Memory, Society and Material Culture: Papers from the Third Theoretical Seminar of the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at the University of Latvia, October 5-6,2007 9984451445, 9789984451442

Table of contents :
The Third Baltic Archaeological Seminar (BASE-3): Introduction / Andris Šnē 7
Valter Lang: Archaeology and Its Wastebasket: Remembering, Forgetting, and Recycling in Archaeological Research 11
Andris Šnē: Society, Identity, and Memory: Memories of the Past in the Archaeological Remains 17
Mika Lavento: Deconstructing Memories in Archaeology: Burial Cairns as Signs of Memories 29
Heidi Luik: Skill, Knowledge, and Memory: How to Make a Bone Awl Properly? 45
Algimantas Merkevičius: Material Culture and Social Memory in the East Baltic Societies during the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age 59
Anna Wessman: Reclaiming the Past: Using Old Artefacts as a Means of Remembering 71
Andrejs Vasks: Burials on Settlement Sites: Memories of Ancestors or Dissociation? 89
Andra Simniškytė: Memory and Identity: Genuine or Fake? Once More on the Question of the "Selonian" Culture 99
Sami Raninen: Martial Themes of the Iron Age: the Constitution of a Warrior 111
Risto Nurmi: (The) Memory Remains: the Immaterial Remnants of the Toll Fence in Tornio Town 121

Citation preview

INTER AR CH AEO LO G IA, 3

Official publication of University o f Latvia University o f Tartu University o f Vilnius University of Helsinki

Interarchaeologia

Organisational and Editorial Board Valter Lang Mika Lavento Algimantas Merkevičius Reda Nemickiene Andris Šnē Andrej s Vasks Anna Wessman

University o f Tartu University o f Helsinki University o f Vilnius University o f Vilnius University o f Latvia University o f Latvia University o f Helsinki

Interarchaeologia is a peer-reviewed publication o f extended presentations held at the theoretical seminars o f the Baltic archaeologists (BASE).

Interarchaeologia, 3 Memory, Society, and Material Culture

Editors: Andris Šnē and Andrejs Vasks English editor: Māra Antenišķe Lay-out: Andra Liepiņa

Printed in Latvia by “Latgales druka”

ISSN 1736-2806 ISBN 978-9984-45-144-2

INTER AR CH AEO LO G IA, 3

MEMORY, SOCIETY, AND MATERIAL CULTURE Papers from the Third Theoretical Seminar of the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at the University of Latvia, October 5-6, 2007

Edited by Andris Šnē and Andrejs Vasks

Rīga - Helsinki - Tartu - Vilnius 2009

Contents

The Third Baltic Archaeological Seminar (BASE-3): Introduction (Andris Šnē)

7

Valter Lang Archaeology and Its Wastebasket: Remembering, Forgetting, and Recycling in Archaeological R esearch......................

11

Andris Šnē Society, Identity, and Memory: Memories of the Past in the Archaeological Remains

17

Mika Lavento Deconstructing Memories in Archaeology: Burial Cairns as Signs of Memories

29

Heidi Luik Skill, Knowledge, and Memory: How to Make a Bone Awl Properly?

45

Algimantas Merkevičius Material Culture and Social Memory in the East Baltic Societies during the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age

59

Anna Wessman Reclaiming the Past: Using Old Artefacts as a Means of Remembering

71

Andrejs Vasks Burials on Settlement Sites: Memories of Ancestors or Dissociation?

89

Andra Simniškytė Memory and Identity: Genuine or Fake? Once More on the Question of the “Selonian” Culture

99

Sami Raninen Martial Themes of the Iron Age: the Constitution of a Warrior

111

Risto Nurmi (The) Memory Remains: the Immaterial Remnants of the Toll Fence in Tornio Town

121

5

6

T H E TH IR D B A LTIC AR CH AEO LO G ICAL SEMINAR (BASE-3): IN TR O D U C TIO N

Originating from the discussions in 2002 that germinated new ideas and inter­ pretations on East Baltic archaeology, the Baltic Archaeological Seminar (or simply BASE) has since then steadily developed into an international forum opened to new views, theoretical interpretations and approaches. In his foreword to the first volume of the BASE papers, Valter Lang wrote that at the time when the seminar was first organised “[w]e actually did not know what BASE really was or what it could become in the future. We thought that BASE should become our common idea that we would develop further to­ gether” (Lang, 2005a, 7). In 2005, the first seminar of the Baltic archaeologists took place in Tartu un­ der the title “Culture and Material Cul­ ture”; two years later, the second seminar “Colours of Archaeology Material Cul­ ture and the Society” was organised in Lithuania. Since the second BASE, the event has grown to involve four coun­ tries and now invites archaeologists from Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Both seminars were followed by the pub­ lication of seminar papers, launching the new periodical, Interarchaeologia (Lang, 2005b; Merkevičius, 2007). The newly established procedure of seminars was maintained, and in the windy but sunny days of October 2007, the third theoreti­ cal BASE was held in Latvia. The title of the third BASE seminar was “Memory, Society, and Material Culture”. Questions related to the meaning of the past both in different periods of history and at the present have attracted con­ siderable attention among historians, ar­ chaeologists, anthropologists, etc during the recent decades. However, up to now, the issues related to memory in archaeo­ logical record have not been discussed

in the Baltic archaeology; thus, BASE members considered the seminar to be a reasonable opportunity to discuss the perspectives and potential of the study of memory in the Baltic prehistory and archaeology. The Third Baltic Archaeo­ logical Seminar was supported by the Faculty of History and Philosophy of the University of Latvia, Latvian Council of Science, and Ventspils History Museum, while the publication of this volume was financed by the Faculty of History and Philosophy of the University of Latvia. Associate Professor, Deputy Director of Ventspils History Museum, Armands Vijups, solved many matters of organisa­ tion of the seminar; we are very grateful for his help. Organised as a two-day event, the third BASE took place in Ventspils on October 5-6, 2007. The morning parts of both days involved visits to different ar­ chaeological sites in north-western Latvia that contained monuments of the Bronze Age, the Iron Age, and the Middle Ages. The afternoon sessions of the seminar consisted of presentations. Overall, 13 papers were presented, including four pa­ pers from Finland and Latvia, three from Estonia, and two from Lithuania. The pa­ pers explored different issues of memory and memorial practices in the archaeo­ logical record, for instance, the meaning of the past in past societies, the reflections of the past in the material culture of the prehistoric, medieval, and modern Bal­ tics, the forms of social memory and their contribution to the formation of ethnic, social, and political identities, etc. As in the previous seminars, the organ­ isational issues of BASE were discussed in the third seminar. The discussions about the future prospects of BASE confirmed that the seminar will develop on the basis 7

Interarchaeologia, 3

of previous experience; the seminar would take place biennially in different coun­ tries, while the following publication of the extended papers would be published at the time between the seminars as the series Interarchaeologia. The participants of the seminars would be both researchers and students from the involved countries. It was decided that the Fourth Theoretical Seminar of the Baltic Archaeologists will take place in 2009 in Finland, organised by the University of Helsinki. The theme of BASE 4 will be “Archaeology and Iden­ tity” in search for new theoretical inter­ pretations and methodological approach­ es to this wide and important subject of the Baltic archaeology. With the fourth BASE in Finland, the first travel circle of Baltic Archaeological Seminars will be completed to return again (hopefully) in two years to Estonia. After three seminars of theoretical archaeology, we may say that being a novelty on the eastern coast of the Baltics at its beginnings, BASE has now surely become a tradition that we have developed together, continue to cul­ tivate now, and that we will expand in the future. BASE has already established itself as a significant event on the scene of the Baltic archaeology. Following the tradition of the first two BASE volumes, this volume contains ten articles that are the elaborated and ex­ tended versions of the papers presented in the third BASE. The articles in the volume are not grouped into strictly organised parts, yet they follow a general chrono­ logical and thematic sequence. The first paper of the volume discusses the role memory plays in contemporary archaeo­ logical research. Differentiating between the metaphors of wastebasket and recycle bin as the places into which one can tem­ porarily put useless things such as ideas, approaches, and theories, Valter Lang ar­ gues that the conscious use of a wastebas­ ket - both in terms of continuously filling 8

it with outdated ideas and updating and fishing in its contents when needed - is a necessary part of everyday archaeologi­ cal research. The second article by Andris Šnē gives an overview of recent studies on social memory in archaeology and history, research approaches, theoretical standpoints and methodology. With the help of several case studies from prehis­ toric and medieval Latvia, he exemplifies the potential of memory studies for the discussions on issues like identity and so­ cial organisation. The next three papers are devoted to the study of Bronze Age archaeological remains in order to find out the meaning of memory in Bronze Age communities. Mika Lavento applies Jacques Derrida's theory of deconstruction to the Early Bronze Age cairns on the Finnish coast of the Baltic Sea. The article discusses the role of memories in the lives of the people of prehistoric societies and ponders on the question how the scholar can understand past memories in his/her contemporary context, which is the necessary starting point for research. The author stresses that the role of remembrance as mani­ fested in burial sites (including cairns) has to be discussed from different view­ points. The article by Heidi Luik explores the technological aspects of the produc­ tion of bone awls during the Late Bronze Age in the eastern Baltics and analyses the important aspects in the choice how to make bone awls: was “natural choice” more important - i.e., which bone is suit­ able for which task - or was “cultural choice” prevalent - i.e., the fact that in a group or society awls have always been made in this particular way? Algimantas Merkevičius discusses different ways how social memory was practised in the Bal­ tic societies during the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age. On the basis of analyses of landscape, settlements, buri­ als, and artefacts, he states that besides

The Third Baltic Archaeological Seminar (BASE-3): Introduction

long-term control over the territory and preservation of the functions of certain zones and sites, other practices of social memory such as mimesis or imitation of natural and cultural objects and finds were widespread in the Baltic region. These articles are followed by four stud­ ies that discuss memory in relation to the archaeological material of the Iron Age. The article by Anna Wessman provides an overview of the occasional ancient ar­ tefacts from Iron Age burials in Finland. She suggests that portable artefacts could play an important part in the construc­ tion of social memory, especially weap­ ons, which could obtain new meanings and mnemonic values through their re­ cycling and thus become heirlooms or objects of memory that played a public role in the society. Burial at the settlement sites in Latvia is the topic of the article by Andrejs Vasks. According to Vasks, burial at an earlier settlement site shows how, with the help of memory, symbolic continuity with the ancestors was created, at the same time arguing for the idea that by covering the deceased with earth from the cultural layer, the living members of the group wanted to dissociate themselves symbolically from the realm of the dead Andra Simniškytė contributes to the long-lasting discussion of Lithuanian and Latvian historiography on the identity and attributes of Selonians and Latgallians. She discusses the identity of these Baltic ethnic groups through the phenomenon of reusing, arguing that repetitive action does not simply imply continuity of the past but explicitly claims such continu­ ity. The question of personal identity is central to the article by Sami Raninen, who introduces the concept of dividual personhood in prehistoric archaeol­ ogy. Such socio-cultural settings where

the relational aspects of personhood are more strongly pronounced than the au­ tonomous aspects constitute the dividual personhood. Raninen considers high-status males in Iron Age northern Europe to be dividuals who were constituted largely by the context of gift exchanges and other rituals that promoted ancestral and other­ worldly values and qualities among living persons. The last paper of the volume written by Risto Nurmi is devoted to the theoreti­ cal aspects of the archaeological study of the material culture of the 17th and 18th century. In his discussion of the concept of material culture in archaeology, Nurmi argues that historical documents should also be treated as artefacts and contem­ porary material culture. On the basis of immaterial evidence (i.e., extinct fea­ tures that are only interpretable through secondary or even tertiary sources), he tells the biography of the toll fence of the Tornio town in northern Finland from 1621 to 1750, arguing that “excavations” of maps and illustrations can also reveal the historical past. Like in the previous volumes of BASE, the articles in this volume are similar nei­ ther in their approach to nor understand­ ing of archaeological theory. I would like to emphasise that current archaeology has to be diverse and plural; several theo­ retical approaches coexist and overlap in our daily research as well. We apply dif­ ferent theories and methods for different research purposes, but we always draw from our own experience, memories, and understanding of theoretical archaeology. Dear reader, welcome again to the world of our Baltic archaeological theory! Andris Šnē

9

Interarchaeologia, 3

References

Seminar o f the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at the University o f Tartu, Estonia, Oc­

Lang, V. 2005a. Baltic Archaeological Semi­ nar: An Introduction. Lang, V. (ed.) Culture and Material Culture. Papers from the First

tober 17-19, 2003 (Interarchaeologia, 1). Tartu, Riga, & Vilnius. Merkevičius, A. (ed.) 2007. Colours of Ar­

Theoretical Seminar o f the Baltic Archaeolo­

chaeology. Material Culture and the Society.

gists (BASE) Held at the University o f Tartu,

Papers from the Second Theoretical Seminar

Estonia, October 17-19, 2003 (Interarchaeo­ logia, 1). Tartu, Riga, & Vilnius. Lang, V. (ed.) 2005b. Culture and Material

of the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at

Culture. Papers from the First Theoretical

10

the University of Vilnius, Lithuania, October 21-22, 2005 (Interarchaeologia, 2). Vilnius,

Helsinki, Riga, 8c Tartu.

AR CH AEO LO G Y AND ITS W A S TE B A S K ET: REMEMBERING, FO R G E TTIN G , AND RECYCLING IN AR CH AEO LO G ICAL RESEARCH1 Valter Lang In the article, attention is drawn to the role of remembering, forgetting and recycling in the process of archaeological research, using the metaphors of “wastebasket” and “recycle bin”. Both of these are places into which one can temporarily put useless things, such as ideas, approaches and theories, as far as academic research is concerned. It is argued that a conscious use of the wastebasket - both in terms o f continuously filling it with outdated ideas and digging out and updating its contents when needed - is an unavoidable and organic part of everyday archaeo­ logical research. Keywords: archaeological research, memory, historiography.

Valter Lang, Institute of History and Archaeology, University o f Tartu, 3 Lossi St, Tartu, Estonia 50090; [email protected]

I In recent decades, archaeologists have been increasingly publishing writings about memory: memory in prehistoric societies (“the past in the past”), the role of memory in the establishment of social and cultural relations in the past, etc (e.g. Bradley, 2002; Jones, 2007, and litera­ ture cited therein). Here I would like to draw attention to the role of memory in the process of current archaeological re­ search. To do that, I use the metaphor of “wastebasket” or “recycle bin” - referring to* the special folder on our computers. Both wastebaskets and recycle bins are places in which one can place things that are useless (for the moment). A waste­ basket is by nature always temporary: the items in the wastebasket can either be thrown away or reused; the files in the recycle bin can either be finally deleted or restored again on the desktop.1

II One of the differences between natural or exact sciences and the humanities is that a revolutionary change of paradigms in the former results in the forsaking of old theories. For instance, Newtons me­ chanics became useless in the study of space after the establishment of Einsteins theory of relativity (Kuhn, 1996). This means that the ideas and theories that were sent to the wastebasket by natural scientists are no longer useful in every­ day research; it is only the history of sci­ ence that will remember them, or perhaps they could be used in other spheres, e.g. in the study of the mentality or general worldview of those times. The situation is quite different in the humanities, includ­ ing archaeology: new theories do replace old ones, certainly; nevertheless, they do not completely destroy or delete them, nor will the old theories become mean­ ingless or useless in the long term. The

1 This research was supported by the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund (Centre of Excellence in Cultural Theory).

11

Interarchaeologia, 3

historiography of the humanities pre­ serves or saves all of the more essential academic approaches, standpoints and theories that were once established, and there is a possibility that they might be re-activated if the need were only to arise. In that sense, the humanities also resem­ ble a museum store, full of old or con­ temporary alternative ideas on our past; from time to time, some of these ideas are taken out and put on show, thereby replacing the ideas that were there before. Sometimes, too, some museum workers undertake outdoor expeditions to look for new ideas. Why is it impossible to empty such a wastebasket or museum store of the fields of the humanities, including archaeology? The object of investigation in the hu­ manities is the whole of human culture. Academic research also is part of human culture; yet, unlike the natural and exact sciences, the object of study in the hu­ manities is (hu)man - man studies man and his creation. This means, in other words, that the object and subject are, in a paradoxical way, equated in the study process. This also is the case in archaeol­ ogy, although the man we are studying is no longer alive, and the distance in time and now and then also several peculiari­ ties in the approaches we use - some­ times seems to make the ancient man into a non-man. Despite this, we still attempt to study man, i.e. human society and its culture. Culture as a human crea­ tion, however, is extraordinarily rich and diverse in its appearance, and evidently it will never be possible to compose one correct and exhaustive approach to stud­ ying and understanding it, neither in an intra- nor in an interdisciplinary way. Although the culture-historical approach

was superseded by the so-called New (Processual) Archaeology, and this, in turn, by the post-processual movement, this does not mean that the culture-his­ torical approach was wrong or that it is now completely exhausted (and, actually, we are witnessing its rebirth; see Kris­ tiansen & Larsson, 2005). It often hap­ pens that new theories in the humanities are just well forgotten old standpoints, or they are modifications of such according to new evidence or methodology. New and different approaches rise to the fore those nuances and aspects of culture that in earlier research were neglected or re­ ceived too little attention; nevertheless, they will not render the main knowledge achieved by earlier approaches non-ex­ istent. This is all the more so because in the humanities (where man studies man), nobody can be finally certain what in our knowledge about ourselves is completely wrong.2 New approaches and theories (e.g. phenomenological, cognitive or gender-related) arise alongside, and not instead of, previous ones. And thus it happens that when new ideas appear, the previous dominant approach is cast aside, i.e. it is sent to a transitional station (re­ ferred to as either the wastebasket or the recycle bin); yet it is not possible to for­ sake it completely, as it is impossible to abandon some part of the culture we are studying. The development of the human­ ities is not characterized by revolutionary changes in paradigms; instead, there are more general transitions (turns) that are observable over time, and which actually still preserve the possibility for a plurality of different and contemporarily useable approaches. Some such approaches may have received more attention at a certain time, while many others may stay in the wastebasket.

2 Here I refer to the so-called large scale, not the more specific details o f material evidence, which can often alter according to developments in overall research.

12

Valter Lang

III One question to be answered then is how well or badly do we, archaeologists, know the contents of our wastebasket or recycle bin? Remembering starts from learning, learning starts from teach­ ing, and teaching, in turn, starts from learning and remembering. Both re­ membering and forgetting are optional, selective; they depend not only on hu­ man capacities3 but also on the present political, scientific and cultural context (e.g. Assmann, 1999, 29). How much do we, eastern Baltic archaeologists, remember the theories of Soviet (resp. Russian) archaeology, for instance? How much do we want to remember them? Is there any need to remember them? One can also ask whether or how well one has to know the content of the wastebasket of his own field of research? Total recollec­ tion may lead to schizophrenia; perhaps it is enough (for practical work) to know the main theories and approaches of the time? Who, however, can say or know (remember) what they are?

IV From another aspect, one wonders which particular theories from the past or alternative ideas from the present will be re-activated; whether this will be done consciously, fully taking into considera­ tion earlier historiography, or by chance, not considering what was done earlier? Or, even, will it be done by consciously ignoring earlier studies? One interest­ ing question is the return to classical authors in archaeology, which for some reason seems not to be as common as in

anthropology, for instance. At the same time, theorists of archaeology always seem to undergo a delay in applying the achievements of anthropology, sociology or philosophy; i.e. archaeologists tend to rummage in the wastebaskets of other disciplines instead of reading from their desktops. Is this one of the peculiarities of archaeological research? As noted, both remembering and for­ getting are selective, but so are reading and listening. Here one can refer, for instance, to the fate of Richard Indrekos alternative theory (in those times) about the ances­ tors of the Finno-Ugrians who reached the Baltic region immediately after the retreat of the glaciers (i.e. in the Upper Paleolithic) from the south and the south­ west (and not in the Middle Neolithic from the east) (Indreko, 1948a; 1948b). Indreko’s ideas were clearly neglected by later scholars until his essay (1948a) was re-published in 2001 (Trames, 2001). The Finnish linguist Kalevi Wiik, for instance, who developed his very similar ideas on the ethno-genesis of the Finno-Ugrians in the 1990s, made no reference to Indreko’s work (e.g. Wiik, 2000). At the same time, in his ethnic reconstructions Wiik equated archaeological cultures with eth­ nic entities - i.e., he used a methodology that many theorists had already long ago sent to the wastebasket of archaeology (see more in, e.g., Lang, 2001). One may note that Wiik did not thoroughly check the wastebasket of archaeology when he elaborated his theory.4 What we want to know from the her­ itage of archaeological research depends on ourselves, but also on the political and cultural background of the researcher.

3 The characteristics o f human memory and the ways in which events are remembered are not the subject o f this article, although they are not at all irrelevant when discussing the topic of how and what we as archaeologists remember from the historiography of our research. On memory and remembrance, see, e.g., the first chapters in Jones, 2007. 4 Formal references to Indrekos essay only later appeared in his writings (e.g. Wiik, 2002).

13

Interarchaeologia, 3

Here one must consider such things as knowledge of languages and scientific imperialism and ignorance (see more in Olsen, 1991). Achievements in small ar­ chaeologies expressed in small languages seldom reach broader audiences, mostly because people there do not understand these languages - a situation that is often accompanied by scientific ignorance to­ wards events elsewhere (see Kristiansen, 2001, 42ff., Fig. 4A). Greater archaeolo­ gies are predominantly monolingual, and references to publications in other lan­ guages (no matter how great they are) are rare (see Kristiansen, 2001, Fig. 1A, 2A, 2B; Lang, 2000, 106ff., Fig. 2). The counter-movement of information, i.e. from greater to smaller archaeologies, is more frequent, but still not always ef­ fortlessly comprehensible. This is caused by the culture-specific and local nature of the objects of study in archaeology, which vary from country to country. Archaeolo­ gists from distant countries usually lack any urgent need to know the contents of each others wastebaskets, or even of that which is on the desktop (the situation is completely different in the case of neigh­ bouring archaeologies, however). From another point of view, we can sometimes also consider either conscious or uncon­ scious resistance to greater and more dominant archaeologies; one can find examples of that among the rather com­ plicated mutual relations between ortho­ dox Soviet Marxism and national archae­ ologies from our recent past (see Ligi, 1993; Sne, 1999, 96-103). Such resistance usually does not arise from the internal needs and developments of archaeology (or other fields of the humanities) but is conditioned by external ideological or political circumstances in contemporary society. In general terms, however, the small archaeologies tend to be more tol­ erant, and there are many more referenc­ es to writings in other languages in their 14

publications (Kristiansen, 2001, 38ff, fig. IB; Lang, 2000, 105ff, fig. 1). One must also increasingly keep in mind prestige reading: from time to time, some authors or periodicals that are considered prestigious to read and follow rise to the fore. After some time, these authors are forgotten, or worse, their thoughts come to be regarded as nonscientific or even harmful to research. The name and fate of Gustaf Kossinna is well-known to each student of archaeol­ ogy in this respect. Vere Gordon Childe, who shared the same general approach to archaeological cultures as independ­ ent historical actors and ethnic entities (see Brather, 2004, 65ff), faced a much more fortunate future in the archaeologi­ cal textbooks. Perhaps the time is ripe to ‘re-activate* something from Kossinnas heritage? Matters are completely differ­ ent when certain authors or their ideas are prohibited (and others are declared to be infallible) by the established political power or ideology. This is something that archaeologists from the former Commu­ nist block countries should still remem­ ber very well from their recent past (e.g. Creutz, 1997, 21); Indreko, along with many others who went into exile, also be­ longed to the group of forbidden authors in the 1950s, for instance. In those times, scholars were forbidden even to peep into their ‘wastebaskets’, much less speak about the possible recycling of their con­ tents. Nevertheless, no political power no matter how totalitarian - is capable of pushing the delete button to finally empty our recycle bins.

