Antler Mace Heads from Zvejnieki (Latvia) and the Changing World of Hunter-Fisher-Gatherers in the 4th Millennium BCE

Acta Academiae Artium Vilnensis

Abstract

The starting point of this article is three so-called grooved mace heads, made of elk antler beams and found in burial 221 at the Zvejnieki cemetery in Latvia. Their best counterpart – a mace head crafted from a white quartzite pebble – was recovered in burial 1a at the Kukkarkoski I cemetery in Finland. Both the Zvejnieki and Kukkarkoski mace heads were discovered in distinctive, symbolically charged burials associated with the Typical Comb Ware Culture. Nevertheless, they are the only mace heads found in such burials – or in any hunter-fisher-gatherer graves – in the eastern Baltic Sea area. Like the Typical Comb Ware material culture more broadly, these burials, and with them the mace heads, reflect new ways of engaging with the material world. Thus, curious as the mace heads may be, they are firmly embedded in the cultural transformations that took place during the first half of the 4th millennium BCE and provide compelling evidence of shared traditions in the eastern Baltic Sea area.