to the gods is probable. In late spring of 2015 nine bronze axe heads and a bronze
spearhead were found in what appears to have been a ritual deposit at Boest in
eastern Jutland. The axes were flanged, rather than shaft-hole axes, and were not
disk-butted. Five of them are massive, each weighing almost a kilo, and probably
were made to serve as a dedicatory offering. According to Constanze Rassmann,
curator of the Museum Midtjylland, the deposit has been tentatively dated ca.
1600 BC(1500 BCon my chronology).
Ships in southern Scandinavia
It is very likely that in southern Scandinavia the long ship—propelled, like a
pentekonter, by dozens of rowers—was an innovation that came with the region’s
158 Militarism in temperate Europe
Figure 5.7Find-spots of Apa- Hajdúsámson swords. From Metzner-Nebelsick 2013,
Abb. 1 (based on Bader 1991, Kemenczei 1991, Harding 1995 and other
studies by R. Munteanu and G. Dumitroaia, T. Kovács, H. Meller and
B. Sicherl). Courtesy Landesmuseum für Vorgeschichte, Halle, and
Carola Metzner-Nebelsick