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The Mont Lassois is a prominent escarpment outlier located in the commune of Vix near Châtillon-sur-Seine in the North of the French département of Côte-d'Or. With an altitude of roughly 100m, it overlooks the upper valley of the Seine. A 12th-century church, classified as a historical monument, is built on its top. An archaeological excavation is also in progress ; notorious archaeological finds of the Hallstatt culture were discovered.
Geography and flora
The Mont Lassois has a North-South oriented J shape. Its main piece, with a 306,4 m summit, is named Mont Saint-Marcel and its secondary piece, 280 m high and East-West oriented is called Mont Roussillon. The church of Saint-Marcel is located at the junction of these two pieces.
It is covered of copse and forest with wide grassy glades on its upper slopes, and cereal and fodder crops on its lower slopes. After being abandoned in the early 20th century, vineyards were implanted again in the 1980s. It consists of pinot noir and chardonnay dedicated to the production of crémant of the Châtillonnais.
Cetlic period
This oppidum overlooking the Seine river was settled since the Neolithic. It seemed to be controlling the antique tin trade route from Great Britain to Italy at the end of the Hallstatt1. The Palace of Vix and the fortified city surrounding it are a testimony to this period. Ruled by a female aristocracy in the 6th century BC, the local celtic population probably benefited from this location to tax passing convoys. The resulting wealth can be seen through the lavishness of its tombs built in the fashion of the chariot tomb. Among other finds, a very rich tumulus enshrining the remains of a woman, probably a queen of a priestess is a revealing element of the status of women in Celtic society. The population of the Mont Lassois seems to temporarily dwindle to the benefit of the Lingones of Vertillum from 20km away.
Archaeological excavation
This hiatus in settlement between the late Hallstatt and the gallo-roman period has left traces of the Celtic civilisation more accessible to excavation than on other sites where the two historical layers have succeeded directly.
As of the 19th century, protohistoric chariot tombs are discovered not far from there at Sainte-Colombe-sur-Seine. One of them produced a large bronze lebes of Etruscan or Anatolian origin kept at the musée du Pays châtillonnais and in another one were found gold jewelry, bracelets and earrings, kept at the musée d'Archéologie national in Saint-Germain-en-Laye. Excavation started in 1930 of the mid and lower part of the hill by Jean Lagorgette, seconded by Maurice Moisson, led to the recovery of gallo-roman material. The excavation resumed after the war, and in january 1953, interest for the archaeological potential of the site was renewed following the discovery of the krater and the Vix grave in a bend of the Seine by Maurice Moisson and René Joffroy.
From 2002 on, new excavation on the oppidum hilltop lead to the discovery of the vestiges of the Palace of Vix, a large unit among a complex of several buildings akin to a city, which is a new phenomenon at this time in the Celtic world. This excavation, carried out by teams of archaeologists from Germany (University of Kiel and Stuttgart), Austria (University of Vienna), France (University of Burgundy) and Switzerland (University of Zurich) managed by Bruno Chaume has since allowed a massive peripheral rempart circling the base of the hill to be unearthed. It features an opening on its North side toward the riverbed of the Seine. What is likely a agricultural exploitation in the plain below was also uncovered, near the discovery site of the Vix krater, and a sanctuary already identified and investigated.