urnfield

[ urn-feeld ]

noun

1. a Bronze Age cemetery in which the ashes of the dead were buried in urns.

urnfield

/ ˈɜːnˌfiːld /

noun

1. a cemetery full of individual cremation urns

adjective

1. (of a number of Bronze Age cultures) characterized by cremation in urns, which began in E Europe about the second millennium bc and by the seventh century bc had covered almost all of mainland Europe

Word History and Origins

Origin of urnfield¹

First recorded in 1885–90; urn + field

Example Sentences

The researchers found that the genomes of the migrants buried near Dover were closely related to those of people then living at sites in France and Spain, including skeletons tied to the Urnfield culture of Central Europe, thought to have links to early Celtic languages.

From Science Magazine