Cuţitele curbe de tip krummesser – la periferia industriei litice cioplite
Krummesser type knives

Summary/Abstract: This is a discourse on the origin, development, and spread in the Carpathian zone of the specific stone artifacts known under the German name of Krummesser (literally: curved knife). The key issue is the origin of these tools. At the beginning the author recalls the opinion of professor Ion Nestor from 1945 that considered that the stone curved knives served as models for metal knives, although we cannot exclude the opposite situation. According to Ion Nestor, the origin of tools of the Krummesser type should be search in the region of the Eastern and Southern Carpathians at the turn of the Stone and Bronze Ages. Therefore, the author takes for the starting points the cultural situation in that region during the so-called transition period. He presumes that the Krummesser concept was inspired by metal knives brought to that region by people of the Tumuli Ochre Graves (of the Pit Graves) around the mid 3rd millennium BC. Classic Krummesser appeared at the beginning of the Bronze Age in assemblages of the Schneckenberg-Glina III complex and then in various groups that can be named Epi-Coţofeni and Epi-Schneckenberg, and also by the Otomani culture. Towards the end of the Early Bronze Age and at the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age Krummesser possibly inspired the development of siliceous sickles produced in specialized workshops in Volhynia. In conclusion, the author excludes tools of the Krummesser type from the main evolution stream of lithic chipped industries, even though chipping techniques were often applied in their production. Instead, he places them on peripheries of these industries.

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