Lake dwelling. Early peoples in Europe sometimes built dwelling places in lakes or at the edges of lakes or creeks. Scientists have come to call these houses lake dwellings. The people placed their houses on wooden platforms which stood on piles, or posts. They drove the foundations deep into the mud, and often held them steady by stones stacked around their bases. Some houses were clustered in villages.
The Greek historian Herodotus, who lived in the 400’s B.C., made the first known mention of lake dwellings. He wrote of a lake-dwelling community located in Macedonia. Archaeologists first discovered the remains of prehistoric lake houses in 1853, in a lake near Zurich, Switzerland. The relics had been preserved by the waters of the lake and by the mud of the lake bottom. Since 1853, scientists have found the ruins of lake dwellings in various parts of Switzerland and beside lakes and streams of other countries in Europe. They have found weapons made of bone, stone, and metal, as well as crude pottery bowls and dishes, near the sites of the dwellings. Some of the pottery vessels still contained cereal grains and fruits. Scientists believe the pottery and weapons belonged to the owners of the dwellings.
Archaeologists have used the ruins of lake dwellings to learn about the early people who built the wooden houses. The scientists believe that there was a sequence, or series, of lake dwellings built in Europe. The first, and finest, of these dwellings were put up about 5,000 years ago, during the Neolithic period, or New Stone Age. Later peoples built lake dwellings during the Bronze and Iron ages.
The early people of Scotland and Ireland built primitive dwellings called crannogs in lakes and bogs. The name comes from the Celtic word crann, which means tree. These rude houses were artificial islands of wood, stones, and earth. Wooden stakes driven deep into the mud held the islands in place.
People in some parts of the world still live in wooden houses built on piles over the waters of a lake or bay. Some people in New Guinea, the Malay Archipelago, and Venezuela build lake dwellings for protection against enemies and floods.
