Papilės kapinyno tyrinėjimų problemos
LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Archeologija; Archeologiniai tyrimai; Lokalinė istorija; Papilė kapinynas; Papilė, kapinynas, piliakalnis, žiemgaliai, žemaičiai, archeologiniai paminklai, paveldosauga; Piliakalniai; Radiniai; Archaeological research; Archaeology; Burial-grounds; Finds; Local history; Mounds; Papile village, old burial-ground, hill-fort, Samogitians, Semigallians, archaeological monuments, heritage preservation; Papilė.
ENThe archaeological monuments in the environs of Papilė are not numerous, they are only a little investigated and so far they are being destroyed. One of the most important of them is the burial-grounds of Papilė, known and being destroyed for more than 100 years, investigated a bit only in 1955. It was included into the list of the monuments conserved by the state in 1973 though its conserved territory is much less than the real one. Only 16 graves from its 3 ha area burial-grounds have been researched that is why most of its exhibits accumulated in the museums of Lithuania, Poland, Latvia and known in the archaeogical literature are accidental finds. The going-on burial-grounds destruction hindered to establish its territory, the location of the graves, to gather data about burial customs, to establish more exact chronology, ethnic dependence. The both mounds of Papilė also remained not investigated, one of which is almost destroyed and the cemetery is established in another, that is why it is difficult to find any link with the old burial-grounds and to form some notion about the community that left them. There is no unique opinion about the ethnic dependence of Papilė environs. A part of researchers assign them to the Southern Semigallia people areal and the others consider them to be of mixed ethnic compositions. The little researched problem is that of Papilė as a local economic (trade) and social centre though two mounds with the settlements and the burial-grounds make up a characteristic of such centre complex of archaeological monuments.The most modem research data allow to date the burial-grounds of Papilė as those of the 7th-the 16th centuries. It was abandoned by the community that lived at the western foothill of Papilė I mound since the first ages A. D. and had built a castle for defense in it. The imported finds found in the burial-grounds show that this community kept up trade relations with the Curonians and other tribes along the river Venta. The environs of Papilė are at the boundary of the Semigallian and the Samogitian tribes’ areals, thus features of both material and spiritual cultures are observed here. During the 1st millennium and the first half of the 2nd millenium A. D. Papilė was a local centre. [From the publication]