V One particular problem is connected with the theories and ideas that should perhaps belong in the wastebasket but are not yet there. If, for instance, one re­ searcher has sent a certain old or alterna­ tive theory to the wastebasket, does that

Valter Lang

mean that this theory is there for all other researchers too? Or does each researcher have his/her own wastebasket? The real picture in the landscape of archaeology is quite heterogeneous in terms of waste­ basket archaeology: there are numerous standpoints, approaches and theories that for some researchers are located in the wastebasket but for others are still on the desktop. One can make reference here to the concept of archaeological culture' mentioned above in the case of Kossinna and Childe: many of us still use that con­ cept in the same meaning they did, while many others are certain that such use is a severe mistake (e.g. Brather, 2000; Lang, 2001; Shennan, 1989).5 Thus, one can even imagine three types of wastebaskets: one large wastebasket for global archaeol­ ogy as a whole, numerous smaller ones for regional or national archaeologies, and a countless number of still smaller containers for individual archaeologists. One more aspect of the latter problem is the question of scientific noise5. It is no secret that the archaeologists - like schol­ ars in all other fields of science - have to produce a certain number of publications per year in order to survive as members of research teams. Moreover, we are in­ creasingly forced to publish abroad, in the so-called high-standard internation­ al journals, because only such journals give enough credit to survive. This is a rule everywhere, and it means more and more publications without original ideas, i.e., we reproduce and modify things that have already been published once (or several times) somewhere else. The situ­ ation is even worse with Travel archae­ ology5: scholars travel around from one

conference to another and give papers that are nothing but slight modifications of what they have already talked about over the last five, ten, or even more years. Because of this all, there is no time to think in peace and look for fresh ideas, or else you will loose your job. This pub­ lish or perish5or producing for wastebas­ kets policy, governed by our bureaucrats in science, has led to the result that all of the wastebaskets of archaeology are severely overflowing. And the delete but­ ton does not function! Large quantities of scientific noise are seriously hinder­ ing the discovery of necessary informa­ tion, as well as new and original ideas. For instance, information on Latvian archaeology scattered over a wide range of international journals is often useless because no one is able to find all of it. One must also consider that due to the local nature of archaeological information, it is only possible to publish unqualified texts on Latvian archaeology, for instance, far abroad, where scientific expertise on the topic is low. The appeal to publish less and only original material and to keep in mind that all important data should (also) be published in national or regional journals would, however, probably be like a death sentence for many of us as acting archaeologists.

VI The main aim of this paper is to draw attention to the memory of scholars in the study process. Research must continue both on the desktop of modern archaeol­ ogy and in its recycle bin, because our new approaches will not free us from knowing

5 The example of using dendrochronological calibrations of radiocarbon analyses is quite curious. After physicists discovered the need to calibrate radiocarbon dates, it had to be evident that the use of such dates without calibration was nonsense. Yet archaeologists - humanitarians as they are - long doubted that, and many of them continued to use non-calibrated dates, particularly in the eastern Baltic countries. In most curious way, calibrated (new dates) and uncalibrated (good old’ dates) are used in one study without any difference between them.

15

Interarchaeologia, 3

the previous ones. It is self-evident, of course, that there is always something in our data and interpretation that proves to be invalid when research is under way, and its resuscitation in the future seems unlikely. In the case of establishment of

new theories, we also proceed from what seems more likely (because we are simply unable to say what the truth was); i.e., we proceed from the assumption that is only more likely to us and not inevitable to our successors behind the desktop.

References

Kuhn, T. S. 1996. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 3rd edition. Chicago. Lang, V. 2000. Archaeology and language. Fennoscandia Archaeologica, XVII, 103-110. Lang, V. 2001. Interpreting archaeological cultures. Trames, 1 , 48-58. Ligi, P. 1993. National romanticism in archae­ ology: the paradigm o f Slavonic coloniza­ tion in north-west Russia. Fennoscandia Archaeologica, X, 31-39. Olsen, B. 1991. Metropolises and satellites in archaeology: on power and asymmetry in global archaeological discourse. Preucel, R. (ed.) Processual and Postprocessual Ar­

Assmann, A. 1999. Erinnerungsräume. For­ men

und

Wandlungen

des

kulturellen

Gedächtnisses. München.

Bradley, R. 2002. The Past in Prehistoric Socie­ ties. London & New York. Brather, S. 2004. Ethnische Interpretationen in der frühgeschichtlichen Archäologie. Geschichte, Grundlagen und Alternativen. Beck, H., Geuenich, D. & Steuer, H. (Hrsg.) Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der ger­ manischen Altertumskunde, Band 42. Berlin

& New York. Creutz, K. 1997. History of research and its interpreters. The impact of politics, atti­ tudes and preconceived ideas in the use of earlier research around the Baltic Sea. Latvi­ jas Zinātņu Akadēmijas Vēstis, 51 (5/6), 18-23. Indreko, R. 1948a. Origin and area of settle­ ment of the Finno-Ugrian peoples. Science in Exile. Publications o f the Scientific Quar­ terly “Scholar”, Vol. 1. Heidelberg, 3-24. Indreko, R. 1948b. Die mittlere Steinzeit in Estland (Kungi. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien Handlingar 66). Stock­ holm. Jones, A. 2007. Memory and Material Culture (Topics in Contemporary Archaeology). Cambridge. Kristiansen, K. 2001. Borders o f ignorance: research communities and language. Kobyliński, Z. (ed.) Quo vadis archaeolo-

chaeologies: Multiple Ways o f Knowing the Past (Center for Archaeological Investiga­

tions, Occasional Paper 10). Carbondale, 211-224. Shennan, S. 1989. Introduction: Archaeologi­ cal approaches to cultural identity. Shen­ nan, S. (ed.) Archaeological Approaches to Cultural Identity (One World Archaeology, 10). London, 1-32. Sne, A. 1999. Social archaeology in Latvia: a survey. Jensen, O. W , Karlsson, H. & Vijups A. (eds.) Inside Latvian Archaeology. Göte­ borg, 89-114. Trames. Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences. Vol. 1: Special Issue on the Origin of the Finnic Peoples and Languages Dedicated to Richard Indreko (1900-1961). 2001.

Wiik, K. 2000. European lingua franca. Künnap, A. (ed.) The Roots o f Peoples and Languages o f Northern Eurasia II and III.

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torica Fenno-Ugrica). Tartu, 202-236. Wiik, K. 2002. Eurooppalaisten juuret. Jyväskylä.

SO CIETY, ID EN TITY, AND MEMORY: MEMORIES OF T H E PAST IN TH E AR CH AEO LO G ICAL REMAINS Andris Šnē The issues related to different aspects of memory are among the widely discussed topics in the historical and archaeological studies during the last decades. The current studies of memory have truly become an interdisciplinary field of research, and the methodology o f the study of memorial culture involves approaches of different disciplines like anthropology, sociology, and folklore. The social memory constitutes one of the key elements in the way of constructing different identities. It is the social memory that creates the collective identity of a particular society, and maintaining of memory (and identity) is closely connected to the praxis of different rituals. The cultural landscape consists of different objects and elements of different ages. Today we recognise the values and context of different monuments, and their meaning has become an essential part of our collective memory. The archaeological monuments were used in different ways and manipulated to create images of a collective past and a collective identity; the way people thought about and imagined monuments reflects their attitude to the past and the content of their cultural memory of distant past. The paper discusses some issues of the study o f memory in the archaeological records, paying attention to the significance and meaning of both rituals and monuments for medieval and contemporary people and the ways of their collective experience. Keywords: social memory, identity, monuments, archaeology, Latvia.

Andris Šnē, Department of Medieval History, Faculty of History and Philosophy, University of Latvia, Brīvības Blvd 32, Rīga, LV-1050, Latvia; [email protected]

Introduction The issues related to different aspects of memory have been among the widely discussed topics in the historical and archaeological studies since the late 1980s and since then have even constituted a boom of research on memorial issues (a special periodical devoted to these questions, History and Memory, has been published since 1989). Although the first studies about memory appeared already in the mid 20th century, turning to memory research in history is associated mainly with the works of the German historian Otto Gerhard Oexle in the late 1970s (see Oexle, 2003, 4ff). It was concluded very correctly that “the concept of memory

can make a fundamental contribution to historical study through its ability to help us reconceptualize time, understand the multi-temporal character of human life and appreciate the capacity of matter and of materiality to embody this temporal process. But it is human social practices... that enable these multiple pluralities to find physical expression” (Hamilakis & Labanyi, 2008, 6). The last decade has showed a growing interest in memory studies in the field of archaeology as well, which has focused on the social (or collective) memory and its reflections in material culture (among recent publications there are, for example, Bradley, 2002; Bradley & Wiliams, 1998; Dyke & Alcock, 2003; Fontijn, 2008;

17

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Hanks, 2008; Jones, 2007; Lillios, 1999; 2008; Williams, 1998; 2003a; 2003b; 2005; 2006). The current studies of memory have truly become an interdisciplinary field of research, and the methodology of the study of memory, its practices, functions, and meaning, as well as memorial culture in the past societies, involves, besides historical and archaeological methods, the approaches of different disciplines like anthropology, sociology, literature, and folklore. The archaeologists and historians of the eastern Baltics have just started their research on the various aspects of memory. For example, several historical studies devoted to the Holocaust have appeared in Latvia (the Holocaust actually is one of the main topics in the Western scholarship of memorial studies, too), as well as studies on the national resistance movement after World War II or in the Soviet socialistic era in the oral testimonies and social memory of the Latvian society, which also explore the meaning of these topics in the collective identity and consciousness of contemporary society (e.g. Dreimane, 2006; Ķīlis, 1998; Ročko, 2004; Saleniece, 2007; Stranga, 2006; Šūpulis, 2007; Zirnīte, 2007). Nevertheless, the research of memory has not usually explored the societies and cultural traditions behind the dramatic history of Latvia of the 20th century. The recent article about the late medieval remembrance and memorial traditions in Livonia by Strenga (2009) is rather an exception than the rule and hopefully the beginning of the memorial studies of the medieval history of Latvia. We must note that Latvian archaeologists have developed a strong tradition of usage of the folklore evidence (legends, placenames, etc) that reflects the longlasting local oral heritage. It is found useful mainly for the identification and characterisation of the archaeological 18

heritage sites or for retrospection, when it was successfully used in analyses of archaeological remains (Ritums et ai., 2006; Urtāns, 2007; 2008a; 2008b). This article will attempt to reveal how the social memory, through different practices, has contributed to the maintenance of the collective identity as evidenced in prehistoric and medieval archaeological remains found in Latvia. Thus, the article will present a study of the embodied memory not the inscribed memory that is analysed through different textual proofs.

Memory and Its Functions in Society The way of memory is the direct and actual way how the present encounters the past, and people have attempted to understand the mechanisms of memory since time immemorial. It was already in the antiquity when the first studies attempted to describe and understand how memory works. Paul Connerton has recently distinguished between three kinds of memory: the personal, cognitive, and habitual memory (Connerton, 1989). In his argumentation, the latter two are closer to the social memory, as it is due to the cognitive memory that we have general knowledge about the world, while habitual memory relates to our embodied practices of cultural and social life (similarly to the habitus of Bourdieu, see Bourdieu, 1977). The memories that we all have shape our understanding of the current situation and form our vision about the past generations. But it is also true that no one will be able to prove that his/her memories are totally true since they reflect the events that have happened and that we may remember differently. The memories of different individuals will not reflect the

Andris Šnē E l

same past although they might even be based on the same experience or sources. The remembering of particular stories, events etc is related to our experience and actual situation, we may choose what to remember and what to forget. Thus, our memories are multilayered and selective, they transform and develop in the course of time, and forgetting plays an essential role, too. The social context of remembering influences the constitution of the memories; thus, memories shared by the majority of members of the community appear. In the course of time, several interrelated concepts about the collective memory have appeared, but the most widespread (although not the only one) today is the term “social memory” (see, e.g., Fentress & Wickham, 1992). The beginning of the research on social memory is commonly attributed to the French sociologist Maurice Halbwachs, who published several studies about collective memory in the 1920s (Halbwachs, 1980; 1992). His works and ideas were revived in the late 20th century, inspiring research in social anthropology, psychology, history, literature, etc. It is worth mentioning that already in the 1930s, the concepts of Halbwachs raised dissatisfaction; for example, Frederick Bartlett argued that “the most important feature of memory, in the way we actually use it, is that it is never out of context” (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 32 If). Different memories emerge from different situations and contexts in which we recognise ourselves, they are individually different due to different personal experiences and understanding of particular situations. According to Halbwachs, the collectively hold memories constitute and structure identity and contribute to the formation of both personal and social identity. Remembering is based on the notions, concepts, and views of the social groups,

and these common notions, concepts and views (i.e., memories) will maintain the social group and its identity stable and long-lasting. Thus, these are groups that remember, and an individual only accommodates to collective memory; we remember because we are the members of the group. Halbwachs very strictly distinguished and separated the collective memory from history; for him history was an abstract register of chronological transformations. He was not the first one saying that history had to serve only as the source for memory, for already Cicero had stated that history is vita memoriae (Berks, 1998, 30). Such notions seem very simplified because today both history and memory is regarded as lacking objectivity, and they have become increasingly problematised. Memory is a complex process, not a simple mental act. As the English historian Peter Burke noticed, our understanding of history is that of the collective memory and it is shaped by the oral tradition, written records, visual images, actions, and spaces (Berks, 1998). The social memory structures our own representation and actions, “when we remember, we represent ourselves to ourselves and to those around us... we are what we remember” (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 7). The German Egyptologist Jan Assman has been developing the concept of collective memory since the late 1980s. He distinguishes between two different kinds of social memory, namely the communicative memory and cultural memory. The communicative memory relates to memories of the recent past, it is about what an individual or a social group remembers. The cultural memory which is linked to the distant past is grounded in three interrelated components, namely memory, culture, and the social group. This reflexive, organised, and normative 19

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way of memory is important for the identity of the group because it constitutes the particularity of a group and allows to maintain the differentiation from other social groups. The cultural memory is structured with the help of different texts, images, and rituals that altogether make the self-image of the community (Assman, 1992; Levans, 2005). Memory tends to be factual; it has to be based on accepted information in order to become shared collectively among the members of the community. Nevertheless, different aspects of power and religious life influence the practices of memory throughout generations and centuries (Rowlands, 1993). Indeed, the transmission of “true” information is only one of the many social functions that memory can perform in different circumstances. And it is also a way how memory differs from knowledge, for remembering is an experience or activity performed by the mind; for example, we may know things but it is not necessary to remember them at the moment. Memory itself is subjective but it is at the same time structured by language, by collectively held ideas and experience shared with others. Thus, the social memory is a source of knowledge, it provides a set of categories through which in a non-selfconscious way a social group experiences its surroundings and realizes their own tradition. In non-literate societies memory is the only way to keep present a lot of culture elements, epic stories, genealogy, myths, laws, etc. In this case, the transmission of culture is based on memory, and especially on the memory of particular individuals like priests, elders, or chiefs, who have to maintain the tradition for the safety of the whole community. As some scholars note, writing freezes memory in textual forms (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 9ff). Many anthropological studies show how 20

a great deal of social memory is preserved by rituals - here the meaning is not put into words (or it is only done partly) but is acted out, the social memory is embodied into the practices of the rituals. As we can see, memory is not limited to the memory of words, it encounters everything around us, including our surroundings or, we may say, the cultural landscape. “[W]e can usually regard social memory as an expression of collective experience: social memory identifies a group, giving it a sense of its past and defining its aspirations for the future... Social memory is a source of knowledge.” (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 25-26) The social memory is closely related to the society’s understanding of itself, it is a way to maintain collective identity through different practices. The social memory forms a stable core of the community. At the same time, practices of social memory are flexible and opened to transformation.

Memory, Monuments, and Folklore Cultural landscape always consists of different objects and elements. Today we recognise the values and context of different monuments and their meaning has become an essential part of our collective memory. Archaeological monuments are used in different ways and manipulated to create images of a collective past and a collective identity; the way people thought about and imagined monuments reflects their attitude to the past and the content of their collective memory of distant past. A place and its monuments were not and are not passive parts in the creation of the meaning ascribed to them. A place and its material culture is not passively interpreted by experiencing subjects situated in specific contexts; rather, they

Andris Šnē

have acted in history and they have been (and will continue to be) active parts of the possibility that human beings attribute meaning to them. In other words, place, material culture and landscape are actively involved in the creation of the interpretative horizons of both the past and present interpreters. People who created monuments in the past, in the prehistoric, medieval, or modern ages, did it with particular intention to ascribe actual and future meaning to the place. As Richard Bradley (1998) has correctly pointed out, the continuous reinterpretation of prehistoric monuments is part of the very logic of monument building. The particular behaviour of people towards ancient monuments in a social and political and historical context is informed by their collective understanding of the past, or, as Jan Assman called it, their cultural memory. The cultural memory is not about an accurate and truthful testimony of past events, but about the making of meaningful statements about the past at the present. Ancient monuments represent the past in the landscape, and cultural memory attributes meaning and cultural and social significance to them at the present. Monuments as timemarks (using the term introduced by Chapman in 1997 as an analogue to landmarks) evolve the past into the present, they become sites of different rituals, commemorations, etc, and thus become part of Geschichtskultur “history culture’. According to the German historian Jörn Rüsen, both memory and history are essential and equally important parts o f‘history culture that in its turn creates a contemporary meaning of the past (Rüsen, 1994). In the 1980s, the French historian Pierre Nora introduced the term “a site of memory” (lieu de memoire in French). Nora, who had edited several

volumes about Frances sites of memory, defined them as “any significant entity, whether material or non-material in nature, which by dint of human will or the work of time has become a symbolic element of the memorial heritage of any community” (Nora, 1996b, XVII). According to Noras concept, such sites of memory included places (regions, cities, cemeteries, memorials, palaces, cathedrals, museums, etc), objects, practices, and ideas (every kind of rituals, symbols and textual works). These sites are created, they are artificial, and they embody the past. It should be said that Nora strictly distinguished between memory and history (e.g., Nora, 1996a, 1996b), but several years later he admitted that history and national memory have become synonyms (Nora, 2003, 683). At the same time, he continues, it is memory that raises differences, but history may unite nations (ibid., 686). Nora considered sites of memory as characteristic only of the modern times. However, as many studies show (including above-mentioned research by Assman or Bradley), past societies also recognized sites with particular meaning for their ritual practices or expressions of political and social inequality. To discern meanings attributed to sites during different ages, it has become popular to use the biographical approach to monuments and write the life-stories of monuments and landscapes (e.g. Holtorf, 1998). Settlements, burials, and any other archaeological sites belong to the period they were constructed and used in; they are Stone Age, Bronze Age, or Iron Age sites. Thus we used to treat the sites in archaeological investigations. Nevertheless, that is only the beginning of their life. The sites stood in the landscape for generations, and they were probably attributed with new meanings after the end of their intended use. The following life-stages may include later 21

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re-use, as in the case of secondary burials or secondary settlements (or both) or deposition of particular objects or a group of objects into the earlier structures (see also articles by Vasks and Wessman in this volume). Thus, a site maintains its significance in the landscape whether or not it is used according to the initial purpose (a cemetery, etc). The ancient monuments have in many cases led to the emergence of folk-tales and legends which would explain why they existed and thus created a narrative context in which they had some meaning. Being in the focus of folk stories and the social memory, the cairns, mounds, hillforts, and other visible structures became places outside the linear time or were linked to some mythical or historical events. As Amy Gazin-Schwartz and Cornelius Holtorf said, folklore wdoes give us a broader understanding of the past as perceived, remembered, and made significant by both past and present people” (GazinSchwartz & Holtorf, 1999, 5). We may look at two examples in order to illustrate the connections between folklore and archaeology. Among the most visible structures in the landscape of Latvia are hillforts that emerged in the Late Bronze Age and were constructed up to the beginning of the Middle Ages (most of about 450 hillforts that were used in the later prehistory were abandoned during the Crusades of the 13th century). Many folk-tales and legends are collected about the hillforts in the territory of present-day Latvia, and more than 1/3 of the identified hillforts are mentioned in those folk-tales. It is interesting to note that interest in Latvian folklore increased in the second half of the 19th century when the first records of folklore were also made. The main plot of the legends about the hillforts is the following: soldiers have made a hillfort with earth brought in their hats (a possible interpretation is that 22

building of earthen fortifications takes place), the castle has sunk into the hill, leaving a pit, well, or chimney (a possible reflection from the Crusades when the local communities were defeated and came under the law of the German Crusaders), and the emergence of the sunken castle if certain conditions are fulfilled (which might be an expression of the hope to regain the lost freedom and prosperity) (for a detailed account on the folk-tales about the hillforts see Ritums et ai., 2006). Even this information shows that hillforts were perceived as the sites where the distant past was still alive, and memory allowed the hillforts to continue to exist at the present and embody an important yet remote past experience. Another example illustrates the transformation in the meaning of sites through centuries rather than continuity. There are several ship settings situated in the western part of Latvia which actually had an exceptional position among the archaeological sites of Latvia (about the ship settings, particularly in Latvia, see Pāvils & Šnē, 1998; Sturms, 1931; Vasks, 2000). Such burial sites and rites are not common and characteristic of the Baltic and Finnish lands, and there are only a few of them recorded in Estonia (two sites) and Latvia (five sites with nine stone ships in total). There are about 300 sites on Gotland, 20-30 on Bornholm, 15-20 on Öland, single graves are found on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea and in Finland. Due to that fact, the ship settings of the eastern Baltic region are usually regarded as burial sites of Scandinavian immigrants, probably coming from Gotland or central mainland Sweden. They date back to the first half of the 1st millennium BC, i.e., the Late Bronze Age. All of the known ship settings in Latvia are located in the Talsi District, in the vicinity of the town of Valdemārpils, and they probably were isolated cultural

Andris Šnē

sites as they are missing (or we have not yet identified) settlements or any connections with other contemporary archaeological sites. Archaeological research of the ship settings started already in the mid 19th century, when all of the known sites were discovered, examined, and excavat­ ed. Ship settings in Latvia are called Velna laivas (the Baltic German archaeologists named them Teufelsböte, meaning Devils Boats in English) on the basis of oral tra­ dition first recorded in the mid 19thcentu­ ry; since then this term has been used in archaeological studies. According to the oral tradition (that is still alive among local inhabitants), the ship settings were established by the Devil, i.e., by foreign forces. One of the ship settings located at the Bilavas homestead was built in Vidzers Forest, according to folk legends, by the Devil in agreement with the local chief. The local chief asked the Devil to help in the struggle against the German Crusad­ ers so the Devil had to build a stone dam in order to protect the lands. But he did not finish it until the next morning and therefore lost the stones; they fell from his hands and formed a ship setting on the ground. There were no connections to the Bronze Age people in these sto­ ries, yet they were linked to the events important for the local community at the present (we should take into account that the legends were recorded in the second half of the 19th century). The stories that were told about the different sites in the landscape reflect the ways how communities perceived the monuments of different ages in their contemporary settings. Some sites lost their original meaning and function in the memories of later generations, some sites were forgotten while other sites maintained their original character in the people’s consciousness through the centuries. Thus, folklore shows the living

landscape andmonuments connected with the needs and dreams of the communities that tell the stories; the sites of the past were perceived as implications of the distant past into present memories.

