Prehistoric pile dwellings around Lake Zurich

Prehistoric pile dwellings around Lake Zurich are pile dwelling sites located around Lake Zurich in the cantons of Schwyz, St. Gallen and Zürich.

The article focuses on the 9 Lake Zurich sites that are among the 111 sites included in the UNESCO World Heritage Prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps established in 2011. 56 of the 111 UNESCO World Heritage pile dwelling sites are located in Switzerland and 9 thereof are located on the Lake Zurich seashore. The article also includes one UNESCO World Heritage site at the nearby Greifensee and one UNESCO World Heritage site at the Pfäffikersee.

The 11 sites described here are only a selection, just like the 111 UNESCO World Heritage sites are only a selection of more than 900 known sites of prehistoric pile dwellings in the Alpine region.

Geography
The 11 prehistoric pile-dwelling (or stilt house) sites are concentrated within an area of about 40 km2, on Lake Zurich respectively Obersee lakeshore in the cantons of Schwyz, St. Gallen and Zürich.

Characteristics
The pile-dwelling sites were built from around 5000 BC to 500 BC. Contrary to popular belief, the settlements were not erected over water, but on nearby marshy land, among them on the Seedamm respectively Frauenwinkel area, or, on the then swamp land between the Limmat and Lake Zurich around Sechseläutenplatz on small islands and peninsulas in Zürich. The settlements were set on piles to protect against occasional flooding by the Linth and Jona. Because the lake has grown in size over time, most of the original piles are now around 4 m to 7 m under the water level of 406 m, giving modern observers the false impression that they always had been surrounded by water.

Most of the settlements were inhabited for some decades and then re-erected at a quite different location. A notable exception is the settlement Robenhausen at the Pfäffikersee, discovered and researched by Jakob Messikommer at the end of the 19th century, which was continuously inhabited for thousands of years.

Archaeological excavations were conducted in only some of the sites in order to preserve the heritage for future generations. Nevertheless, the excavations yielded evidence that provides insight into life in prehistoric times during the Neolithic and Bronze Age in Alpine Europe and the way communities interacted with their environment. The settlements are a unique group of exceptionally well-preserved and culturally rich archaeological sites, which constitute one of the most important sources for the study of early agrarian societies.

Sites
Sources, among them area, date and location as well as coordinates and ID, used in the table base on Prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps, and are listed as references. The list bases on the dates of December 2014.

Lake Zurich
Excavations of the "Pan-European stilt house settlements" began at Lake Zurich in Switzerland. During the winter of 1853–54, in the context of lowered water levels at Lake Zurich, archaeologist Ferdinand Keller discovered the remains of the Meilen–Rorenhaab site. Probably the majority of the important sites of the so-called Horgen culture are situated on lakeshore, including Grosser Hafner on a former lake island and Kleiner Hafner on a peninsula at Sechseläutenplatz respectively at the effluence of the Limmat, and Zürich–Enge Alpenquai within an area of about 0.2 ha in the city of Zürich.

Freienbach–Hurden Rosshorn is a unique site because it was not a dwelling site but the site of prehistoric lake crossings between Hurden and Rapperswil (today's main lake crossing in this area is the Rapperswil Seedamm). The dwelling sites Hurden Seefeld and Technikum are closely associated with these prehistoric lake crossings; the Feldbach site is also not far away.

Sites with World Heritage status
The following nine Lake Zurich sites are among the 111 sites included in the UNESCO World Heritage Prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps.

Sites without World Heritage status
Examples include:
 * Grosser Hafner

Greifensee
The Greifensee is located at a distance of appromimately 7km to the northeast of Lake Zurich.

Pfäffikersee
The Pfäffikersee is located at a distance of appromimately 6km to the east of the Greifensee.

Protection
As well as being part of the 56 Swiss sites of the UNESCO World Heritage Site, each of these 11 prehistoric sites is also listed in the Swiss inventory of cultural property of national and regional significance as a Class A object of national importance.

Hence, the area of each settlement is provided as a historical site under federal protection, within the meaning of the Swiss Federal Act on the nature and cultural heritage (German: Bundesgesetz über den Natur- und Heimatschutz NHG) of 1 July 1966. Unauthorised researching and purposeful gathering of findings represent a criminal offense according to Art. 24.

Literature

 * Peter J. Suter, Helmut Schlichtherle et al.: Pfahlbauten – Palafittes – Palafitte. Palafittes, Biel 2009. ISBN 978-3-906140-84-1.
 * Beat Eberschweiler: Ur- und frühgeschichtliche Verkehrswege über den Zürichsee: Erste Ergebnisse aus den Taucharchäologischen Untersuchungen beim Seedamm. In: Mitteilungen des Historischen Vereins des Kantons Schwyz, Volume 96, Schwyz 2004.