Klaipėdos universitetas

Hill-forts are visually distinct archaeological monuments of the Lithuanian landscape; despite excavations that have recently become more intensive, more often than not we still make judgments of hill-forts on the basis of their surviving image, which is assumed to reflect the final stage of their existence. Usually our knowledge about the size of the settlement at its foot, its planigraphy, and of course chronology, is too slender to make any conclusions. By employing complex non-destructive research methods (palynological, geochemical, lithological and geomagnetic analysis, as well as 14C and thermoluminescence dating), the article discusses the time of the rise and the abandonment of Skomantai hill-fort and settlements, the hierarchical relations with the hill-fort as an object forming the settlement structure of the neighbouring area, both settlements at the foot of the hill, and the surrounding burial grounds and monuments, all of which make up a micro-region. As the economic model of the community and the social structure of society changed, the relations between the hill-fort and the settlements changed, as did the purpose of the hill-fort.

A detailed description of the Late Glacial environment was attempted through an interpretation of pollen data and lithological records in the sequences with 14C chronologies. Pollen data suggests that during the pre-Alleröd time (>11.914C kyr. BP) tree-less vegetation flourished in the area where sedimentation in freshwater bodies with a high water level was dominant. The formation of Betula and Pinus predominating forest (11.9−11.814C kyr. BP) coincides with the increasing representation of the organic constituent in investigated sequences. Palaeobotanical records show some improvement of the climatic conditions since the middle of the Younger Dryas cold event (10.5−10.414C kyr. BP). Sedimentation in oligo-mesotrophic nutrient-rich lakes with a rather high water level was typical for the end of the Late Glacial.