The Elp culture spreads through the Netherlands, Northern Germania and just south of the Baltic coast. Bronze and Iron Age cattle people, the Elp (c. 1800 - c. 800 BCE) are militant barn-house builders and cattle keepers.
READ: Cult of the Fire God - Bronze Age Quest Adventure
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The Elp people evolve largely northeast of the Rhine. They're known for producing Kümmerkeramik or Grobkeramic, meaning coarse pottery, and redeveloping the longhouse.
READ: Cult of the Fire God - Bronze Age Quest Adventure
They're part of broad northern European cultural complex descended from the earlier Unetice group. A widespread civilization, the Unetice culture (c. 2300 - 1600 BCE) is a dynamic force of influence through much of ancient Europe by travel, conquest and trade.
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The famous Nebra sky disc (c. 1800 - 1600 BCE) comes from the Unetice. The site on the Mittelberg hill where the disc is found is seen as an enclosed sacred space, defined by earthen ramparts.
From this location, when the disc is aligned to north, the upper terminus of the western gold arc points toward the Brocken in the Harz mountain range. There, the sun is seen to set on summer solstice.
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Later, the Brocken becomes the famous site of revels on Hexennacht or Witches' Night. It's called Walpurgisnacht since 8th century Christians convince the people the saint bestows protection against evil witches and also bleeds holy oil.
The Elp culture rises as Unetice forces decline. The Elp develop around and east of IJssel, a Dutch distributary of the River Rhine. Flowing north, before 1932 it discharges into the IJesselmeer (IJessel Sea), a natural harbor of the mighty North Sea.
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The people occupy what's now North Germany and the Netherlands near Rotterdam. They inhabit peninsular Jutland and today's Denmark, arcing up along the Baltic Coast. Amber is a regular trade good.
In domestic and economic realms the longhouse has been a standard type of dwelling in the north as far back as the Neolithic c. 5000 BCE. The longhouse develops on both sides of the Atlantic, and the farmstead or barn house style is still used into the 20th century.
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One of the earliest widespread construction methods is wattle-and-daub, whereby woven branches, reeds or sticks are formed into walls. They're mortared and sealed with a sticky mixture of clay or soil, animal dung and grass or straw.
The building style is found in the round huts of Neolithic Mesopotamians, with walls woven of reeds. Skills of weaving also develop with this type of construction, especially in reed weaves due to lightness and flexibility of materials.
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With wattle-and-daub construction, it's easy to add more living space or renovate walls if needed. As time goes by buildings increase in scale and need reinforcement. The use of support pillars and crossbeams facilitate sturdier building and wider constructions.
In the south, post and lintel construction has been used on monumental levels in Egyptian architecture. Unlike the Egyptians, the northern cultures have plenty of wood. In Europe timber frame structures appear c. 2000 BCE. The building industry prospers.
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Wooden fortifications are common around Bronze Age settlements, sometimes two or three deep. These indicate the people living here own something valuable desired by others, be it land or cows, and good defenses are required.
READ: Cult of the Fire God - Bronze Age Quest Adventure
Farming settlements expand into groups of six to twelve longhouses with avenues between. People live close to their own tribal kin and extended families. Germanic cattle-farmer longhouses appear along the SW North Sea coast in the third or fourth century BCE.
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A local cattle tradition prevails among Saxons and the Frisians, who build hilltop houses on natural land formations, surrounded by lush plains fed by wetlands. Others in the Germanic regions lean toward sedentary crop-central agriculture.
Crops of the northern regions can include einkorn wheat, gold-of-pleasure, broad bean, barley, sweet pepper and tubers such as potatoes. The people might raise chickens, sheep or pigs.
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The longhouse farmstead or barn house style appears between 1800 and 1500 BCE, in the mid to late Bronze Age. Examples of longhouse construction can also be seen in the Italian Bronze Age Terramare (Terramara) site, in the Po Valley.
In the Germanic and Netherlands regions the longhouse develops from two to three aisles by 1800 BCE. Further north in Scandinavia a similar design arises. The houses are built as a way to contain cattle during the winter. Warm cows produce more milk.
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The longhouse is one of the earliest agricultural animal shelters. Family or families keep the cattle penned in part of the building. This provides warmth for people and animals, and easy access to milk, cheese, butter and other dairy products in the depths of winter.
Humans of the prehistoric age are lactose intolerant after infancy, but consume dairy anyway. Butter churns date back to the Chalcolithic Age. Not only does this create a healthier human but a mutant lactase gene allowing many humans to tolerate lactose.
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People with an Indo-European background develop the tolerance and it's first evident in today's Turkey. About 68% of the world's people are lactose intolerant, especially in Africa and Asia.
Cattle are also stalled in the longhouse to prevent cattle raids, which come into practice with the growth of livestock breeding and herding. A cattle cult might exist in this area as seen by cowhides in graves and evidence of animal offerings in Sweden and Denmark.
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Grave goods, rock engravings, fortifications and hoards give strong evidence of a martial culture among the Elp. Over time burial customs show influence over time of nearby groups such as the Tumulus people.
Earliest burials of the Elp culture, c. 1800 - 1200 BCE, are bodies with funerary items in shallow pits, covered by a low hill or barrow. Grave goods include pottery vessels, favorite items or weapons.
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After c. 1200 BCE the ways of the Urnfield culture overtake the tumulus practices. Bodies are cremated and buried in fields of urns. Family burials appear in later stages.
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