Thinking Through Images

Narrative, rhythm, embodiment and landscape in the Nordic Bronze Age

Christopher Tilley

• Publisher: Oxbow Books
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781789257021
• Topic: Sozialwissenschaften
• Subtopic: Archäologie

This book provides a general self-reflexive review and critical analysis of Scandinavian rock art from the standpoint of Chris Tilley's research in this area over the last thirty years. It offers a novel alternative theoretical perspective stressing the significance of visual narrative structure and rhythm, using musical analogies, putting particular emphasis on the embodied perception of images in a landscape context. Part I reviews the major theories and interpretative perspectives put forward to understand the images, in historical perspective, and provides a critique discussing each of the main types of motifs occurring on the rocks. Part II outlines an innovative theoretical and methodological perspective for their study stressing sequence and relationality in bodily movement from rock to rock. Part III is a detailed case study and analysis of a series of rocks from northern Bohuslän in western Sweden. The conclusions reflect on the theoretical and methodological approach being taken in relation to the disciplinary practices involved in rock art research, and its future.

PART I

Arias: motifs and interpretations

In total 611 motifs can be recognised on the rocks at Brastads-Backa, excluding cupmarks and fragments or unidentifiable designs. Of these, 60% occur on the southern series and 40% in the northern series of rocks. The major designs, as elsewhere in Scandinavian rock art are few in number but repetitively executed, consisting of boats of various forms, humans, feet/shoe-soles, animals (primarily horses and red deer), birds (cranes and ducks or other aquatic species), carts, discs, circles and so-called ‘sun stands’. A very small number of others occur that are numerically infrequent (see Figs 2.15, 2.19, 2.21, 2.26, 2.28–2.31, 3.2 and 4.1; Tables 1 & 2).

In this first section, I discuss the manner in which these design forms have been interpreted and understood in the broad context of the literature on Scandinavian Bronze Age rock art. Figure 2.1 shows the most frequently mentioned areas and locations discussed. I then analyse in a general and preliminary way the specific forms these different motifs take on the rocks at Brastads-Backa to form a background to the more detailed analysis of the carved rocks undertaken in Part III. The location and numbering of the rocks are shown in Figure 3.2.

Boats

The boat would have represented, in a general sense, the most sophisticated woodworking technologies to exist in the Bronze Age world requiring considerable skill in their production and use. Lives depended on these skills and woodworking techniques, long developed, are highly likely to have been transferred to producing images in stone. In particular, the production of boat images materially embodies the care and attention to detail expressed in the making of real boats. They are consistently some of the most elaborated of all the carvings. This is a culture in which boats were both socially and symbolically important, as evidenced by their sheer frequency on the rocks compared with all the other figurative designs. The individuality in which boats are depicted in a dazzling array of forms and styles contrasts markedly with the creation of other kinds of images that tend to be much more standardised in character.

Boats were of crucial significance as a local means of transport along the coasts, within island archipelagos running along both the North Sea coast of Scandinavia, the Baltic and inland along river systems, and for deep sea and local fishing (Glob 1969; Malmer 1981; Kaul 1998). They allowed the acquisition of marine resources and the means of communication between the Danish islands and Sweden, between Jutland and Norway and beyond.

The more general significance of the frequency of boat representations in Scandinavian rock art has been explained in a number of contrasting ways. The three main interpretations that are currently dominant are that a) they are primarily visual expressions of myths and cosmologies, b) they are linked to death cults, and c) they had functional significance in relation to long-distance trade and exchange and acquisition of metals, other raw materials and finished artefacts in the European Bronze Age world. Many scholars eclectically combine aspects of all these three perspectives in their accounts.

There have been two opposing ways of understanding what the boat images represent. The first is that they are mythological images and bear little relationship to the appearance of real boats in the Bronze Age. As expressions of myths and cosmologies they have been argued to refer to, or be inspired by, Mediterranean rather than Nordic vessels or even be depictions of miniature ships employed in rituals. Specific details shown such as prow head images did not really exist (Almgren 1927; Althin 1945; Marstrander 1963: 79–80; Malmer 1981: 32; 1989; and see Hauptman Wahlgren 2000 and Goldhahn & Ling 2013 for historical reviews). The other converse perspective shared by many is that the boat depictions provide valuable evidence for the actual appearance and use of boats in the Bronze Age (Kaul 1995; 1998; 2004; Helskog 1999; Kristiansen 2004; Coles 2005; Kristiansen & Larsson 2005; Ling 2014).