Memory, Social Identity, and Medieval Burial Rites in Latvia Many researchers have argued that the social memory constitutes one of the key elements in constructing of different identities (e.g. Nora, 2003; Oexle, 2003). The French historian Ernest Renan concluded already in 1882 that “the essence of a nation is that all its individuals have many things in common, and also that they have forgotten many things” (quoted in McCaffrey, 2001,120). Common memories and experiences may lay foundations for regional (national), social, ethnic, gender, etc identities that have common features that differ from other similar groups. We have already discussed here that it is the social memory that creates the collective identity of a particular society and in this sense the maintenance of memory (and identity) is closely connected to the practices of different rituals. In present-day society, for example, these are war memorials and commemoration of warfare victims that make an important contribution to the social memory and forms the backbone of the collective identity (let us remember the famous motto of the Soviet occupation period concerning the experience of World War II, “none and nothing is forgotten”). The most ancient commemorative practice is burial and burial traditions that are closely linked to the living community. The funeral of the dead is organised by the living members of the kin and community, and thus burial 23

Interarchaeologia, 3

rituals are influenced by the status of the dead as much as by the needs and future aspirations of the living descendants and contemporaries. The last centuries of prehistory (the Late Iron Age, from the 10thto 12thcentury AD) in the territory of the eastern Baltics are characterized by multiple forms of burial traditions. The archaeological sites of that period include barrows and flat burial grounds as well as stone cairns, in which both inhumations and cremations are discovered. Some differences in the burial traditions might relate to particular ethnic groups, for Baltic Finns used to bury their dead in stone graves while the different groups of the Balts used both barrow and flat cemeteries. A common feature also is the practice of different rites and offerings in the cemeteries alongside the burials. At the end of the 12th century, mission­ aries from northern Germany began to preach the Roman Catholic faith on the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea, the process developed into the Crusades in the next century. The 13th century brought new lifestyles and created new social, political, economic, and cultural structures in the previously heathen eastern Baltics (i.e., Livonia in the Middle Ages) due to the Christianisation, colonisation, and conquest of these lands. Livonia remained the frontier of the Western Christendom throughout the Middle Ages, but it was heavily influenced by the eastern (the Russian principalities) and southern (the Grand Duchy of Lithuania) neighbours. The medieval world was a world of lit­ erate Christian society and as such it at­ tributed much importance to the mean­ ing of memory (memoria), although different from that in non-literate socie­ ties. As Gustavs Strenga (2009) showed in his study about medieval memoria in Livonia, the most important aim of the late medieval memoria was to secure the memory of persons after death in order 24

to escape long suffering in the purgatory. Memory in medieval society was based on religious rituals and praying (liturgi­ cal memoria), and rituals of death were of the highest importance. The Christian burial rites that originated in the 3rd cen­ tury included several features that faith­ ful Christians had to follow in order to secure their souls. Yet the oral tradition maintained its role in the social memory of particular social groups, for example, in the genealogical schemes of some Eu­ ropean regions (see, e.g., Bartlett, 2004). Being integrated into the Christian world, the local communities of Livonia had to adopt new customs and rites, including the burial customs. It is important to note that Livonia escaped wide colonisation, and peasantry on the countryside was constituted by the local people. The newcomers in Livonia settled down in the towns and castles that were introduced in the eastern Baltics in the course of the Crusades. The archaeological research shows that the majority of medieval burials were organized according to the Christian traditions, while about a third of the countryside burial sites of the medieval period reflected the previous heathen beliefs and traditions or at least vestiges of them. In some cemeteries it is possible to observe the transition from burial mounds of the 12-13th century to the flat graves of the 13-14th century. In western Latvia, Curonians used cremation in the 14th and 15th century, while Livs still buried their dead in barrows (i.e., under large burial mounds) (Muižnieks, 2008; Zemltis, 2004). The quantity and quality of grave goods sharply decreased from the 13th century onwards, but even when grave goods had more or less disappeared from burials by the 16-17th century, everyday utensils and coins still accompanied the dead into the afterlife. In this context, the Lejaskrogs cemetery

Andris Šnē

in western Curonia, which was used from the early 14th to 16th century, is a very unusual case. Archaeological excavations revealed grave goods in 124 (or 84% of the excavated) burials; mostly jewellery, but weapons like axes or spears were also found in 8 male burials (Muižnieks, 2003,102-106). Thus, we can suggest that western burial practices slowly but surely became widespread only by the 16th or even as late as the 17th century (at least partly the process was determined by the Reformation processes in the Baltics) (Mugurēvičs, 1998; Šnē, 2007). A detailed study of the medieval cemeteries of southern Estonia also suggests the longlasting persistence of the archaic burial traditions in the Christianised Livonia (Valk, 2001). Records written by Christians depict a quite complicated situation with the religious consciousness of the newly converted natives of Livonia. The knight Guillebert de Lannoy, who travelled through the western parts of Livonia in 1413-1414, wrote that Curonians richly decorated the corpse and then cremated it; in 1589, Salomon Henning wrote that the inhabitants of Curonia worshiped the Sun, the Moon, stars, different wa­ ters and trees and believed in sacred for­ ests (we can find comparable claims in other sources from the 16th century; see Spekke, 1995). Thus, the heathen traditions of the local communities of medieval Livonia had survived the Crusades and attempts of Christianisation. The new Christian ideology very gradually and slowly (but in the long-term perspective successfully) transformed the landscape of Livonia, but its impact on the mentality of the locals in the countryside proved to be less profound. We can state that the local people of Livonia during the Middle Ages remained neophytes - they were ignorant of the Christian religion,

they spoke different languages, they had different traditions and folklore, etc (Kala, 2001, 19-20). This one example of the medieval burial traditions practiced by the local communities shows preservation and continuity of traditions several centuries long (and in some cases continuity of cemeteries that were used in the pre-Crusade period). The practices of particular burial rites through which the ancestral traditions were remembered maintained the identity of the community. The Crusades and Christianity were the foundations for the collective identity and self-consciousness of Baltic Germans, descendants of the newcomers in Livonia. The heathen traditions were an important part of the society of the locals inhabitants in Livonia. Both identities were also constituted by other opposing components, like the urban and countryside lifestyle and different social and political status. Nevertheless, it seems that remembering (and also forgetting) acted as a strategy of survival and strategy of power for both sides, and Baltic Germans especially maintained and articulated their interpretation of the 13th century processes in the Modern Age, when it was used in the argumentation for their privileges and lordship in Livonia.

Epilogue Archaeology in its essence is about memory. The archaeologists excavating the past remains allow the public to recognise its past and create a story about its history. The narrated past becomes remembered past, and it exists further as part of the society’s history culture. The embodied memories that were preserved via repetitive ancient cults and rituals maintained the identity of the indigenous society and culture throughout the Middle 25

Interarchaeologia, 3

Ages after the cultural contact with the Westerners; they were crucial for the people in their (probably unconscious) attempts not to lose themselves. The folklore evidence, too, shows the longlasting oral tradition that helped recall distant memories and made them actual at the moment of telling. The prehistoric and medieval past does not play the main role in contemporary Latvian identity because the backbone of the historical consciousness and identity is formed by the dramatic events of the 20th century (contrary to, e.g., Lithuanians, whose cultural memory still incorporates various memories about the Age of the Crusades and its heroes; see Nikžentaitis, 2007). Nevertheless, some selected elements of the archaeological past (like hillforts and their imagined rulers, warfare, and everyday life evoked by experimental archaeology) are present

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Chichester, 228-254. McCaffrey, E. 2001. Memory and Collective Identity in Occitanie. The Cathars in History and Popular Culture. History and Memory , Vol. 13(1), 114-138.

Mugurēvičs, Ē. 1998. Etniskie procesi baltu apdzīvotajā teritorijā un latviešu tautas veidošanās 6.-16. gadsimtā. Latvijas Vēstures Institūta Žurnāls, 2 ,19-32. Muižnieks, V. 2003. Arheoloģiskie pētījumi Puzes Lejaskroga kapsētā un viduslaiku apbedīšanas tradīcijas Ziemeļkurzemē. Ventspils Muzeja Raksti, III, 94-112. Muižnieks, V. 2008. 14., 15. gs. ugunskapi Kurzemē. Muižnieks, V., ed. Pētījumi kursu senatnē (Latvijas Nacionālā Vēstures Muzeja Raksti Nr. 14). Rīga, 35-56. Nikžentaitis, A. 2007. Kryžiaus karų epocha Lietuvos kultūrinėje atmintyje. Trimoniene, R. R. & Jurgaitis, R. (eds.) Kryžiaus karų epocha Baltijos regiono tautų istorinėje sąmonėje. Moksliniu straipsniu rinkinys. Šiauliai, 236-249. Nora, R 1996a [1989]. Between Memory and History. Nora, P. & Kritzman, L. D. (eds.) Realms o f Memory. Rethinking the French Past. Vol. 1: Conflicts and Divisions. New

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Rīga. Ritums, R., Tāle, I., Urtāns, J. & Vītola, L 2006. Teikas par Latvijas pilskalniem. Laiviņš, M. (ed.) Pilskalni Latvijas ainavā (Latvijas Universitātes Raksti, 695. sējums, Zemes un vides zinātnes). Rīga, 7-26. Ročko, J. 2004. Holokausts mūsdienu sabiedrības apziņā. Ērglis, D. (ed.) Holokausta izpēte Latvijā. Starptautisko konferenču materiāli, 2003. gada 12.-13. jūnijs , 24. oktobris, Rīga, un 2002.-2003. gada pētījumi par holokaustu Latvijā (Latvijas

Vēsturnieku Komisijas Raksti, 12. sējums). Rīga, 106-111.

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D E C O N S TR U C TIN G MEMORIES IN AR CHAEOLOGY: BURIAL CAIRNS AS SIGNS OF MEMORIES Mika Lavento One of the key objectives o f modern archaeology is to reveal the intentions of the acts of people in the past. This pertains to discussing the role o f memory and memories of individuals in past societies. There is no agreement on the way memories manifest themselves, in which way they emerge in the material and what their meanings have been to the individuals and societies in the past. For instance, graves have had the central role as a group of material in many periods of prehistory. It is therefore natural that an archaeologist should pay attention to the importance of memories that could be linked with the death of human beings. In the article, memories of the people in prehistoric societies will be discussed and we will expand pondering on the questions of the problem of how the scholars can understand past memories in contemporary context, which is the necessary starting point for their research. In addition, I will illuminate the problems that complicate the understanding processes. Prehistoric people have difficulties to understand meanings of their own memories or remembrances. It is far more complicated for the researchers who try to grasp them today. The theoretical starting point in the analysis is the Jacques Derridas theory of deconstruction. Despite the evident dangers it implies, the theory still gives hope for archaeologists to attain interpretations that are sensible and that delineate the borders of their knowledge. To elucidate the difficulties related to memories and their interpretation in the con­ nection of archaeological material, the article discusses the Early Bronze Age burial cairns on the Finnish coast of the Baltic Sea. The role of remembrance has been discussed in relation to cairns from different viewpoints: cairns have been not only graves - resting places of the deceased - but they may have had another function, too. Keywords: deconstructive archaeology, memories, Jacques Derrida, Early Bronze Age.

Mika Lavento, Department of Archaeology, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 59 (Unioninkatu 38F), 00014 Helsinki, Finland; [email protected]

Introduction One of the priorities in the modern theory debate in archaeology is the read­ ing of memory with its various meanings. Human memory is selective, it maintains and modifies its experiences and gener­ ates new meanings. In memory, a hu­ man being preserves information in a conscious or unconscious way, which makes the understanding of its structure and content of meanings complicated to approach. Keeping this in mind, hu­ man experience can be divided into two kinds of structures: (1) fundamental and (2) varying. The first structure is related

to conscious experiences which structure the human mind into natural and static categories. These categories exist in the world in the sense they were considered fundamental in classical philosophy, for example by Immanuel Kant or already by Platon. The second, based on varying categories, is changing in the course of life of the human being. In the long run, it also defines a considerable part of the human life. The role of fundamental and changing categories has been discussed in various ways by philosophers, natural scientists or arts scholars. I will concentrate mostly on the discussion relevant in a recent 29

Interarchaeologia, 3

discussion in cultural research. For this reason, the main focus of my paper is on the lines of thought developed recently by philosophers and soon after adopted and exploited by anthropologists and archaeologists representing postmodern thinking. One solution to distinguish between static and changing categories has been presented in anthropology. The ideas characterising the fundamental catego­ ries were further developed by the French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss, one of the most influential researchers still living. On the basis of his field studies in Brazil, he suggested two kinds of struc­ tures or categories of human thinking (Levi-Strauss, 1955). According to his semiotic thinking, myths and rites are preserved in human culture despite the continuous changes of the varying parts of the mind. The mythical categories and totemie behaviour of individuals include the static concepts which give opportunity for considerable change. These changing variables are so complex that the original categories are difficult to differentiate. They are still in the background when the researcher tries to formulate the elements of the culture. The second, more general approach to culture was suggested by hermeneutics. The understanding and the possibility in general through which the researcher liv­ ing today is able to begin the discussion with the individuals in the past involve certain common categories about phe­ nomena which can be reached through assiduous research. The horizons of today and the horizons of the past meet each other when all the details correspond to each other. This mutual consensus can be reached as a result of long and indefati­ gable discussion between the scholar and his sources. Anyway, the exact categories between people in the past and people in the present are difficult to formulate. 30

The third point of view which aims at uncovering the past phenomena is deconstruction. The key person who has de­ veloped deconstruction and its approach to the past is the French philosopher and scholar of culture, Jacques Derrida. Deconstruction can be considered to be the radical version of understanding the thinking of the past individuals (Derrida, 1986). It reads the past through texts which have been produced by somebody. The substantial hypothesis in this branch of philosophy is that the text is not a co­ herent and complete presentation of past thinking. It is an entity implying consid­ erable difficulties and problems. It is still a product of reading, which is sensible; in spite of all its complexities, the text gives the reader much interesting information. The excavation of this information is, however, problematic, but the task is es­ sential and rewarding in any case. The paper at hand has been construed by approaching deconstruction as a theoretical approach in archaeology. Deconstruction can be considered the key issue for those archaeologists who are willing to follow the most contemporary theoretical viewpoints in archaeology because it gives one considerable opportunity to understand the past as a complicated matter, and it accepts the starting point that archaeological data implies without doubt a considerable amount of confusion. The evident confusion in complex ar­ chaeological data means that problems arise particularly due to the fact that every individual has their own manner to see the world around them, and that the more complicated are the accepted prerequisites, the more complex were the populations and larger groups of human societies in the past. The questions dis­ cussed in my article are related to these problems. In addition to theory, I consid­ er it rewarding to connect this perspective

Mika Lavento

with practice. For this purpose, I have chosen the Bronze Age cairns situated in the coastal zone of the Baltic Sea - defi­ nitely a Finnish example material of re­ search. In a broad perspective, the ques­ tions of the paper are the following. 1) How to approach the past without having the connection to the people in the past? In Derridas language, the question can be posed as “how to draw when being blind”? 2) What is the problem of text for the reader and what are the possibilities to read it? The question can be asked in Derridas language as “what are the problems of verification in try­ ing to analyse the past by reading fragmentary text”? 3) Using the archaeological example, an archaeologist can ask “how to de­ construct the meaning of cairns”? In practice, one has to decide “what are the methods in order to understand the Bronze Age burials on the basis of a small and problematic mate­ rial?” Approaching this in Derrida's language, one might perceive the cairns as fragmentary texts which can be read in some way as a re-ex­ perience. The questions are basically connected with the world between life and death. 4) What examples could be presented to make a conceivable interpretation of the intentions of building burial cairns during the Bronze Age and Pre-Roman Age in Finland? What might be the most convenient ways to use deconstruction for under­ standing the burial tradition which spread in a large area of Europe and along the Baltic Sea in particular during the Early Bronze Age? By simplifying the starting point, the two last questions are examples where the two first afore-mentioned points are put into practice. I find this essential, because

archaeologists often consider that the foundations of the upper level theories are secondary or maybe not valid at all. In other words, for instance, the mean­ ings of burial cairns in the Bronze Age so­ cieties remain an interpretation through opinions and intentions without the link to theory. The missing link of the archae­ ological thinking and its foundations in theory emerges there. In this paper, I am not able to prove that deconstruction is the solution for the dif­ ficulties of interpretations. My target is to show that interpretation is more compli­ cated than it is normally assumed when accepting general and large-scale views. Interpretations also remain fragmentary and leave question marks, because valid hypotheses are extremely difficult to at­ tain. Instead of being generally acceptable through global analogies, they are more connected with each local society, and how they develop will be wielded through the language of deconstruction.

Deconstructive Thinking According to deconstruction, human understanding is basically linguistic. The process takes place when individuals use their capacity to formulate themselves in the most sensible way through words and sentences. The world out there, however, is built of not only linguistic entities. Mountains, rivers, stones etc are not linguistic objects. They can continue living if language dis­ appears. Languages continue their exist­ ence after the death of human beings, but they change all the time. In the same way, the prehistoric objects made by individu­ als in the past are not of a linguistic char­ acter. The connection between us and the people who have built cairns during the Bronze Age has gone but the legacy of the 31

Interarchaeologia, 3

people remains in the objects they have made and in languages. Despite the problem, an archaeologist can still accept that cairn is the concept that can be reformulated and thus make it possible to handle it with linguistic terms. This can happen because every individual who knows the dating and general con­ text of building burial cairns can present a considerable number of interpretations. This can be done with the help of the deconstruction approach. One of the main ideas of deconstruction postulates that all information available is fragmentary. Although the text itself can be formally homogeneous, this is only an illusion. The assumption, according to deconstructive thinking, is that one has to accept the different views represented in the text as well as the thoughts of its writer. In every case, the writer has pro­ duced a text which is problematic and full of contradictory and conflicting parts. It follows that the reader or interpreter does not have a full text in front of him. The same problem pertains to the reader. The researcher who tries to make an interpre­ tation ends up with fragmentary work. Something becomes visible and under­ standable to him, but the large part re­ mains blurred. In spite of many difficulties, one should not abandon hope yet. The researcher still has something, some fragments in the text which are feasible to building an acceptable and sensible interpretation. In practice, an acceptable interpretation can be constructed by using the method accepted by the researchers that choose hermeneutics as their starting point. The process takes place through common sense argumentation, through experience and learned routines of research. According to the constructive approach of hermeneutics, the researcher aims at approaching the truth by accepting the starting point which connects the readers 32

and writers positions. This is partly the target in deconstruction, too. It does not happen, however, because - as Derrida (1972) says - the reader knows too much to be free because he/she has lost the original, meaning that there is no such position as tabula rasa, which would give the reader the opportunity to interpret without prejudices or assumptions aris­ ing from pre-understanding. He/she can always catch part of the writers position and only part of the ideas of the producer of the text. In other words, the reader is able to find only fragments of the pur­ pose, objects and meanings of the source text. At first sight, this seems radical. Although one might first assume that this is a serious problem, there is another side to this question. Interpretation needs imagination, particularly in those cases when the validity of hypotheses cannot be attested with the help of clear observa­ tions. Asking new and curious questions is the key of many branches of research of culture. The fire of asking and search­ ing the invisible in the past should be the purpose in the research. Questions must be such that can be answered. Thinking of answers, one can easily understand their fragmentary character. An archaeologist is able to observe extremely small details of the past. In methodology, it turns out that only part of the entities of the ma­ terial available are possible to research. For instance, an archaeologist research­ ing the Finnish Bronze Age is able to see only cairns which give very fragmentary information on the life of humans. What constitutes the life of a human being has remained only partly understood, be­ cause sites are rarely found and poorly researched. Only small amount of mate­ rial available has been researched; fur­ thermore, the investigations have been fragmentary and scholars have lost a large amount of possible information.

Mika Lavento

In addition, although interpretation is difficult anyway, it is full of pitfalls as well. An aim is to arrive at a coherent and sensi­ ble result although often it is not possible to prove it to be valid. According to Der­ rida, the best interpreter is an individual who can draw from his memory. In its radical meaning, it involves the statement that “blind is the most successful drawer” (Derrida, 1967, 31-48). This means that for an interpreter the feeling is included in his study. What he should be able to do is to be willing to break rules and conven­ tions. The result of drawing and writing refreshes the interpretation and says what has not been said before. The purpose of all productive research is to produce new results including refreshing ideas. This takes place without a glimpse of recon­ struction. What new is it then that deconstruction can offer to archaeology? It is evident that deconstructive research depends on our imagination and willingness to present hypotheses which remain without veri­ fication. This is much more important than what we usually want and dare to confess. Archaeology needs imagination and in this work, theories do not have the prominent position. In addition, the material leaves many questions open and gives possibilities for interpretations of different kinds. The concept of diffėrance is essential for understanding Derridas concepts and his aim to catch the past phenomena (see Derrida, 1972). Diffėrance as a concept is not the same as what we first may think when thinking about the concept of dif­ ference. The two have, of course, some­ thing in common, but their aims are not the same. The first assumption says that they both mean that two entities - what­ ever they may be - are not the same. The purpose of diffėrance is to understand the past entities, which can be short, large, small, big, simple, complex etc. What will

be the aim of it depends on the posed questions and the framing of questions. Secondly, despite the questions as well as the success of the methods, one cannot shed light on the objects of the research in such a way that all sides of it can be approached. In other words, no questions can be solved so that the complete truth can be found out. According to Derrida, it is an illusion that an eidos - suggested by Edmund Husserl - of some phenomenon can be reached. What can be reached is an enormous number of different pictures or views which cast light on the object we are interested in. All these views are dif­ ferent, but still they have something to do with the original. Finally, the concept of diffėrance refers to the concept of ‘different’, but it simultaneously has something to do with the researcher who seeks the original. Trying to reach the original or truth is the researchers task. Natural sciences operate through experimental methods and they construct and attest their results by observations. Their questions have been posed in such a manner that answering is possible with the results obtained after application of certain methods in the study. The structure of the research implies scientific principles. When the questions are directed to understanding of individuals and societies, the results can be only partly achieved with the help of methods that follow the laws of probabilities. Archaeologists are interested in not only chronology, technologies, typologies or descriptions of the results obtained in the excavations of sites, their questions are related to human beings and their interests in the past. Answers cannot be found by direct observation. They can be obtained by presenting hypotheses that cannot usually be verified. What an archaeologist can practically do is to use his/her imagination. 33

Interarchaeologia, 3

Derrida considered that the philosopher and his thinking can be classified in the framework of post-hermeneutics developed for understanding the human being and his rational and irrational sides. In practice, one of the figures still in the centre of hermeneutics of the late 20th century is Hans-Georg Gadamer. Gadamers (see Gadamer, 1975) views start from the hermeneutical circle and rely on that circle during the research process. Despite that, Derrida suggests that what one should do is draw a new picture - like a blind drawer. In a way, the picture is harmonious although below the surface it implies a large number of disharmonic entities, how many and of what kind they are it is not possible to understand. Anyway, the world itself is for Derrida full of conflicts, regarding both the interpreted object and interpreter. Our intuition as a writer or interpreter brings up not only one right result but a lot of possibilities, and we choose some of them or, in practice, one of them, which we present as the result of our research process. The result of the research carried out in Geisteswissenchaften is the new interpretation, including the earlier thoughts but something new as well. In the same way, this is the aim of the study suggested by Derrida. However, an important difference is that if Gadamer tries to achieve a harmonious result, Derrida denies this in principle. In hermeneutics as well as posthermeneutics, the problem of verification is left at least partly open. The problem is that the number of right or sensible interpretations is too large for deciding that only one is right. Gadamer trusts the fusion of horizons. He thinks that during this fusion, a large number of implausible alternatives can be cast out although the scholar still has several alternatives. 34

Derrida does not believe the fusion of horizons is the solution. He emphasises that the conflict remains and our abil­ ity to proceed in the right direction is more an illusion than reality. He does not deny that the scholar is doing his best to achieve new results; albeit there is a large number of possibilities, this does not mean that research is hopeless. We must trust ourselves and suggest interpreta­ tions. For many reasons, we can get false results, but we still get results which have something to do with the phenomena we are interested in. Some flashes may come to our mind that reveal the phenomena and can shed light on them better than we might imagine. Derridas philosophy may raise ques­ tions, and the reader may consider it in­ sensible, because Derrida does not say that science is a system which corrects itself little by little. Although he restrains himself from saying this, Derrida accepts the idea at least to the certain degree. It seems that he thinks that this kind of assumption does not belong in the world that is full of conflicts and problems, and that one should not overestimate ones capability to solve the questions related to the human being, his thinking and social life. To think that the research results always lead to the right interpretation is too easy for him. Many problems can be overcome but it is the source material and the unconscious and conscious details that generate new interpretations all the time. The process is endless and therefore the problems are left unsolved. Derridas world is full of problems although some questions can be answered so that other researchers believe the results have been achieved. The number of problems often increases when researchers are more familiar with the topic of their study. Despite the difficulties, that does not put out the fire that encourages to know more.

