Around two million of these old piles are still in Lake Constance. They come from around 200 settlements that people built into the lake during the Stone and Bronze Ages (4,300-847 BC). Covered and protected by water, they have been preserved to this day. What can they tell us?

These timbers provide information about the location, size, shape, arrangement and extent of the villages. Tool marks allow us to draw conclusions about their manufacture and the structure of the houses. The tree rings report climate changes and the composition of the forest during the time of the pile dwellers.

These wooden witnesses from bygone times are the basis for the reconstructed pile dwellings in our open-air museum.