| Abstract: | Eikotiškis cemetery has been known since the beginning of the 20th century. The inhabitants of this place used to find various finds from different places there. According to these finds the cemetery was dated to the middle of the first millennium. A lot of things fell into the hands of outsiders - collectors. Only a small part of them came to museums.
Although archaeological expeditions were carried out here four times, data about society’s burial ritual are almost unknown (fig. 1). There were found signs of 3 graves/?/, and only one of them was a real remain of burial (fig. 3). The cemetery belongs to the area of the East Lithuanian burial grounds culture. But there were not found any features of burial grounds, except the a row of stones, which might belong to a stone circle (fig.2). So there is a lack of information, but referring to some facts such as the depth, concentration of artefacts in trenches, spreading of their findplaces in environs of Eikotiškis and so on, we could guess about the origin of finds from burial grounds.
There is an abundance of stray finds: 31 ring-like temple ornaments (fig. 4), 2 neck rings with cone- shaped terminal (fig. 5:4), 3 crescent-shaped openworks, 1 brooch with a star-shaped foot (fig. 5:3), 1 penannular enamelled brooch, 1 pin with barrelshaped head (fig. 5:5), 3 sash-like bracelets (fig. 5:1,2), 6 spirals, 11 unknown ornaments (fig. 6), 1 lanceolate spearhead; 8 axes with a narrow blade and a blunt end, 1 darning needle (fig. 7), 1 strike-iron, 1 awl, 1 brushed potsherd and many sherds of wheel made pottery (fig. 8).
The pin and bracelets are from the 3-4th century. Other things (except iron-strike and pottery) can be dated to the middle of the 5th century. As it was mentioned Eikotiškis cemetery is in the area of the East Lithuanian burial grounds culture. Researches guess that a row of such monuments (single graves, without features of burial grounds: Žadavainiai, Dusetos, Kairėnai, Seiliūnai, Medžionys etc.) could be united into 1 group, which is similar to the 4-5th century East Lithuanian culture. But as it turned out that culture was not continuous. The stray finds from the North Eastern Lithuania differ from the artefacts of the rest East Lithuania (fig. 9,10). It is quite clear from the chronology of the finds. Such early things as from the upper reaches of the Šventoji are not found anywhere in East Lithuania. A pin and bracelets (3- 4th AD) is a witness of the link with the societies which lived in the West. But even those artefacts which are synchronous to the East Lithuanian burial grounds finds, distinguish themselves in typology and production traditions. The geographical location and the anthropological type make us doubt of the version about their belonging to the East Lithuanian culture.
It is hard to attach Eikotiškis society to one or another ethnocultural group. But all traits show, that unique, local, "mini" culture was created there. |
