archaeology
aardvarchaeology | October 6, 2007Monday's entry about the Djurhamn sword rocketed up the lists at the social bookmarking sites, and so Wednesday became the best day for traffic ever here at Aard. On an average day in the third quarter of this year, the blog saw about 650 unique visitors. For Wednesday, the number was 52,200. Someone to whom I owe thanks submitted the entry to Digg -- under the heading "Offbeat News", the section for entertainingly shaped carrots and blurry phonecam clips of poor dear Britney Spears' genitalia.
Looking at sites that linked to the entry, I soon found with some amusement that the whole thing…
aardvarchaeology | October 3, 2007
On the excursion during the Sachsensymposium in Trondheim last month we visited Slipsteinsberget ("Grindstone Hill"). Not only did we visit the place, but the entire conference (some of whose participants were in their 70s) climbed around the whole hill (rain-sodden, wooded and steep) like mountain goats. Our guide was the charming Bodil Østerås, head of Egge Museum. Her 2002 Augmented Master's Thesis (No. hovedoppgave) Slipsteinsberget i Sparbu : kva eit klebersteinsbrot kan fortelje om gamle steinhoggartradisjonar deals mainly with the site we visited.
The hill consists mainly of…
aardvarchaeology | October 2, 2007
Today we finished fieldwork at the find spot of the sword I wrote about yesterday. Sieved 5 sqm without a single non-recent find, but the only way to know is to sieve. My dad came out with a pulley and removed the hazel stump that had been sitting on the sword, so we're pretty damn sure there wasn't anything else of interest within the confines of that trench.
Immediately outside the trench, though, began a quay foundation, taking the form of a straight c. 20 m long stensträng, a line of stone blocks, at a right angle to the incline. You can see it as a diagonal from top left to bottom…
aardvarchaeology | October 1, 2007
Happy Djurhamn project co-directors Katarina Schoerner and August Boj.
Aided by many volunteers and using tools borrowed from my dad and the Stockholm County Museum, I've spent the day getting the Djurhamn sword out of the ground.
I found the sword on 30 August while metal detecting around the Harbour of the Sheaf Kings. Today we marked out a 2.5 by 2.0 metre trench around the sword, got rid of a lot of vegetation, dug and sieved 2.5 square metres and got the sword out. Its point was wedged between the roots of a large hazel bush, so I only got it out in one piece thanks to its excellent…
aardvarchaeology | September 30, 2007
Two weeks ago when I worked for Thomas Englund and Bo Knarrström at the 1719 battlefield on Skogsö, I came across a variant on a type of archaeological site that I've blogged about before. A site where children have built and abandoned something, but this time it wasn't a tree house ruin: to me it looks more like the remains of an outdoor gym built by the cub scouts who periodically camp in a nearby house. You know, chin-ups and stuff.
To this end, the kids nailed and tied horizontal spires to trees, clumsily and with very little regard for the trees' well-being. While they were at it, they…
vhughes | September 28, 2007
Our Neanderthal ancestors probably cleaned their teeth, Spanish newspaper El Pais reported recently.
Spanish paleontologists recently uncovered two, 63,400-year-old tooth fossils near Madrid. The molars, found in near-perfect condition, once resided in the jaw of an approximately 30-year-old Neanderthal.
It's been 25 years since another human specimen has been unearthed from that region. But even more exciting, head researcher Juan Luis Asuarga told El Pais, is that the teeth showed grooves that were likely formed by some kind of pointed object—presumably, a small stick used for cleaning…
aardvarchaeology | September 27, 2007From today's issue of free subway paper Metro, I translate:
Hey there...
... Martin Rundkvist, 35, the archaeologist who has found a unique 16th century sword in the woods.
How did you make the find -- through cutting-edge methods?
-- I sat down in the lotus position and took in the vibrations with my astral antennae.
Astral antennae?
-- You've got to have long hair to take in the vibes. All hair dressers are paid by the government to cut off the astral antennae. They've got a hidden agenda, them hair dressers.
Really? So, how many lives do you think the sword has taken?
-- Well, it really…
aardvarchaeology | September 25, 2007
Found an early-16th century officer's sword at the Harbour of the Sheaf Kings. I tried to keep it quiet, but now the mainstream media want my ass. I'm seeing the County Archaeologist about an excavation permit this afternoon. More anon.
Media coverage: Metro, Radio Skaraborg, SVT, ABC-nytt, Radio Stockholm, Svenska Dagbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Östgöta Correspondenten, Jönköpingsposten, you tell me what else please.
[More blog entries about archaeology, history, Sweden, swords, 16thcentury; arkeologi, historia, Djurö, Värmdö, svärd, 1500-talet.]
aardvarchaeology | September 25, 2007
The twenty-fourth Four Stone Hearth blog carnival is on-line at Paddy K's Swedish Extravaganza. It's a particularly populous and witty edition. Check it out! Archaeology and anthropology to scratch your pubic lice and soothe your fear of the cave bear.
The next open hosting slot is on 24 October 7 November. All bloggers with an interest in the subject are welcome to volunteer to me. You don't have to be an anthropologist, but bipedalism is encouraged.
aardvarchaeology | September 22, 2007
Friday last week I did some met-det for Thomas Englund and Bo Knarrström at the 1719 battlefield at Baggensstäket on Skogsö, of which I've blogged before. This time I was directed to a hillside that had seen heavy musket fire. I may not have had much balls when I came there, but I certainly did when the day's work was done, before I handed my finds over to the guys. Above is an intact 1719 musket ball, either dropped by a shaky soldier or fired into soft earth. Below is a ball that has hit a rock. Getting hit by one of those 15 mm lead spheres was not an enjoyable experience, but at least…
aardvarchaeology | September 20, 2007
Here are the fruits of my ten hours of metal detecting in Kaga while Immo and Per mucked around with the magnetometer Wednesday and Thursday.
