and the layout of these vestiges, found amid the beams and the pillars of the bridges and also up- and downstream, are not very well known. The finds extend to almost the whole range of what one can expect to find in an archaeological site: weapons, tools, ornaments, and implements made of iron, but also of bronze, wood, and bone; potsherds, baskets, fabrics, and leather articles. Zoological and anthropological remains were also various and numerous: bones of horses, oxen, pigs, sheep, goats, and dogs as well as several human skeletons.

Most of the archaeological material (nearly 90 percent) has been assigned to the middle La Tène period (approximately 270–150 b.c.) while the Vouga bridge, upstream, can be dated to 252 b.c. by dendrochronology. The rest of the finds provide isolated evidence of the occasional frequention of the shore during the final La Tène period and then during the two first centuries a.d.; the Desor bridge could well be Roman.

There have been many hypotheses about the function of the site, as well as about the circumstances of its abandonment. The site was set in a strategic place, straddling the Swiss plateau and the foothills of the Jura, and the quality, richness, and variety of vestiges were unique. The layout of the objects was also striking, with concentrations in several zones of different types of artifacts, such as swords, spears, or horse bits and rings.

Thus, the site has been regarded as an oppidum (fortified town), or a place of refuge; as a military post with an arsenal; and as a trading place with a port or a frontier post. The interpretation most favored by the majority of scientists was formulated by Klaus Raddatz in 1952: La Tène was a place of sacrifice, a hypothesis that could be easily combined with any one or more of the above-mentioned functions. It is based on the characteristics of the site’s animal bones, which totally contradict the usual data for a settlement place. It is reinforced by the presence of “new” objects and of wrapped or “mutilated” human skeletons—one of which was found with a rope around its neck (E. Vouga 1885, 32).

Controversy about the nature of the La Tène site is still far from over. In a study of the Celtic bridge of Cornaux a few miles downstream, Hanni Schwab is convinced of the trade and craft functions of La Tène. According to her, the site would have been suddenly devastated, like the bridge of Cornaux, by a big rise in the lake’s water level shortly before mid-first century b.c. This point of view has not been favorably received, but Schwab must be given credit for showing that evidence for a definitive interpretation of the site, whose last excavations date back more than three-quarters of a century and whose material has not yet been entirely studied, is too weak and incomplete for any final resolution.

Marc-Antoine Kaeser

See also

Celts

References

Desor, E. 1864. “Les constructions lacustres du Lac de Neuchâtel: III—Age du Fer.” Musée Neuchâtelois 1: 63–69.

———. 1865. Les palafittes ou constructions lacustres du Lac de Neuchatel. Paris: Reinwald.

———. 1868. “Le tumulus des Favargettes.” Musee Neuchatelois 5: 229–242.

Dunning, C. 1990. “La Tène.” In The Celts: Exhibition Catalogue, 366–368. Milan: Bompiani.

Egloff, M. 1989. “Des premiers chasseurs au début du christianisme.” In Histoire du Pays de Neuchatel, 1:13–171. Hauterive: Attinger.

———. 1991. “L’artisanat celtique d’après les trouvailles de La Tène?” In The Celts: Exhibition Catalogue, 369–371. Milan: Bompiani.

Hildebrand, H. 1872–1880. “Studier i jamforande fornforskning I: Bidrag till spannets historia.” Antiqvarisk Tidskrift for Sverige 4: 1–263.

Jacob-Friesen, G. 1980. “Ein Jahrhundert Chronologie der vorromischen Eisenzeit in Mittel und Nordeuropa.” Bonner Jahrbucher 180: 1–30.

Kaenel, G. 1991. “La Tène (canton de Neuchatel), un site mythique qui n’a pas livre tous ses secrets.” In Les Celtes dans le Jura: L’age du fer dans le massif jurassien (800–15 av J.-C.), 117–118. Ed. P. Curdy, G. Kaenel, and M.-J. Rouliere-Lambert. Yverdon, Switz.: Cornaz.

Muller, F. 1990. Der Massenfund von der Tiefenau bei Bern: Zur Deutung latenezeitlicher Sammelfunde mit Waffen. Antiqua no. 20. Basel: Schweizerische Gesellschaft fur Ur- und Fruhgeschichte.

Navarro, J.-M. de. 1972. The Finds from the Site of La Tène. 1: Scabbards and the Swords Found in Them. London: Oxford University Press.