Excavations
One of the aspects of the Museum’s academic activities, pursued from the time it was established, are archaeological digs. Most of such work is carried out at the expansive settlements of the Mazovian Centre of Metallurgy. However, sites of different character, such as cemeteries or smaller settlements, also are explored. Below, there are short descriptions of selected sites excavated by the Museum’s team.
A Przeworsk Culture iron smelting settlement occupied from the second half of the 2nd to the first half of the 3rd century AD. The total excavated surface covered over 31,500 m2 and revealed the remains of 3,689 bloomery furnaces. The total scale of production is estimated at approx. 5,000 furnaces. Other structures, both linked with iron smelting and of settlement function, such as hearths, lime kilns, bog ore roasting pits as well as water wells, dwellings, grain warehouses, amber workshops and horse burials, were also found. Alongside the Iron Age settlement, a small Lusatian Culture cemetery as well as remains of human habitation from the Stone Age up to the early Middle Ages were discovered.
A Przeworsk Culture iron smelting settlement occupied from the second half of the 2nd to the first half of the 3rd century AD. The total excavated surface covered over 5,250 m2 and revealed the remains of 1,390 bloomery furnaces. The total scale of production is estimated at several thousand furnaces at least. Other structures, both linked with iron smelting and of settlement function, such as water wells, workshops and dwellings, smithy and smoking houses, were also found. Alongside artefacts related to the Iron Age settlement, remains of human habitation from the Stone Age up to the early Middle Ages were discovered.
A multi-cultural site excavated by Stefan Woyda in 1964–1972. The total excavated surface covered over 5,250 m2 and revealed the remains of close to 1,100 various features. The overwhelming majority were Przeworsk and Wielbark Culture graves dating from the Late Pre-Roman Period to the Migration Period (2nd c. BC – 4th c. AD). A Bronze Age settlement – associated with the Trzciniec and Lusatian Cultures – and a small early Middle Ages cemetery were also discovered.
A Przeworsk Culture iron smelting settlement from the first centuries AD. Several thousand archaeological features, such as stone-lined hearths (probably related to smithing), dwellings and production pits, were found. Besides the settlement dating to the Roman Period, archaeological remains of habitation from the Bronze Age to the early Middle Ages were discovered.
A Przeworsk Culture iron smelting settlement occupied from the second half of the 2nd c. BC to the first half of the 2nd c. AD. A variety of numerous features were found, including the remains of approx. 1,500 bloomery furnaces. Hearths, annealing furnaces, one water well, plus utility buildings and dwellings, including a structure whose fireplace had been built with – besides the customary stones and clay – fragments of slag lumps, also were uncovered. The building yielded numerous pottery sherds, animal bones and two weaving weights. Alongside finds dated to the Roman Period, remains of human habitation from the Stone Age up to the early Middle Ages were discovered.
A Przeworsk Culture iron smelting settlement occupied between the 1st and 4th century AD. The total excavated surface, explored in 2004–2005, covered 38,670 m2. Some 1,297 finds were recorded, including 224 bloomery furnaces. Other features linked with the functioning of the settlement, such as hearths, utility dugouts or pits, were found. The most interesting find was a kiln for firing wheel-made pottery. This is the sole such feature ever excavated in Mazovia and dated to the mid-2nd c. AD. Inside the kiln, there were fragments of some 28 pottery vessels of various degree of firing. Some remains of Modern Era dwellings, dating from the 16th to 19th century, were found. The record suggests the initial – probably wooden – structures of a “country manor” were violently destroyed somewhere at the end of the 16th or early 17th century, possibly during the Swedish “Deluge” of 1655. This era also yielded one human burial and numerous pits with animal remains.
A Przeworsk Culture iron smelting settlement occupied from the mid-2nd century BC to the 3rd century AD. The total excavated surface covered over 14,600 m2 and revealed the remains of 449 bloomery furnaces. Other features linked with the functioning of the settlement, such as hearths, annealing furnaces, one water well, utility or habitation features, and animal burials, were found. Besides the settlement dating to the Roman Period, archaeological remains of habitation from the Neolithic Period up to the early Middle Ages were discovered.
In 1987 an archaeology student at the University of Warsaw, discovered severely damaged remains of a burial. The grave contained fragments of a painted glass vessel. Already in the same year, a MAMM team headed by Stefan Woyda carried out a limited scope rescue dig, leading to the discovery of five features, including three Roman Period burials. One of the graves revealed additional fragments of the aforementioned glass vessel, which turned out to be a very rare painted beaker decorated with depictions of gladiators, dated to the second half of the 1st or the first half of the 2nd century AD. The archaeological record from the site suggests the functioning of a Przeworsk Culture cemetery between the 1st and 3rd century AD. Also found were the remains of a (hypothesised) settlement and a cemetery from the Early Middle Ages, as well as the remains of a mill.
In 2021, the Museum – in cooperation with the Faculty of Archaeology of the University of Warsaw – resumed the exploration of the cemetery and the nearby located – and dated to the same period – remains of a larger settlement with signs that it was an iron smelting centre.