Yxhult stone cist
DatedEst. 3500–2800 BCE
No licensed photograph yetWe have no photograph we may publish for this site, so the interpretive 3D view leads instead.
Overview
About this site
Overview
The Yxhult stone cist (Hällkistan i Yxhult) is the remnant of a small stone cist in the Hällkistan nature reserve, near Hällabrottet in Örebro County, Sweden. It dates from the Younger Stone Age or the early Bronze Age (2400 to 1500 BCE).
Read on Wikipedia1 min readCC BY-SA 4.0
Where it sits in time
The site's dated range, placed against world reference points.
The scale is logarithmic: each step to the left is about ten times older than the last.
Article
Yxhult stone cist
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
The cist has lost its covering of stone and earth, its capstones and its gable hole.
ExcavationsSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
The cist was investigated in excavations in 1902 and 1961. The archaeologists found teeth and bones of humans and animals, but no grave goods.
A cist is a small stone-built coffin-like box used to hold the bodies of the dead; in Swedish it is called a hällkista.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
In Närke there are about 20 stone cists, of which three have gable holes. Cists with gable holes are more common in western Sweden. A cist is a small stone-built coffin-like box used to hold the bodies of the dead; in Swedish it is called a hällkista.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Scandinavian and German stone cists
A cist, or kist, is a small stone-built coffin-like box used to hold the bodies of the dead. It may once have been covered by a cairn or a long barrow, and several cists are sometimes found together within the same cairn or barrow. Ornaments are often found in excavated cists, which shows the wealth or prominence of the person buried. In Scandinavia the stone cist is called the hellekiste in Danish and hällkista in Swedish, and in Nordic megalith architecture it is one of the recognised types alongside dolmens and passage graves.
The most spectacular cist in Scandinavia is the central chamber of the King's Grave at Kivik in Scania, from about the fifteenth century BCE. It is about 4 metres long and 1.5 metres wide, made of ten upright slabs of which eight are decorated with carvings of people, ships, birds, fish, horses, axes and a chariot. It was opened in 1748 by farmers who were taking stone for field walls.
Other cists are much smaller. Associated with Nordic Bronze Age settlements are burial cairns, mounds and cemeteries, with interments including oak coffins and urn burials. The cists in the Atlas, many of them in Sweden and Denmark, are usually single graves under a cairn or a barrow.
Dating relies on the objects in the cist and on radiocarbon dating of any surviving bone.
When visiting, look for a box formed by slabs, exposed where its covering mound has gone.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Cist, Wikipedia: Kivik grave, Wikipedia: Nordic megalith architecture, Wikipedia: Nordic Bronze Age · CC BY-SA 4.0
From the article
Dated moments in the story
- 1500 BCE
Den utgörs av resterna från en mindre hällkista från yngre stenåldern eller tidig bronsålder (2400–1500 f.Kr.) Hällkistan saknar täckning av sten och jord, täckstenar samt gavelhål.
Source - 1902
Hällkistan undersöktes vid utgrävningar 1902 och 1961. Arkeologerna fann tänder och ben från människor och djur, men inga gravföremål I Närke finns ett 20-tal hällkistor, varav tre med gavelhål.
Source
See it in 3D
An interpretive reconstruction of the monument, standing on the real ground at its exact point, under the sun for that place and season. Drag to look around it.
The reconstruction is ours, not a survey: it shows what a monument of this type looks like, at the size the record gives for this one.
Lore
Evidence & Lore
What the sources actually support — and, kept apart, what has been claimed.
What the evidence supports
Dates
Est. 3500–2800 BCEHow this date was established: Type comparisonTypical range for cists in Sweden; this site has not been dated itself. Swedish stone cists (stenkistor) belong to the Nordic megalith tradition which emerged predominantly between 3500 and 2800 BC.Source for this date
Where it stands
Sweden
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 59°06′31″ N, 15°13′36″ EFor a GPS or map app: 59.10850, 15.22669
Access is as our sources describe it; we have not visited the site to check.
Nearby
The closest sites in the Atlas, by straight line.
- MegalithKumla 25:12000–500 BCE
- MegalithKumla 24:12000–500 BCE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Kumla 51:12000 BCE–1050 CE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Kumla 52:12000 BCE–1050 CE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Kumla 53:12000 BCE–1050 CE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Ekeby 8:32000 BCE–1050 CE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Björnrösena2000 BCE–1050 CE
- Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Björnrösena2000 BCE–1050 CE
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q2341148wikidata.org
- 02Source for this dateen.wikipedia.org
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Around this place
The ten nearest sites, by compass
Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Hällkistan i Yxhult" (Swedish), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; authors are listed in the page history. Reused under CC BY-SA 4.0. Read on Wikipedia · Edit history and authors
- Wikipedia (Swedish): Hällkistan i YxhultCC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q2341148CC0