Celtic village

[StephanN]

The Hallstatt culture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallstatt_culture) was pretty dominant in parts of central Europe during the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age. In the Austrian village of Mitterkirchen there is an open-air museum with some 20 buildings, located at the site of a dwelling from that age - they found quite a few human remains inside a tumulus as well. Great care was taken to build in the original style, using materials and techniques as similar as possible (and as far as is known, Archeology relies a lot on educated guesses, after all ). They even reconstructed the interior of one of the tumuli. The village is not to far from the current bed of the Danube, in earlier times the river would have been running freely in plenty of arms, which probably accounts for the massive dugout-canoe.

 

Neither the Wikipedia-site (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keltendorf_Mitterkirchen), nor the site of the village (http://www.keltendorf-mitterkirchen.at/keltendorf) sports an English version, but apart from the musum, they offer the usual type of events, like Build-Your-Own-Slingshot, or Pottery-The-Hallstatt-Way, etc., mainly for kids, I suppose. However, perhaps you'll find this to be of interest, 3D-model of the Keltendorf: http://www.keltendorf-mitterkirchen.at/Keltendorf/Ueber_uns/3D-Modelle_vom_Keltendorf , and the 2D-description: http://www.keltendorf-mitterkirchen.at/Keltendorf/Ueber_uns/Beschreibung_mit_Rundgang, perhaps you can auto-tranaslate this in your browser.

 

It is really interesting to see that the people living in this part of the world around 1000 - 600 BC were not barbarians how we imagine barbarians - even though they were living on the left bank of the Danube, so to the Romans, they were barbarians. But, as we know now, the Danube-Limes was never a fully closed border, there was a lot of going to and fro, and plenty of trading.

 

Today I went there with some friends, taking along the Canon EOS 6D, converted to 700nm, and the Canon 11-24, thinking the 11mm might come in handy. Especially indoors those 11mm truly work wonders, no big surprise that real-estate agents use them.

 

Also, this time I did play around with hue and saturation a bit more than usual. I've taken around 150 shots, I guess, and after weeding out the failures and duplicates ended up with about 100. Of course, plenty of them still are very similar, so I selected but a few.

 

#1: view from the chief's hut, towards the summer-house left, and the backing-hut, which is partly subterranean

 

#2: view from the entrace to the burial mound towards the frame which protexts the dugout canoe

 

#3: eatery for the visitors (basically this: https://dict.leo.org/englisch-deutsch/jausenstation )

 

#4: view from the weaving-shed (the one for the visitors), left is the pottery

 

#5: inside the pottery

 

#6: from left to right, the chief's house (painted white). winter-house, summer-house, backing-hut (partially underground). I don't know the purpose of the one construction in the foreground, but seeing as it is located above the gully, it's probably to hide the modern underworld

 

#7: well, through the wooden frame you can catch a glimpse of the dugout canoe

 

#8: from left to right, wood-workshop, museum-workshop (where they build and repair stuff), metal-workshop, fence of the pasture, back-side of the chief's house

 

#9: roof of the backing-hut

 

#10: interior of the summer-house, in the back room there's a huge single bed, in the front room a fire-place and chairs, etc. The pole leaning at the wall left of the door has a few rungs sticking out, turning it into a simple kind of ladder

 

#11: the chief's house

 

#12: chief's house, and winter house (they kept animals and people under the same roof, for biological heating )

 

#13: view from the weaver's hut, left to right, summer-house, chief's house, winter-house

 

#14: fence and pasture at the back of the winter-house. They do keep a couple of goats here

 

#15: view from behind the chief's hut, dugout canoe (pretty big), wooden-workshop and musum-workshop

 

#16: room inside chef's hut, left the chief's chair, in the center fire-place with chimney. In the opposite corner there's a bed, but it's hidden by the chimney, estimated length of bed: 1.60 m

 

#17: up the chief's chimney

 

#18: the chief's axes

 

#19 (this I added afterwards): interior of the burial mound, where a woman was buried with a hearse, horse-harness (they did not bury the horse, I belive), and plenty of bronze and pottery. Talk about equal rights / rites: women and children were buried in the same style as the men.

