Rulership in 1st to 14th century Scandinavia

Royal graves and sites at Avaldsnes and beyond

Dagfinn Skre

• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9783110425796
• eBook ISBN:
  9783110421156
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Ancient History

Germanische Altertumskunde Online ( Germanic Antiquity Studies Online ) – just like the Reallexikon that has merged with it – is accompanied by supplementary volumes. This series comprises both monographs and edited volumes on specific topics from the fields of archaeology, history, and literary studies. It thus expands the database with the inclusion of aspects that require comprehensive analysis. More than 100 volumes have now appeared, from Germanenproblemen in heutiger Sicht ( The Problems of Germanic Peoples from a Contemporary Perspective ) to Germanische Altertumskunde im Wandel ( Germanic Antiquity Studies in Flux ).

2 Intraregional Diversity. Approaching Changes in Political Topographies in South-western Norway through Burials with Brooches, AD 200–1000

Mari Arentz Østmo

University of Oslo, Museum of Cultural History, postboks 6762, St. Olavs plass, NO-0160, Oslo, Norway

This chapter addresses socio-political structure and change through the examination of spatial and temporal differences in the deposition of brooches in burial contexts and aspects of burial practices. Diachronic sub-regions within Rogaland and parts of southern Hordaland are inferred, enabling a further address of the trajectories within sub-regions and how they interrelate in ongoing socio-political processes. The paradox of observed concurrent processes of homogenisation and upsurges of local or regional particularities is addressed through the theoretical framework of globalisation. Within the study area, the sub-regions of Jæren and the Outer coast/Karmsund appear most defined throughout the period AD 200–1000. Here, quite different trajectories are observed, indicating a parallel development of different practices and sub-regional identities.

2.1 Introduction

Throughout the Iron Age, dress accessories included brooches, clasps, and pins that held garments together while simultaneously adding decorative and communicative elements to the dress. While the functional aspects of brooches are persistent, their form and ornamentation vary greatly within the first millennium AD; the typologies of brooches thus constitute a major contribution to the development of Iron Age chronology (Klæsøe 1999:89; Kristoffersen 2000:67; Lillehammer 1996; Røstad 2016a). As such, the brooches deposited in burials provide an exceptional opportunity to address both spatial and temporal variations in burial practices, and furthermore in the social groups that performed those rituals.

Regionality, defined as the spatial dimension of cultural differences (Gammeltoft and Sindbæk 2008:7), is here approached on a microscale, focusing on intra-regional diversity in the selective and context-specific use of a particular part of material culture, namely the brooches. This article draws on basic notions within ‘materiality-oriented’ theory, particularly the co-constitution of people and things where the objects both embody intentionality and mediate social agency, and thereby may both become a material citation of an owner o...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Section A: The West-Scandinavian Coast
• 2 Intraregional Diversity. Approaching Changes in Political Topographies in South-western Norway through Burials with Brooches, AD 200–1000
• Section B: Rulership in First-Millennium Scandinavia
• 4 Between Tribe and Kingdom – People, Land, and Law in Scandza AD 500–1350
• 5 The Ship Graves on Kormt – and Beyond
• Section C: The High-Medieval Royal Manor
• 7 The Royal Edifice at Avaldsnes: A Palatium for the King or a Residence for his Canons?
• 8 Avaldsnes’ Position in Norway in the 14th Century