Top left is a spool-shaped copper-alloy handle, cast around a slim iron rod that's broken off at the lower end. There's indistinct cast relief decoration on the handle, and its shape and size are identical to those of 11th century key handles. These keys are L-shaped with prongs toward the end of the horizontal rod.
The next thingie is also a handle, belonging to a key or an ear scoop. El Cheapo openwork decoration typical of the 10th century, where…
aardvarchaeology | September 20, 2007Originally posted 19 September from my handheld via the cell network and e-mail to my old site.
Drove to Linköping this morning listening to the Digital Planet podcast, M Coast's latest album and a Povel Ramel hits collection. On site in Kaga I was greeted by my friendly National Heritage Board colleages Immo Trinks and Per Karlsson. They were busy assembling Scandinavian archaeology's first motorised magnetometer setup, and informed me that my site would see the equipment's first non-trial run.
The setup consists of a long trailer made of aluminium and held together by bronze and plastic…
aardvarchaeology | September 17, 2007My friend Howard Williams of the University of Exeter touched down at Arlanda airport in Sweden a couple of hours ago. He's here for a few weeks of study and also giving talks at four archaeology departments. Good stuff for all friends of the Dark Ages!
Wednesday 19th September, 13.00
University of Stockholm
'Memories in Miniature: New Perspectives on Artefacts and Commemoration in Early Medieval Britain c. 450-850 AD'
Thursday 20th September, 10.15
University of Uppsala
'The Archaeology of Early Medieval Commemoration'
Wednesday 26th September, 15.00
University of Lund
'The Archaeology of…
aardvarchaeology | September 17, 2007
Up until a thousand years ago, almost all buildings in Scandinavia through the ages had roof-supporting posts dug into the ground. Postholes are lovely things: they're deep enough for at least the bottom end to survive heavy ploughing, they trap a lot of interesting stuff while a house is being built - lived in - torn down, and their layout across the site lets you reconstruct the building in great detail.
When you machine off the ploughsoil from a site and find a posthole building foundation, it is common to mark the postholes with coloured sticks, paper plates or shaving foam and…
aardvarchaeology | September 14, 2007
Olof Eriksson skotkonungr (c. 980-1021) is the first man of whom historical sources of adequate quality tell that he managed to get himself elected king of both the Götar and the Svear. These tribal groups had previously been organised separately, and thus Olof may fairly be seen as the first king of Sweden as we know it.
Olof's main power base was the town of Sigtuna between Stockholm and Uppsala, founded by his father King Erik as a Christian replacement for the pagan trading post on Björkö (Biaerkey, latinicised Birca). Sigtuna was the site of Sweden's first known mint, where English…
aardvarchaeology | September 13, 2007The twenty-third Four Stone Hearth blog carnival is on-line at The John Hawks Anthropology Weblog. Check it out! Archaeology and anthropology to scratch your itch and soothe your yearnings.
The next open hosting slot is on 24 October. All bloggers with an interest in the subject are welcome to volunteer to me. You don't have to be an anthropologist -- you don't even have to be anthropoid!
aardvarchaeology | September 13, 2007
Being an archaeologist, I like tombs, and being a science fiction fan, I like Jules Verne. So you can imagine that I'd like Jules Verne's tomb regardless of what it looked like. As it turns out, David Nessle has pictures from Amiens showing the tomb in question, and it's an incredible piece of work. Look at the lettering! Look at that sculpture! "It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's Jules Verne who's been resurrected and learned to fly!"
[More blog entries about books, graves, julesverne, sf, sciencefiction; gravar, julesverne, sf, sciencefiction, böcker, läsning.]
aardvarchaeology | September 12, 2007Here's a story kindly brough to my attention by Tegumai, Paddy, Hans and Ian Joe (am I forgetting anyone?). Pub in Wirral near Liverpool is torn down in 1938 to make room for a car park. Buried wooden boat is found by demolition men, who are ordered to keep quiet and cover it up. Nottingham archaeologist Stephen Harding hears the rumour and locates the wreck with ground-penetrating radar, hopes to excavate it, suggests that it has Scandy traits, hopes for Viking Period date. There's little info so far, but I look forward to learning what kind of vessel they've got there!
aardvarchaeology | September 11, 2007
The Oseberg ship burial of Norway is a mind-blowing find, full of Early Viking Period carved woodwork and textiles of unparalelled quality. Dated by dendrochronology to AD 834, the long ship and its contents were sealed under a clay barrow, perfectly preserved when excavated in 1904. I consider myself a stakeholder in the Oseberg find, as it was excavated by Gotlander Gabriel Gustafson. In 1881-82 G.G. had performed the first excavations with useful documentation at the Barshalder cemetery on which I wrote my dissertation some 110 years later.
The Oseberg barrow was opened during the Viking…
aardvarchaeology | September 7, 2007I spent most of the past week with Professor Steve Steve at the Internationales Sachsensymposion in Trondheim, Norway. We had two and a half days of paper sessions and one day's bus excursion in the vicinity, all pertaining to post-Roman archaeology.
Here the professor is studying a Roman/Migration Period large-scale iron production site at Heglesvollen, a shieling in the mountains east of Trondheim. He's in animated conversation with two of his admirers, Oslo PhD students Ingunn Røstad and Gry Wiker.
Here's a piece of production slag that the professor found eroding out of the hillside at…