Aspects of Bronze Age Art

S. Hansen

German Archeological Institute, Berlin

ASPECTS OF BRONZE AGE ART 1

In prehistoric archaeology the term "art" is usually applied with caution. For of course it does not correspond at all with the modern term or concept of autonomous art, but is instead bonded with ideological religious conventions. Yet, forgoing the use of the term "art" when concerned with prehistoric archaeology distorts the view of the aesthetic dimensions of objects of the Neolithic and Bronze ages. Therefore, as an open and unrestricted expression, like Ernst Gombrich propagated, the term "art" seems especially suited for prehistoric archaeology. According to Gombrich: "There is no people in the world that does not have art". His reasoning is as simple as it is elucidative:

''It is an old story, that «art is as art can», but this does not mean that the essential point in art is talent;; instead simply that the word «art» originally designated every useful skill -A useless skill was unimaginable. This still applies in architecture. It is still inconceivable today that an architect would build an uninhabited house. And should he, moreover, design the house so that it is not only useful, but even beautiful (…), then it is a work of art, even if perhaps a modest [work of art]. This was once the same with carving and painting" [Gombrich, 1996, p. 39].

Archaeology enables us to observe images that were produced over a very long span of time. Thereby, gaps in research on and the documentation of archaeological material must of course be taken into account. For example, reference is repeatedly made in archaeology to the significance of prehistoric wood carving, most examples of which however have vanished. Yet again, the absence of images must surely be understood as a conscious decision. The rejection of images for ideological or religious reasons is a phenomenon that can still be observed today, as demonstrated by the iconoclastic attacks on the Buddha figures in Bamiyan (Afghanistan) in 2001 or on Christian icons in Syria in 2014.

The beginnings of art have always been fascinating subject and the occasion for far-reaching conclusions about the nature of humankind. Nonetheless, the discovery of the cave at Altamira in 1879 led to heated debate, as to whether the images there were really Palaeolithic paintings or modern forgery. New discoveries have repeatedly broadened our knowledge. The discovery of the Grotte Chauvet in 1994 showed that the beginnings of painting reaches even farther back into history than assumed until then [Chauvet et al., 1995]. The ivory figurines found in the Swabian Alb point likewise to a time around 35000 BP [Conard, Floss, 2000;; Floss, 2009].

The history of the reception of Palaeolithic art indicates that it always touches upon philosophical reflections about the evolution of man and his relationship to the world 2 . The question drawn from historical experience in images is whether or not the development of mankind is linked with the production of art, be it iconic or aniconic, and if so - why [Mellink, Filip, 1985, 73 ff.]. This question of course plays a role in the problem of the emergence of religion. The common denominator of figural art and religion is founded in the hypothesis that the ability to visualise something that is not present and to realize it in words and religious beliefs or works of art and tools belongs to the condition humana [Kehrer, 1988, p. 69]. This represents a carefully tended dividing line between other human forms and animals in archaeology as well.

Thereby, it is emphasised that only Homo sapiens was capable of producing images and that through this skill differs from the Neanderthal man and even Homo erectus. Nevertheless, according to previous examinations, the pebble from the Acheuléen site of Berekhat Ran ( fig. 1) on the Golan Heights is a worked artefact and not a trick of nature [Goren-Inbar, 1986, 7 ff. fig. 2;; Enrico, Nowell, 2000, 123 ff.;; on this also . The grooves in the surface that accentuate the natural form that resembles the female body are artificial. Indeed, it is the oldest secure evidence for an anthropomorphic depiction, which antedates the beginning of figural aesthetics in the time between 250,000 and 280,000 BP. Moreover, the large hand-axes show that Homo erectus possessed a conception of form and a sense for the aesthetics of material [Bredekamp, 2013, 28 ff.].

