Groß Timmendorf grave field

A small Iron Age urn cemetery lies on the western edge of Groß Timmendorf village in Kreis Ostholstein. It once stretched across 6 150 square metres on land called Derbergsche Koppel, beside the road to Pansdorf. Three excavation campaigns in 1960, 1976 and 1993 uncovered 1 058 graves, making it the largest such site in northern Germany. Earlier Bronze Age traces appeared beneath the urns, including flint tools and post holes that hint at vanished houses. Archaeologists found the graves grouped in circular hollows forty to eighty metres wide, each hollow holding dozens of stone-lined pits. Urns stood at the centre, surrounded by fist-sized cobbles or covered by low stone circles up to four metres across. Most urns were wide-bellied jars or two-part flasks, some still holding chains, arm-rings, brooches and needles. Fibulae from the graves show brand marks, suggesting they were part of the dead person’s costume placed on the burning pyre. Visitors today see a quiet field beside the village road. Low grass covers the stone circles and grave pits, their outlines marked only by darker soil. A second urn grave and a Neolithic megalith sit nearby at the Timmendorfer Waldfriedhof. The site tells of a farming community that buried its dead over seven centuries, from 550 to 150 BC, leaving traces that archaeologists still piece together.