Mika Lavento

Bronze Age Cairns on the South-Western Coast of Finland: an Example to Apply Derrida’s Philosophy Archaeology is a good example of a discipline that can attain some results but it has to be admitted that what can be attained is still only a tiny fragment of prehistory. Although unclear, the re­ search results are rewarding and enrich our knowledge of the past. The obstacle to doing comprehensive analysis is usu­ ally the source material. For example, the Bronze Age culture in the coastal zone of Finland has been mostly described with the help of exca­ vating and interpreting cairns. The idea is understandable, because they particularly represent the biggest concentration of ancient monuments of the period in Fin­ land. The basic idea has also been used in the interpretation of Iron Age and re­ lied much on burial research. In the Iron Age cemeteries, the deceased were buried with goods in their grave, some remains of clothes and many other remains of ma­ terial culture are left. Certain periods of the Bronze Age offer the means to analyse human bones and provide information for understanding the life of the deceased. The cairns are normally empty of bones and even other finds. The interpretations of the same kind are not possible here. The cairns are significant because they are easy to find and they are situated in salient places on the tops of cliffs and hills. Considerable numbers of dwelling sites have not been found. Their size is small and the amount of material uncov­ ered by excavations remains scantier than usual at the Stone Age sites. Although the appearance of the cairns is compa­ rable with Scandinavian cairns, the same cannot be said about the finds. Only the small number of finds has been uncov­ ered. On the majority of cases, the cairns

are empty. Because bones have not been preserved either, the problem has become more considerable. In other types of sites, the archaeologi­ cal data is even more obscure. The number of dwelling sites is small, and in several cases the Bronze Age (1600-500 cal BC) material has been found mixed with Kiukainen ceramics (2300-1500 cal BC) or with the contemporary inland culture. An example of this is Textile pottery. The site can include later or even older remains of habitation as well. It may be that the material includes ceramics indi­ cating the Early Iron Age through Morby ceramics (800 cal BC - 300 AD), which is considered the follower of the Bronze Age ceramic types (Edgren, 1999). Some­ times it has been found at the Stone Age dwelling sites (Edgren, 1969). Anyway, it represents the transition type from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age (Meinander, 1969). Already Johan Reinhold Aspelin (1875; 1885, 33) believed in the continuation of Stone Age settlement and the possibility of two kinds of Bronze Age cultures in Finland. Soon after this, the assumption that impulses from Scandinavia came to Finland during the earlier Bronze Age was suggested by Alfred Hackman, who further elaborated the idea of Bronze Age cairns (Hackman, 1897). He touched upon the dating of the cairns as well, although most excavations were done later. The view was further clarified by Aarne Michael Tallgren (1918, 1931a, 1931b; Tallgren &Lindelof, 1916), who dated the Scandinavian Bronze Age in the coastal zone with the period of 1500-500 BC. Tallgren emphasised the migration of the Scandinavian population which changed the culture in the coastal zone. He argued for the continuation of inland settlement by the Stone Age culture (Tallgren, 1931b, 91) in spite of some changes in the culture. 35

Interarchaeologia, 3

The role of Scandinavians and eastern influence were later discussed by several researchers. Aarne Äyräpää did not con­ sider the influence of Scandinavians con­ siderable, and he emphasised, contrary to Tallgren, that it was particularly the local population which caused the formation of the Bronze Age culture in Finland. How­ ever, he did not still deny the immigra­ tion of small populations from Sweden (Äyräpää, 1952, 294). Carl Fredrik Meinander (1954b, 198) supported Äyräpääs hypothesis and con­ nected his argumentation with the devel­ opment of the Kiukainen culture which influenced the coastal area of Finland during the final stage of the Neolithic (1954a, 186). Meinander s opinion was, in short, that there was Scandinavian in­ fluence, but it began already in the last period of the Stone Age. Furthermore, because it was probable that Kiukainen culture conflated with the earlier parts of the Scandinavian Bronze Age (Montelius periods I and II), it seemed possible that immigration continued during the later phase of Kiukainen culture, too. Aarne Äyräpää (1953) considered the local population important but not only in the coastal area. He saw that inland a population that developed the type of ce­ ramics later known as the Sarsa type de­ veloped. Meinander (1954b) divided the inland ceramics into two types and sepa­ rated the southern variant as Sarsa type from the eastern variant as Tomitsa type. For him, this mixed ceramics was the hy­ brid that was the result of influences from the west and south but which neverthe­ less had some influence of the earlier population. In the late 1960s, Meinander suggested a more detailed picture about the northern parts of the area as well by suggesting a hypothesis about four differ­ ent subcultures living in the Pre-Roman time (Meinander, 1969). The division 36

was made particularly with the help of ceramic groups. The discussion was continued by Chris­ tian Carpelan who developed the model of the ceramic groups for the later phase of the Early Metal Period in his Licentiate Thesis (1965). Meinander s inland groups were replaced by three others. Later, Car­ pelan distinguished between more groups, in the northern and eastern Finland in particular (Carpelan, 1970; 1979; 1982; 2003). During his career, he has been most interested in northern Finland and Lapland; it was Unto Salo who continued and developed the discussion about the Bronze Age culture on the south-western coast of Finland. Researchers who have later worked on the subject have supported the idea of immigration, but they have suggested different explanations about the mecha­ nisms in which way and why it started. They have dated and connected it with the early phase of the Bronze Age. Unto Salo (1981; 1984) considered the coming of the new population as a process of oc­ casional immigration of single families. According to Salo (1981), some of the families not only visited Finland but also remained to live in the new areas. Chris­ tian Carpelan (1999) has postulated, instead, that the visitors were groups of traders from Scandinavia. They came to the coast for commercial reasons, but they also influenced the local population. Their visiting considerably changed the Stone Age culture. Both these theories want to commit to the general lines of the development of processes which were responsible for the change of societies, sites, and archaeological material. Unto Salo (2004) has continued his discussion of coastal and inland Bronze Age in southern Finland on several occasions. The Department of Archaeology at the University of Turku has done systematic listing and survey

Mika Lavento

of the Bronze Age cairns in the 1980s (Salo et ai., 1992) but later the results of this project have not been much utilised. Tapani Tuovinens (2002) dissertation revealed important points of view on the Bronze Age and Early Iron Age in the archipelago of Aboland. Jari Okkonens (2003) dissertation discusses the coastal zone, too, but in the northern part of the Baltic Sea. It is useful because there are considerable differences between these two areas. Recently, research has been continued by Peter Holmbland in the middle part of the Bothnian Gulf. Inland, first of all in the regions of Saimaa, the Oulujoki Water systems, and in the Karelian Isthmus, the research has been advanced by Mika Lavento (2001; 2005; 2008).

How to Construct the Theories on the Basis of Bronze Age Cairns The previous section shortly touched upon the research which explains the relationship between immigration and local populations. Common to all these theories is that various numbers of new immigrants reached the south-western and western coast of Finland during the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age. Common to the theories also is the fact that the number of immigrants was small. Speaking in broad terms, perhaps dur­ ing the past 100 years research generated nothing notably new to the history of the coastal Bronze Age in Finland. The ba­ sic ideas, even chronologies outlined by Scandinavian archaeologists like Oscar Montelius (e.g. Montelius, 1899) in the late 19th century, are still valid with mi­ nor corrections. What the scholars have attained are details which only correct the dating and the development in the local areas or individual sites. If we are

satisfied with prehistory in broad terms, this is enough. Despite this, much has changed in the scholars approaches and emphasises. It is essential, for instance, that the ques­ tion about immigrants is now researched in a different light than before. The basic axiom in Finnish archaeology until the early 1970s was that Finns immigrated to Finland from Estonia at the beginning of the Roman Iron Age. However, today there is no archaeologist who believes in this explanation as the only one. Further­ more, the number of cairns has increased drastically although the number of dwell­ ing sites has remained small. It is also the case that the Baltic countries and the northern coniferous zone during the Late Neolithic are considered to have been more important than before, whereas the importance of southern Scandinavia has weakened in explaining the beginnings of the Bronze Age. The discussed theories should to be ap­ proached from the point of view of the function of the cairns. The research did not focus on the argument whether they were the graves of newcomers; later, sev­ eral other functions have been attributed to cairns. Graves are difficult objects of research for archaeologists, because their find material is very scanty. Being almost empty of finds or even remains of bones, they present problems when discussing their function. They can represent the symbols of new religion which is a sen­ sible probability, but not the only possi­ bility. Recently, the function of graves has been viewed in different light although the interpretations are not easy to verify. Graves may have been needed for show­ ing other groups or individuals the own­ ership of the land. The suggestion can be taken for granted because the Bronze Age is the period when attitude towards the meaning of land in economy changed. 37

Interarchaeologia, 3

The different ways to utilise the arable lands - the so-called first landnam - may also have occurred in the eastern part of the Baltic Sea (see Lang, 2007). The cairns may have been monuments for the earlier generation, the forefathers. In this meaning, they may have been showing to whom the land belongs. The issue may have been of importance for newcomers who did not automatically become the owners of the areas. In ad­ dition, the Bronze Age society may have become more and more hierarchic and the question who had right to use land was becoming more complex. In Finland the arable land has been the reason for attesting ownership. Cairns may have had a function of bor­ ders between the groups, and they may probably have been sacred sites (in Finn­ ish pyha). Approaching the question from the viewpoint of comparative religion, the cairns may be interpreted as borders. The original meaning of the word pyhä was a border between groups. Veikko Anttonen assumes that the word and its meaning were adopted by Germans - the newcomers. He reserves the term hiisi for the place of the border not between living populations but the living and the dead. Later the meaning of the concept has sig­ nificantly changed and today it refers to holy or sacred (Anttonen, 1996). In spite of the changed meaning, the significance of the concept in the society has pre­ served. It means the place or area which has influenced and still influences the society but in different manner than dur­ ing the Bronze Age. The interpretation is interesting but difficult to establish. One reason for remembering the cairns may have been that they had guided sail­ ors and tradesmen, who travelled to the area too seldom to remember the places or sites for revisiting them; the cairns were signs which showed the right ways from one place to another. Although they 38

were not originally built for this purpose they became navigation marks which have stayed in the memory of seafarers from one generation to the next. Remains of memorial places are monuments which carry a considerable number of different meanings. The term memorial place offers great potential to deconstruct and reconstruct their roles in the past societies, because the memo­ ries do not only have such implications that are known to us today but also those that have been bestowed upon them by the generation of their original builders and, later on, the next generations. They are not only the places where the younger generation wants to ‘meet* or remember their ancestors. In addition, although the link between generations may have ceased to exist, recent visitors at the sites have been ready to generate new mean­ ings to the constructions. The emergence of new meanings given by the new gen­ erations indicates that the new meanings have prevailed, for instance, when later generations consider the sites as the buri­ als of their ancestors. On the grounds of this argumentation, the newcomers have legitimised themselves as the owners of the land which was in real terms new to them. In all these meanings both the new generations and the newcomers have de­ constructed the meanings of the cairns. One reason for building the cairns in the coastal zone of Finland during the Bronze Age is evidently related to the Scandinavian Bronze Age culture. Ac­ cording to contemporary interpretations the visitors, migrating traders or families, assumed to have been in charge of their buildings. The interpretation has been based on the tradition which seems to have its roots in southern Scandinavia. It has authorised archaeologists to state that the tradition has spread from there to Finland (Hackman, 1897; Tallgren, 1931b, 92-93).

Mika Lavento

The cairns are well-known in the Baltic countries as well, although their dating as early as to the Bronze Age now seems unjustified. Their emergence reflects the tradition the origins of which may have spread Estonia as the result of influence from the south, west and north. This sug­ gests that the first builders of the monu­ ments were pioneers who had trade con­ tacts, but not only them because they adopted a new way to construct grave monuments, a new religion and new in­ fluences which affected the construction habits in the society in a different manner than before (Lang, 2007). When the building of cairns began in Scandinavia, we cannot overlook the fact that despite their communication network, the individuals or groups who initiated the change of the new burial tra­ dition visited the new area very seldom, and without purpose to stay there. Con­ nections with the innovators of the tradi­ tion and the original populations may also have taken place for some other reasons than what can be read through the cairns. New and considerable change in network systems is not necessarily needed for the change, which seems outstanding and which seems to manifest the extensive change in the whole society in the eyes of an archaeologist. Again, an archaeologist makes and interpretation on the basis of visible yet misleading data. In the coastal zone of south-western Finland, data has been recorded on some sites which indicate that they have been built and the resources around them have been utilised by populations representing different ceramic traditions (Lavento, 2001). How much the ceramics can prove the existence of two different groups and the simultaneous or not simultaneous settling of the site is an extremely difficult question to solve. From the social point of view, both explanations - good rela­ tions with possible separate populations

or difficulties with them - seem relevant, keeping in mind the long settlement pe­ riod during the Bronze Age. As we shortly discussed earlier, the memorial places may have been consid­ ered to be ‘places to remember” in the secondary meaning, too. The approach starts with the assumption that the sites have not belonged to the ancestors of the population which keeps them as their own memorial sites. The places obtain their meaning through other attributes than those which have been in the mind of the generations which have first built them and buried their deceased in them. In this secondary meaning the place be­ comes important through the processes which grow from the need to make use of it against other individuals or popula­ tions. In Finland, many areas are chang­ ing because shore displacement remoulds the scenery so that the place sooner or later looses its contact to the sea or lake. In some cases, for instance, the ijord changes to river which stays running in its place although the shore withdraws. In spite of this, the area keeps its attractive­ ness for thousands of years. In this case, the environment functions as the trigger of the memorising process, which begins again and again in different individuals in different generations. When the many hypotheses of build­ ing and use of cairns for some purposes have mixed meanings, the interpretations need evidence to support the argumen­ tation. In some cases, this can be found. If an archaeologist detects the remains of the deceased in the cairn, to consider it a grave is natural. Many other explanations are not excluded either but they are not clearly plausible. The alternative interpretation of the cairn as a place of offering is perhaps understandable but not easy to prove on the basis of finds. In this case, the origi­ nal meaning of the burial construction 39

Interarchaeologia, 3

has changed in such a way that the site has become a place for memorising; this act has been attained by sacrifying food or tools. It can still be said that this can indicate the need of the human beings to express their worship of gods, owners of the nature or entities which influence their life in the world, and when their time in the world ends, they will enter this other world. Sites with large numbers of cairns may have meant agglomeration, a centre of memorising deaths but at the same time meeting the living relatives. If we assume the idea that populations were exogamous, it is also necessary to postulate that there must have been somewhere the sites where these groups normally met each other. Because cairns are sites easy to find and remember, they may have suited well for this purpose. In other words, we can postulate the interpretation of cairns as meeting places but we have very thin arguments to support our hypothesis. One problem with cairns has often been that dwelling sites have seldom been found near the cairns. The problem should not be overestimated because, in general, the number of Bronze Age sites has remained relatively stable - particu­ larly by the Baltic Sea in Finland. In recent years, more sites have been found, which gives more strength for the argumenta­ tion. One problem with the sites is that because the cairns are usually situated in bedrock, even on high cliffs, these sites are not suitable for living for a long period. In addition, if they were used for living, the evidence of living has not been preserved on the bedrock and is almost impossible to find. In other words, although some settlement activity may have occurred on the bedrock, today we have very few pos­ sibilities to ascertain it by our methods. So far, very few Bronze Age sites have been found in connection with the cairns (see e.g. Salo, 1984,159-161). 40

On the basis of these hypotheses it becomes clear that interesting interpre­ tations can be suggested, but they can­ not always be based on clear evidence. Sometimes there is little evidence and no credible support. This is normal in archaeology. When foundations are not acceptable, we have to confess we are no more than blind drawers who do the drawing by fantasy. What helps the drawer is analogies. They tell us that our interpretation is possible but they do not prove our hypothesis true. Most of our interpretations have been deduced from incomplete and fragmentary source data. They are glimpses of the past which help the blind drawer. Do our interpretations come close to Derridas suggestions?

Conclusions: Deconstruction and the Interpretation of Cairns Although it would be possible to find more examples of how to interpret the use of cairns, the afore mentioned are enough for the purpose. To the questions posed at the beginning of the article, the following answers can be given. Following Derridas ideas, the question “how to draw when being blind” can be seen as the usual dilemma of an archaeol­ ogist. Drawing the picture of the reasons of emergence of the Bronze Age cairns gives different answers that have already been considered. In this case more essen­ tial than the ‘real* answers, which are ex­ tremely difficult to reach, are possibilities. In other words, the archaeologist creates probable explanations. He does not give ready answers. Accepting the hypothesis that material can be converted into a text, we can ask “what are the problems of verification when trying to analyse the past by read­ ing a fragmentary text”? The problem with

Mika Lavento

the archaeological texts almost always is their fragmentary character. Although it could be a full text, it is still fragmentary in the philosophical meaning of the data, while what we know about the past is, in all occasions, only part of the whole. For carrying out acceptable and pro­ ductive research, we have to know "how to deconstruct the meaning of cairns”. In practice, what methods should be used in order to understand the Bronze Age burials on the basis of small and prob­ lematic material? The explanations can be obscure but they still sound reason­ able. Already in the beginning we have to admit that the picture is fragmentary and that it will change for several reasons. We know some parts of the totality (in rela­ tion to questions) but because the most part of the attributes which may affect our answers are unknown to us, the impres­ sion that final answers can be obtained is a dream. One can disagree with the criti­ cism by stating that the questions must be narrowed and so precise that there is evidence to consider the answers accept­ able. This strategy certainly helps, but it still leaves us in a confusing situation. If we are able to claim that we have received only one possible explanation for the use of the type of the site - in this case burial cairns - the conclusion remains particu­ lar. How far we can generalize our result always remains a difficult question. We can also say that what we will do is we will bring up an example of how things might have been. The purpose is to give the final explanation, but it cannot be completely achieved. In addition to this, it is not without difficulties to say that our explanation is right even if it concerns one site which has been totally excavated. It can be said that what we suggest is still no more than one possible explanation. Natural­ ly, practical evidence is easier to accept than theory, which says that all cairns

should have one and the same function. Resorting to explanations of a very local or single phenomenon is reasonable, but it is not often enough for archaeologists. The questions are usually much broader. With the broader questions, explanations remain hypotheses. The fourth question asked, what might be the most convenient way to use deconstruction for understanding the bur­ ial tradition which spread in a large area along the Baltic Sea and in Finland dur­ ing the Bronze Age. What are our means to go forward? They are well-known and, despite our background philosophy, the same that have been used since the be­ ginnings of archaeology. We are able to do comparison by using the ethnographic analogue and our own experience. Finally, what are the opportunities deconstruction can offer to improve our understanding of the function of the Bronze Age cairns in Finland? They are the opportunities to connect fragments of our own knowledge, experiences and memories and create a view of how things may have happened. It means some kind of way of seeing or inner feeling about the past. It might be reasonable to think that in the best case, the final result is the pic­ ture that has been created on the basis of all information available. Following Derrida the last prerequi­ site is not necessary for good interpreta­ tion. Because it is not necessary for the result - as a research is an interpretation anyway - to take into account all possible information. What is needed is a solid and creative description of the invisible and unknown past, phase or series of events. In the case of the cairns, this might be splitting the time of usage into flashes of past and creating several views of how the builders of the cairns have arrived at the areas new to them. The picture must be based at least partly on the evidence re­ ceived from the archaeological research. 41

Interarchaeologia, 3

If there is no connection between archae­ ological evidence and the picture created, the verification remains without the basis. Although missing of the connection does not hinder the formation of the picture, it remains almost hopelessly vague. It seems at the first sight to be unacceptable. It is necessary to stop for a short mo­ ment to think about the characteristics of archaeology as a science. Archaeology is

diving in small places which have come up to the surface by change. The diving represents only parts of the original re­ mains of which the people in the past have left behind. What can be attained, even in the best cases, is only an impression of the past. More or less - and depending on the viewpoint of the researcher - this picture is of the same kind Derrida suggested. Right or wrong, but here we are.

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Carpelan, C. 1999. Käännekohtia Suomen esihistoriassa aikavälillä 5100-100 e Kr. Fogelberg, P. (toim.) Pohjan poluilla. Suo-

Anttonen, V. 1996. Ihmisen ja maan rajat: ’Pyha kulttuurisena kategoriana (Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seuran toimituksia 646). Helsinki. Aspelin, J. R. 1875. Suomalais-ugrilaisen muinaistutkinnon alkeita (Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seuran toimituksia 51). Helsinki. Aspelin, J. R. 1885. Suomen asukkaat pakanuuden aikana. Helsinki. Äyräpää, A. 1952. The Settlement of Prehis­ toric Age. Fennia, 72, 285-299. Äyräpää, A. 1953. Kulturförhallandena i Fin­ land fore finnarnas invandring. Fińska Fornminnesföreningens Tidskrifl, LII: 1, 77-98. Carpelan, C. 1965. Sär 2. Alustava katsaus erääseen rautakautiseen keramiikkaryhmäänja siihen liittyvään problematiikkaan. Lisensiaatintyö Suomen ja Pohjoismaiden arkeologiassa toukokuussa 1965. Manu­ script at the Institute for Cultural Research, Department of Archaeology, University of Helsinki. Carpelan, C. 1970. Ns. imitoitua tekstiilikeramiikkaa Suomesta. Suomen Museo, 1970, 23-34. Carpelan, C. 1979. Om asbestkeramikens historia i Fennoskandien. Finskt Museum , 1978, 5-25. Carpelan, C. 1982. Om bronsälderns jordbrukssamhälle i Finland. Sjovold, T. (ed.)

