EAA 2022: Abstract

The paper seeks to follow the story of the changing chronology of Tornow-Klenica type strongholds and pottery throughout the 20th century. Based on the study of archival and published material it will trace the origins of the early-dating paradigm back to its roots in Silesian archaeology of the 1920s and 1930s and explore how and why it was taken up in Eastern German and Polish post-war archaeology until its eventual refutation in the light of dendrochronological data in the 1990s. It will discuss how the early dating of Tornow-Klenica type sites and finds was connected to ethnic interpretation which in itself was informed by respective German and Polish history politics. The strongholds thus served as key elements in the creation of grand narratives told from a national(ist) history perspective, which apparently could only be finally overcome after the end of the Cold War and by cutting deep sections into those monuments to obtain timbers for dendrochronology. The case of the dating history of Tornow-Klenica therefore raises the question of whether the study of archival documents as part of a critical approach to understanding and contextualising long-established research paradigms could offer a non-invasive corrective to challenging and overcoming them.

Tornow-Klenica strongholds, early medieval strongholds, history of chronology, history of archaeology, history politics

Oral presentation

  Abstract (PDF)

Karin Reichenbach¹