Urnfield Culture - Distribution and Local Groups

Distribution and Local Groups

The Urnfield culture was located in an area stretching from western Hungary to eastern France, from the Alps to near the North Sea. Local groups, mainly differentiated by pottery, include:

• Knovíz culture in western and Northern Bohemia, southern Thuringia and North-eastern Bavaria
• Milavce culture in southeastern Bohemia
• Unstrut culture in Thuringia, a mixture between Knovíz-culture and the South-German Urnfield culture.

South-German Urnfield culture

• Northeast-Bavarian Group, divided into a lower Bavarian and an upper Palatinate group
• Lower-Main-Swabian group in southern Hesse and Baden-Württemberg, including the Marburger, Hanauer, lower Main and Friedberger facies.
• Rhenish-Swiss group in Rhineland-Palatinate, Switzerland and eastern France, (abbreviated RSFO in French).

Lower-Rhine Urnfield culture

• Lower Hessian Group
• North-Netherlands-Westphalian group
• Northwest-Group in the Dutch Delta region.

Middle-Danube Urnfield culture

• Velatice-Baierdorf in Moravia and Austria
• Čaka in western Slovakia

Gáva culture

Sometimes the distribution of artifacts belonging to these groups shows sharp and consistent borders, which might indicate some political structures, like tribes. Metalwork is commonly of a much more widespread distribution than pottery and does not conform to these borders. It may have been produced at specialised workshops catering for the elite of a large area.

Important French cemeteries include Châtenay and Lingolsheim (Alsace). An unusual earthworks was constructed at Goloring near Koblenz in Germany.