As most archaeological material is discovered in a fragmented condition, the phenomenon has been regarded as a natural result of objects' having been long buried underground.
As indicated in a Good News Network report, approximately 6,000 years ago, hunter-gatherer communities in northeast Europe yielded skillfully manufactured slate ring ornaments in big numbers.
Friendship Ornaments From the Stone Age Were Crafted and Worn as a ‘Symbol of connection' https://t.co/JxUfs34fbY
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Whereas such ornaments are typically referred to as "slate rings," they were unusually used as intact rings. Rather, the ornaments were intentionally fragmented, using pieces of rings as tokens. More so, such fragments were further processed into pendants.
Furthermore, the fragments have most likely functioned as Stone Age hunter-gatherers' symbols of social relations.
Keeping Social Relations
According to Marja Ajola, a postdoctoral researcher from the University of Helsinki, not all objects have essentially been broken by accident.
Rather, it is plausible that some were fragmented deliberately as part of keeping social relations, bartering, or ceremonial activities.
The study, published in the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, demonstrates that a significant number of ornaments have been discovered in extensive and central areas.
As some of these ornaments came from the Lake Onega region and have been brought to Finland through an extensive exchange network, if possible that they are symbolizing the links established between the network.
Slate Ring Ornaments Matched
By matching the slate ring ornaments, assessing their geochemical composition, and investigating traces of use, as well as manufacture in the objects, a team of researchers from the University of Helsinki and the University of Turku showed that the ornaments had not been worn but intentionally broken, as well.
Since fragments from the same ornament were discovered in two different areas, it is plausible that they were worn by two different individuals.
Another specification of this is the fact that one of the fragments had been more finely worked on compared to the other.
Such fragments of the same object may exhibit the hand print, as well as the preferences of two individuals. Probably, they used the ornaments as a symbol of a link established.
Perfectly Fit for Study of Archaeological Objects
A similar connection was found in slate ring ornaments created during the same process of manufacturing, one of which was discovered in a settlement-site context, and the other in a burial site investigated close to the settlement.
What is seen here, may be a way of keeping the connection between the living and the dead. This is the first clear material link as well, between a specific place of residence, and a burial place.
This means that the people living there most possibly buried their dead in an area near them. Essentially, an X-ray fluorescent analysis or XRF of a little more than 50 slate ring ornaments showed that some of the fragments or ornaments thereof had been imported from the Lake Onega region in Russia, hundreds of kilometers from the area where they were found, XRF analyses can be utilized to determine the element concentrations, as well as raw materials of inorganic archaeological materials with extremely high accuracy.
The approach can be used as a totally non-invasive surface analysis, which is making it perfectly suited to the study of archaeological objects.
Related information about Stone Age ornaments is shown on The Norris Museum's YouTube video below:
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