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abs tr act
The main topics examined in this paper concern chronological aspects of agrarian
settlements and land use in the Viking Age and the Middle Ages, and the methods for
ascribing farms to these periods. Traditionally, prehistoric and medieval place names,
especially farm names, and Iron Age burials have played an important role in assessing
the development of rural settlements in Norway and the rest of Scandinavia. The
validity of these criteria can, however, be questioned. The paper presents some recent
archaeological case studies of eleven farms in western Norway to assess this question.
The selected farms represent different physical conditions for subsistence in relation to
topography, available resources and territorial extent, located in different landscapes
at different altitudes from coast to inland. These investigations showed that farms that
have been considered as medieval or from the Late Iron Age may have a considerably
longer history than earlier recognised and that the place name chronology and other
traditional criteria for dating the origin and development of farms is less reliable than
commonly thought.
Keywords: Rural settlements, agrarian landscapes, dating, place name chronology,
western Norway.
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regional diversity in settlement patterns and land use should be expected and
taken into account.
t he s tat e of re s e a rch
Until the 1970s, archaeological investigations of prehistoric and medieval agrarian settlements dealt mainly with small abandoned and rather marginal single
farms, especially in the south-western and western part of Norway, focussing
on house constructions and the layout of the farmhouses (e.g. Petersen, 1932;
1936; Hagen, 1953). In the 70s and 80s, ecological and environmental issues
were increasingly taken into consideration and studied by help of interdisciplinary approaches and methodologies. Farm structure, access to resources and
the character of local topography gained more interest, and structures such as
clearance cairns and lynchets became new fields of research, but still limited
to single site analyses or abandoned farms (e.g. Salvesen, 1977; Randers, 1982;
Kaland, 1987; Martens, 1989). deserted farms with their fossilised structures
and landscapes are undoubtedly important archaeological study objects. yet,
as abandonment was generally a fate that befell marginal farms that had been
run for limited periods, such farms are hardly representative of prehistoric
and medieval farms in general. Studies from the 1960s into the 80s of socalled farm-mounds in northern Norway accumulated masses and deposits
of household refuse and ruins of buildings have for instance demonstrated
strong continuity in settlement and land use, in many cases from the Early Iron
Age to the present (Munch, 1966; Bertelsen, 1979). Similar continuity should
also be expected in western Norway and other topographically scattered and
demarcated agrarian landscapes. Long term continuity from the Bronze Age to
historic times was for instance documented in such landscapes in Sunnmre as
early as the 1950s (Johnson & Prescott, 1993).
In the last few decades, large scale rescue excavations based on mechanical stripping of topsoil have been carried out in more central agricultural
landscapes, most extensively in the Oslofjord region (Brdseth, 2008; gjerpe,
2008). Larger expanses of features and structures have been exposed, such as
postholes outlining buildings, hearths, pits and other features, both in seemingly blank spaces and beneath more obvious earthworks. Plough-marks,
cultivation layers and clearance cairns have also been uncovered. Such large
scale excavations based on surface-stripping have clearly demonstrated that
earthworks and structures visible above the surface, such as house grounds
and/or burial monuments, do not give a representative expression of prehistoric and medieval settlements and land use. Revealing structures over larger
areas beneath the surface, they indicate both stable and shifting land use and
settlements in a long time perspective from the late Stone Age to the Middle
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Ages. In many cases such structures are located within the territories of historic farms, but the settlements have, to some extent, also moved within these
areas, as shown in southern parts of Sweden and in denmark. At the same
time, continuity of land use has been documented within the catchment area
of historic farms. Some of these excavations, both in western Norway (e.g.
Ringstad, 1998; 2000; diinhoff, 2005; 2008; 2009) and in other regions (e.g.
Rnne, 2005), have also revealed house structures and prehistoric settlements
close to the historic farm settlements, signifying continuity from the Early Iron
Age, if not earlier. However, only a few medieval house grounds have been
uncovered, which may be explained either by stability in settlement, or that
present buildings cover older structures (Martens, 2009).
Altogether, archaeological studies of agrarian landscapes and settlements
have been carried out on different scales and with different techniques in different landscapes. generally, they have been associated with individual sites as
parts of smaller or larger rescue excavations and have been published as reports.
They have given a more diverse and complex picture of prehistoric settlements
and of processes that may vary regionally, and do not always appear synchronically in all types of landscapes. So far, analyses of the survey data have not
provided regional syntheses of agrarian settlements.
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Zone 4
Zone 3
Zone 2
Zone 1
Farm's
Nucleus and Cattle lane
Settlement
Area
Infield arable fields
and meadows
Close outfield
meadows and pastures
Distant outfield
pastures and close shielings
Mountainous areas
distant shielings
Fig. 1. different zones within the farms territory according to use and use rights.
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Sivertsen, 2006; Stre, 2008; Foyn, 2008) and a Phd project (Zehetner, 2007).
Altogether, eleven farms have been investigated. Two are from the county of
Hordaland and nine from the Sognefjord area (Fig. 2). The research areas have
been chosen to represent different physical conditions for subsistence in relation to topography, available resources and territorial extent. They are located
in different landscapes at different altitudes from coast to inland, with settlement areas varying from c.40 to 450 masl. The farming areas include: terraces in
a fjord mouth (Indre Matre) or close to a fjord with access to vast outfields and
pastures (Havr, Rnset, Ssol, grinde, Ornes and Kroken), a remote valley
(Jostedalen in Sogn with the farms Nedrelid and Kruna) or high-lying mountain plateaus (Lee and Ormelid). Some of them have prehistoric burial mounds,
others do not. Some have old farm names, while others have younger names.
Although some have a central location, others are in more marginal areas, as
they were known in historic times. They represent single farms and agglomerations as well as freehold farms and subordinate farms within larger estates. In this
way they represent different types of historic farms and supplement investigations of deserted farms and rescue excavations of more random areas.
Using the traditional criteria for assessing the genesis of farms mainly
prehistoric burials, farm names, relative size and earliest historic records (Table
1), six farms and probably also a seventh, would be classified as prehistoric
(marked in bold), either from the Early (500 BC570 Ad) or Late Iron Age
(5701000 Ad). Four farms have visible traces of burials close to the historic
settlement areas or as demarcations of the historically known borders of the
resource areas. Only two of the farm names are of a prehistoric type, as shown
by their suffixes: Rnset (set-name) and Lee (vin-name). The other names
refer to topographical or cultural features, and can hardly be dated on this basis.
Two are mentioned in documents from the early fourteenth century (Ssol
and Havr). According to the relative value (r.v.) of the farms in the Early
Modern Period, they vary from smaller farms, clearly below the average, to
units about double the average farm sizes of the surrounding districts. Some of
them must, however, have included larger areas at an earlier stage, while others have more permanent topographical borders. According to this criterion, a
seventh farm, Havr, would probably be classified as prehistoric, and only one
(Ssol) as medieval. The rest, Nedrelid, Kruna and Ormelid would be seen
as possible or probable medieval farms, as they are first mentioned in the late
sixteenth century.
The archaeological investigations can be used to test these criteria. As indicators of farms, traces of permanent or stable farming in the inner zones can
be counted. Altogether 222 trenches, some of them trial pits were excavated,
and altogether 291 14C-datings were taken from different layers showing agricultural activities (Table 2). Without going into the empirical results in more
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Farm
name
Municipality
Farm
no
Burials
Name
Class
Size
productivity
r. v. 1647
Earliest
records
in written
sources
(Indre)
Matre
Kvinnherad
250
IA grave- Culture
field)
0.81
1314
Havr
Ostery
68
Nature
1.75
1303
Rnset
Hyllestad
71
-set
1.2
1520
Ssol
Hyllestad
78
0.7
c.132060
grinde
Leikanger
BA (?)
Culture
1.7
c.1360
Nedrelid
191
Nature
1.28
1596
Kruna
Luster
208
Culture?
1596
Ormelid
(Lid?)
Luster
0.56
1596
Ornes
Luster
91
BA/EIA
Nature
1.98
1308/09
Kroken
Luster
Nature
1.9
1298
Lee
Vik
vin
0.7
c.1360
69 & 182
54
Table 1. Traditional criteria for dating farms to the medieval period or earlier.
The average farm is given the value of 1.
detail, some trends should be mentioned. Ten out of eleven farms show traces
of agricultural land use at an earlier stage than the burials and names indicate.
The oldest traces of agricultural activity in the Late Neolithic period (LN;
24001750 BC) and Early Bronze Age (EBA; 17501100 BC) probably reflect
periodical use of wider areas which did not require more permanent settlement
and cannot be directly connected with the later farms. Recent open area excavations have, however, uncovered traces of houses connected with arable cultivation and agricultural activities from the Late Neolithic, the Bronze Age (BA)
and Early Iron Age (EIA) in western Norway (e.g. Ringstad, 2000; diinhoff,
2005; 2007). Excavations in other regions in Norway and Scandinavia (e.g.
Rnne, 2005) also open up for sedentary farming at a very early stage.
Another interesting observation is that intensification, identified as thicker
layers of artificial and modified soil, repeatedly dug over and fertilised with
dung and otherwise improved, started in the Late Bronze Age (LBA; 1100500
BC) at some of the farms, and in the Early Iron Age at others. Traces of the
most intensive use at all farms have been located in the inner zones, indicating
sedentary farming and long term continuity of land use.
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Municipality
Farm
no
Trenches
(N=222)
14Cdatings
(N=291)
Oldest
traces
Farmindicating
traces
Intensification
Indre
Matre
Kvinnherad
250
31
29
LBA
EIA
LIA
Havr
Ostery
68
27
31
LN/BA
EIA
LIA
Rnset
Hyllestad
71
14
30
BA
EIA
LIA
Ssol
Hyllestad
78
13
31
LN
MP
EMA
grinde
Leikanger
25
24
LN
BA/ EIA
LIA
Nedrelid
Luster
191
12
12
LBA
MP
EMA
Kruna
Luster
208
EMA
MA
Ormelid
Luster
28
19
BA
EIA
LIA
Ornes
Luster
91
14
37
LN/BA
BA/EIA
LIA
Kroken
Luster
69&182
42
34
LN/BA
EIA
LIA
Lee
Vik
54
17
25
LN/BA
BA/EIA
LIA
Farm
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datings. The results of the pollen analyses that were carried out generally correspond to and confirm the archaeological results.
It should be noted that only four of the ten farms with apparent prehistoric
origins have burial mounds or burial cairns within their historic resource areas.
Where burials occur, they are located close to the historical habitation area or
close to borders of the infield that were visible from roads and sea routes a
pattern also known from other parts of the country (degaard, 2010). If one
interprets burial monuments as demarcations of ancestral freehold land and
indicators of land rights and social stratification (cf. Skre, 1997; Iversen, 1999;
2005), it is interesting to observe that the cairns are located to the three larger
clustered farms in the project, of which Ornes and Kroken were nuclei in
larger medieval estates. As demonstrated by Iversen (1999), there is a significant statistical concurrence of burial mounds and historical records of freehold
farms or main farms of larger estates in western Norway. There is also a general
lack of burial mounds on medieval tenanted farms and farms that were parts of
larger medieval estates. The absence of burial monuments on tenanted farms
in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period may therefore indicate some
kind of subordinate status even at an earlier stage.
concl us ions
The studies referred to, open up new perspectives, not only with regard to
agricultural land use, but also to the dating of farms and settlements and the
understanding of the social landscape. Farms that have been considered as
medieval or from the Late Iron Age may have had a considerably longer history than hitherto recognised. The implication being that the place name
chronology and other traditional criteria for dating the origin and development
of farms is less reliable than commonly thought. This should be taken into
consideration when assessing the timing of the expansion of settlements and
demographic development in the Viking Period and Early Middle Ages. At the
same time the studies confirm that this was a period of intensive farming and
subdivisions, but often within older agricultural landscapes.
Only further archaeological examinations of rural landscapes and historical
farms can confirm whether the trends observed in western Norway are representative of other regions. The split up topography of western Norway would
seem to limit the farming areas and a pattern of burial mounds close to historical farm nuclei and boundaries make it easier to discover the tendencies mentioned. Results from rescue excavations using open air stripping do, however,
to a large extent concur with the trends of the case studies referred to, although
in a more random way. different methodologies and different landscapes and
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regions all show the similar tendency that the agrarian landscapes and settlements are older than earlier reckoned, even in marginal landscapes. Without
depending on each other, the different approaches and methods that have been
used, complement each other and strengthen the validity of the results.
The combined use of archaeology, written sources and later structures thus
holds a large potential for understanding the development of land use, settlement and social organisation.
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