university of klaipėda lithuanian institute of history roman širouchov ...

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Archival data of pre-war Prussian, Curonian and Scalvians ma-
terials of former “Prussia” museum, stored in the museums of Berlin,
Kaliningrad, Olsztyn and Schleswig, as well as new archaeological
collections of museums of Kaliningrad, Klaipėda, Riga, Vilnius etc. are
extensively used in the study.
Considering certain historical events, character of burial rite,
social structure and other the 11 th -13 th centuries features in the light of
archaeology it is used a wide range of written sources, mainly those
German, Polish, Danish and other chronicles and early historical works,
that covered the period of the 11 th -14 th centuries: from “Deeds of Bish-
ops of the Hamburg Church” of Adam from Bremen down to the “The
Prussian Chronicle” of Peter of Dusburg.
Novelty of the study
This dissertation shows the very first example of detailed com-
parative analysis of the artefacts, chronology and typology, burial rite,
certain questions of economical development and social structure of the
pre-selected Baltic tribes – Prussians and Curonians.
For the first time the data of newly investigated Prussian ceme-
teries of the 11 th -12/13 th centuries involved into statistical analysis and
compared with pre-war and 1950-1990-s investigated archaeological
materials.
For the first time since J. Hoffmann’s 1941 monograph archival
and newly investigated data of the 11 th -13 th centuries ornaments, tools