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(Bidrag till kännedom av Finlands natur och folk 153). Helsinki, 249-280. Carpelan, C. 2003. Inarilaisten arkeologiset vaiheet. Inari - Aanaar. Lehtola, V.-P. (toim.) Inarin historia jääkaudesta nykyaikaan. Inarin kunta. Oulu, 28-95. Derrida, J. 1967. Ce dangereux supplement. De la grammatologie. Paris. In Finnish: Vaarallinen täydennys, translated by T. Arppe. Platonin apteekki ja muita kirjoituksia. Hel­ sinki, 27-57. Derrida, J. 1972. La difference. Marges de la Philosophie. Paris. In Finnish: Difference, translated by H. Sivenius. Platonin apteekki ja muita kirjoituksia. Helsinki, 246-273. Derrida, J. 1986. Lettre ä un ami japonais. Psyche. Inventions de Vautre. Paris. In Fin­ nish: Kirje japanilaiselle ystävälle, transla­ ted by T. Itkonen. Platonin apteekki ja muita kirjoituksia. Helsinki, 21-26. Edgren, T. 1969. Reflectioner kring tvenne epineolitiska Iekāri. Finskt Museumy22-26. Edgren, T. 1999. Alkavan rautakauden kulttuurikuva Länsi-Suomessa. Fogelberg, P. (toim.) Pohjan poluilla. Suomalaisten ju u ­ ret nykytutkimuksen mukaan (Bidrag till kännedom av Finlands natur och folk 153). Helsinki, 311-333. Gadamer, H.-G. 1975. Wahrheit und Metho­

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43

SKILL, KNOW LEDGE, AND MEMORY: HOW TO MAKE A BONE AW L PROPERLY? Heidi Luik The knowledge and opinions about how something must be done exist in every human society. This knowledge also includes technology - how an artefact should be made, which materials, tools and working techniques must be chosen. Humans reproduce their existence and their so­ cial relations through everyday practices, which take place in material conditions and through material culture. These everyday practices are influenced by historically established cultural be­ liefs, attitudes and habits. Techniques are first and foremost social products; any technique, in any society, is concerned with how things work, how they are to be made and to be used, and is taught through tradition. In this article, one o f the most common bone artefact types - bone awls or points - in the eastern Baltic region in the Late Bronze Age is discussed. The aim o f the article is to analyse what was important in making choices how to make the awl from bone: was “natural choice” more important - i.e., which bone is suitable for such task, or “cultural choice” - i.e., that in this group or society awls have always been made in this way. In the Late Bronze Age in the eastern Baltic region, awls made from goat/sheep metapodials were standardised both in terms of choice of material and manufacturing techniques. It is possible to distinguish that although the same material was used, these awls were made using different techniques in different regions. Keywords: bone awls, technology, natural choice, cultural choice, eastern Baltic region, Late

Bronze Age. Heidi Luik, Institute of History, University o f Tallinn, Rüütli 6, 10130 Tallinn, Estonia; [email protected]

Introduction Richard Indreko, who investigated the hillfort of Asva in the 1930s, wrote about bone awls already found there in rather large numbers in the first excavations, “they are so common everywhere and in every culture that a longer discussion of them would be completely useless” (In­ dreko, 1939,30). I would not like to agree with this opinion. It is definitely true that awls are “very common in every culture”, but nowadays it is possible to draw con­ clusions helping to understand better the ancient society under discussion on the basis of such artefacts as plain bone awls as well. One of the possibilities is specifying the field of exploitation of awls: investigation of use-wear allows to draw conclusions

about the materials the awls were used on, which, in its turn, may provide infor­ mation about the activities which have left no direct archaeological traces ow­ ing to poor preservation of the material (about use-wear analysis of bone artefacts see e.g. Buc & Loponte, 2007; Christidou, 2005; Christidou & Legrand, 2005; Gates St-Pierre, 2007; van Gijn, 2005; Griffits, 2001; Legrand Be Sidėra, 2007; LeMoine, 1997; Maigrot, 2005). Such analysis has been called reciprocal illuminating9; the appearance of eyed needles in the Pal­ aeolithic Period, indicating the spread of sewing craft, may serve as an example of this (LeMoine, 2001, 4-5; see also Grif­ fits, 2001, 191; Olsen, 2001, 200). Janet Spector’s (1991) feminist approach could be mentioned as one more possibility of interpretation of an awl. 45

Interarchaeologia, 3

The present article focuses on the mak­ ing of bone awls, not on their exploitation. This subject is not connected with mem­ ory in the direct sense of the recollection of past or history. Yet at the making of artefacts habits and traditions, which are also related to memory and remember­ ing, have played certain role in the choice of materials and technologies. As Richard Bradley puts it “making a decorated pot according to time-honoured formula was an act of remembering just as much as visiting and maintaining a burial mound” (Bradley, 2002, 11).

Technology, Society, and Memory In the archaeological research of recent decades, more attention has been paid to problems connected with technologies, accentuating the fact that technology is inseparable from man and society; it is the realisation of social and political re­ lationships (e.g. Brück, 2006; Choyke, 1997; Dobres, 1995; 2000; Ingold, 2000; Lemonnier, 1993; Russell, 2001). Material culture is actively involved in social proc­ esses and human interaction, but material objects are no bare reflections of human behaviour; they are manipulated as part of intentional strategies (Capie, 2006, 6ff; Gosden & Marshall, 1999, 170; Hodder, 2004, 29, 36; Prown, 1993, 1; Renfrew, 2002, 135; Schiffer, 1999). All actions take place within cul­ tural frameworks (Hodder, 2000, 38); the knowledge and opinions about how something must be done has existed in human societies since always (Barrett, 2005; Earle, 2002). This knowledge also includes technology - how an artefact should be made, which materials, tools and working techniques must be chosen. Humans reproduce their existence and their social relations through everyday 46

practices, which take place in material conditions and through material culture. These everyday practices are influenced by historically established cultural beliefs, attitudes and habits (Bourdieu, 1977; Bradley, 2002,6; Robb, 2005). Members of a group accepted the rules or codes passed down among generations so that accepted production methods of material symbols emerged (Patrik, 2000, 132). In Bradleys opinion, people did not make artefacts or build structures according to a traditional format because they were unable to think of anything else; it rather was a way of ad­ hering to tradition and maintaining links with their past; they made and used things in a particular way because they had been taught to do so (Bradley, 2002, 9,11). As Pierre Bourdieu puts it, ‘the child imitates not ‘models' but the other peo­ ples action (Bourdieu, 1977, 95; see also Edmonds, 1999, 38). Through such imitating he/she later remembers how something must be done rightly; hence, this remembering will be passed down from one generation to the next. Mark Edmonds (1999, 45-46) has analysed the making of flint artefacts in the Neolithic, and according to him, the spread of waste and rough-outs suggest that a number of people worked in proximity in a par­ ticular location, thus they were able to observe how others produced axes, and they were observed themselves. Such axe production provided a context in which the skill of flint knapping could be watched, learned and developed. People working with stone in customary ways encountered the past through their work; thus, other times were always present (Edmonds, 1999, 49-50). Pierre Lemonnier (1993) emphasises that techniques are first and foremost social products. Any technique, in any society, is always learned through tra­ dition and concerned with how things work, how they are to be made and to be

Heidi Luik

used. Lemonnier points out that although sometimes it happens that the choice made within a society is inadequate or even unfavourable, people still persist in acting the same way because this has al­ ways been the way to behave; therefore, it is considered to be the only correct way. Pierre Petrequin (1993, 52) points out that some manufacturing process was probably self-evident because of techni­ cal and cultural habits, and it took several generations to overcome a habit. According to Marcia-Anne Dobres, technology depends on cultural attitudes to what are the right and wrong ways to make and use material culture, it concerns active involvement of social actors in the gradual creation of their material world; it is an ongoing process through which peo­ ple, society and materials together create and recreate the meaningful conditions of everyday life. Technological practice is not simply the activities and physical actions of artefact production and use, but also a sensuous, engaged, mediated, meaningful and materially grounded ex­ perience that causes individuals and col­ lectives to act as they do (Dobres, 1995, 27ff; 2000, 4-5). As Joanna Brück (2006, 311) puts it, both people and objects can be thought of as materialised memory which is not static but a continuous productive proc­ ess. According to Brücks opinion, peo­ ples understanding of materials and sub­ stances have an impact on technological processes: “Humans and the material world are linked through a complex web of metaphors, which enables people to understand and conceptualise social re­ lationships. These metaphorical links in­ vest the material world with meanings, which affect the way people feel they can use particular artefacts and substances. People do not work with a “real” envi­ ronment, outside of history, but with their understanding of it as constituted

through a particular cultural tradition” (Brück, 2006, 307). In the present article, an attempt is made to use these ideas in the analysis of bone artefacts from Late Bronze Age hillforts in the Baltic countries. The article tries to answer the question what similar­ ities or differences of peoples choices can be observed in selection of materials or techniques for making artefacts, particu­ larly bone awls. Were these choices based on practical purposes, or were they also influenced by other factors? What was determinant, traditions and habits, or, on the contrary, innovations?

Natural or Cultural Choice? In this article, one of the most com­ mon bone artefact types - bone awls or points - in the eastern Baltic region in the Late Bronze Age is discussed. The aim of the article is to analyse what was impor­ tant in making choices how to make the awl from bone: was “natural choice” more important - i.e., which bone was suitable for such task, or “cultural choice” - i.e., that in this group or society awls have al­ ways been made in this way. In general, bone awls, like other bone artefacts, can be divided into two groups: 1) artefacts for which a bone (or a piece of bone) of the most suitable shape was chosen, which was but slightly worked; 2) care­ fully elaborated artefacts, which were often quite standardised (Choyke, 2005, 131; Choyke et al., 2004, 185; Choyke & Schibler, 2007, 57-58). The first group is often called ad hoc tools; it is not possible, of course, to speak about “making prop­ erly” in connection with such artefacts, probably the suitability of bone or bone fragment for making the tool or just using it as tool was important (e.g. Graudonis, 1989, pis. XXI; XXII: 1-5; XLIII: 11-14; Luik & Maldre, 2007, Fig. 21; Sperling, 47

Interarchaeologia, 3

2008, 200-202). Choice because of natural reasons depends on the suitability of a bone for an artefact, for example, the use of a rudimentary metapodial bone or ulna for an awl, or some physical property of a bone, for example, the inclination of metapodials of ruminants to split along the longitudinal groove in their middle. At the same time, tradi­ tions could also exist concerning the suitability of a bone of cer­ tain species or of certain skeletal part for making a certain tool or artefact (Choyke, 1997, 66-67; Choyke et al., 2004, 178). Ac­ cording to Pierre Lemonnier (1993, 3), the choice of a certain technique, raw material or tool may sometimes depend on some symbolic value attributed to them by the society rather than on their real physical properties. This way, the use of a certain material or technique may have Fig. 1. Sites mentioned in the text: 1 - Bronze Age hill- been considered imperative in forts; 2 - Late Neolithic graves; 3 - stray find from Lake certain cases, regardless of the Lubāna. Drawing by Ķersti Siitan fact that the artefact could have been made in a different way or 2006, pis. XLIX: 1, 2; LVII: 6, 8). The from different material, or, on the con­ second group of the Late Bronze Age trary, rejected completely notwithstand­ material in the eastern Baltic consists of ing the excellent suitability of the mate­ awls made from goat/sheep metapodirial. For example, Robert McGhee (1977), als, which are standardised both in terms who has analysed the choices of bone, of choice of material and manufacturing antler, and walrus ivory in bone working techniques. However, it is possible to dis­ of the arctic peoples of North America, tinguish that, although the same material has suggested that besides the function­ was used, such awls were made using dif­ al properties of materials, the symbolic ferent manufacturing techniques in dif­ meanings attributed to them were also ferent districts. Thus, one can assume that important. “cultural choice” - i.e. how an awl should be made properly - was as important as Chame opėratoire “natural choice”. Careful analysis of artefacts reveals that The reasons behind the ancient craftmens choice of material and the technol­ even in the case of similar shape of arte­ facts, the manufacturing techniques may ogy may be natural as well as cultural (e.g. have been different. Several researchers Capie, 2006,94; Friedel, 1993,44; Kriiska, 48

Heidi Luik

Fig. 2. Bone awls from Lithuania, Sokiškiai. Drawn after Grigalavičienė, 1986b, Fig. 15 and 16; drawing by Heidi Luik

have accentuated the importance of oper­ ational sequence - chaine opėratoire: the result may be similar but the artefacts were produced differently, which indicates cul­ tural differences (see e.g. Petrequin, 1993, 63, 69, Fig. 1.20). Chaine opėratoire was first used in the analysis of worked stone and bone material from the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic. For example, MarciaAnne Dobres (1995; 2000, 164ff) has dis­ cussed the possibilities of such analysis; she has used this method in investigation

of morphological similarities and differ­ ences in the manufacturing techniques of bone artefacts from the Upper Palaeo­ lithic in France. Concerning awls, Isabelle Sidera’s (2005, 85-87, Fig. 8) analysis of Neolithic awls made from metapodials can serve as an example of such analysis. According to Sidėra, a thorough reading of the fabri­ cation marks shows that three distinctive manufacturing methods were used; these manufacturing methods differentiate the 49

Interarchaeologia, 3

cultural complexes in time and space and represent a significant amount of cultural know-how. The methods are: 1) manufac­ ture using abrasion only; 2) manufacture by first sawing the metapodial in half and then abrading it; 3) manufacture by first abrading and then sawing. The tools for making these objects also differ depend­ ing on the methods used. For the first method, only a polishing tool was used; the second and third methods require some sharp stones and polishing tools, which were used in varying order. From a morphological point of view, the products of the three chatties opėratoires are very similar, only the profiles have slightly dif­ ferent shapes and the cross-sections of these objects partly reflect the techniques used. Sidėra stresses that an almost iden­ tical morphological type may result from different techniques and cultural skills (Sidėra, 2005, 87; see also Legrand & Sidėra, 2007, 67-68, Fig. 1). Thus, not only the shape but also the manufactur­ ing technique could be a cultural choice.

Bone Awls in the Eastern Baltic Region in the Late Bronze Age Awls made from metapodials of sheep/ goat (similar artefacts were also made from roe deer and red deer metapodi­ als) are a type of artefacts known almost everywhere and throughout different periods, probably because of their func­ tionality. Examples can be given from all over Europe, from the Neolithic as well as the Bronze Age (Bąk, 1985, Fig. 3: 3-5; Christidou, 2005, Fig. 12; Choyke, 2005, Fig. 10: 5, 6; Gadzyatskaya, 1976, 137, Fig. 3:24,28; Maigrot, 2005, Fig. 4:17-19, 21-23; Malinowski, 2006, Fig. 13: 1-4; Petrequin, 1993, 63, Fig. 1.19; Sidėra, 2005, 85, Fig. 7, 8; van Vilsteren, 1987, Fig. 13), and also from sites temporally 50

and spatially as distant as Arizona of the Archaic and Classic period (Griffits, 2001, Fig. 4; James, 2001, Fig. 2, 6), the Pampas region of South America (Buc 8c Loponte, 2007, 145, Fig. 2), or settlements of the Slavonic period (7 -12th century AD) in Germany (Becker, 2001, Fig. 4, 9). Differences in the shape and manu­ facturing techniques of awls made from metapodials of goat/sheep in the Baltic region attracted my attention when I was studying the finds from the Lithuanian Bronze Age settlements in Lithuanian Na­ tional Museum in the framework of the project “Bone artefacts among archaeo­ logical finds from the Bronze Age forti­ fied settlements of the Baltic countries”. I tried to find material for comparison among the finds from Estonia and Latvia (Luik 8c Maldre, 2007). Among the finds from the Lithuanian sites (see Fig. 1 for sites mentioned in the text), the majority of such awls were made from a sheep/goat metapodial bone, splitting it along its natural longitudinal groove, and the articular surface of the distal end was used as a handle (e.g. awls from Narkūnai, Nevieriškė and Sokiškiai; Fig. 2: 1-4, 6-9; Grigalavičienė, 1986a, Fig. 14: 20-22; 1986b, Fig. 15: 3-4, 7-8, Fig. 16: 5-11; 1995, Fig. 78: 1-5, Fig. 80: 1-2; Luik 8c Maldre, 2007, Fig. 16: 1-2; Fig. 17, 18; Volkaitė-Kulikauskienė, 1986, Fig. 24-25). The shape of the handle end varied depending on the stage of ossifica­ tion of epiphyses (compare e.g. Fig. 2:1-2 and 3-4, 6-9; Luik 8c Maldre, 2007, Fig. 17). Very few such awls made from longitudinally split bones have been found in Latvia, for example, in Mūkukalns (Graudonis, 1967, pi. XVI: 7, 13), and Estonia, where I know only two examples from Asva and Ridala (Fig. 3: 7-8). Another possibility was awls from metapodial bones of sheep/goat made without longitudinal splitting of bone. In that case, the whole epiphysis formed the

Heidi Luik

Fig. 3. Bone awls from Estonia (from the collection of the Institute of History, Tallinn Univer­ sity): 1-7 - Asva (AI 4366: 1169, 1777, 1676, 1558, 1453, 1531, 823); 8-9 - Ridala (AI 4261: 287, 211); 10-11 - Asva (AI 3307: 188, 4366: 1592) handle, and point was shaped by cutting or breaking bone diagonally. Such awls are very common in Estonia, where most of the specimens made of sheep/goat bones are made precisely with this method. About 40 examples of such type come from Asva (Fig. 3: 1-6, 10-11; Sperling, 2006, L: 1-3; LVII: 1-2), they are also found in Ridala (Fig. 3: 9) and Iru (Lang, 1996, pi. VIII: 11; Vassar, 1939, Fig. 46: 6). Such awls were widespread in Latvia as well, for example, in Ķivutkalns, VInakalns,

Mūkukalns, Klaņģukalns, Daugmale (Fig. 4; Graudonis, 1967, PI. XVI: 6, 8, 9, 14, 15; 1989, pis. XXII: 7-17; XLIII: 9, 10), but they are considerably rare among the finds from Lithuanian hillforts. Only a few examples from Kereliai, Sokiškiai and Moškėnai hillforts are known to me (Fig. 2: 5; Grigalavičienė, 1986b, Fig. 15: 5, 6; 1992, Fig. 5: 20; 1995, Fig. 80: 6; Luik & Maldre, 2007, Fig. 16: 3). Not only the shape, but the production technologies also differed: by one of them, 51

Interarchaeologia, 3

the bone was split longitudinally, some­ times with the aid of sawing and groov­ ing, by the other, the bone had to be cut or broken diagonally. Since the analysis of Bronze Age bone finds in the Baltic coun­ tries is not finished, I must admit that at the present stage of investigations I cannot say whether grooving as a bone working technique was less widespread in Latvia and Estonia than in Lithuania or not. Concerning this artefact type, the di­ ameter and/or shape of holes produced by these awls is functionally important, but from a bone, longitudinally split or not, thicker and finer points can be made, as well as artefacts with tips with oval or round cross-section (Fig. 2-4; Luik 8c Maldre, 2007, Fig. 16-18). Whether a whole or halved end of bone was left for handle was presumably functionally not so important, in that case the choice was probably cultural - artefact was made in an accustomed shape and way. Certainly, by halving bones one could produce a double number of awls. Examining the identifications of Bronze Age faunal re­ mains, sheep and goat were the dominant domestic animals in Estonian sites - about 37-51% of bones; in eastern Lithuania their ratio was considerably lower, about 5-17% (Lang, 2007a, 73; 2007b, 110-111, Table 1; Löugas, 1994, 74, 78-79; Luik 8c Maldre, 2007, 6-7, Fig. 2; Maldre, 1999; 2008, 265fF, Table 1, 2, Fig. 2). However, judging from the fact that faunal remains always include unused potential raw ma­ terial, such economising of material’ was hardly of great importance. The choice of the raw material for the mentioned awls was standardised, and in many cases awls have been repeatedly sharpened (some are long, others rather short; see Fig. 2-4; Luik 8c Maldre, 2007, Fig. 16, 18). Many researchers have ex­ pressed an opinion that standardised and curated artefacts were substantial for the requirements of the society as a whole, 52

while for individual or household needs simpler and occasional, the so-called ad hoc tools were often used (Choyke, 1997; see also Capie, 2006, 189-191; Choyke et al., 2004, 184-185; Choyke 8c Schibler, 2007, 57, Fig. 7). In her analysis about ęatalhoyūk Neolithic assemblages, Nerissa Russell says that both resharpening and longitudinal splitting could suggest that sheep/goat metapodials were not very easily available to makers of bone points (Russell, 2001,244). The reason for this may be an uneven access to these ani­ mals or that they were slaughtered quite rarely. However, Russell also stresses that not all metapodials were used for making tools, and that in the long run demand did not exceed the supply, but probably these bones were not always available when a point was needed (ibid.). In Estonian material the varying level of working of awls from metapodials should be mentioned: some of them are very reg­ ular and carefully manufactured (Fig. 3: 1-6), in others the breaking of bone has been more casual making the awl irregular too (Fig. 3: 9-11). Among the finds from Asva, regular points occur alongside with those with casually broken ends, whereas in Ridala most of the awls have casually broken ends. The case seems to be simi­ lar with Latvian awls (compare different artefacts in Fig. 4 and Graudonis, 1967, pi. XVI; 1989, pi. XXII). Evidently the skill and experience of people who made these awls varied - although the intended shape was the same, not everybody man­ aged to “make the awl properly” (compare e.g. Edmonds, 1999,38 on the same prob­ lem in flint working; Luik, 2005, 97-98 on bone working of the Late Iron Age). As for the Baltic region awls made from goat/sheep metapodials, one must admit that in each case in a region where one type prevailed, some specimens of the other type have also been found. Hence, the other method for making an awl was

Heidi Luik

Fig. 4. Bone awls from Latvia, Ķivutkalns (from the collection of the National History Museum of Latvia, Riga); A VI 120: 1 - 1707, 2 - 2658, 3 - 1506, 4 - 809, 5 - 1075, 6 - 1305, 7 - 2365, 8 - 134, 9 - 250, 10 - 403.

known, but the accustomed method was evidently preferred.

From the Neolithic to the Bronze Age In several places in Europe it has been observed that in the transition from

the Neolithic to the Bronze Age bone artefacts mostly remained unchanged (e.g. Choyke, 2005, 129; Choyke & Schibler, 2007, 60-61). Most likely bone arte­ facts were functional artefact types used for activities which also remained. On the other hand, the emergence of new occu­ pations or basic changes in performing of some operations caused the emergence of 53

Interarchaeologia, 3

new artefact types and sometimes also in­ troduction of new technologies. As it was said before, awls made from goat/sheep metapodials were a type of functional artefacts widespread in many regions of Europe both in the Neolithic and the Bronze Age. It must be noted that the awls from sheep metapodials found in the Late Neolithic burials in Sope and Ardu, which are among the oldest tools in Es­ tonia made from bones of domestic ani­ mals (Löugas et al., 2007, 26, Table 1, 2, Fig. 4: A; see Fig. 1 for location of sites), resemble Estonian Bronze Age awls made from metapodials in their shape. A similar awl has also been found in Lake Lubāna in Latvia (Vankina, 1999, pi. CIII: 8; Fig. 1); however, although it is published as Stone Age find mate­ rial, it could belong to the Bronze Age as well. A Late Neolithic burial contain­ ing two bone awls among other grave goods is also known in Selgas, Latvia (Grasis, 1996, 63, Fig. 13; 2007, Fig. 2; Loze, 2006, 312, 320); according to Li­ nas Daugnora, these awls are made of roe deer bone (Grasis, 1996, 65; 2007, Table 1). One of the awls from Selgas is made of longitudinally split metacarpus, the other is made of tibia and is not split (Grasis, 2007, Table 1, Fig. 4: 3, 4). It is thought that the cultural frontier be­ tween northern and southern Baltics is running approximately along the Dau­ gava River already since the Late Neo­ lithic (Lang, 2007a, 16). Selgas is situated in southern Latvia (Fig 1; Loze, 2006, Fig. 1:11) not far from Lithuania, where later hillforts (with bone awls from split metapodials) were situated. Neverthe­ less, it is impossible to draw conclusions about continuity or discontinuity of ar­ tefact types on such scarce material, all the more so because no such finds are yet known in the intermediate period the Early Bronze Age. 54

Conclusion Although bone awls made of sheep/ goat metapodials are a very common ar­ tefact type in Bronze Age sites of all Baltic countries, their shape and manufacturing differs by regions. We can summarise that in making awls from goat/sheep metapo­ dials, the choice was both “natural” and “cultural”: the choice of material was evi­ dently natural' since these bones are of suitable size and shape for making an awl. The choice of technology - how to make an awl properly- was cultural', i.e. de­ pended on the habits and traditions of the society/community. Cultural choice can also be observed in some other bone arte­ fact types. For example, javelin heads from sheep/goat tibiae were primarily spread in Lithuanian hillforts, while the situa­ tion is the opposite with carefully worked bone arrowheads - these are numerous in Latvia and Estonia where only a few spear­ heads are found. It is possible that the pref­ erence for bow or javelin for long distance combat also was a cultural choice (Luik & Maldre, 2007, 33). Meanwhile, some bone artefact types are quite similar in the ter­ ritory of all Baltic countries, for example some bone pins and antler double buttons. However, it should be stressed that these are artefact types which replicate foreign bronze artefacts, thereof local culture tra­ ditions and habitual manufacturing could not come into question in the case of these objects. In the case of some other artefact groups, similarities and differences could be classified otherwise. Although similar habits and traditions in making awls from sheep/goat metapodials were observed in archaeological records of hillforts in Esto­ nia and in the surroundings of the Daugava River, dissimilarities were also noticed, for example, in ceramics and bronze objects (Lang, 2007a). Types of bronze artefacts were certainly influenced by the origin of artefacts themselves or their prototypes