Nonetheless, it is undeniable that linked with modern human beings of the epi-Palaeolithic period was a revolution in the production of images and that the medium of imagery was realised in different forms and materials: paintings and three-dimensional objects made of stone, bone and clay. Statuettes are the first proof that clay was fired, not coincidentally, but as part of a complex technical process 3 . The "Venus' of Dolní Věstonice ( fig. 2) was made of tempered clay, that is, clay specially prepared for production, a fact that clearly points to experimental occupation with that material. Bone powder was used as temper, which can be interpreted as a mimetic use of material. In the contemplation of the artistic form, the image of human beings, for the very first time we find the transformation of this substance. Out of the soft and malleable clay emerges through firing a hard, but also breakable ceramic 4 . All of the other materials used to produce statuettes retain their physical qualities in the production process, that is, their hardness, density, colour etc. This is only different in the case of forming in clay and the subsequent firing process. Clay gave the ceroplastic modeller and later the potter the freedom to create any imaginable form, and thus it is surely no coincidence that 3 For further finds, see Hansen 2007, 41 f. 4 There was likely a far greater number of clay figures, as indicated by the fortuitous finds of clay bisons from the cave of Tuc d'Audoubert [Vialou, 1991, fig. 152]. Berekhat Ram, Israel [Goren Inbar, 1986] Fig. 2. Female figurine of clay. Dolní Vĕstonice, Moravia [Jelínek, 1972] later creation myths recount the creation of mankind in clay. Most clay statuettes and other ceramic fragments -5,761 pieces in all - derive from Dolní Věstonice, where they are dated to the time around 26,000 BP and, thus, are 10,000 years older than the earliest evidence for clay vessels [Vandiver et al., 1989[Vandiver et al., , 1002; Kuzmin, 2010, 415 ff.]. Counting together the sites of Pavlov I and II, Předmostí and Petrkovice, more than 10,000 fragments of ceramics are known from Moravia. Fired to a less hard state, the figures from the site of Kostenki I on the Don River represent animals, there among mammoths, lions and bears, as well as humans.

Palaeolithic art was long interpreted as a manifestation that vanished at the end of the Ice Age and had no influence upon later developments. Ernst Gombrich formulated a widespread view, when he wrote: "There is no path that leads from these strange and enigmatic beginnings to the art of our time." [Gombrich, 1996, p. 55]. The link was sought far more via Greece in Egypt. But, new finds as well as radiocarbon datings show that this reconstruction is incorrect. Today it is possible to make evident a "gapless" sequence from the Palaeolithic age through the Neolithic period as far as the early civilisations [Hansen, 2007]. This sequence can be designated as "gapless" only in an area that encompasses large parts of Europe and the Near East. Aside from the state of research, spatial and temporal concentrations in the archaeological material are indicative foremost of the bond between the production of anthropomorphic images and their social function.

Copper Age art

The Neolithic Revolution began with a fully new concept of human images made of clay that varied in manifold ways ( fig. 3). Unlike Palaeolithic figures, these statuettes could stand alone with the view directed slightly upwards. Mostly of small size, the figures belonged as ideological self-identification to the set of tools and techniques, brought to Anatolia and Southeast Europe by farmers in newly founded settlement areas. It is, nevertheless, all the more remarkable that the oldest farmers in northern Africa, southern Italy, Spain and southern France did not produce any images of human beings in a durable material.

With the development of metallurgy at the beginning of the 5 th millennium BC -at the latest -a new work material entered the world. Soon this material was also utilised to produce images. Two figures of a bull were found in Grave 36 in the cemetery of Varna on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast. They are the hitherto oldest known representations of animals made of metal and were produced between ca. 4600 and 4400 BC ( fig. 4). The bull already played an important role in the art of the Neolithic period. Thus, it is not surprising that this animal is represented in the earliest horizon of figures made of metal. Furthermore, such figures appear in contemporary megalithic art in the Bretagne on the Atlantic coast. Similarly, the figure of the bull played a prominent role in the art and cult of the Bronze Age, too. [Fol, Lichardus, 1988] Retrieved from the same grave 36 in Varna was a golden astragalus, the first imitation of the bone of an animal. A piece of gold sheet in the form of a woman is known from the settlement of Russe on the lower Danube River, unfortunately now lost. These metal images emerged in a cultural milieu that was marked by an especially extensive production of small statuettes. With the very first use of animal bone for this production, yet another new material was introduced for depicting human images (fig. 5). All of the materials have their symbolic qualities, and there is a relationship between material and form.

Thus, the introduction of bone statuettes signifies that the range of imagery known until that time was transcended . The utilisation of a substance from an animal to depict images of humans led to the emergence of a new symbolical relationship between the two entities.

And with metal completely new aesthetic qualities came into the world. Its hardness, sound, sheen and transformability without any loss of substance offered unforeseen possibilities for representing humans and deities.

