The Early Iron Age Grave Mounds in Kinding-Ilbling

The grave mound field conveniently lies mostly in areas which were not directly endangered by the building of the ICE tracks. It became necessary to excavate in 1995 due to the railway company's decision to relocate a pressurised water pipe and plans for new track routes. The rail company had also designated large tracts of the grave field as a flood prevention area. This involves removing enormous amounts of top soil to match the ICE embankment which is built up to 8m high. It can only be hoped that the rail company can be persuaded to alter their plans for the flood defences so they are compatible with archaeological concerns. If not then it is certain that enormous areas of archaeological interest would be affected and could subsequently no longer be investigated in detail.

The majority of the Hallstatt period grave field in Kinding/Ilbling (approx. 800-450 B.C.) lies on the lower terrace which is regularly flooded due to the present climate and drainage conditions. This flooding covers large areas with alluvial sediments. The grave field is also covered by such a layer and has these deposits to thank for it's excellent state of preservation.

Aerial photograph showing clearly visible mound discolouration (Photo: BLfD Ingolstadt).

The Kinding barrow cemetery is unusually large, covering approximately 5 hectares and containing several hundred barrows. It was completely unknown before it's discovery at the beginning of May 1995. It was found using archaeological aerial photography when the section of valley was re-recorded from the air. The extremely wet spring of 1995 meant that crops were growing very quickly but the areas directly above stone packing and stone circles appeared as "negative crop marks" in the aerial photographs and pointed to the location of the graves.

Only during excavation did it become clear that the aerial photography had only picked up on the largest barrows which almost reached the modern surface or which broke through the layer of flood sediment. Other, mostly smaller barrows are completely covered and therefore cannot be recognised from the surface.

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