Heidi Luik

(Lang, 2007a, 80-81; 2007b, 117ff). Dif­ ferences in ceramics could sometimes be caused by divergent foreign connections as well (e.g. Lang, 2007a, 45). Awls from sheep/goat metapodials discussed in this article were probably very utilitarian and functional tools, which were not influ­ enced by foreign innovations or “trends of fashion”

Acknowledgements The research was supported by the Estonian Science Foundation (Grant

References

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M ATERIAL C U L TU R E AND SOCIAL MEMORY IN TH E E A S T B A LTIC S O C IE TIES DURING T H E BRONZE AG E AND T H E PRE-ROMAN IRON AGE Algimantas Merkevičius The article discusses different types of social memory practised in the Baltic societies during the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age. Although the agrarian society the formation of which started in the Neolithic and was completed in the Late Bronze Age changed quite rapidly, some aspects of its societal lifestyle, behaviour, and cognition remained constant, stable, and unvary­ ing, or subject to only minor changes. Two dichotomic processes were going on in the society: search for and appropriation of novelties and preservation of some old features. Through the social phenomenon of collective memory the society maintained the continuity of traditions, rituals, a certain way of life and behaviour, and connections with the past. One o f the areas where continuity and lasting stability can be observed is the long-lasting control of a territory in possession of a society and its division into constant “ritual” and “profane” zones having dif­ ferent physical and spiritual characteristics. A variety o f sites were established in both zones, separated by water, most often a river, to serve the purposes of burial, ritual sacrifice, daily living, economic activities, a.o. At some sites, especially at burial places, people created outstanding structures which dominated the environment. Other sites did not have such structures but were set up in locations with specific nature. Some sites of both types were often used continuously or with some interruptions for a few hundred or even a thousand years or more at later times. The established spatial structure of the society was a reflection of the ideological system that people tried to preserve in spite of the considerable changes of various kinds. All this demon­ strates the continuity of the society and preservation o f its identity through the exploitation of social memory. Besides long-term control over the territory and preservation of the functions o f certain zones and sites, other practices of social memory such as mimesis or imitation of natural and cultural objects and finds were widespread in the Baltic region during the period under discussion and later on as well. Keywords: social memory, material culture, social archaeology, Bronze Age, east Baltic

societies. Algimantas Merkevičius, Department of Archaeology, Vilnius University, 7 Universiteto St, Vilnius 01315, Lithuania; [email protected]

Introduction Memory, individual and collective, is a specific social phenomenon. It penetrates the most diverse sectors of daily life, be­ haviour, and cognition of society. Even though societies, especially those of the Bronze Age, strove to adopt novelties, to improve or embellish their life, they also tried to maintain their stability and con­ tinuity, retain ties with the mythological ancestors, and ensure their support. Thus,

the two dichotomic factors - change and preservation of the existing - accompa­ nied a society in almost all areas of its activities. Although a society itself con­ sciously selected what was important and had to be remembered and what was un­ important and could be forgotten, mem­ ory is also associated with the emotional state of people since the human mind records certain images related to feelings and emotions instigated by a variety of triggers, such as sounds, signs, locations 59

Interarchaeologia, 3

the people had visited before, etc. Those emotional aspects associated with mem­ ory influenced conscious actions as well, and these human actions were both ra­ tional and irrational (Fontijn, 2008, 86-88). Memory is extremely important for society, because without memory and recollection we would not have an iden­ tity (Wickholm, 2007, 107). Various cul­ tural and natural material objects contain different types of social memory; hence, one can agree with Katina T. Lillios that “memory is a material reality as well as a social practice” (Lillios, 2008, 235). Since the 1990s many archaeologists have started publishing their studies on memory and material mnemonics; espe­ cially significant works have been pub­ lished during the last decade (Lillios, 2008, 229). Most of them examine the use of social memory in burial archae­ ology (see Jones, 2008, 226; Wickholm, 2007,107). Nevertheless, no work on this subject has been written in the eastern Baltic region so far, with the exception of an article by Valter Lang, which discusses the burial aspects of the eastern Baltic societies in the Late Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age in terms of ideology and religion. That article also provides data on the manifestations of social memory of the period (Lang, 2007b, 87). The aim of my article is to analyze different types of social memory practised in the Bronze and Pre-Roman Iron Age Baltic societies, briefly presenting a few case studies. Which archaeological evidence - mate­ rial objects - does provide data on the so­ cial memory engaged and what methods can be used to reconstruct the ancient social memory? Some researchers claim that “for archaeologists to invoke memo­ ry, two conditions are generally satisfied. First, there is an indication of sequential behaviour; that is, first A, then B. Further­ more, there is usually the demonstration that A was still visible when В occurred” 60

(Lillios, 2008, 235). I would supplement this fully plausible reconstruction of so­ cial memory by adding that in some cases action A was not visible at the moment action В occurred, but the preceding ac­ tion A was known to the society in cer­ tain other ways. Specific social memory is associated with the creation of the ideol­ ogy of a society and its transmission onto the surrounding environment, as a result of which, an operational spatial structure of societal organization in the natural en­ vironment based on certain features was created and maintained as long as pos­ sible. Examining the archaeological evidence of mnemonic practices in the Neolithic in western Europe, Katina T. Lillios dis­ tinguished between four types of these practices: 1) reuse and/or transformation of burial monuments, 2) curation of arte­ facts and human remains, 3) inscriptive recording, and 4) mimesis (Lillios, 2008, 235). I can fully agree with the author’s opinion and believe that even more prac­ tices or types of behaviour associated with social memory could be identified. Hence, the first type of practices singled out by Lillios can be supplemented with several sub-types of archaeological sites, especially fossil fields, some ritual and sacrificial sites, settlements, and others.

Space, Landscape, and Social Memory Social memory is associated with the specific environment that surrounds a society. Each Bronze Age society or com­ munity, including the societies in the eastern Baltic region, controlled a territo­ ry it occupied and divided into particular activity zones, located in certain places in accordance with the peculiarities of the terrain as well as other natural and so­ cial features (Merkevičius, 2007, 97-99).

Algimantas Merkevičius

“These places not only share specific physical characteristics, but [..] they may also have had specific histories” (Fontijn, 2008, 89). “[Different types of places became imbued with different ideas and values through time.” (Ibid., 87) Hence, the landscape was socialized. Individual activity zones where different sites were constructed in accordance with a particu­ lar system constituted an interconnected and interdependent spatially organized framework which people strove to main­ tain unchanged. This spatial structure was a reflection of an ideological system. Individual places and sites were associ­ ated with specific activities that could not be changed since any alteration damaged the whole structure and endangered the arrangement within the society. Due to that the established spatial order of the society remained unchanged for long, regardless of the various changes taking place in the society. David Fontijn divides the territory con­ trolled by communities into two main dichotomic zones: ritual and profane, and the behaviour - into practical and ritual (Fontijn, 2008, 88). Ritual zones contain sites sacred to a society and sites where religious rituals and sacrifice were performed, as well as burial places. Ac­ cording to Valter Lang, cemeteries “were simultaneously both cultic places and burial sites” (Lang, 2007, 80). Examina­ tion of evidence from the burial sites of the period under discussion fully sup­ ports this view. Profane zones could in­ clude living quarters and places of eco­ nomic activities: agricultural fields and pastures, places for hunting, fishing, and gathering as well as places for artefact production and exchange, trading sites, etc. Besides secular activities, rituals were also performed in specific zones of the profane places. These places could be permanent as well as changeable. For in­ stance, a frequent find near fossil fields in

western Lithuania is cup-marked stones with a few small or one big cup-mark impression. Researchers interpret these stones as ritual objects related to agricul­ ture (Tvauri, 1997). Up to quite recent times, the local people believed that the cup-marked stones were sacred. Legends about some of these stones witnessing their use at religious rituals are still told (Vaitkevičius, 1996, 6, 9). Thus, specific rituals related to agricultural activities could have been performed close to fossil fields. A relevant example illustrating the dis­ tribution of such individual zones and establishment of special places within these zones and their lasting use is the Kurmaičiai micro-region in west Lithua­ nia. Various contemporary archaeologi­ cal sites, doubtlessly interrelated, are lo­ cated here on both sides of the Akmena River in a rather large territory, stretching about 1 km in diameter. As long ago as before the Second World War, a barrow cemetery dated to the end of the Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age and a burial ground dated to the 1л-4 гЬ century were found on the right bank of the Akmena River and investigated (Kulikauskas, 1968, 12-56; Puzinas, 1941, 19-27). The barrow cemetery and the adjacent burial ground were constructed eastwards of an oblong hill called the Church Hill, which was a ritual place of the prehistoric times. Hence, the Kurmaičiai site is a case of a burial and a ritual site constructed in the same place, very close to each other. The ritual site was located on an oblong hill, while the burial site was set up at its eastern foot. The two sites comprised the ritual zone of the Kurmaičiai community. Such a location could serve as a proof that burial grounds were also used as cultic places or at least places for certain rituals, most probably related to sacrifice. Yet another profane zone of societal activity in Kurmaičiai was located on the 61

Interarchaeologia, 3

other side of the river, on the left bank of the Akmena River. Here, at the con­ fluence with the Pilsupis rivulet, a hillfort was constructed, which, as witnessed by archaeological investigations, was con­ temporary with the barrow cemetery and the burial ground (Merkevičius, 1980, 20-22; Merkevičius 1982, 27-28). Ap­ proximately 0.2-0.3 km westwards of the hillfort, on the same side of the river, fos­ sil fields were discovered (Kanarskas et al., 2005, 277). Thus, a profane zone with a fortified settlement and agricultural fields was set up and other economic activities were carried out on the other, the left side of the river. The two zones were separated by the river waters. The use of water to separate the two different zones - the secular and the ritual - is also evident in many other sites of the Baltic region, not only in the Bronze Age but also in later periods. In the face of drastic changes in burial practices, the transition from cremation to inhumation and from barrow cemeter­ ies to burial grounds with stone circles, the barrow cemetery of Kurmaičiai and burial grounds of a later stage remained in the same place from circa the middle of the 1st millennium BC to the 4th century AD, i.e., for about a thousand years. Fur­ thermore, during the transition from barrow cemeteries to burial grounds, graves were constructed at the same spot - close to the barrow cemetery, north of the bur­ ial mounds. Then, about a few centuries later, circa the 3rd century AD, the dead were again buried near the same barrow cemetery, although southwards; thus, the barrow mounds remained undamaged yet in proximity (Kulikauskas, 1968, 47). Even when the graves drew close to one barrow mound erected at some distance, the latter was not harmed. This is a case of a long-lasting usage of social memory (about a millennium) when the same function of human burial was performed 62

in one place. Here we observe an obvi­ ous sequential behaviour, when action В is performed with full knowledge of the preceding action A. We can state that in this case, social memory had a significant impact on the distribution of graves in a particular place. Even in the face of radi­ cal burial changes, the other side of the ideology remains unaltered - the burial place, the proximity of new and old graves is an attempt to follow a certain order and relationship with the past and the ances­ tors. Furthermore, there were secondary graves in the barrow cemetery that were dug into some barrow mounds, although reuse of these barrows occurred after a short timespan of several decades. The Kurmaičiai community continued the division of its territory into zones, and the stability of these zones was main­ tained in the course of three different ar­ chaeological periods: the end of the Late Bronze Age, the Pre-Roman Iron Age, and the Roman Iron Age, throughout numerous changes in various areas of communal life, and particularly in burial practices. This aspect, i.e. retention of the burial place and positioning of the graves in proximity without damaging the pre­ vious burials, ensured a certain stability and continuity of the society. In this way, even in the area of the burial, elements of continuity persisted along with marked changes. We should note that a constant division into zones with specific places and continuous retention of the same functions within zones are known also in later archaeological complexes of this kind as well.

Cemeteries and Social Memory Specific social memory is associated with the reuse of burial mounds. Many researchers distinguish and analyse reuse and transformation of burial mounds or

Algimantas Merkevičius

barrows as one of the most significant manifestations of social memory (Fontijn, 2008, 93; Lillios, 2008, 235-239; Wickholm, 2007, 109-114). A study of the Bronze Age and Pre-Roman Iron Age burial rites in the Baltic region shows that this kind of burial associated with social memory was widely practised. Some re­ searchers underline several further im­ portant factors like the location of graves, especially in the burial mounds, the order of multiple burials, position, sex, and age of the buried persons (Lucas, 2005, 80; Mizoguchi, 1993). I would like to briefly analyse a very im­ portant barrow in the east Baltic region the Kaup barrow, excavated in 1873 in the former east Prussia (Fig. 1). Two Late Ne­ olithic graves were found, both on stone pavements. The deceased in the earliest grave was buried in a contracted position, 1.46 m deep. The grave goods included two bone girdle-clasps and a flint scraper (see Gimbutas, 1956, 159, Fig. 96). The other grave, dated from the end of the Stone Age - the beginning of the Bronze

Fig.

1.

Age, was discovered lying over the first one, 0.96 m below the surface. The con­ tracted skeleton was laid on a stone pave­ ment half the size of the first. The grave goods included a perforated stone axe of a rhomboid form, a flint knife, and a bone pin (Gimbutas, 1956, 160-161, Fig. 96). The third grave was discovered almost above the first two (Gimbutienė, 1985, 47-48). The dead individual was dated to the very beginning of the Bronze Age and was buried in an extended position, just a little more to the south compared to the first two graves. The grave goods included a flat bronze axe and a bronze pin. The fourth cremated grave was recovered in an urn covered with stones, at the top of the barrow. This grave was dated to the Late Bronze Age (Gimbutas, 1956, 159). Analysis of the graves in the aforemen­ tioned barrow draws attention to two im­ portant aspects. Firstly, all the graves were not only arranged in one and the same barrow, but also in the same - south­ ern - part, almost on top of each other. Secondly, the first three dead individuals

Four graves (A, B, C, and D) from the Kaup barrow (Gimbutas, 1956, Fig. 96)

63

Interarchaeologia, 3

were buried with relatively short intervals of approximately one to two to three hun­ dred years. Nonetheless, such intervals were long enough for the buried indi­ viduals to become mythological ancestors (see Fontijn, 2008, 93). However, the third and the fourth grave were separated by a timespan of at least five to six hundred years. The interval between the first and the fourth grave is no less than a thousand years. The examination of the reuse of the burial mound rules out the element of ac­ cidental occurrence. The sizeable burial mound was very visible in the environ­ ment; it could easily become and had ob­ viously become a memorial site. In his analysis of the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age burials in the Netherlands, Fontijn claims that the ma­ jority of burial mounds constructed in the Late Neolithic and at the beginning of the Bronze Age, i.e. up to the Middle Bronze Age, were re-used for burial, that burials were ‘only dug into existing barrows long after they had been erected”, and that ‘constructing of a mound was

much more than the closing act of a fu­ neral; it also formed a lasting artefact that would ‘presence the former occupants of the landscape” (Fontijn, 2008, 93). The situation must have been quite similar in the Baltic region as well, where burial mounds and the deceased buried inside them also stood out as important symbols in the landscape, and they were reused long after they had been erected while at every period serving the symbolic func­ tion of control over the territory. The reuse of the site can be explained as a proof of stability and continuation in the society, while burial mounds as well as the dead buried inside them witness the existence of the ancestral cult. Important individuals, their significance revealed in the dimensions of the barrow, grave fur­ nishing, and burial goods, were buried in distinguished and old ancestral burial sites. That demonstrated the link between the past and the present, the maintenance of communal continuity and identity, as well as respect for the past and the ances­ tors. The researchers often point out that “the idea of building something new on top of something old is always a sign of continuation” (Wickholm, 2007, 114).

Religious Rituals, Sacrifice, and Social M em ory

Fig. 2. Artefacts from the Juodkrantė hoard (Rimantienė, 1995, Fig. 144) 64

Repeated deposits of particular arte­ facts also indicate an active collective memory, which helped to sustain links with the past and reproduction of com­ munal identity. In the Baltic region in the Bronze Age, these specific artefacts were mostly made of metal or amber. Collec­ tions of artefacts that are called either deposits or hoards can be hidden or sac­ rificial. In the following passages, we will only deal with the sacrificial hoards. Anthony F. Harding describes Bronze Age hoards as “any collection of more than one object that was found together

Algimantas Merkevičius

other than in a funerary or domestic situ­ ation” (Harding, 2000, 352). An archaeo­ logical hoard is most often an accumu­ lation of archaeological artefacts, which were once hidden or sacrificed at the same time and in the same place in isolation from other archaeological items. Quite a number of such small Bronze Age hoards have been discovered in the eastern Baltic region (Lang, 2007a, 117-118, 246-248; Merkevičius, 2006,32-38; Vasks & Vijups, 2004). Even though the prevailing hoards are contemporary collections of several or a few dozen artefacts, there have been occasional finds of hoards consisting of hundreds of specific artefacts, repeatedly deposited over a long period of time. One of these was found in the 19th century at Juodkrantė, western Lithuania. As early as in the middle and the second half of the 19th century, about 500 or more amber artefacts dating to the end of the Neolithic and the beginning of the Bronze Age were found at the site during the digging works at amber mines in a rather small territory called the Amber Bay (Klebs, 1882). It is almost beyond doubt that the archaeo­ logical finds from Juodkrantė - human and animal figurines, pendants of various shapes, buttons, and others - were most­ ly used as amulets (Fig. 2). After having served the purpose, these ritual artefacts were sacrificed by throwing them into the water at a particular sacred place. This practice continued for a few centuries. Such long-lasting ritual sacrifice in one place indicates a specific social memory associated with a continuous ritual usage of the place. Here there was no visible hu­ man construction, a monument markedly dominating the environment, but rather a specific sacralised natural place where a lasting practice of religious rituals and sacrifice, hence continuity of viewpoints, was retained. Thus, along with the visible monu­ ments created by people and dominating

the environment, which served as burial places and were associated with ancestors buried there, “invisible”, inconspicuous, and non-dominant ritual places were also known and continuously used. Repeated hoarding of specific artefacts of metal, amber, or other indicate an active collec­ tive memory.

Reuse of Fossil Fields and Social Memory Fossil fields in the east Baltic region came into use as early as in the Late Bronze Age, the last quarter of the 2nd millennium BC (Lang, 2007a, 96). Most of the same fields were repeatedly ex­ ploited from the Late Bronze Age or PreRoman Iron Age to the Late Iron Age or even later periods (Lang, 2007a, 97). Due to the long-lasting and repeated exploita­ tion, some fossil fields occupied vast ar­ eas amounting to several dozen hectares. People returned to them again and again. The majority of fossil fields under investi­ gation do not reveal any features or signs of other types of archaeological sites. This leads to an assumption that the society had in most cases assigned the territory of the fields for agricultural purposes and kept this purpose in memory for centu­ ries or a millennium and sometimes even longer. This functional goal was so deep­ ly recorded in human minds that it was somehow remembered and retained by new communities in the course of many years and generations. A good example of such sites is the Kluonaliai fossil fields in western Lithua­ nia. Quite a number of stone fences and approximately 200-250 clearance cairns had been recovered here in a large area of about 50 hectares already before World War II. In 2002, a survey was conducted here again (Kanarskas et al., 2005, 277). From 2004 to 2008 65

Interarchaeologia, 3

large-scale archaeological excavations were carried out in the area (Nemickienė et ai., 2006a, 286-287; Nemickienė et ai., 2006b, 378-379). The investigation that was carried out for several years revealed that the picturesque elevations on both sides of the Jaurykla rivulet, close to the confluence with the Akmena River, had been used as agricultural fields for a long period of time. During the excavations, baulks and stone fences of three types and some remaining cairns were found. The stone fences of different types var­ ied from the stratigraphic point of view. They also differed in physical character­ istics like length, width, orientation, po­ sition, etc. The finds also included some cairns parts of which were dismantled during subsequent cultivation of fields of a different type. The stray finds recov­ ered in the fields (stone axes, a hoe, and remains of structures) provide a basis for arguing that the fields were cultivated as early as in the Late Bronze Age and were exploited throughout the Iron Age. The latest use of these fields can be detected in the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century. It is noteworthy that no other types of archaeological objects have been found in the territory, except for some stones recovered at the confluence of the rivulet and the river (Tarasenka, 1958, 54; Vaitkevičius, 1998, 79), which were most probably associated with the fields, although the attractive elevations on both sides of the rivulet and the con­ fluence with the Akmena River were perfect locations for a burial ground, a settlement, or another site of a differ­ ent type. The society must have returned to this place and reused it for the same purpose with some interruptions for about three thousand years, preserving a specific social memory of its function, which remained unchanged. There are more fields of a similar character known both in western Lithuania and in other countries of the Baltic region. 66

Mimesis Carefully shaped artefacts were pro­ duced “using techniques which were passed down over the centuries and mil­ lennia, no doubt through a process of mimesis” (Renfrew, 2005, 128). Katina T. Lillios ascribes mimesis to memory prac­ tices and characterizes it as “materialized behaviours that cite or reference imagery from the natural or cultural landscape in new media. [..] I consider three catego­ ries of such behaviour: architecture refer­ encing landscapes, architecture copying earlier architecture, and material culture evoking other material culture in new me­ dia (media transferral or skeuomorphs).” (Lillios, 2008, 245). I will here briefly touch upon the third category in connection with the east Bal­ tic region in the Bronze Age. The imita­ tion or mimesis of the different types of bronze artefacts was widespread in the Baltic region since numerous and varied imitations have been found there. One can argue that a whole industry of imita­ tions was established in the region with no sources of non-ferrous metal ores. A separate group of such artefacts has even been distinguished in an attempt to asso­ ciate these artefacts with a particular so­ cial group (Merkevičius, 2005a, 48-49). Such artefacts were basically mimick­ ing bronze items and were made mostly of flint, stone, and bone. They mainly included ornaments, especially pins (Rimantienė, 1995, 150), weapons, and working tools (Merkevičius, 2005a, 49). Even stone or flint axes mimicking flanged bronze axes were made. One of such flint axes was found in north-eastern Lithua­ nia, near the Aluota hillfort, and it was dated to the middle of the 2nd millennium BC or a somewhat later period (Girinin­ kas, 2000, 515-516; Merkevičius, 2005b, 13) (Fig. 3). More stone axes mimicking their bronze counterparts have also been

Algimantas Merkevičius

Fig. 3. A flint axe found close to the Aluota hillfort (Girininkas, 2000, Fig. 47)

found (Bagušienė & Rimantienė, 1974, 87). Such imitations were probably be­ lieved to acquire the qualities and value of the artefacts they were mimicking (Lib lios, 2008, 245).

Conclusion In this article social memory is regard­ ed as a phenomenon practised by the entire society or a substantial part of it. I have tried to argue that the social mem­ ory of the societies of the eastern Baltic region during the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age had penetrated the most diverse fields of human activities, lifestyle, behaviour, and cognition. Nu­ merous material objects including places, sites, and artefacts contain evidence on the existence of social memory that is of­ ten revealed through the repeated use of such objects. Researchers draw special at­ tention to the burial monuments, namely barrow cemeteries, which stand out in the environment. The article highlights the opinion that social memory was actively used to cre­ ate the ideology of the society, which was partly transferred to the natural environ­ ment as different activity zones with spe­ cific places for various sites were created.