Figure 2.1 The most frequently mentioned areas and places in southern Scandinavia discussed in the book. 1: Jutland, 2 Fuen, 3 Zealand, 4 Skåne, 5 Halland, 6 Småland, 7 Öland, 8 Gotland, 9 Bohuslän, 10 Västergötland, 11 Östergötland, 12 Södermanland, 13 Uppland, 14 Østfold, 15 Vestfold. B: Balkåkra; F: axe mound; Fp: Fogdarp; K: Kivik cairn; Ka: Klinta; S: Sagaholm barrow; St: Stockhult; T: Tanum Unesco World Heritage Site for rock carvings; V: Viksø.

There has been much discussion with regard to what types of boats are depicted: dugout canoes, hide boats or plank built wooden boats. Marstrander (1963; 1979) and Strömberg (1983) suggest that hide boats are indicated while a majority of scholars now believe that plank built rowing boats are most likely (Crumlin-Pedersen 2003b; Kaul 2004; Ling 2014). Given the huge range in the size and styles of the boats being represented it may be, as Coles has suggested (1993; 2005: 22), that a wide range of different boat types is indicated, the largest and most elaborate probably being plank built vessels.

Such are their frequency that sometimes boats on individual carving surfaces are consistently referred to by scholars in terms of fleets and flotillas being depicted but this may be misleading. Looked at in detail each boat appears to have its own personality and individual identity. This individualisation suggests that some were carved as acts of memorialisation of the building of real boats. This might account for the large numbers and their significant stylistic differences. It would also suggest that boats were conceived as having a soul and a spirit. They were animate forms akin to animals and birds and people. They would have had individual names, as boats do today, and their own personal biographies and personalities. The personality of the boat was an extension of that of the boat builder, or in the case of the larger boats, the wider community.

Table 1. The frequency of the main motif types on the rocks in the southern series at Brastads-Backa arranged in sequence from the southernmost rock to the most northerly in the series

Only free-standing humans are counted, not those in boats. Animals pulling carts and ards also excluded from number counts. Other motifs: Rock 26: one cloven hoof print; Rock 18:1: two meandering lines; 3 ards; Rock 15: one single and one double spiral; Rock 16:1: one double spiral, one tree-like motif; one meandering line

Table 2. The frequency of the main motif types on the rocks in the northern series at Brastads-Backa arranged in sequence from the southern most rock to the most northerly in the series

Only free-standing humans are counted, not those in boats. Animals pulling carts also excluded from number counts. Other motifs: Rock 1:1A three ards; three T formed spirals; one tree-like motif; one axe-hammer; one net/‘ladder’; Rock 5: one cloven hoof print

The designs seem to represent very different kinds of vessels ranging from small boats used in the relatively calm and safe waters of the Bohuslän archipelago for fishing and travelling to much larger ones capable of long-distance open sea travel. Most of the larger and more significant boats at Brastads-Backa are decorated with stylised animal (horse or deer) or bird heads or elaborated spirals on the prows at the bow and stern. These sea-going vessels are not only more elaborate but bigger and more robust.

The size or capacity of these boats may also be indicated by the number of crew strokes present. The crew of the larger vessels are, in almost all cases, depicted as simple anonymous crew strokes signifying the collectivity, rather than boat ownership by individual persons or families. Ling’s study of the boat images from northern Bohuslän shows that, among the total of 418 studied boat depictions from the EBA in the parishes of Kville, Svenneby and Bottna, a large proportion have 6–13 crew strokes, with seven being by far the most common while 51 boats have no crew strokes at all. The results for the Tanum area are remarkably similar: a total of 276 boat depictions with crew strokes and 47 with no crew strokes; the number of crew strokes ranges from 6–14 and seven is by far the most common number (Ling 2014: fig. 10.6). These figures may indicate that in these areas there was a similar way of building, dimensioning and crewing real boats during the EBA. Furthermore, the length of the boat depictions is generally 30–35 cm and the hull is 15–25 cm long (Ling 2014: figs 10.7 and 10.8). The height of the crew strokes is generally 2–5 cm. These dimensions increase with the number of crew strokes. For instance, boats with 13–15 crew are in general 45–55 cm long and their hulls 30–40 cm.

A total of 433 boat images with crew strokes classified to the LBA derive from the parishes of Kville, Svenneby and Bottna. The number of crew is mostly in the range 6–11, with, again seven by far the most common number. Another 134 boat images from the LBA in these parishes have no crew strokes at all. There are two sites with boat images that have 38 crew strokes (Kville 149: 1–2).

The 503 LBA boat images that Ling studied from Tanum parish are generally similar in terms of both size and number of crew strokes (Ling 2014: 194). The number of crew depicted on the decorated late Bronze Age razors in Danish graves is, by contrast, in the range of 20–60 people (Bradley 2008). This may in itself indicate that these were depictions of exceptional vessels – ‘warships’ according to some, or ceremonial boats that may not have existed in reality.