For the production of three-dimensional metal figures a new technique, lost-wax casting, was a basic prerequisite. This casting process enabled almost any desired form to be made [Born, 2001, 182 ff.;; Levy, 2007, 93 ff.;; Goren, 2008, 376 ff.]. For this first a wax model of the object that was to be cast later had to be created. This model was then covered with clay and subsequently fired, so that the molten wax would run out of the model. The hollow clay form that was created thereby was then filled with molten metal, poured into the form through a funnel. Lost-wax casting was an essential process frequently utilised by casters of the Copper- and Bronze Age. There is no doubt that the production of a wax model, as well as the very complicated production of a clay form was extremely time-consuming. Yet, it saved the expenditure of effort and no less time-consuming work of removing the seams from objects cast in bivalve moulds. Only by employing the lost-wax process could spiral decorations be made with such great precision, like those known from the Nordic Bronze Age. And the process employed thereby could be reconstructed [Rønne, 1989]. Animal figures of the late 5 th and the 4 th millennium BC are among the earliest, secure evidence for the use of the lost-wax casting technique. The two golden and the two silver figures of bovines ( fig. 6) from the large kurgan of Maikop in the northwestern Caucasus mountains are indeed masterworks of this handicraft [Piotrovskij, 2013]. The figures were components of the grave furnishings in an 11-metre high burial mound, which can be dated to the first half of the 4 th millennium BC. Only 7.6 and 9.2 cm in length, the cattle figures are modelled in unusually rich detail. In contrast to these are the two cattle figures from Bytýn, Voj. Wielkopolskie ( fig. 7), which can be dated to the second half of the 4 th millennium [Łęczycki, 2004]. They were found together with six axes on a large stone as a gift to the imagined powers. The cattle are stout animals, whose short massive legs are directed outwards in order to stabilise the figures. Both animals are bound together by a yoke, already broken upon its discovery;; that is, they served as draught animals for a wagon or plough or sledge. As different as the formal possibilities in sculpture may have been, the casters in the Caucasus were masters of their skill just as were those metalworkers in Great Poland. Further evidence for coeval figures of animals is found as far as Hessen in the North and Susa in the South. Nonetheless, the oldest evidence for the lost-wax casting technique stems from the "Cave of the Treasure", a cave near Nahal Mishmar on the Dead Sea, where in 1961 a hoard containing more than 400 metal objects was discovered. The hoard is now dated to the late 5 th millennium BC 5 . The objects include maceheads, crowns and standards, as well as simple tools. Amongst the pieces that must have been produced in the lost-wax process are an attachment with ibex heads, a "crown" with attachments in animal form, a sceptre with two ibex figures and a small cast vessel ( fig. 8). The paucity of early evidence for this casting technique points to the gaps in our knowledge. However, this paucity is paradoxically a sign that there must have been far more examples of this work. For only through many castings in lost-wax form could a command of all the special knowledge and mastery of the techniques have developed at all. In general, the 4 th millennium was altogether a time of experimentation in metallurgy. Thereby, the decisive innovation was the alloying of metals. Through the addition of another metal to copper, initially arsenic and antimony, later tin and zinc, the caster could increase the elasticity and hardness of the metal. Not least, alloying copper improved its properties for casting, for the formation of bubbles in molten metal was decreased, a factor that in turn minimised the formation of hollows (Lunker) in the cast product. In addition, silver and lead began to play an important role, and as early as the mid 4 th millennium BC silver could be separated from lead.

Animal figures made in the lost-wax technique are all oxen (or bulls), without exception, and were part of a yoked team. Around the middle of the 3 rd millennium BC the wagon and/or the plough drawn by a pair of oxen were a ground-breaking innovation. The place of the wagon's invention cannot be established, for it spread rapidly throughout the area between the North Sea and Mesopotamia. There are countless representations of a team of oxen or a wagon in this vast expanse ( fig. 9-10) 6 . It is noteworthy that the team could also be depicted merely with a sign in Figreviated form. Namely, with a simple vertical line topped by an open semi-circle the draught animal and with that the new manner of transportation could be quickly depicted. The sign functioned like an icon, here to use a term from the world of computers. Similar such signs have been noted in northwestern Germany and the Alps and as far as eastern Ukraine and Armenia in the southern Caucasus. They are the expression of a world that had come into motion.

Recognisable on a 2.75-metre high depictive stone, which was found by chance in 1932 in Algund/ Lagundo in South Tirol, are draught animals and a wagon ( fig. 11-12) [Ladurner-Parthanes, 1952]. Concerned here is an anthropomorphic stele, in which the body of the human image is divided into an upper and a lower part by a wide, segmented belt. The head, only vaguely indicated, is damaged. Numerous axes and daggers are depicted in the area of the upper body, which render the figure as defensive and combative. A great number of anthropomorphic stelae such as this one have been found in the area between the Caucasus and the Atlantic. Thereby, the geographic distribution is very irregular. The easternmost finds are in Azerbaijan and Saudi Arabia, while stelae are present in the northern Caucasus and the north Pontic area. Only few stelae are known from the Carpathian Basin. In Italy, by contrast, the regions of the Lunigiana and Trentino can be highlighted in view of the numerous stelae found 6 Mont Bego (Arcà, 2013). [Gladilin, 1967] there. Further, Valcamonica in the Alps has an abundance of rock depictions [Casini, Fossati, 2013]. In France stelae are concentrated in the Provence, eastern Languedoc and the Rouergue [Philippon, 2002]. On the Iberian Peninsula stelae are known everywhere, except in the southeast. Angelika Vierzig could compile more than 1000 examples and with that outline this phenomenon in its entirety. The stelae are clearly older than thought a few years ago: they appear before 3700 BC and likely end around 2400 BC.

I have designated large stelae showing numerous weapons as images of a new social type (the "hero"), and have affiliated such representations of weaponry with the overabundance of furnishings in graves [Hansen, 2002;; 2013b]. A. Vierzig designates them in general as "stones of power" and views the anthropomorphic large sculptures as an "innovation of the epoch, in which all of the other innovations meet" [Vierzig, 2013, p. 215]. The erection of large stones was nothing new in the 4 th millennium BC;; indeed, menhirs had been emplaced earlier in western Europe, already during the 5 th millennium. "New" is far more the production of recognisable anthropomorphic figures in stone. The hardness and duration of stone are properties that were of importance for proclaiming the power of the persons depicted. The stelae were often arranged in groups, in a circle or in rows along a road. Not at all infrequently, the stelae were soon removed from their original position and used, for example, as building material in graves, evidently to in order to appropriate the power of the depicted weapons. The anthropomorphic elements of the stelae, such as the head, the face or the hands, are often only vaguely indicated, almost never elaborated. All the more emphasis was given to the weapons and jewellery that were depicted. Large sculptures in Europe are parallel in appearance with the first large stone images of divinities in Egypt;; yet they may not be viewed as a reflection of the Egyptian cultural development, for indeed they are older. Anthropomorphic stelae were undoubtedly marked by elements in the landscape. Whether standing alone or arranged in groups, they are monuments that once evoked feelings of awe and still do so today.

Whereas monumental sculptures became virtual hallmarks of Bronze Age civilisations in the Near East and Egypt, the erection of anthropomorphic stelae of the European Bronze Age did not continue, at least at first. Only at the end of the Bronze Age, that is, the beginning of the Iron Age did larger stelae and soon also images worked in the round appear again. If the anthropomorphic stelae of the 4 th and 3 rd millennium BC are viewed as "stones of power", as the representation of the authority of armed potentates, then the end of these images could plausibly be interpreted as a sign of the decline of their power. This conclusion, however, is not really founded, for anthropomorphic stelae are largely absent during the central European Bronze Age in the 2 nd millennium BC. The depiction of humans was avoided, at best only hinted at. The pendant on a phalera found in a votive offering in Bullenheimer Berg may illuminate this ( fig. 13). The pendant is not explicitly anthropomorphic, but its form does allow an anthropomorphic interpretation. Exceptions to the effort not to portray the human form are found in some Middle Bronze Age cultures in Southeast Europe, where small clay statuettes were nevertheless produced. Also, human beings -almost always warriors -are depicted in rock carvings in northern Europe. In most of the other regions in Bronze Age Europe, except for Greece and Sardinia, there are no representations of persons. This presumably underlies a religion-based ban on images. Religious symbols replaced human beings in Bronze Age art.