On the basis of ideological principles, the controlled space was divided into ritual and profane zones, according to which relevant sites were constructed in line with the natural and cultural character­ istics attributed to such zones to be used continuously or with some interruptions for centuries or even more than a millen­ nium. Different dichotomic zones were commonly separated by water. The article points out that next to the reuse of burial sites that can be associ­ ated with the cult of ancestors, other archaeological sites were repeatedly re­ used as well, such as fossil fields, ritual sacrificial sites, settlements, etc. Besides structures which stood out in the envi­ ronment, inconspicuous sites were also reused. Information on the previous use of the latter was transmitted in differ­ ent ways than on the use of the former. A long-time use of the same technologies and types of artefacts as well as mimesis or imitation of natural or cultural features and artefacts imply the manifestation of a specific social memory of the Baltic soci­ ety in the Bronze Age and the Pre-Roman Iron Age, as well as in the later periods. More detailed studies of social memory will definitely make it possible to reveal new patterns in the manifestation of this social phenomenon. 67

Interarchaeologia, 3

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69

RECLAIM ING T H E PAST: USING OLD A R TE FA C TS AS A MEANS OF REMEMBERING Anna Wessman This paper provides an overview of the occasional ancient artefacts from Iron Age burials in Finland. These artefacts, which are often much older than the grave itself, have sometimes been interpreted as the remains of an older settlement or burial layers, but the question o f deliberate deposition should be taken into consideration, too. Old monuments and landscapes are appreci­ ated not only for their ritual but also for their commemorative role. Ancient burial mounds and abandoned houses were re-used, especially during the Viking Age, in both Scandinavia and the British Isles. The choice of burial location seems thus to be connected to the selective remember­ ing or forgetting o f the past. Burials are sometimes also manipulated in other ways; certain arte­ facts might either be removed from or deposited into the grave. In this paper, I will suggest that portable artefacts could play an important part in the construction o f social memory. Especially weapons could accrue new meanings and mnemonic values through their recycling. They could become heirlooms or objects of memory that played a public role in society. Keywords: social memory, heirlooms, artefact re-use.

Anna Wessman, Institute for Cultural Research, Department o f Archaeology, University o f Hel­ sinki, PO Box 59, 00014 Helsinki, Finland; [email protected]

Introduction In burial archaeology surprising dis­ coveries are commonplace. Archaeolo­ gists often find artefacts that seem to be much older than the grave itself. These old artefacts confuse us, archaeologists, and make our imagination spin. Why are they there? Have the prehistoric people valued heirlooms or are these objects merely bi­ zarre amulets without a context? There are three types of re-use documented in prehistoric Finland. First, there are buri­ als that contain one or more old artefacts. Second, there are old burials that contain much younger artefacts. Third, there are burials that are overlaid with more recent burials, often of different type. To this cat­ egory also belong burials that are erected on top of older settlement sites. It is a widely recognized fact that monu­ ments and landscapes are appreciated for their commemorative role (e.g. Bradley,

2002; Tilley, 1994). However, artefacts can also play a part in the construction of collective memories. Such artefacts ob­ jectify both memories and history. Dur­ ing a funeral, such kinds of objects might obtain new meanings depending on their life histories. They acquire a mnemonic significance and can even function as memory-aides (Gosden & Marshall, 1999; Lillios, 1999, 236; Lillios, 2003; Williams, 2005, 253-255). This kind of re-use has often been overlooked by archaeologists. However, in this article, I will argue that re-use was not random. Instead, it should be understood as meaningful, because it was a visual and tangible way of commu­ nication with real or perceived ancestors. Re-use could also provide a means of le­ gitimising control or claims on the land. For this reason, this behaviour should not be seen as an anomaly (Bradley, 2002, 122-124; Hāllans Stenholm, 2006; Peder­ sen, 2006, 351). 71

Interarchaeologia, 3

How Does Social Memory Work? We can look at memory as both emo­ tional and conscious. It can thus be re­ membered and understood through awareness and experience. Memories are shaped by social and cultural contexts. The historical experience has to do with deep-structured mental images. Memo­ ries are often very individual and pri­ vate. An adequate example of the kinds of personal memories is Marcel Prousts famous autobiographical novel series A la recherche du temps perdu (1913-1927). Historical awareness, on the other hand, concerns ideology and it identifies itself by collective and public memories. We have, for example, not experienced the French revolution ourselves, but we still have the knowledge and understanding of its historical significance for European history. In other words, our memories are mixed, possessing both personal and social aspects (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 7). Of course, it is individuals who do the remembering but when people remem­ ber they actually do it collectively as parts of a community. This means that people remember within their social group. According to Maurice Halbwachs, the grandfather of social memory theory, these groups can be families, believers of a religion, or social classes. It follows that we remember our childhood as being part of our family and our working life as part of an office community. These memories are all group memories, memories that we share with others. This is what is referred to as social memory (Halbwachs, 1992 [1941, 1952]). As Barbara Misztal states, “memory is social because every memo­ ry exists through its relation with what has been shared with others: language, symbols, events, and social and cultural contexts” (Misztal, 2003, 11). The past is 72

thus commonly shared and remembered (ibid., 13). Paul Connerton extended the concept of collective memory to include the hu­ man body. In his book How societies re­ member he suggests that it is bodily ges­ tures, manners, performances and other socially negotiated practices that func­ tion as sites for the collective processes of memory. The things we learn to do with our body (the so-called incorporating practices) are not learnt by teaching or explaining, but instead by showing how it is done (Connerton, 1989). Classic exam­ ples of embodied memory are how to ride a bicycle, to swim or to skate (e.g. Baddeley, 1976, 255; Misztal, 2003, 9; Nilsson Stutz, 2004). Pierre Nora has contributed to this ap­ proach by drawing the places and spac­ es of memory into the debate. Certain memories are often connected to certain places; he calls them lieux de memoire or realms of memory (Nora, 1996). This means that our memory is bound to the context.

The Art of Remembering and Forgetting Our memory is a complicated system for storing and retrieving information. It can “range in storage duration from fractions of a second up to a life-time” depending on whether the memory is working sufficiently or not (Baddeley, 1997, 3). It is often said that our memory resembles a library. There does not seem to be any problem in our ability to store information; instead, it is our ability to retrieve information that limits our mem­ ory (Baddeley, 1976, 285; Baddeley, 1997, 191). Memory also tends to mythologize the past since it appeals to our emotions. Memory is thus subjective, selective and sometimes also inaccurate (Misztal, 2003, 99). On the other hand, our memory is

Anna Wessman

never accidental. This relates to both oral and written history (Fentress & Wickham, 1992). Material culture can also be associ­ ated with memory even though this has attracted little interest of archaeologists before the 21st century (Jones, 2007; Van Dyke & Alcock, 2003; Williams, 2003). Places, buildings and monuments are physical reminders of the past, but eth­ nographic and archaeological examples have shown that objects have mnemonic functions, too (e.g. Bruhns, 1994; Gosden & Marshall, 1999; Hoilund Nielsen, 1997; Lillios, 2003; Schuster & Carpenter, 1996). Amongst the Nuers of Sudan, only important ancestors are remembered and the less significant individuals are forgotten. The important ancestors are usually males who form the apex of a triangle of descent. Among the Nuers, the past goes back only 10 to 12 gen­ erations (Evans-Pritchard, 1968 [1940], 199-200) which means a time span of at least 300-400 years. The Nuers are thus selective in their ways of remembering but they have some kind of strategy to re­ member things that were important. On the other hand, amongst the Enga people that live on the main island of Papua New Guinea, the oral tradition covers a period of 250-400 years. The memories passed down by men concern historical informa­ tion about the past, such as subsistence, trade, wars, migrations, cult and ceremo­ nial activity (Weissner, 2002, 237). We usually become aware of our mem­ ory when it starts to fail (Baddeley, 1997, 169). To many of us, losing our memory, through amnesia or dementia, is fright­ ening because memory helps us to un­ derstand who we are. Thus, memory also shapes our identity (Halbwachs, 1992). Since we use our memory constantly, the result of loosing it would produce much frustration and in the end prob­ ably also an identity crisis. Forgetting is, of course, normal even though it can

be embarrassing at times. We might, for example, not remember exactly how we looked like ten years ago even though we look at ourselves in the mirror every morning. If we see a photograph from 10 years ago, we realize how much our faces have changed. Hence, the habitual act of looking in the mirror every morning has erased our previous memory of look­ ing in the mirror (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 39). Forgetting can also be organized and strategic. In authoritarian societies the po­ litical machinery could remove important monuments and statues in order for the people to forget the past, while new ones, more politically correct, were created. Remembering can be thus placed under censorship. Also, some memories could be too difficult to live with and thus they became intentionally forgotten or erased from peoples memories. This has been well documented in Milan Kundera’s Book of Laughter and Forgetting (1979) and in Imbi Pajus’ documentary film about Esto­ nian post-Soviet memories (Finnish Torjutut muistot). In Finland, the Civil War of 1918 is still being emotionally processed. This is partly because of the fact that the loosing side was not allowed to raise any public monuments over their causali­ ties which led to suppressed memories. The winning side, on the other hand, commemorated their dead in different ceremonies involving statues, memorial stones, parades, and speeches. Heroism and patriotism were especially fostered in these memories (Roselius, 2007). However, it is important to recognize that when people have found it relevant, their memories can be extremely exact. Memory is thus both objective and sub­ jective at the same time; the objective part includes facts and knowledge while the subjective part consists of feelings that are based on our consciousness (Fentress & Wickham, 1992). 73

Interarchaeologia, 3

Re-use of Old Sites

(Lehtosalo-Hilander, 2000b, 172-175). In one of these cairns (Cairn 422) dated As stated above, re-use of sites and arte­ to the Late Bronze Age or Pre-Roman facts is often ignored in the archaeologi­ Iron Age (763-465 cal BC), a Late Iron cal literature. However, this kind of re-use Age spearhead and miniature sickle was is such a thoroughly recognized pattern found during the excavations (ibid., in Europe that it must also have been 13-17). It would seem right to say that conceived as a ritualized way of both this cairn was manipulated during the remembering and forgetting during pre­ time when the inhumation cemetery was historic times. The practice of re-use has erected, but it is uncertain whether the seldom been studied in a framework of artefacts derive from a later burial insert­ ritual theory, even though it is implicitly ed into the monument or whether they analyzed as a kind of ritual. The premedi­ are merely later depositions. However, I tation and the function of the practice are often described, but a wider discussion of find it probable that the whole inhuma­ what it means for the burial ritual itself tion cemetery was established at that place because of the recognized presence is often dismissed (Hāllans Stenholm, of the older cairns. The mnemonic value 2006, 341). of visible monuments, such as cairns and Monument re-use, or old burials that mounds, has been illustrated by several are overlaid with more recent burials, researchers (e.g. Bradley, 2002; Jennbert, are found primarily in Roman Iron Age 1993; Thäte, 2004; Tilley, 1994; Williams, cemeteries, in both Sweden and Finland, 1998). A very interesting addition to this and the behaviour seems to be popular specific cairn was the base from a battle especially during the Viking Age. We axe. The axe was found on the northern have examples from Finland where there side of the edge-chain of the cairn and it is a continuous usage of the same burial place for over a thousand of years (Hāl­ seemed to have been reshaped, possibly at a much later date (Lehtosalo-Hilander, lans Stenholm, 2006, 342; Wickholm, 2007; Wickholm, 2008). The same phe­ 2000b, 13). There are two cases of re-use from nomenon also exists in Estonia, where Ostrobothnia in western Finland which the tarand-graves1 of the Roman Iron are both quite similar. In one of the Age period often seem to be re-used or Bronze Age cairns (Cairn No. 5) at the manipulated on several occasions during Niemenmaanmäki in Isokyrö, a Migra­ later times (e.g. Lang, 2003). tion-Period secondary burial had been There are a few examples from Fin­ made at the outer edge of the cairn. This land of contemporary artefacts that have was an inhumation grave, which are actu­ been placed in old burials. For example, ally very rare in this period2 (Meinander at the famous Luistari cemetery in Eura, 1950, 53, 199). Another example comes south-western Finland, there are six from the large Bronze Age cairn at cairns from the Bronze Age or Early Iron Högberget in Lappfjärd, Ostroboth­ Age on the perimeter of a large inhuma­ tion cemetery dated to the Late Iron Age1 nia. A well-preserved Migration Period 1 A tarand-grave consists of one or several stone enclosures, often linked together. They were built from the Pre-Roman Iron Age to the end of the Roman Iron Age but some were still in use during the beginning of the Migration period (AD 400-450). Tarand-graves are known in eastern Sweden, the Finnish south and southwest coast, Estonia, and Latvia. There are both inhumations and cremations known from these graves (see, for example, Lang, 2007; Feldt, 2005, 127-139).

74

Anna Wessman

equal-armed brooch was found inside this cairn. According to Meinander, the brooch had clearly been placed there as a sacrifice (Meinander, 1977, 26). Peter Holmblad has studied the Migration Pe­ riod re-use of the Bronze Age cairns in this area. He has suggested that there is a similarity in the monumentality of the Bronze Age cairns and the cairns of the Migration Period. It means that the Mi­ gration Period population would not only have been aware of this likeness but ac­ tually aspired towards it. Sometimes this interest in the past would also have been concrete, as the two above-mentioned examples show (Herrgard & Holmblad, 2005,172; Holmblad, 2005, 43-44). From the Aland islands comes another example. In Sundby, in Sund parish, a large Bronze Age cairn with elaborate finds of a bronze sword, a dagger and burned bones was found in 1894. During the excava­ tions in 1953, some Merovingian Period artefacts were suddenly found in the same cairn (Meinander, 1954, 107, 211). In the Brobacka single tarand-grave in Karjaa, southern Finland, a Permian brooch (NM 17055:269) dated to the 8th century AD was found during exca­ vations in 1966. The tarand-grave was dated by its finds to the Late Roman Iron Age. The brooch was found near the outer frame of the tarand, quite unexpectedly, according to the excavator Carl Fredrik Meinander: “It was as if the object had been lost or hidden into the grave” (au­ thors' own translation). His interpreta­ tion was that the find did not belong to the burial; instead, it must have been a later addition, possibly from a votive of­ fering (Meinander, 1973, 146). There is another example from Turku (in former Kaarina), south-western Fin­ land. In the Ravattula cairn dated to the2

6th century AD, both the pommel and the guard of an S-type 10th century sword were found. The pieces were both found in the north-eastern part of the cairn, near its outer edge. The original burials consisted of two cremations from the Mi­ gration Period. Ella Kivikoski, the exca­ vator, explained the sword as a sacrifice that happened 400 years after the origi­ nal burial took place. Interestingly, she also tried to explain this behaviour. She was convinced of the fact that prehistoric people were able to understand the his­ torical significance of the old monument (Kivikoski, 1945, 142-145). She seems to have been one of the first Finnish archae­ ologists who realized the significance of monument re-use. The Penttala cemetery in Nakkila is fa­ mous for its long-term use. It is dated to the Pre-Roman Iron Age and to the Early Roman Iron Age. There is an older settle­ ment layer under the cemetery dated to the Bronze Age underlying the cemetery. Just outside the cemetery a Viking Age axe (NM 5716:5) was found during ex­ cavation, but Unto Salo never problematized the find (Salo, 1968, 75-77). Having considered the re-use of an­ cient monuments, I will now consider examples of the re-use of artefacts from earlier times.

Placing Old Artefacts in New Graves Stone Age tools from Iron Age inhu­ mation graves are interesting examples because they seem to be quite frequent. Moreover, reviewing the known cases of old artefacts inside Iron Age cemeteries, one realises that these are mostly Stone Age tools of different kinds, such as differ­ ent types of axes, adzes, and arrowheads.

2 Traditionally the first inhumations appear in the Finnish material during the 11th century AD. The only exception is the Lake Pyhäjärvi region in western Finland where inhumation starts already during the 6th century AD.

75

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A common theme they all share is that they are edged weapons. However, one must bear in mind that for archaeologists, stone tools are much easier to recognize and date when they are found in a pure Iron Age context than, for example, old metal objects that are often badly burned when found inside cremation cemeteries. This disparity in the material might thus be a mere coincidence. There are two examples of this practice, Graves 812 and 854, from the Luistari in­ humation cemetery in Eura. There were a stone chisel and the fragment of a stone axe. According to Pirkko-Liisa LehtosaloHilander, these tools should be under­ stood as ritual objects, in other words, as amulets or talismans (Lehtosalo-Hilander, 2000b, 95, 107). Another Late Iron Age inhumation cemetery in Käräjämäki, in Eura, revealed more Stone Age tools. Unfortunately, there are no excavation reports from these excavations, only some references in the find catalogues at the Finnish National Board of Antiquity. In Grave 5 a slate arrow of the so-called Pyheensilta type (NM 2995:5) was found in 1894. The arrow lay in 60 cm depth just above the coffin. In the excavation of 1912, another similar inhumation grave was found. In the NE end of the grave a small polished stone adze (NM 6127:50) was found. However, this adze was also found in the filling of the grave, making the context more or less vague. These ob­ jects could be dated roughly to the Mid­ dle and Late Neolithic (for a picture of the finds, see Lehtosalo-Hilander, 2000a, 165). In Yli-Nuoranne in Eura, a small Stone Age adze (NM 18317:8) made of green slate was placed in the foot end of a Merovingian-Period inhumation grave (Grave 26). Since the adze was placed in­ side the coffin, it is evident that it was not there by accident (Lehtosalo-Hilander, 1970). In the nearby Köyliö region, the fill of inhumation Grave A3, from the Migration/Merovingian Period inhumation 76

cemetery Kjuloholm, contained a Stone Age chisel (NM 9725:4), and Grave A5 contained some flint. The excavator, Nils Cleve, did not believe that the flint be­ longed to fire strikers, but that they more probably had been older artefacts (Cleve, 1943). In Peltokutila in Kalvola, Häme, a Mi­ gration Period cairn was altered during the Merovingian Period into a cremation cemetery under level ground. When Nils Cleve excavated the site in 1933, he found a small (10.4 cm) battle axe (NM 9726:19) amongst the fragments of an arm-ring and a ring dated to the 7th century AD (Cleve, 1933). The Kakkulainen cremation cemetery under level ground in Kokemäki, west Finland, is dated to the Merovingian Pe­ riod and Viking Age. Unfortunately, this cemetery was partly destroyed by con­ struction work before the excavations in 1924 (Šalmo 1952, 62-63). Here, a frag­ ment of a Stone Age chisel (NM 8338:83) was found inside the cremation cemetery. In the immediate vicinity an almost com­ plete silver ornamented sword and a half penannular brooch were found. Since on the base of the chisel there were traces of drilling, it seemed that someone had tried to drill a hole through the chisel, probably at some later point (Kampman, 1925). In the Vanhalinna hillfort in Lieto, south-western Finland, dated from the Late Iron Age to the Middle Ages, a stone chisel (TYA 818:64) was found inside a fireplace within a settlement context. It was first believed that the stone chisel had been placed inside the fireplace as some kind of votive offering during the Late Iron Age or in the Middle Ages. How­ ever, the radiocarbon dating showed that the fireplace was already in use during the Early Roman Iron Age, which seems to make the re-use associated with these sharp stone tools much earlier than it was believed (Asplund, 2005).

Anna Wessman

deceased had worn during his lifetime Stone Age tools are also frequently (Schauman-Lönnqvist, 1988, 75-76). found in Swedish and Danish graves dat­ ed to the Iron Age and medieval times. At In a low earth-mixed cairn dated to the the end of the Viking Age, runic inscrip­ Merovingian Period in Hiidentöykkä, tions were occasionally made on these Huittinen, pieces of an enamel orna­ stone axes that imply that they had an mented penannular brooch of the soamulet function (Horn Fuglesang, 1989, called Estonian type from the 4th century 22; Moltke, 1938, 144-147). Ethnograph­ were found (Fig. 2). These pieces were ic parallels tell of a widespread belief in found together with artefacts and 1.6 kg the axes of the Thunder God (Carelli, of burned bones that dated mainly to 1996, 157; Huurre, 2003, 168-169; Muhothe 6th century AD. The enamel brooch nen, 2006, 4; Siikala, 1992, 172-177). seemed to have been in much more in­ There are many beliefs concerning these tense heat than the other objects; some axes throughout Scandinavia (Finnish of the grave goods had probably not even Ukonvaaja, Swedish Torvigg). For exam­ been in the pyre. The enamel was almost ple, it was believed that these axes could gone and it was no longer possible to protect their owner from fire and light­ see the original colours of the brooch. ning and that they could protect livestock Kivikoski was still convinced that all and afford success in hunting. According the finds were from a single burial. The to these folk traditions, an axe could also first piece of the enamel brooch (NM make its owner invulnerable (Almqvist, 1974, 534). Due to these strong beliefs, stone axes and chisels were still used in Finland for many purposes dur­ ing the 19th century (Huurre, 2003, 169). The partially drilled hole on the chisel found in Kokemäki suggests that the ar­ tefact had indeed been in use at a later point. It seems that most of the research has focused on the meaning of stone axes inside later graves, resulting in the fact that other objects have become overlooked. Nevertheless, other types of ancient artefacts have been found in Iron Age con­ texts. In a Migration Period cairn (Cairn No. 55) from Palomäki in Salo, south-western Finland, a Bronze Age button was found (Fig. 1). According to Mari­ Fig. 1. Above: the button from Palomäki in Salo. Below: the anne Schauman-Lönnqvist, fragments from the scabbard chape from the Tiitusmäki the button could have been cemetery in Piikkiö. Photographed by M. Haverinen, an antique amulet that the 2008, National Board of Antiquities 77

Interarchaeologia, 3

10361:36) was found in 25 cm depth and the second two pieces (NM 10361:56) in the deep­ est part of the burial, in 51 cm depth. She thus interpreted the brooch as being placed in the grave at the same time with the burial. However, she did not sug­ gest that the brooch could have been an heirloom. Instead, she interpreted that the brooch type had been in use much longer than archaeologists had ear­ lier believed (Kivikoski, 1936; Kivikoski, 1937, 10-11). This explanation is interesting be­ cause only five years later at the excavation site of Ravattula did Fig. 2. The pennanular brooch from Loima in Huittinshe explain a similar situation as en. Photographed by E. Laakso, 1936, National Board sacrifice. However, the latter case of Antiquities concerned pieces of a sword that were to the contrary much younger than (NM 11285:109) from a sword scabbard the burial. It thus seems likely that when that was found quite near the surface of an artefact is in fact much older than the the cemetery. This is quite specific for this grave, it is easier to explain through a cemetery type; finds are often found im­ long usage time or as deriving from an mediately under the thin turf layer. There older burial. The Pre-Roman Iron Age are similar chapes from a Danish Roman spiral needle (NM 19000:5385) found Iron Age bog finding (Nydam); therefore, in a level-ground cremation cemetery the chape was dated in comparison to in Mahittula in Raišio, south-western the Late Roman Iron Age (AD 200-400) Finland, is another good example. The (Kivikoski, 1941). Jukka Luoto has sug­ needle was the only ancient find in a gested that the cemetery actually dates to cemetery that was otherwise dated to the Late Roman Iron Age and that it has the 7 - 12th century AD. However, instead come into use again during the Viking of explaining the find as a later offering, Age (Luoto, 1989, 39). On the other hand, the needle was explained to have derived one might ask why there is only a single from an older, already destroyed cairn find from this period. It would thus seem situated under the cremation cemetery justified to suggest that the chape was (Pietikäinen, 2006, 79). placed in the cemetery at a later stage. A very interesting example also comes from There are at least two cases in Finland the aforementioned inhumation Cem­ where the ancient artefact is part of a weapon. In Piikkiö, south-western Fin­ etery A in Köyliö. In Grave A5, the same grave that contained flint, lay a Meroving­ land, there is a Viking Age cremation ian period sword with a pommel that was cemetery under level ground called Tiitusmäki (Fig. 1). When the cemetery was much older than the sword itself. It seems that the pommel had originally belonged excavated in 1941 by Ella Kivikoski, there to a ring sword dated to the 5th century was a find that was seemingly older than AD. In the re-investigation of the sword the other finds. This was a broken chape 78

Anna Wessman

it also became evident that the ring had been removed from the pommel at some point before it had been attached for the second time on the new sword (Erä-Esko, 1973, 7, 19-20; Tomanterä, 1973, 23-24; Raninen, 2007, 22). An interesting fea­ ture of this grave also is that the deceased had been placed in a different orientation (with the head to south,-south-east) than the rest of the 21 inhumation graves that were placed with the heads to the north, and that the sword lay on the right side and not on the left side of the deceased as usually (Cleve, 1943, 25-26). In addition to the re-used sword, this perhaps reflect­ ed some special traits of the personality of the deceased or his status (Raninen, 2007, 22). One last example of this kind of re-use comes from Mynämäki in south-western Finland. There, at the graveyard of a medi­ eval stone church, a Merovingian period cremation cemetery consisting of crema­ tion pits and a cremation cemetery under level ground was excavated in 1927. How­ ever, in 1943 the local gravedigger stum­ bled upon a very extraordinary burial that probably belongs to the same cemetery. The cremated bones and the grave goods were not placed in a simple pit as most of the surrounding graves (even though it is highly likely that these graves have also included some kind of a container of an organic material). The grave goods - a sword, a shield, a spear, a Finnish battle knife, a knife, a Permian belt, horse bits and pieces of harness, the handle of a whip (or a rattle?), a dress pin, rings, an arm-ring, a deformed silver artefact, and a bone comb - were instead all placed inside the so-called Vestland cauldron

(NM 11353:32). The grave is dated to the end of the 7th century or the beginning of the 8th century according to the typology of the artefacts (Šalmo 1946, 20-22, 31). These cauldrons are believed to have been manufactured in the Roman Empire and they were used as burial vessels in Scan­ dinavia during the Late Roman Iron Age and the Migration Period. They were es­ pecially common in Norway, and it seems that they never contain any weapons and only occasionally jewellery. In Scandi­ navia, bone artefacts such as combs and game pieces, gold artefacts in Salins style I and small accessories to the dress such as belt fittings are much more common amongst the grave finds (Hjorungdal, 1999, 81, 84). The bronze cauldron is by itself a very rare find in Finland. Only three other examples are known, all from Ostrobothnia in western Finland.3 The fact that this burial contained a large amount of weapons and jewellery differ­ entiates it from the rest of the Scandina­ vian finds. Furthermore, what made this burial so special is that the cauldron was at least 200 years older than the rest of the grave goods, suggesting that it was an antique already when being placed inside the grave (Šalmo, 1946, 30-31). An inter­ esting fact also is that the Merovingian Period cremation cemetery was built on top of some older burials. During the ex­ cavations, an urn grave was dated to the Early Roman Iron Age or the Migration Period (Salo 1968, 87-88). As we have seen from the examples above, not all ancient artefacts derive from the Stone Age, nor are they all sharp objects. It is clear that these old objects must have looked different from the other

3 These cauldrons are from Levänluhta in Isokyrö (NM 2441:1) and from Gulldynt (NM 68) and Kaparkullen (NM 2891:14) in Voyri. They are all considered to come from cemetery contexts (Šalmo, 1946, 30; Wessman, in press). These cauldrons are still part of our collective memory since both the Levänluhta and the Mynämäki finds are displayed at the National Museum of Finland.

