period are comparatively speaking very scarce in Denmark; but also that the cairns, stone-circles, and standing stones, which are characteristic of the iron-period, and which are to be found in such considerable numbers in Norway and Sweden, at once stop at the old borders of Denmark, where they are completely unknown, and where again the remains of the bronze-period, which are nearly unknown in Norway, and the northern part of Sweden, are exceedingly common. This seems to afford a strong argument that the civilization of the iron-period, which can first be traced with any certainty in Sweden and Norway, as late as the fourth and fifth centuries, must have been completely introduced into Denmark at a still later date. It is in that respect worth observing, that the tombs of this period in Norway, and Sweden, consist of barrows of the old fashion, in which the bodies were interred after having been burnt; but, that the tombs in Denmark belonging to the same period form large burying-grounds, in which the bodies were buried unburnt. This custom does seem not to have prevailed before, in the transition from paganism to Christianity ; on which account, there have been found in these burying-places, both in Switzerland and in the south of Germany, Christian inscriptions and Christian emblems.
The remains of the iron-period in Denmark are scarcely sufficient to fill up a couple of centuries, before the first commencement of Christianity, (826); and we cannot therefore carry the complete introduction of the civilization of the iron-period into Denmark farther back, than to the sixth and seventh centuries.
About the year 500, it seems to have been introduced into Mecklenburg, as the Slavonic people took possession of the land, which was left by the Saxon people, who went over to England. But the civilization was sooner and more easily introduced into Mecklenburg by the new invading people than into Denmark; where evidently, the same people who lived there in the bronze-period continued to keep possession of the