Bronze Age art: spirals

Ever since the beginnings of the science of prehistoric archaeology, the aesthetic aspect of objects has been taken in consideration. Christian Jürgensen Thomsen studied the form and decoration on objects as a means to ascertain the age of finds: "In order to determine the approximate age of antiquities, or at least, the temporal epoch to which they belong, there is yet another guideline, which until now has been less considered in the north, namely the examination of forms and ornaments, which kinds were found in association, to determine the order in which changes have occurred (…) [Thomsen, 1837, p. 62]. He recognised ring- and spiral-decoration as characteristic ornamentations of the Bronze Age, while serpent and dragon motifs were those of the Iron Age.

Even though Thomsen did not conduct this approach in a systematic way, he was confident of the timespecific character of decorative motifs, for example, Bronze Age spirals. Yet, he did not have any fixed reference points for determining the age of the Bronze Age. These were established in the course of time. During a trip to England in 1842 Thomsen saw an architectural fragment from the "Treasury of Atreus" in Mycenae on exhibit in the British Museum ( fig. 14). In view of the spiral decoration on the surface he put forward that it was parallel in time with the Nordic Bronze Age [Jensen, 1992, p. 207 f. cca]. The marble ornamentation of the façade of the tholos grave had been purchased by the British Museum from Lord Elgin in 1816, yet already in H. Schliemann's time 1874 the artistic façade was no longer preserved [Schliemann, 1878, p. 54 with figure]. Spiral motifs appear in the Aegean during the Dimini period, that is, during the Greek Late Neolithic, 5 th millennium BC. Likewise in Southeast Europe spiral decoration played an important role on pottery as well as on metal works of the 5 th millennium BC, here for example, pins with a spiral head ( fig. 15) and double spiral pendants ( fig. 16) 7 . The great symbolic meaning of these double spiral pendants is demonstrated by the contexts in which they were found, as well as the material out of which they are made: Many were found deposited in opulent hoards, or they are made of gold. Such pendants are pictured on stelae in the Alps ( fig. 17) [Casini, Fossati, 2013]. The tradition of spiral pendants was long carried on and in different variations, well into the Late Bronze- and early Iron Age (fig. 18), a fact that underscores their symbolic value all the more.

Hans-Georg Buchholz placed spiral motifs within the sphere of power and the divine [Buchholz, 2010]. Likewise, Stefan Hiller emphasised that the spiral motif would underlie temporal and spatial eco-]. Likewise, Stefan Hiller emphasised that the spiral motif would underlie temporal and spatial eco-7 Eitting, Distr. Straubing-Bogen: Hansen, 1994, 450 no. 221. Greek mainland, yet widespread on the Cyclades. In the Late Bronze Age the spiral as a symbol of power and royal status were not limited only to the Aegean, but also pursued an "international" career. In the Orient they were associated with deities and kings.

In Central Europe spiral decoration was favoured on pottery, metal objects and bone artefacts in various find landscapes at various times during the Bronze Age. They were repeatedly affiliated with Mycenaean spiral décor and interpreted as the result of cultural influences from the Greek civilisation. Laura and Oliver Dietrich recently could show that not all spirals are equivalent and that pottery of the Carpathian Wietenberg culture was not influenced by Mycenae [Dietrich, Dietrich, 2011]. However, the emergence of different spiral decoration is likely no coincidence, but instead reflects a norm that went beyond regional cultural groups. Clemens Lichter broadened the field of view of spiral decoration as far as the Caucasus [Lich-Lichter, 2013, p. 138]. Armbands with spiral ends, known in greater numbers between the Baltic Sea and the Carpathian Basin, are also found in the Caucasus. They were commonly used in Central Europe, between the Baltic Sea and the Rhine River already in the mid-15 th century BC, and deposited as grave goods especially between 1400 and 1300 BC ( fig. 19).

Considering the symbolic dimensions of the spiral motif, then contacts between different cultural groups presumably played a subordinate role, for spirals belonged to the repertoire of Central Europe ever since the Copper Age and could be actualised again and again in various contexts. Its wide distribution is the result of a world that was closely interconnected since the 4 th millennium BC. Spiral decoration became a particularly distinguishing element in the sphere of the "Nordic Bronze Age" in the early 2 nd millennium BC. There it appeared only occasionally in Bronze Age Period I to become omnipresent on metal objects in Period II, and then in Period III it subsided. Spiral decoration was employed with such masterful skill nowhere more than in southern Scandinavia. The disc from Langstrup in northeastern Seeland ( fig. 20) is a piece of perfection, which displays a superb play between light and shadow. It was long the opinion that the decoration had been made with the chisel and/or punch, but P. Rønne could show that it was produced using the lost-wax casting technique. This applies to many other extraordinary bronze works as well, amongst these the bronze hilts of Nordic swords. Indeed, from the very beginnings onward, spiral decoration accompanied weaponry, whether in southern Europe, Central Europe or the Nordic sphere. Recently the symbolic significance of decorations on swords was discussed summarily by Gábor Ilon [Ilon, 2012].