Ellmers, discussing the decorated early Bronze Age (Period Ib) Rørby sword, a votive deposit and part of a pair found in a bog in western Zealand, Denmark, notes that the boat image on it is depicted with the crew arranged in 16 pairs. Each person is shown as a single line with a dot for the head. In addition, there are depictions of single crew members at the prow and stern steering or propelling the boat (Ellmers 1995). He argues that this is a pictorial image of the manner in which boats were actually manoeuvered and used for over 3500 years in prehistoric and historic times. A crew of up to 20 as a possible norm for larger sea-going vessels engaged in long-distance journeying from the early Bronze Age onwards seems much more likely from other lines of evidence.

The Hjortspring plank-built ‘war canoe’ was found in a bog on the small island of Als, in southern Jutland, Denmark (Kaul 1998; 2003; Randsborg 1995; Crumlin-Pedersen 2003b; and see discussion in Ling 2014). Constructed primarily of lime it is dated to the pre-Roman Iron Age (PRIA) (mid-late 4th century BC) and has been held to exemplify the existence of a long tradition of building boats in this style from the early Bronze Age. It was made as a delicate shell around one central bottom strake or keel with sawn overlapping timber planks sewn together. The boat is estimated to have been 18–19 m long with its interior 13–14 m long. The maximum external breadth was 2 m and the height amidships 0.75 m with an estimated weight of 530 kg. It had ten thwarts set about one metre apart with carved seats giving room for around 20 paddlers sitting side by side in pairs, together with additional space for two persons at the helms (Crumlin–Pedersen 2003a; 2003b).

Another plank-built boat find from Haugvik, Norway dated 840–420 cal BC, this time made of pine, establishes beyond doubt the existence of plank built boats in the late Bronze Age and a long and established tradition of building boats of this sort (Sylvester 2006).

Ling notes that given that the depictions of the boats on the rocks are almost always in profile with only a few exceptions, the numbers of crew depicted might be twice those depicted if they were shown as sitting in pairs i.e. as around 40 crew strokes with additions to the aft and the stern (Ling 2014: 189). However, the vast majority of rock art ships irrespective of age or location have visual proportions corresponding fairly well with that of the Hjortspring boat. The hull constitutes about 80% of its total length and the prows and keel extensions about 20% (see Figs 2.15–2.17).

Much has been made of the fact that the Hjortspring boat was found together with one of the largest finds of weapons in Scandinavia made up of 169 spearheads, 11 swords, 50 shields and remains of chain-mail coats, indicating that it was intended for military and ceremonial purposes (Randsborg 1995; Kaul 2003). But a military purpose for at least some of the larger boats cannot be generalised and there are other possibly far more significant ways to understand the dominance of boat images in the rock art. The fleeting and moving characteristics of the boats when viewed in the water are in many ways akin to the graceful movements of deer on the land (see Ling & Rowlands 2015). They might be regarded as equivalents but occupying different domains. There is a strong association with the wild and movement rather than domestic fixity. Ling has envisaged a boat being carved on the surface of the rocks as commemorating its inception or final launch and naming (Ling 2012; 2014).

The largest boats are likely to represent the community as a whole and the smaller vessels individual people or family units. This would account for the large number of boats and the variability of the images. Some appear to be dominant images on individual rocks. Others are small or fragmentary symbolic tokens of the significance of travelling by water and fishing in everyday domestic life. There is a clear emphasis on animism: the boats had spirits or personalities and biographies. Some of the boats have humans depicted in them. These are not rowers (paddles are very rarely depicted) but special people with upraised hands and postures suggesting greeting or waving on departure or arrival.

The arrival and departure of the open sea-going vessels would have constituted major events in the life of the community and some of the most dramatic moments. Many have argued that the passage of boats across the sea and their return would have provided a major source of narratives and stories about the past and the present associated with the movement of boats and the deeds of those who moved with them. Their significance has been linked with the impact of imported raw materials and bronze. Boats were the material medium through which the local community was commemorated and valorised and through which immaterial knowledges were acquired, reproduced or transformed over the course of time. Ling (2014) suggests that concentrations of rock carvings in Bohuslän, and elsewhere, may signify the places from which social elites embarked on their journeys to distant worlds.

The embellishment of the boat prows and the additional provision of impressive keel extensions in many cases during the late Bronze Age signify that these boats were made to impress others and perhaps, in particular, exchange partners. They might indeed have a magical effect in inducing others to give up their wealth, as Gell (1998) has argued in relation to Trobriand canoes and their role in kula shell exchange. The boats themselves, their size, magnificence and elegance, would directly contribute to the fame and prestige...