Barczewko – a cemetery of the first settlers in Southern Warmia against the background of medieval inhumation necropolises in Teutonic Prussia

Abstract

Barczewko is located near Olsztyn, in the Warmian-Masurian province (north-eastern Poland). The site on Lake Wadąg was the place of the first location of today’s Barczewo (Ger. Wartenburg). Urban settlement with the castle/watchtower was erectedon the initiative of the bishop of Warmia at the end of the 1320s. The development of the young urban colony was interrupted in 1354 when it was invaded by Lithuanian troops, burned down and abandoned. The village that was later established nearbywas called Alt Wartenberg. The hill behind the village, referred to as the Old Town, has never been built on. The place is a specific time capsule, preserving the remains of buildings and the basic elements of the town’s spatial arrangement. In the years 2013–2019, a Polish-German research project was carried out here. After a series of non-invasive tests, the cellars of dwelling buildings with artefacts abandoned on the day of the raid, fortifications, market square buildings, central place of craft and trade nature (the so-called mercatorio) and the settlers’ cemetery, as well as the remains of the victims of the raid, were uncovered by excavation. It is a unique complex which provides a lot of information about the pioneering phases of town formation in the state of the Teutonic Order, and about the everyday life of settlers coexisting most likely with the Old Prussian population. The excavations reveal details of the dramatic events related to the fall of the town, thus confirming written sources. This text presents for the first time the preliminary results of the research on the cemetery of the first settlers in southern Warmia. The necropolis provides evidence for the presence of the Old Prussian indigenous population who played a significant role in this process.