Shallow and ploughed settlement sites in forested environment: Opportunities to multilevel prospection (an example of a prehistoric site in eastern Lithuania)

Abstract

This article presents the results of geochemical survey performed at one of the shallow and ploughed prehistoric settlement sites in eastern Lithuania. The goal of the survey was to delineate the territory of the prehistoric settlement based on a multilevel survey, and geochemical patterns were analysed relative to the stratigraphy of the site. This research explores how particular aspects of the built environment might be visible in layer-specific data sets produced by soil coring and a range of different geochemical analyses and how the results from different levels correspond to each other and relate to test excavation results. The study also has value in adding to the discussion of the geochemical properties that could be indicative of prehistoric human activity in Lithuanian sites and how they contribute to understandings of the site's overall size and structural arrangement. The results have demonstrated the lack of consistent correspondence between layer-specific geochemical data sets and calls into question the validity of single-level surveys for ploughed sites. Distinct anthropogenic sediments do not always reproduce the expected elevation of the allegedly anthropogenic geochemical markers. A thick cultural layer could represent the traces of post-deposition in secondary zones rather than primary occupied parts of the settlement. Conversely, the number of geochemical properties indicative of human occupation may survive in their original position in different strata even if the cultural layer is very fragmentary or not preserved.

Tracing the spatial organization and activity zones of an Early Mediaeval homestead at the Pohansko stronghold (Czechia) by combining geophysics and geochemical mapping

“…Geochemical surveying enables us to identify the organization of the space and distinguish boundaries or the particular functions of objects and structures, which significantly helps us to understand land-use activities on archaeological sites (e.g., Salisbury, 2013;Save et al, 2020). The use of these methods can be especially important in the study of archaeological sites where the objects were situated at the level of the Early Mediaeval surface (and thus were not sunken into the subsoil) and their remains have not been preserved due to unfavourable environmental conditions or where the infilling of archaeological objects cannot be distinguished from the surrounding cultural layer (Seren et al, 2013;Simniškytė et al, 2021). The recognition of above-ground features and features not sunken into the subsoil has been a long-term subject of discussion in Early Mediaeval archaeology (Donat, 1980;Milo, 2014;Šalkovský, 2001).…”