A 1-metre-high hillfort in a Lithuanian marsh

Marciūniškės piliakalnis, also known as Palatviškio sala, is a hillfort located in the Dusetai community of the Zarasai district. The site is situated in a marshy area on the southeastern shore of the lake, near the mouth of the Malatinėlė stream. To reach it, one can follow a path through the marsh for 100 metres from a nearby farm, heading southeast from the northern shore.

The hillfort features an oval courtyard measuring 30x16 metres, with a height of up to 1 metre. Archaeologists have found stone enclosure structures, stone axe heads with holes, stone scrapers, and pottery at the site. On the western slope, there is a 2-metre-wide terrace that ends in a terrace-like slope reaching up to 3 metres high, with the overall slope reaching up to 7 metres toward the water.

The hillfort is dated to between the 1st millennium BC and the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. Nature has left its mark on the structure, which is covered in heather and shows signs of erosion on its western slope. Around 1980, the hillfort was surrounded with spruce trees. Today, it remains a protected cultural monument covering an area of 8,100 square metres.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons