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Founded: 1000-500 BCCategory: Prehistoric and archaeological sites in Estonia
Historical period: The Bronze Age (Estonia)
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Behind the small Asva village on a low-lying hayfield is located one of the most archaeologically important bronze-age sites in Northern Europe. This site, Asva, has given its name to an entire culture. Asva culture was the westernmost reach of the Finno-Ugrian late Bronze Age culture. This culture was based on herding, seal hunting, the beginnings of agriculture and, bronze casting.
During the Bronze Age, the ridge on which the settlement was located was an islet or peninsula in a shallow bay. Today, the sea has retreated many miles, and the settlement reminds us of its old seashore location only during spring flooding. The area was first excavated in 1930-1931 by a local resident, O. Reis, then a student at Tartu University.
Later excavations verified the existence of the oldest (at that time) and the longest habited fortified settlement on Saaremaa. The entire settlement covers a 3,500 square meter area. Approximately one sixth of that area has been excavated, a total of 5,800 finds has been collected. The oldest dated settlement was destroyed by fire sometime during 685 to 585 B.C. Soon, rebuilding started. The natural rise of the bluff was refortified with a mixture of soil and clay. Unfortunately, that one also fell to fire.
There are signs of a continuing settlement from the beginning of the first millenium. More tensive building took place during the middle of the first millenium. The edges of the bluff were sharpened, walls were rebuilt and heightened. The site as we see it today dates to those years. Apparently, the site maintained its name, Hill Fort Field, in popular oral tradition, from those years dating back to the years around 500 A.D.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.