Senovinė apeigų vieta Dauglaukyje

Abstract

The article presents some important results of inves-tigations (1991-1998) in Dauglaukis (the district of Tauragė) ritual place. Some other archaeological find-ings will be discussed as well (Fig. 1,2). The ritual place was found near Dauglaukis cemetery (70-260 AD) while looking for a burial place of a later period. The investigation exposed three cultural layers of different periods (Fig. 3). The first (lower) one could be dated to the Middle Neolithic age on the basis of ceramics fragments and an irregular processed piece of flint. The area under investigation touched only upon a small part of this layer. The third (upper) layer is dated to the beginning of the II millennium on the basis of an iron horseshoe-shaped fibula with curved ends. We mainly dealt with the second (middle) cultural layer identified as the ritual place. It consists of two horizons (the thickness of the lower one is 0,05x0,55 m, and that of the upper one - 0,02x0,2 m). Most of the finds were uncovered in the lower horizon, while the upper one yielded only some pottery fragments, single iron dross pieces, remnants of iron artifacts and a lot of charred remains which sometimes comprised entire areas. [...]