The sun and its depictions

The spiral is not always clearly distinguishable from the motif of the uninterrupted concentric circle, which ever since the early Bronze Age was a defining Bronze Age symbol in Central Europe as well. 8 As of the later part of the Early Bronze Age (Reinecke A3) a multitude of round pendants with concentric ribs around a central pointed spike or flat knob appeared along the middle area of the Danube River. These spiked discs are a symbolic form, which at the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age became rapidly [Casini, Fossati, 2013] Fig. 16. Stollhof, Lower Austria, Hoard [Ruttkay, 1995 widespread. They were numerously worn as colliers, which are mostly evidenced in graves, although in recent years colliers have been found in hoards as well. (fig. 21). 9 This symbolic motif was handed down with few variations over generations in time until the Early Iron Age. It appears in small as well as large size on weapons. Further, it is represented especially frequently on works of gold, in which gold vessels like the gold hats are densely covered with punched concentric circles ( fig. 22). This circular ornamentation is also found on the golden sun disc, drawn by a horse, such as the famed sun-wagon from Trundholm ( fig. 23). The typical boat drawn by water-birds, moreover, is frequently encountered on many metal works 10 . One image on a belt plaque in Radolinek/Floth (Poland) suggests the interpretation that it was in honour of the sun and a person as well [Hänsel, 1997, p. 21, fig. 2].

Male and female acrobats

The spiral and the concentric circle motifs were the dominant elements in the applied art of Southeast, Central and northern Europe, whereas figural or anthropomorphic figures were the exception. This stands in strong contrast to Mediterranean civilisations of the 2 nd millennium BC, where representations of deities and humans constituted a substantial sphere of the fine arts. Images were a sign of power, and the destruction of these likewise destroyed the power inherent in them.

Among the most important discoveries made by Arthur Evans in Knossos are the frescoes. These murals offered the first insight in a hitherto unknown world of Bronze Age painting. There are scenes of life in the royal court, processions and also the Aegean Sea;; floral motifs play an important role in the frescoes as well. Among the most well-known motifs is that of the bull-jumper: daring young men and women jumping over bulls [Evans, 1930, p. 209 ff.]. Different kinds of bull-games, for example, the enormous performance of bull races, are still among the exciting events put on for youths in cities of the Languedoc today [Rites éternels, 2004]. They became legendary through no one less than Ernest Hemingway and the bull-run in Pamplona in Navarra.

Arthur Evans dated the bull fresco in Knossos ( fig. 24) to phase Late Minoan I, in the 15 th century BC 11 . Bull-leaping ceremonies are also known elsewhere in Crete, for example, on seals. The bronze figural group with a youth standing upon a bull was dated by Evans to the phase Middle Minoan III ( fig. 25) [Evans, 1930, p. 221, fig. 155]. Depictions of bull-leaping on seals or other image carriers are known from the Greek mainland too 12 . In contrast, outside of Crete, frescoes depicting bull-jumpers 9 Vohburg, distr. Pfaffenhofen a.d. Ilm: Uenze 1982;; for this phenomenon cf. Wels-Weyrauch, 2008. 10 Wirth, 2006;; on the forerunners see : Hänsel, 2012, 109 ff. 11 Evans, 1930; Aruz, Benzel, Evans 2008, 132 fig. 40 assign the bull-jumper fresco to the phases Late Minoan II-IIIA. 12 Compliation of finds in: Younger, 1976. Deutschland [Lichter, 2013] have only been found in Egypt until now: corresponding fragments came to light during excavations in palace F in Tell el Dab'a, in the northwest of ancient Avaris [Aruz, Benzel, Evans, 2008, p. 130-131, fig. 39]. Such scenes were presumably widespread in the Levante too, where frescos have also been found.

The discovery of a bull-jumper scene on an Old Hittite relief vessel of the 17 th century BC from Hüseyindede Tepe near Çorum was quite surprising ( fig. 26-27) [Sipahi, 2000, 63 ff.]. The tumblers depicted on the relief vase are part of a group of musicians with percussion and wind instruments. It is possibly the depiction of a ritual. As Tunç Sipahi notes, it is a Hittite interpretation of a theme that was widespread in the eastern Mediterranean.

