BONE ARTEFACTS FROM THE KEAVA HILL FORT AND LINNAALUSTE SETTLEMENT SITES

Abstract

About 50 bone artefacts and pieces of bone working scrap have been found at the Keava hill fort and Linnaaluste settlement sites. More than half of these items were discovered among faunal remains in the course of the investigation of animal bones. From settlement sites I and III of Linnaaluste, finds typical of the Viking Age, particularly in northern and western Estonia, have been recovered. Finds from Keava hill fort have analogies among the finds from many hill forts and settlement sites of the Final Iron Age. Most of the bone artefacts were made of bones of domestic animals, and objects and working scrap of bones of wild animals are few in number. Based on the random choice of bones plus the level of bone working and the number of artefacts and scrap pieces in Linnaaluste, as well as in Keava, bone working was a domestic craft, and users themselves made the necessary artefacts. From the found bone artefacts it is also possible to gain information about some occupations other than bone working. 1 The research was financed by the target financed research project No. SF0130012s08.