The Bullroarer Atlas

KOCH1992-002 - archaeological find

Fernewerder decorated whirring blade

Germany - Brandenburg - former Kreis Nauen - Europe

Archaeological datec. 9600–4000 BCMuseum display date; object not directly dated.

Function not recorded

The Fernewerder bone Schwirrblatt on display at the Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, Berlin.
The Fernewerder bone Schwirrblatt on display at the Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, Berlin. · CC BY-SA 3.0 Image source

Source term: Schwirrplättchen / Schwirrblatt

Schwirrplättchen / Schwirrblatt: small whirring plate or whirring blade; archaeological German terms for a bullroarer

A long bone blade tapers to a single perforation at its broader end, with four rows of V-shaped nicks cut down its faces. That ornament is why Koch singled it out among the eight Mesolithic whirring blades of his eastern German survey, and why Berlin's prehistory museum displays it as a decorated Schwirrblatt from the Havelland hunters' gear, somewhere in the millennia between 9600 and 4000 BC. But the blade in the case is a copy: the original went east as war booty and sits in Russia, out of reach for anyone wanting to check its thickness, its wear, or the hand that cut the Vs.

Das Objekt aus Fernewerder, Kr. Nauen, hat vier Reihen aus V-Motiven.

The object from Fernewerder, Kreis Nauen, has four rows of V motifs.

Koch 1992:120
Object
Long tapered bone blade with one perforation at the broader end and four longitudinal rows of engraved V motifs; the Berlin display shows a replica because the original is held in Russia.
Function
Not recorded.
Map confidence
medium - Fernewerder locality anchor from public OSM/GeoNames data; the exact archaeological findspot is not recovered.
Source location
Page references

printed pp. 119–120; Fundliste 7; Berlin museum display

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