Storm unearths ornate Early Iron Age dagger

A heavy storm on the Baltic coast of Poland collaborated with a pair of metal detectorists to uncover a richly decorated dagger from the Early Iron Age Hallstatt period (ca. 800-620 B.C.). Jacek Ukowski and Katarzyna Herdzik, respectively president and member of the St. Cordula Exploration Association for the Saving of Monuments, discovered the dagger on March 30th, on the beach where storms had dislodged a chunk of clay from the cliff face, exposing the bronze weapon.

Ukowski immediately notified Grzegorz Kurka, the director of the Kamień Land History Museum, to the find and turned the dagger over to the museum for safekeeping.

The dagger is 24.2 cm (9.5 inches) long and decorated with intricate engravings from the pointed pommel to the blade point. The handle is ridged in alternating wide and thin bands. One band close to the pommel and another close to the shoulders of the blade are decorated with a crosshatch pattern. A band around the midpoint of the hilt has triangular wedges excised out of it giving it the appearance of eyes and a mouth. The blade is decorated down its full length, starting with crosses and crescents (they ends almost meet, like circles with a break more than a crescent moon) at the shoulders, followed by a line of crosses down the center of the blade to the end that narrows to a slender point. The center line of crosses is bracketed on both sides by diagonal lines angled towards each other in v shapes.

“As for finds in Poland, I have not come across such a dagger,” said Grzegorz Kurka, director of the Museum of the History of Kamień Land, where the relic has been donated.

Kurka believes the blade may have been a ritual object linked to a solar cult, or part of a wealthy warrior’s arsenal, and may have been produced in a southern European workshop.

“It is a true work of art,” he said. “The craftsmanship indicates remarkable metallurgical skill.”

The Provincial Conservator of Monuments in Szczecin will be notified and they will decide which museum the artifact will be assigned to. Of course Kurka is hoping the Kamień Land History Museum will get to keep it. If so, he intends to perform metallurgic analysis to determine the composition of the copper and tin, which may also determine its geographical origin. He will also study its wear patterns in the hopes they will indicate whether the dagger was used as a combat weapon or for ritual purposes.