Ever since the discovery of the bull-jumper scenes there have been controversial discussions as to how realistic the depictions actually are, and whether these movements could really be performed. As to whether the distinctions like "acrobatic ritual performance" and "ceremonial performance" are appropriate is another matter [Aruz, Benzel, Evans, 2008, p. 132]. Namely, the conventions in representations and depictions that ruled in Anatolia, on Crete and in the Levante were not necessarily all the same. Performances with acrobatic bull-leaping were part of a festive occasion with dance and music, as the relief vase from Hüseyindede Tepe illustrates.

In 1779 six bronze figures were discovered in Grevensvaenge in southern Seeland ( fig. 28) [Djupedal, Broholm, 1952, 41 ff.].

Only two of the figures are preserved today. One figure wearing a short skirt is bent backwards in an acrobatic position ( fig. 29). As the plate under the feet indicates, it was originally part of a complex group, to which the other figures once belonged 13 . The figure is generally dated 13 My thanks to Flemming Kaul for a conversation in Stralsund 2013 concerning the date of the female acrobats. [Müller, 1921] Fig. 21 [Hvass, 2000]. In 1921 an oak coffin holding the remains of a female aged 16-18 was found in "Storhøj, which today can be dated to the time around 1370 BC. For this dating the skirt of the acrobat is admittedly not decisive, for the time during which such skirts were worn was likely not limited to a few decades.

A comparable scene in a rock engraving in Sottorp, Swedish Bohuslän, has long been acknowledged. A female or male acrobat fly over a boat, on which two figures stand with ten dots, who likely must do the rowing ( fig. 30). The depiction was dated by Bertil Almgren to period III, at the close of the 14 th century BC, and by Johnann Ling to the Late Bronze Age, that is, after 1000 BC [Almgren, 1983, p. 49;; Ling, 2008, p. 199]. Whether or not the acrobats depicted in Grevensvaenge and Sottorp may be viewed as inspired by the Mediterranean sphere depends not in the least upon the dating. Namely, during the Late Bronze Age in Denmark after 1000 BC, they had long ceased to exist in the Mediterranean. If the earlier date is accepted, then the depictions of bull-jumpers or boat-springers can be understood as part of a network in the Bronze Age world between the Mediterranean and the Baltic Sea, around the middle of the 2 nd millennium BC or shortly thereafter. Circulating throughout this politically and socially fragmented world, on whose 14 Kaul 2004, 70;; Iversen 2014, 243 without a justification for period IV, 1000-900 BC. [Djupedal, Broholm, 1952] one (southern) end a state-organised palace culture existed and on the other (northern) end a population characterised by groups of hunters and fishers, were objects, myths, and representation 15 . They were re-interpreted, integrated in the local traditions and set together anew again and again.

Summary

The Bronze Age world began to gain contours in the 4 th millennium BC. A multitude of innovations spread throughout all of Europe. Amongst these were fundamental innovations in transport, textile production and metallurgy. The yoked team of oxen that drew the wagon or plough was a universally understood icon between northern Germany and southern Caucasia.

Whereas a multifaceted iconography for the worship of deities and rulers formed in the civilisations in Mesopotamia and the Nile Valley during the 3 rd millennium BC, in continental Europe hardly any lasting forms of representation were produced. Anthropomorphic stelae were still erected until the middle of the 3 rd millennium BC. By the end of the Bronze Age anthropomorphic as well as zoomorphic representations were either an exception or extremely schematic. Thereby, the acrobats of the Nordic Bronze Age are a noteworthy exception.

The spiral motif acted as a link between certain stages of the second millennium BC, appearing in the different most variations and representing far more than a simple decorative form. This motif is at home likewise far more in the Mediterranean sphere, in the sphere of divinities. As illustrated on the most diverse objects, it was temporally restricted and evidently as protection from illness and death. The manifold circle motifs obviously had the same function, through which the sun could be seen and which as preferred representation was applied on symbolical golden hats and other ceremonial equipment as repetitiously as possible. Söttetorp, Sweden [Almgren, 1983] Fig. 29. Akrobat in the find from Grevensvaenge, Denmark [Djupedal, Broholm, 1952]

Literature