centuries ad, to refine the chronology of the horse burials in the region, and to use the new zooarchaeological data for more detailed studies of mortuary practices.

The Origin of Late Roman Period–Post-Migration Period Lithuanian Horses

“…Intra-tooth variation SD (0.0001) of this horse is one of the lowest of all of the horses analyzed (Figure 3), implying that this individual had very low mobility at the time of the tooth's formation. Although the strontium analysis suggests that the horse was of local origin, this individual stands out from the horses of local type due to its slightly larger size [6,11].…”

“…This practice is closely connected to warfare, military elites, and is especially frequent during periods of migration and conflict. The rite of horse burials spread across Lithuania in the first centuries AD and persisted until the Christianisation of Lithuania in the late 14th C AD [4][5][6]. The human and horse burials during the mid to 1st millennium stand out above all of the other human and horse burials in terms of wealth, imported grave goods, and the large number of weapons.…”

“…To date, only nine of these burials have been excavated. In the Western and Central Lithuanian cemeteries, the buried human remains were accompanied by whole horses or only their heads and legs [6]. This latter tradition spread into Lithuania from the West via the Sambia Peninsula (modern Kaliningrad, Russian Federation).…”

The Baltic Crusades and ecological transformation: The zooarchaeology of conquest and cultural change in the Eastern Baltic in the second millennium AD

“…This reflects changes in the roleand therefore depositional contextsof the horse, rather than relative abundance of the equine population. Horse meat was widely consumed in the pre-crusade period, particularly in Livonia, whilst whole individuals and disarticulated parts were also deposited within cemeteries in parts of Prussia, Lithuania and southern Livonia (Bliujienė 2009;Shiroukhov 2012;Bliujienė et al 2017;Lang 2017). This study has only compared horses in assemblages from settlement sites.…”

Burials with Horses at the Necropolis of the Sambian-Natangian Culture of the Early Middle Ages and Anthropological Data

“…Конские захоронения достаточно хорошо представлены и на могильниках других западнобалтских культур/групп, в частности, в богачевской культуре ), в судавской/голдапской группе (например: Bitner-Wróblewska 2007) или в эльб лонгской группе (Kontny, Okulicz-Kozarin, Peitrzak 2009). Погребения с лошадьми известны и у восточных балтов, также с римского времени и до эпохи средневековья, в частности, на территории Литвы (см., например: Куликаускене 1953;, а также другие статьи в Archaeologia Baltica 11, 2009Bliujienė et al 2017).…”