Lusatian culture treasure from the Hallstatt period from Nicwałd, Grudziądz district

Abstract

In 1885, a treasure consisting of 3 bronze hoop forms was discovered in Nicwałd on the shores of Lake Skąpe: a multi-coil bracelet, another bracelet and a necklace fragment. In the scientific literature to date, the treasure functions as a two-piece treasure with a multi-coil bracelet and a necklace fragment. Now, on the basis of a preserved glass negative depicting the 19th century collection of the former German Municipal Museum, it was possible to establish that another element of the treasure, hitherto unknown, was a bracelet with non-contacting ends. The treasure is dated to the early Hallstatt period and linked to the Lu- satian culture. The most characteristic and recognisable element of the set is a multi-coiled spiral bracelet made of a bronze flat-convex band with tapering ends. Another element of the treasure was a fragment of a hexagonal necklace, and the third, so far unknown, was a bracelet with non-contacting ends decorated with a double zigzag. From the treasure in the current collection of the Museum in Grudziądz, a multi-coil bracelet and a fragment of a bracelet have survived, while a fragment of a necklace has been lost. In the literature to date, the two-element treasure is dated to the Early Iron Age. It seems that the above dating is not altered by another element of this assemblage – a second bracelet with non-contacting ends, which are also characteristic of the Early Iron Age. This is also confirmed by the chemical analysis of the bracelets by Łukasz Kowalski, which showed similar compositions of both hoop forms. According to J. Kostrzewski, multi-strand bracelets similar to those recorded at Nicwałd and Rybieniec are similar to Kuyavian patterns, while the hexagonal necklace from Nicwałd and the octagonal necklace from Rybieniec were imported from Pomerania (Kostrzewski 1966, p. 81).