Barbara Rappenglueck

Institute for Interdisciplinary Science, Gilching

The traditions of peoples are packed with the wondrous qualities of containers. Vessels may e.g. serve as uterus, they manage transformation and rebirth, and they can communicate harm and death, or transmit notions of abundance and wisdom. Beyond that, containers may in manifold ways relate to cosmic symbolism, either representing the whole cosmos...

Archaeological sites undoubtedly destroyed by a meteorite impact had not been identified so far. For such a proof, both a meteorite impact and its definite effects on an archaeological site would have to be evidenced. This review article reports on geoarchaeological investigations, involving mineralogy, petrography, and geophysics, which establishe...

The claim that meteorite impacts shaped human history is a well-known element of (neo-)catastrophism. But many methodological caveats, shortly summarised in the first part of this article, should be considered before drawing such far-reaching conclusions. So far no evidence existed of any archaeological site directly being involved in an impact pro...

To the best of our knowledge, the first examples worldwide of artificial remnants, which directly co-exist with meteorite impact-diagnostic shock metamorphism, come from an excavation site in Stöttham (Chiemgau, SE-Germany). Archaeological finds (‘slags’), analysed by polarising microscope and SEM-EDS, exhibit complex structures of rocky partitions...

The largest meteorite impact of the Holocene known to date occurred during the Bronze/Iron Age in southeastern Bavaria, between Altötting and the edge of the Alps. The event is known as the "Chiemgau Impact". More than 100 craters with diameters from 5 m up to several hundred meters are distributed over an area of about 60 km length and 30 km width...

A hitherto worldwide unique evidence of a new type of impactite contains particles of metallic bronze and iron artefacts in a strongly shocked polymictic impact breccia from an archaeological excavation in the crater strewn field of the Chiemgau impact, dating the impact to relatively precise 900-600 BC.

In English: “Chiemgau Impact” is an event which took place in the Bronze Age / Iron Age with the creation of a large meteorite strewn field by the impact of a comet / asteroid in southeast Bavaria. The research is interdisciplinary from the outset. It covers, among other things, geology, geophysics, limnology, archaeology, mineralogy, speleology,...

This paper focuses on the globe in depictions of the Salvator Mundi (Redeemer of the World), in which Christ is shown blessing with His right hand and holding the globe of the world in His left hand. From the end of the fifteenth to the start of the seventeenth century these globes show a remarkable diversity which is not observed either earlier or...

Comets have been interpreted as portents of political fortune since ancient times. The use of comets in the iconography of political caricatures from the 18th to the 21st century substantiates that comets have always been and still are a suitable metaphor for expressing political statements. But in the caricatures the comet as an icon does not serv...

In the field of archaeoastronomy and cultural astronomy the annual conferences of SEAC, the European Society of Astronomy in Culture (Societe Europeenne pour la role de l’Astronomie dans la Culture, www.archeoastronomy.org/), have been established as a central meeting event for experts since 1993.

Humanity’s integration into the cosmos is fundamentally shaped by the perception of structured celestial movements: the rotation of the celestial sphere and the various regular paths of celestial bodies. Participating in these cosmic regularities has been an objective of human cultures since ancient times. Reproducing their structures may serve to...

We acknowledge the observations of Doppler et al . on our paper and we are grateful to Antiquity's editor for this opportunity to reply to their objections. Firstly, it should be noted that we have not claimed that the Chiemsee once included the Tüttensee. We agree that the region in which both lakes lie was glacially formed. But while Lake Chiems...

Arguing from a critical reading of the text, and scientific evidence on the ground, the authors show that the myth of Phaethon – the delinquent celestial charioteer – remembers the impact of a massive meteorite that hit the Chiemgau region in Bavaria between 2000 and 428 BC.

A more exact dating of the Chiemgau meteorite impact in Bavaria, southeast Germany, that produced a large strewn field of more than 80 craters sized between a few meters and several hundred meters, may provide the indispensable fundament for evaluating its cultural implications and thus enable an extraordinary case study. A straightforward answer h...

The Chiemgau strewn field in the Alpine Foreland discovered in the early new millennium comprises more than 80 mostly rimmed craters in a roughly elliptically shaped area with axes of about 60 km and 30 km. The crater diameters range between a few meters and a few hundred meters. Geologically, the craters occur in Pleistocene moraine and fluvio-gla...

Did in the Holocene meteorite impacts of a size capable to affect human cultures happen at all and – if the answer is “yes” – which cultural implications did they have? Since a few years this question is fiercely and controversially discussed. The Chiemgau meteorite impact event may provide an important contribution to the discussion. This event st...

Did in the Holocene meteorite impacts of a size capable to affect human cultures happen at all and -- if the answer is ``yes'' -- which cultural implications did they have? Since a few years this question is fiercely and controversially discussed. The Chiemgau meteorite impact event may provide an important contribution to the discussion. This even...

In the past three decades cosmic events such as supemovae and the impact of !arge meteorites have undergone a remarkable rcnaissance in being considered as a trigger of radical change, not only on geological timescales but also among prehistoric cultures. In such theories, archaeological horizons indicative of destruction events are combined with e...

Pythagoras and Plato established the basic ideas of the occidental theory of “cosmic music”: the relations between intervals of music and numbers, the character of the scales and their influence in nature and society, the harmony of the planetary spheres, etc. Occidental philosophy and theology went back to these concepts, up to their influence in...

Ropes and the use of ropes have left clear traces in the myths and fairy tales of people all over the world. Numerous examples let us surmise that many of these ropes are related to the sky and connected with selected astronomical phenomena. This article categorizes these phenomena more closely, focusing on only a few very representative examples,...