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Jordanów, Jordanov, Jordansmühl

Maximilian O. Baldia

List of Figures

Figure 1. Location of the Jordanów typesite.

Figure 2. Central European chronological table

Figure 3. Pottery from the type-site of Jordanów, Silesia, Poland.

Figure 4. Copper ornaments from the type-site of Jordanów, Silesia, Poland.
Figure 5. Amber, chipped and ground stone artifacts from the type-site of Jordanów, Silesia, Poland.
Figure 6. Jordanov (Jordanów) pottery from the Czech Republic.
Figure 7. Postholes below a mound, identified as a Jordanov (Jordanów) House, Moravia, Czech Republic.

Introduction

The purpose of this text is to provide a general overview of the culture and is intended as a resource for students and teachers of European Archaeology.

Location

Along the upper Oder settlements of the Lenyel interaction sphere passed their cultural heritage on to the local groups, including the Jordanów culture or group (Polish: Jordanów, Czech: Jordanov, German: Jordansmühl). The type-site, in Silesia, Pololand, was excavated from 1898 - 1911. The pottery can be identified in southwestern Poland, Bohemia, Moravia and adjacent Central Germany. In Central Germany very few sites have been identified. Behrens (1973) felt that the group did not exist as an entity of its own. He argues that the occasional occurrence of the pottery probably came from nearby Bohemia.

Chronology

Both the pottery and the chronology seem ill defined (chronological tables: Germany, Moravia). The only plausible C¹⁴ date I can find (cf. Müller 1999:89), suggests a date between 4000 – 3800 cal BC. Therefore, one can only date the pottery indirectly. For the reasons expressed below, I tentatively conclude that Jordanów existed sometime between ca. 4300/4200 – 3700/3600 cal BC.

Pottery

Some of the pottery shows designs that may have been influenced by the Bodrogkeresztúr culture of Hungary.[1] However, Hungary is relatively distant and Bodrogkeresztúr may well start after Jordanów. In Moravia the Jordanów group cannot be separated from the Moravian Painted Ware IIb.[2] It exhibits Late Lengyel affinities and many pottery types are similar to those of the Lower Austrian (Nieder Österreich) Bisamberg-Oberpullendorf group of the Epi-Lengyel period.[3] Thus, Jordanów’s beginnings should probably fall into the same time range calculated for the Epi-Lengyel by Stadler, i.e. 4250 - 3950.[4] Furthermore, Bisamberg-Oberpullendorf exhibits “graphite” slip (a black, burnished covering) on some of its pottery. This is also found in the early Funnel Beaker culture’s Moravian Baalberge phase of the Funnel Beaker culture (TRB I) (Šmíd personal communication 1999) . Similarly, some (later?) Jordanów pots exhibit affinities to Baalberge pottery. Even the pottery from the type-site of Jordanów has pottery covering the range from early Bisamberg-Oberpullendorf-like pottery to TRB pottery, such as funnel beakers with upside-down V-shaped, appliqué-like handle and collared flasks. It is likely that future detailed examination will prove Jordanów to be one of several “cultures,” that takes part in the interregional development of the Funnel Beaker culture. If so, it Jordanów would ultimately have taken on TRB characteristics or be part of a larger regional change that led to the formation of the TRB (Baldia 2004).

The most recent discovery of Jordanów pottery in Moravia stem from sites in Kostelec na Hane, Popuvky (Popůvky), Smirzice (Smiržice), and Prostejov-Krasice (Prostějov-Krasice). At the last site, a typologically later incised sherd with “graphite” slip was found in an isolated Jordanów context.[5] This (roughly?) corresponds to early Moravian TRB pottery, which features black, burnished graphite-like slip in the TRB South Group.

Houses

Houses appear to be rectangular and smaller than the earlier, Bandkeramik houses of the Lengyel interaction sphere, as postholes below a mound, identified as a Jordanov (Jordanów) House in Moravia, Czech Republic, seem to imply.

Burials

Burials in Central Germany are flexed individual with east-west orientation in graves (pits). Occasionally a stone frame is present. In Moravia, Czech Republic, there are also inhumation burials, but at least one cremation is known.

Copper

Metallurgy reaches a high point in Jordaów, since the culture occupied the mountainous regions, containing copper ores. However, the actual copper source needs further investigation. Copper ornaments from the typesite of Jordanów exhibit a richness and variety that hints at easy availability and the well developed skill of (local?) copper smiths.

