Nowa Cerekwia is often described as one of the most important La Tène sites north of the Carpathians. But this raises a simple question: why here?

The answer was probably not only fertile land, although that certainly mattered. The settlement lay in a region attractive for agriculture, on the northern foreland of the Moravian Gate — one of the most important natural passages between the Danube world and the lands north of the Carpathians and Sudetes. In the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, this position gave Nowa Cerekwia something more than good fields. It placed the site close to one of the major communication corridors linking Central Europe with the Oder and Vistula basins, and further north with the Baltic coast.

This is where amber enters the story.

When archaeologists speak about the Amber Route, they do not mean a single road marked out like a modern highway. In prehistory, it was rather a network of tracks, river valleys, crossings and local exchange zones. Some places, however, clearly mattered more than others. Nowa Cerekwia seems to have been one of such places: a central La Tène agglomeration, a regional hub of craft production, exchange and long-distance contacts. The finds from the site support this interpretation. Nowa Cerekwia produced evidence of specialised craft activities, including metalworking, advanced pottery production, glass ornaments, coins and objects pointing to far-reaching contacts. It was not an ordinary rural settlement. It was a place where goods, raw materials and people moved through a wider network.

Amber itself was also present. At Nowa Cerekwia, archaeologists found lumps of raw amber and a small number of amber objects. The evidence is not massive, but it is important. Stronger traces of amber working are known from nearby Celtic settlements, especially Samborowice, where raw amber, a worked bead and other amber ornaments were discovered in settlement features. Some of these objects were technologically advanced, including unusual separators for bead necklaces, and at least some may have required the use of a lathe. This suggests that amber was not merely passing unnoticed through the region. At least part of it was being processed locally, probably before finished objects or smaller prepared pieces moved further south.

The scale of the exchange becomes even clearer when we look north-west, to Wrocław-Partynice. There, in 1906 and again in 1936, three pits filled with raw amber were discovered. Together they contained around 1.3–1.5 tonnes of Baltic amber. This remains the largest known anthropogenic deposit of raw amber in Europe, and possibly in the world. The Partynice deposits are especially important because they were not found in a clearly Celtic context. The associated settlement material belongs rather to northern cultural environments, usually described archaeologically as Jastorf and early Przeworsk. This does not weaken the connection with Nowa Cerekwia. On the contrary, it makes the whole picture more interesting.

The Amber Route was not controlled by one community alone. It depended on cooperation, exchange and intermediaries. Northern groups had access to the routes leading toward the Baltic. La Tène communities, including those of Upper Silesia and Moravia, had strong demand for amber and links to southern markets. Between them were zones of contact, negotiation and movement. This also helps explain why non-La Tène objects found at Nowa Cerekwia matter so much. Hand-built vessels connected with northern Jastorf and early Przeworsk traditions, discovered within La Tène settlement features, are not just curiosities. They may be traces of the same broader relationships that allowed amber, metal objects, coins and ideas to move between different cultural worlds.

So why did the Celts settle at Nowa Cerekwia?

Because it was a good place to live, but also a good place to connect. It stood near fertile land, close to a major north-south communication corridor, and within reach of exchange networks linking the Danube world with the Baltic. Its importance was not only in what was produced there, but also in where it stood.

Nowa Cerekwia was one of the places where the Celtic world, northern communities and the flow of Baltic amber met.

Source

Dulęba P. 2026, Nowa Cerekwia. La Tène Culture Agglomeration on the Amber Road, t. 1–2, Wrocław.

Dulęba P., Markiewicz J.E. 2023, The lords of the Amber Road: amber storage, distribution and processing in the early Iron Age and the La Tène period, „Prähistorische Zeitschrift” 98 (1), s. 310–337.

Markiewicz J.E. 2026, The non-La Tène finds, [w:] Dulęba P. (red.) 2026, Nowa Cerekwia. La Tène Culture Agglomeration on the Amber Road, t. 1–2, Wrocław, s. 167–178.