Der Herrenhof von Rees-Bergswick

Untersuchungen zur Siedlungs- und Sozialgeschichte der späten Eisenzeit am unteren Niederrhein

Schletter, Hans-Peter

The Lower Rhine region has traditionally been little studied in research on the Late Iron Age, despite its significance during the mid-1st century BCE, when local tribal societies came into direct and indirect contact with the Roman world. The Herrenhof of Rees-Bergswick, excavated in 2010, sheds new light on these social structures. The settlement, located in the Rhine floodplain between Rees and Haldern, features a fortified enclosure with a wall and ditch and a two-phase residential building, the later phase of which was designed as a representative structure. For the first time, previously invisible social hierarchies can be identified, suggesting the site served as a residence for local elites, comparable to the Viereckschanzen and établissements ruraux of the Celtic world. Finds such as a Roman amphora – the earliest Roman find east of the Rhine – and a smith’s tongs support this interpretation. Comparisons with other published and unpublished sites in the southern Lower Rhine, the Netherlands, and Belgium reveal a broader pattern of fortified farmsteads serving as elite residences.
The book is intended for students and researchers who are exploring, for the first time or in greater depth, the Iron Age in the Lower Rhine region and the social structures that existed before Roman rule.