Armament And Society 383
attention to the characteristic weapon finds (arrowheads and lamellar armour)
from children’s graves.22
The tradition of early medieval archaeology in Germany has also focussed
on children’s graves with weapons, and Irmingard Ottinger has interpreted
these weapons partly as status symbols and partly as toys or practising
weapons.23 Other approaches to these weapons, such as interpreting them as
having apotropaic significance, have been suggested by Hanni Schwab.24
The relationship between weapon deposition and age group of the deceased
was considered by Heinrich Härke in the study of Anglo-Saxon weapon burials.
His work was based on a large sample of anthropological data (893 cases). His
main conclusion was that most of the weapons were placed with adult buri-
als but an ability in using such weapons played no role in their deposition, as
shown by the children and senile individuals with weapons. He observed the
increasing number of weapons relative to increasing age and presented some
weapon types characteristic of a specific age. He established some age limits in
weapon deposits: from 12 years of age onwards the number of weapons rose in
burials, from 20 years onwards seaxes and axes were also deposited. According
to the observations of Härke in Anglo-Saxon England weapons were deposited
in high-status children’s graves and only a tiny proportion can be regarded as
toys or practising weapons.25 The relationship between costume and age group
has also been addressed recently by Sebastian Brather.26
The two main questions concerning the age groups of Avar weaponry is:
first, whether there was an age limit at all, and second the age limits of certain
weapon types. For addressing these questions anthropological data is needed
for comparative analysis which limits their study to those cemeteries examined
by physical anthropologists (mainly for age). The main problem is the inter-
disciplinary nature of the topic, with age being studied by biological features
which in some cases does not correspond to the social age of the individual.27
The age determinations of anthropologists can refer to various periods and are
of varying precision, and therefore I will use the data on the basis of these age
groups: infants, juveniles, adults, mature and senile individuals.
22 Simon 1983, 45–69.
23 Ottinger 1974, 405–407.
24 Schwab 1982, 260.
25 Härke 1992, 192–195.
26 Brather 2004b, 1–58; Brather 2008, 283–291.
27 Social age is the socially important life-phase, like adult manhood or the bridehood for
women (Brather 2004b, 2).