Economy

There seems to have been active exchange or trade. For example, a Jordanów cup was found at Bergheim, Lkrs. Neuburg-Schrobenhausen, Bavaria. It was associated the Münchshöfen culture and found in the ditch of a (round?) causewayed enclosure.

References and Credits

Baldia, M. O.

1995 A Spatial Analysis of Megalithic Tombs. Vol. 1-2. Ph. D. Dissertation. Southern Methodist University.

Baldia, M. O.

2004 The oldest Stone Rampart: Enclosures and Megalithic Tombs of the Funnel Beaker Culture (4100-2800 cal BC) in Central Europe. In I. Jadin et al., Section 9: The Neolithic in the Near East and Europe; Section 10: The Copper Age in the Near East and Europe. Actes du XIVème Congrès UISPP, Universitè de Liège, Belgique, 2-8 Septembre 2001. BAR S1303, 2004:153-161, Archaeopress, Oxford.

Baldia, M. O, C. (Chandler) Baldia and D. Frink

1998 The Czech American Research Project: 1998 Activity Report. The Comparative Archaeology WEB©. (Originally published on by Christel Chandler on the Weber State University web site. Major updates and revisions)

Baldia, M. O. and M. Smíd

1998/01 Rmíz: The oldest fort with stone faced rampart and its significance in the Neolithic/Copper Age Moravian landscape. Presented at the 63^rd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in the symposium: Prehistoric communication: The first wheels, roads, metals, and monumental architecture. Friday, March 27, 1998 in Seattle, Washington, USA. The Comparative Archaeology WEB©.

Behrens, Hermann

1973 Die Jungsteinzeit im Mittelelbe-Saale-Gebiet. Veröffentlichungen des Landesmuseums für Vorgeschichte in Halle, 27, VEB Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, Berlin.

Behrens, Hermann and Brigitte Rüster

1981 Kalibrierte C14-Daten für das Neolithikum des Mittel-Elbe-Saale-Gebietes. Archäologisches Korrespondenzblatt, 11/3:189-193.

Matějíčova, Andrea and Miroslav Šmíd

2000 Eneolit – Äneolithikum. In M. ČižmřK. Geislerová, J. Unger. Výzkumy – Ausgrabungen 1993-1998. Všechna páva vyhrazena, Ústav archeologické památkové péč Brno. Brno 2000:23-29/93-96.

Ruttkay, Elisabeth

1983 Das Neolithikum in Niederösterreich. Forschungsberichte zur Ur- und Frühgeschichte, 12, Östereichische Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Ur- und Frühgeschichte, Wien.

Ruttkay, Elizabeth and Christian Mayer

1995 Spätneolitikum. In Lenneis, E., C. Neugebauer-Maresch, E. Ruttkay, Jungsteinzeit im Osten Österreichs. Forschungsberichte zur Ur- u. Frühgeschichte 17. Niederösterreichisches Pressehaus u. Verlagsgesellschaft, St. Pölten – Wien. 1995:108-209.

Šmíd, Miroslav

1993 Nástin periodizace kultury s nálevkovitými poháry na Moravé. Pravěk, Nova řada 2, 1992:131-157, Brno.

1994 Ein Burgwall mit steinerner Stirnmauer aus der älteren Stufe der Trichterbecherkultur auf dem Burgwall Rmíz bei Laškov im Kataster der Gemeinde Náměšť na Hané, Kreis Olomouc, Land Mähren. Jahresschrift für mitteldeutsche Vorgeschichte, 76:201-230.

1995 Výsledky zjišťovacího výzkumu na eneolitickém hradisku Rmíz u Laškova. Pravěk, Nova řada 3, 1993:19-77.

1998 Sídliště kultury s nálevkovitými poháry u Laškova, okr. Prostějov. Pravěk, Nova řada 6, 1996:97-138.

Matějíčova, Andrea and Miroslav Šmíd

Stadler, Peter

1995 Ein Beitrag zur Absolutchronologie des Neolithikums in Österreich auf Grund der ¹⁴C-Daten. In Lenneis, E., C. Neugebauer-Maresch, E. Ruttkay, Jungsteinzeit im Osten Österreichs. Forschungsberichte zur Ur- u. Frühgeschichte 17. Niederösterreichisches Pressehaus u. Verlagsgesellschaft, St. Pölten – Wien. 1995:210-224.

Please send comments or questions to Max Baldia.