 

#20 (also added): fully working reconstruction of the hearse:

 

#21 (added): Yours truly, pretending to be the coxswain of the dugout-canoe, so the canoe is really not that small

[colinbm]

The village is so other worldly & the IR just emphasised that.
So many stories in these pictures.

[Nate]

Super shots!

Wondering what the second to the last pic shows, and what it was used for back then. Flue for cooking?

[Kai]

A lot of things are exciting here: the location, the spectral selection and the post processing and, of course, the extreme angle of view. Great series!
However, I have to say for myself that I use my 11mm Irix only very rarely. IR and wide angle I think are great, but I usually come back to focal lengths around 20 mm.
Thank you very much for showing, Stephan :)

[Andrea B.]

I really enjoyed this series. The IR does enhance the scenes. 

 

Gracias, Stephan.

 

The scene I looked at most was the 16th one (pinkish) or alternately 3rd from last. Looks like a really cool bed which probably had curtains around it for warmth. But what is that stone thing to the left?? Looks like a throne of some kind??

 

It is so fascinating to see this reconstruction of a settlement of the Hallstatt culture. I tend to be surprised by such reconstructions due to my misguided thinking that 1200-500 BC was more "primitive" than it actually was. This culture really was not at all "primitive". The art objects are beautiful, the buildings well made, metal work advanced - and so on. I read some in this Wiki link:  Hallstatt Culture.

[ulf]

Andrea, I think that the "bed" you see actually is a fireplace for heating and cooking, the same as I can see in the next picture where you look up into the chimney.

The hook like wooden parts hanging looks to give a height adjustable hanging point for whatever would hang over the fire.

Just my guessed interpretations. I might be wrong

[StephanN]

Thanks for your kind word, everyone, and apologies for just flooding this thread with photos

 

I'll edit my initial post tonight, adding numbers and descriptions to the photos. Will I be able to do this, I remember there has been some change to how edits are possible?

[StephanN]

In the meantime, perhaps you'll find this to be of interest, 3D-model of the Keltendorf: http://www.keltendorf-mitterkirchen.at/Keltendorf/Ueber_uns/3D-Modelle_vom_Keltendorf , and the 2D-description: http://www.keltendorf-mitterkirchen.at/Keltendorf/Ueber_uns/Beschreibung_mit_Rundgang, perhaps you can auto-tranaslate this in your browser.

[Nate]

35 minutes ago, StephanN said:

3D-model of the Keltendorf

That's really great, thanks

[ulf]

43 minutes ago, StephanN said:

Thanks for your kind word, everyone, and apologies for just flooding this thread with photos

No need for apologies here!

All the pictures in this post have different intent.

They are interesting, well framed and processed. 

This post could be a reference for other members how to show many photos together.

 

It looks like you selected and processed the best images from a bigger number of shoots.

 

If you have trouble editing the initial post, just message Andrea to temporarily be able to edit them.

I am looking forward to see the enhanced version of the first post in the tread.

[Andy Perrin]

Yes, this was all very well done, and I liked the choice of subjects! The village is very interesting. Apple’s Safari browser can automatically translate the wiki, so I was able to read it. 

[StephanN]

All right, edited the initial post, answering a few of the question from the later posts , and also providing three additional photos.

[Andrea B.]

The bed is a fireplace !!! I did not connect the two photos #16 & #17 at all.  Now I can see it.

Too funny how our eyes sometimes see what they want to see rather than what is actually there.

 

 

Stephan, thanks for the added captions. This was a very enjoyable Photo Tour.

[StephanN]

11 hours ago, Andrea B. said:

Too funny how our eyes sometimes see what they want to see rather than what is actually there.

 

Every time I look into the mirror