An Ullerslev-type javelin or spearhead

This exceptional bronze armourer is the end of a spear weapon intended for throwing or stabbing. It is a long, narrow specimen reinforced with a rib, richly ornamented at the outlet of a short socket. It might have belonged to the parade armament. Together with an axe and decorative shield pendant, the spearhead was part of the equipment of a grave with a skeletal burial. Laak, a farmer, discovered traces of it in his field on 10 March 1937, probably during ploughing. In the sand, at a depth of about 50 cm from the surface, he found poorly preserved, unburnt human bones and three bronze objects stacked next to them. All of them, thanks to the teacher Hüpfel from Laski, found their way to the Pommersches Landesmuseum in Stettin (Polish: Pomorskie Muzeum Krajowe w Szczecinie; English: Pomeranian State Museum in Szczecin), where they stayed until the evacuation in 1944, ordered by the Museum director Otto Kunkel due to the Allied air raids on the city. Together with other valuable exhibits, they were transported deep into Germany. They returned to Szczecin in 2009 due to the Polish-German exchange of old archaeological artefacts. Bronze objects from Kukułowo were displayed at an occasional exhibition organised at that time. The complex from Kukułowo, dated to the 2nd period of the Bronze Age (approx. 1500-1300 BC), belongs to very rare grave finds from Pomerania connected with the settlement of grave cultures. It is worth emphasising that the type of spearhead, present in its composition, is one of only three ones known from Poland's territory. It is of Nordic origin, and its more significant concentrations have been recorded in southern Sweden and Denmark.

Dorota Kozłowska