The Palaeolithic sites in Willendorf in der Wachau

Seven archaeological sites, nine layers, one global star: the place where the famous Venus figurine was found is one of the most important Palaeolithic excavation sites for archaeologists.

The Venus of Willendorf – a voluptuously shaped female figurine about 11 cm tall and nearly 30,000 years old – has made the village of Willendorf in the Wachau valley world-famous. However, little is known about the figurine’s archaeological context or the Palaeolithic site itself.

 

Start of the excavations

The first finds in Willendorf were made in 1889 when clay was being dug up for bricks. The big discoveries did not come until 19 years later, however, when Stone Age finds were unearthed at a total of seven sites as a result of major earth movements during the construction of the Wachau railway. The site where the Venus was found, number 2 in the official count, is located on a loess spur where the Willendorfer Bach (Willendorf stream) flows into the Danube; it appears to have been repeatedly visited by Stone Age hunter-gatherer groups over a long period of time. The archaeological excavations began in 1908 and were led by Josef Szombathy, an archaeologist at the Natural History Museum Vienna; they continued until 1927. More excavations were carried out in 1955 and most recently in 2006 as part of research projects conducted by the University of Vienna.

 

The site

The loess, which was deposited as windborne sediment during cold periods, forms a 6 m layer at the site where the Venus of Willendorf was found. Within this layer, a total of at least nine cultural layers are visible as blackish brown bands. The lowest two layers are just over 40,000 years old and could date back to Neanderthal times. This would make it the only open-air site from this period that is currently known to exist. The two cultural layers above these can be attributed to the Aurignacian, the oldest period of the Upper Palaeolithic (40,000 to 29,000 years old), based on the stone implements found.

The finds from layers five to nine, which are about 29,000 to 19,000 years old, belong to the Mid-Upper Palaeolithic (Gravettian). The Venus of Willendorf is from layer nine. Excavations have repeatedly revealed remains of sunken hearths and indications of tents or other dwellings. The site appears to have been regularly used as a base camp in the ice-age winter, as evidenced by remains of wild horses, reindeer and ibex as well as wolverines, bears, cave lions and mammoths.

 

Tip: the Venusium in Willendorf provides information about the site and excavations. The original Venus of Willendorf is on display at the Natural History Museum in Vienna.