79

Interarchaeologia, 3

artefacts. Therefore, it is probable that the historical significance was apparent to the people who reburied these items.

How Were These Objects Obtained? The question of the accessibility of the ancient artefacts is an interesting question that, however, is very difficult to answer. Were these old artefacts looted from old­ er graves or were they obtained in some other way? That also raises the question of how long a single artefact was in cir­ culation. Is it, for example, possible that these objects were in circulation during all this time, so that the artefact was never looted from an older grave? And what in that case did these objects mean for their owners? Did their owners understand the original meaning of the artefacts or were they symbolic or mythological objects? In order for us to answer all these ques­ tions, we must try to establish the context of these finds. This is not a simple task, since they often derive from excavations that are not documented or of the high­ est quality. The above-mentioned cases derive from both cremations and inhu­ mations. This shows that the mnemonic aspect of portable objects was important throughout the Middle and Late Iron Age regardless of the burial custom. I believe that most of the ancient ar­ tefacts mentioned in this article have been removed at some point from older burials. The old burials had either been marked in some way or the social mem­ ory had in fact lived on for several cen­ turies. It is possible that these artefacts were perceived as belonging to the con­ text of the dead. This is also suggested by the fact that some of the artefacts bear signs of fire. In addition, the artefacts seem to be fragments, as, for example, the above-mentioned find from Tiitusmäki where only the chape of a sword 80

was placed inside the grave. The ancient sword pommel from Köyliö suggests the same, making it an evident example of a connection between material culture and memory. The ancient fragments inside burials would thus be examples of pars pro toto, which means that only a small piece is enough to symbolize the original artefact. The graves that were re-opened were probably special in some way. Stories or myths were presumably associated with them or with the surrounding landscape. Therefore, these graves were open and certain artefacts were removed from the graves.

Discussion A culture with a strong oral tradition has to remember vast amounts of in­ formation. Mnemonic systems can help people to remember and retrieve valu­ able information (Baddeley, 1976, 369). Oral tradition was still important in the Middle Ages, especially among the com­ mon people. Written culture was at that point still restricted mainly to the elite. In many cultures oral tradition and thus also memory is helped by a specialist, such as a memory-man or a singer who preserves the memories of rituals, technologies and local knowledge (Misztal, 2003, 29-31). In the Hawaiian chiefdoms, the ability to recall lineage histories was a key compo­ nent in the legitimatisation of chiefly sta­ tus and power. Memory specialists were enlisted to keep track of these chiefly ge­ nealogies (Lillios, 2003, 147). Some Ma­ laysian and South American tribes record genealogies, kinship, and clan affiliations in different kinds of tattoos on their bod­ ies (Schuster & Carpenter, 1996, 154, 166-169). Oral tradition thus combines mythology, genealogy and narrative his­ tory (Fentress & Wickham, 1992, 82). There also are early examples of written genealogies from Scandinavia. The Norse

Anna Wessman

skaldic poem Ynglingatal is a list of 27 de­ ceased kings and their genealogical line from Fjolner to Rangvald (Noreen, 1925). The poem is believed to derive from the 9th or 10th century AD and it mentions not only the name of the king but also place names like Vendel, Uppsala, and Borre (Burenhult, 1999,301,337). The fa­ mous rune stone Rökstenen, in Östergötland in Sweden, is an excellent example of a prehistoric attempt to preserve both the oral and written history The inscriptions describe events, legends and myths cover­ ing several generations. The stone, which is dated to the 9th century, is an obituary where a father (Varin) is honouring the memory of his dead son (Vämod). In the text, the father strongly draws out his influential descent and status, render­ ing the stone a status symbol for his kin. According to some researchers, it is pos­ sible that the father was in fact responsi­ ble for remembering the genealogy and history of his kin, thus giving him the sta­ tus of a memory-man. Hence, the runes not only transmitted memories but also preserved and passed on mythical tradi­ tions (Arwill-Nordbladh, 2008, 173-174; Zachrisson, 1999,341-342). Also, the pic­ ture-stones from Gotland show the myths and sagas of the Old Norse world, even though this is not demonstrated through writing but instead through illustrations (Meulengracht Sorensen, 1992, 166). Below I will give two possible explana­ tions to the phenomenon of ancient arte­ facts inside later burials. A.

Translate o r

g ra v e ro b b e ry ?

There are many examples from Euro­ pean prehistory of graves that have been re-opened some time after the funeral. It seems that certain items have been removed from the graves due to their emotional, historical or material value. Occasionally, the body has also been manipulated or even removed from the

grave. These re-openings and the remov­ al of objects have traditionally been ex­ plained as grave robbery, but alternative approaches have been introduced, too (e.g. Leskovar, 2005; Staecker, 2005). The economic motive is a logical explanation for grave robbery, but there must also have been deeper meanings to this. Cer­ tain objects, such as swords, helmets, val­ uable jewellery or rings, could have been important symbols for legitimating and passing on ownership, hereditary rights, and power. These objects were removed from the grave and used in a particular way in rituals involved in the crowning of new political or religious leaders (Myhre, 1994,74,79-80). An excellent example of this is found in some early manuscripts of the Legend of Olav the Holy. When the king is born and baptized, a pre-Christian grave mound is re-opened and a sword, a ring and a belt, all symbols of leadership and power, are removed from the burial and given to the newborn king (Rothe, 2000, 173-174). Graves were also opened and manipulated at later times. The tombs of saints were, for example, opened frequently during medieval times. Relics, such as clothing, objects or the human remains of saints, were popular collec­ tor items in Europe during this time. Ac­ cording to the Catholic Church, the saint was present even in the smallest piece of a relic. The relics were thus real; they pos­ sessed high powers and had great ritual value (Geary, 1986; Lahti, 2007). Hence, the re-opening of the graves might be something called translatio. Traditionally the term means that a pa­ gan grave is opened some time after the funeral and that the deceased is removed from the grave and placed in a Chris­ tian burial ground. The Danish Jellinge monuments are often referred to in this context (Krogh, 1983; Roesdahl, 1997; see also Staecker, 2005). In my opinion, translatio could also involve removing an object from the grave and taking it into 81

Interarchaeologia, 3

circulation once again. This act might have nothing to do with the transition into Christianity; it probably happened during pagan times as well. One should not mistake this for grave robbery In­ stead, it should be understood as ritual activity that involves the removal of cer­ tain objects that have been chosen before­ hand (cf. Myhre, 1994). According to the Norwegian archae­ ologist Bjorn Myhre, the motive for re­ moving objects from graves was not of an economic but of a religious character. He explains it by pointing out that not all items are removed from the graves. Many valuable objects remain inside the manipulated burials. Hence, it seems that only occasional objects with a probable symbolic character are removed from the grave (Myhre, 1994, 74-75). These artefacts legitimized the link between the past and the present, creating a genealogy between the living and the dead. As it is often stated, the one who owns the past also owns the present (Steinsland, 2002, 94-96). В. H e irlo o m s a n d in a lie n a b le p o s s e s s io n s

Heirlooms are objects that have been in circulation for a long time. These an­ tiques are often passed down through sev­ eral generations so that they are inherited from father to son or mother to daughter. Heirlooms are valuable because they are historic and they have passed through the hands of historic persons (Malinowski, 2005 [1922], 68). The possession, display and transmission of heirlooms are im­ portant. Through heirlooms people were able to differentiate themselves from the others while the object served as a link to the ancestral past and as a symbol of an inherited rank (Lillios, 1999). When an heirloom was finally taken out of circula­ tion and placed in the grave, it possibly no longer had any meaning for its owner. 82

The reason might be that the deceased left no relatives behind to inherit the heir­ loom or that the object no longer had any significance to the people who where left behind. At the same time, the heirloom might have been perceived as belonging to the ancestors; thus, its context inside a grave would be self-explanatory. Keeping-while-giving is a model of ex­ change developed by the American an­ thropologist Annette B. Weiner (1992). Her approach is based on the kula shell exchange system amongst several tribes living on a number of islands in Mela­ nesia. This exchange system has also been widely studied by Bronislaw Ma­ linowski (2005 [1922]). In the kula tradi­ tion certain shells are received, held and passed on by men in a complex ritual ex­ change system. The shells are always gifts; through the exchange system their func­ tion is to maintain social relationships. Each transaction results in a lifelong relationship or partnership between the giver and the receiver, involving different duties and privileges. The shells that are mostly worn as long necklaces (soulava) or bracelets (mwali) carry the history of their former owners and as such they become important for their new owners identity and status (Malinowski, 2005 [1922], 62-68). Since the kula exchange system covers a fairly large geographical area and many different tribes, it also in­ volves expressions of power and political control (Weiner, 1992,133; Persson, 1999, 12). The mnemonic value of the shells should not be forgotten either. According to Weiner, these hierarchical shells would often be withheld from circulation and kept as trophies for as long as possible. To keep a shell out of circulation even for a short time is seen as a triumph by its present owner. As such, some shells be­ come famous and hence inalienable pos­ sessions or heirlooms. Some shells can be so old and worn down that one can clearly see the history on them. When

Anna Wessman

the shell is finally placed back in circu­ lation, it is considered to be a huge loss and an emotional moment for the former owner (Weiner 1992, 133-137, 145). This means that each shell is unique; they bear a name, they have a personality and a history attached to them (Mauss, 1990 [1950], 24). Objects naturally have a practical func­ tion but, as I have shown, they carry social messages too. Alfred Gell has il­ lustrated this by suggesting that objects are social agents and that people often attribute their things with a personality (Gell, 1998, 16-21). Thus, objects play an important role in the social structure and in maintaining social relationships. Weapons have several qualities and they are often treated in various ways be­ fore being placed inside a grave. Weap­ ons do not only indicate the presence of a warrior elite, they have a symbolic and social meaning too. Swords are of­ ten associated with their owners or with certain events. The swords might have a name, a personality or a story attached to them. This is shown, for example, in the medieval myth of King Arthur (Ex­ calibur), Beowulf (Hrunting and Naegling), and in Skäldskaparmäl in the Edda (Gram) (Beowulf, lines 1290-1298, 2369; Bradley, 1990, 1-4; Ellis Davidson, 1962, 126,129; Sturluson, 1997,146). The mne­ monic aspects of weapons should not be overlooked either. Beowulf, for instance, describes swords as precious’, priceless’, Tabled’, ancient’, old’ or as ‘heirlooms’ (Beowulf, lines 1605, 2680, 2276, 1799, 710, 1319). The Scandinavian sagas, on the other hand, tell of broken swords that are remade into new weapons (Ellis Davidson, 1962, 135, 142, 162-163). The presence or absence of certain weapons in graves might thus suggest inheritance and commemoration (Williams, 2005). In Finland, the weapons are often burned, bent and broken before being placed inside a cremation cemetery. It is

probable that the weapons were broken in order to kill or free the soul that the people thought lived inside the weapons (Karvonen, 1998). Sometimes the purpose or the meaning of the weapons inside graves changes. In the cremation cemeteries un­ der level ground in Finland, the Merov­ ingian Period weapon graves seem to be the main type of individual burial, while the rest of the cemetery is collective in its nature (Wickholm & Raninen, 2006). In some of these burials the burned bones of the presumed male warriors are placed inside shield bosses, transforming the defensive weapon into a container or urn for the deceased’s earthly remains (Hackman, 1938, 11; Heikkurinen-Montell, 1996, 95). The same phenomenon can also be seen in the coeval Finnish boat burials (Appelgren, 1897, 60). In some cremation cemeteries in Fin­ land and in the Aland islands, there are vertical spears in the cemetery layers suggesting that they have been thrown in the graves as some sort of funeral rit­ ual. The spears are, for example, struck down around grave urns or cremation pits (Wickholm, 2006). There is evidence of similar rituals from Scandinavia and Estonia as well (Artelius, 2005; Mägi, 2002; Nordberg, 2002; Price, 2002). It has been implied that these vertical spears could either have been associated with the cult of Odin and would thus be votive sacrifices (Nordberg, 2003; Price, 2002), or that their verticality could be associ­ ated with the life-history or biography of these spears (Gosden & Marshall, 1999). Old weapons could in fact have been used as a way of fixing social memories. In some inhumation graves from the 11th century AD in the Häme region, it seems that the coffin has been “nailed” with weapons that are considerably older than the inhumation grave. In addition, these weapons are often taken from an old cremation cemetery under level ground. In Makasiininmäki cremation cemetery 83

Interarchaeologia, 3

in Janakkala, Häme region, there is an in­ humation grave where the coffin was fas­ tened with two spears, a knife, and a hook. These objects were 500 years older than the grave and probably derived from the older cremation cemetery (see Wickholm, 2006). This means that ancient artefacts were indeed taken from old burials at times and re-used in other burial rituals. This might have been a particular way to connect the past and present generations.

Conclusion The above-given explanations for an­ cient artefacts could possibly be varia­ tions on the same theme. What unites them is that they are old artefacts with several owners during their life history. It is evident that these objects must have had some kind of value for their owners. This value might have been of religious, symbolic, memorial or economic signifi­ cance. The objects probably also played an important part in communal ceremo­ nies and would thus be of collective sig­ nificance. When these objects finally were put into a grave, their role was possibly to display the deceased individuals’ status or personhood within the community. By reburying old artefacts inside younger burials, people were able to express con­ tinuity even if these old objects did not come from their own past. It could have been a way to manipulate time by creat­ ing a longer history and another kind of origin myth. Also, territorial rights or

84

claims for more land could have triggered the use of older artefacts. This deliberate disturbance of the graves, both by erect­ ing a new grave on top of an older one or placing an old artefact in a new grave, involved emotions and the commemora­ tion of the dead (Williams, 2007). Given this discussion, I think it is pos­ sible to conceptualise Iron Age funerals as rituals concerned with keeping-while­ giving. To renounce something valuable or important is not always easy and dur­ ing funerals this is possibly even more explicit. As I have shown above, certain grave goods have more value than oth­ ers. It is not impossible to think that some items perhaps never made it into the grave. They might have played an im­ portant part in the funeral ritual, but in the end they were too valuable to be giv­ en away. These objects might have been placed inside a grave at some later point, possibly because they had lost their value for their owner. Alternatively, it was a way to bring to an end a long tradition.

Acknowledgements The author wishes to thank Dr Howard Williams at the University of Chester and Dr Tuija Rankama at the University of Helsinki for valuable and helpful com­ ments to an earlier draft of this paper. MA Sami Raninen and MA Eva Ahl-Waris also took the time to read and comment this paper, which I am most grateful for.

Anna Wessman

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Abbreviations NM = The National Museum o f Finland, ar­ chaeological collections TYA = Turun Yliopisto arkeologia, Uni­ versity of Turku, archaeological collections

BURIALS ON S E TT L E M E N T S ITES: MEMORIES OF AN CESTO R S OR DISSOCIATION? Andrejs Vasks Burial on settlement sites in the territory of Latvia was practiced from the Mesolithic up to the Iron Age. Although there are not many such cases, they are not fortuitous, but reflect a deliberate choice of location. The author has information about 20 Iron Age barrows and flat cemeteries established at the sites of earlier settlements, as well as four barrow cemeteries where earth from the cultural layer of a settlement had been used for the barrow. Burial on an earlier settlement site might be interpreted as indicating that memory was an important factor in creating symbolic continuity with the ancestors. The utilisation o f the cultural layer for burial might also have been connected with a wish to legitimise a groups rights to a territory. By burying a person in a “dead” location or by covering the deceased with earth from the cultural layer, the living members of the group may have been guided by a wish to dissociate themselves symbolically from the realm of the dead. Keywords: Iron Age, burials, ancestors, memory, continuity, dissociation.

Andrejs Vasks, Department of Archaeology and Auxiliary Historical Disciplines, Faculty of History and Philosophy, University of Latvia, Brīvības Blvd 32, Rīga, LV-1050, Latvia; Andrejs, [email protected]

Introduction Burial on settlement sites is a common phenomenon in various periods of pre­ history, from the Late Palaeolithic up to the Late Iron Age, in both hunter-gath­ erer and agricultural societies. Already in the Mesolithic, the practice began of burying the dead outside of settlements, at specially chosen burial sites. However, the custom of burial on settlement sites was still practiced from time to time. As indicated by the examples from the settlement sites of Zvejnieki (Zagorskis, 2004, 49-50) and Vendzavas (Bērziņš, 2002), burial at settlement sites has been practiced in the territory of Latvia since the Mesolithic. At Neolithic sites, such cases have been recorded at Abora I, Kvāpāni II (Loze, 1979, 43-54), and pos­ sibly also at Riņņukalns (Šturms, 1927) and Rutenieki (LA, 1974, 44). The buri­ als on the Ķivutkalns hillfort (Graudonis, 1989, 50-51) and at the Ziedoņskola

settlement (Zagorska, 2000) indicate that this practice continued in the Bronze Age as well. Likewise, the Iron Age has fur­ nished a string of cases of burial on settle­ ment sites. These examples show that the tradition was more or less expressed in all periods of the prehistory of Latvia during a time interval of more than seven mil­ lennia. This is a very long time interval, during which the economy, social struc­ ture, and religious beliefs of the local so­ cieties were cardinally transformed. Thus, the reasons that motivated people to bury their dead in the area of a settlement site may have differed considerably in various periods. In this paper, I will discuss the expression of this custom in the agrarian societies of the Iron Age in the territory of Latvia, seeking to explain it. In doing so, I have proceeded from the postulate that the site of burial or the location of the cemetery was not chosen fortuitously, and that this choice was motivated by the society’s beliefs regarding a person’s fate 89

Interarchaeologia, 3

after death and the relationship of this society with the world of the living and the dead.

Cemeteries on Settlement Sites in the Iron Age In the Early and Middle Iron Age (the 1st to 8th century AD) barrow cemeter­ ies were characteristic of the central part of Latvia. A stone circle or peristalith was created around the base of a barrow within which the dead were inhumed, covered by the sand of the barrow. It is also common to find a burnt layer at the base of the barrow, the “house” of the dead, something that indicates that ritu­ als involving fire were conducted to pre­ pare the burial site. More than 120 such cemeteries are known in the territory of Latvia. A cem­ etery usually has just one or a few barrows. Less commonly, they number 10 or more barrows. Generally, the barrows were established in the vicinity of the set­ tlement site, at a location that had not previously been used for other purposes, and the barrow consisted of clean, lightcoloured sand. However, several burials show a departure from this norm. A clear example in this regard is the archaeologi­ cal complex of Plāteri-Spietiņi. It lies on the left bank of the River Daugava, at the margin of the river valley and on a river terrace some 400 m from the river. The complex includes two settlement sites and two barrow cemeteries. The earlier settlement, Plāteri, was inhabited in the 1st millennium BC and the early part of the 1st millennium AD. It was located at the edge of the river valley, on a sandy hill, bordered by slopes on the northern and partly also on the eastern and west­ ern side. The cultural layer of the settle­ ment site was 40 to 50 cm thick. In the 3rd century AD, a barrow with a peristalith 90

was created on the settlement site, and earth from the cultural layer of the set­ tlement was used for the barrow. The site was used for burial up to the 6th century. The later settlement site, Spietiņi, was located 100 m northwards, on a terrace of the River Daugava 10 metres lower. It was inhabited in the 1st to 7th century AD. The thickness of the cultural layer at this site varied from 20 up to 60 cm, and it extended across an area of 2 ha (Daiga & Atgāzis, 1962). To the northeast, adjacent to the settlement site, was the cemetery of Spietiņi with two barrows, where burial was practiced from the 2nd to the 7th cen­ tury AD (it is possible that there were one or two more barrows which had been de­ stroyed (Atgāzis, 2006,20)). Barrow No. 1 consisted of dark earth brought from the cultural layer of the adjacent settlement site; however, that was not the case with Barrow No. 2 (Atgāzis, 2006). Thus, there were two barrow cemeteries associated with the Spietiņi settlement site, located on both sides of the settlement, sepa­ rated by a distance of about 300 m. The creation of these barrows represents three traditions: 1) the most widespread prac­ tice when the barrow was established at an empty location, 2) a barrow that was established at a former settlement site, and 3) a barrow for which earth from the cultural layer of a contemporaneous set­ tlement site was used. Including Plāteri and Spietiņi, the author has information about six cases when barrows were estab­ lished in the territory of an earlier set­ tlement site, and four cases where earth from a cultural layer had been brought in order to create the barrow. It is possible that there were more cases of both kinds, but they have not been recorded because of the inadequacy of excavation methods, particularly in the 19th century. The establishment of cemeteries at earlier residential sites continued in the Late Iron Age as well (the 9th to 12th

Andrejs Vasks

century), when flat inhumation cemeteries predominated. Out of approximately 200 Latgallian flat cemeteries, at least 10 had been established at earlier settlement sites. Out of 15 Liv flat cemeteries, mainly along the lower reaches of the River Daugava, there is evidence that three of them had burials in the cultural layer of the settlement site. So far, there is no clear evidence of similar cases in the basin of the River Lielupe or in western Latvia. An exception is Matkules Toj āti on the right bank of the River Abava. Here, five 10-11th century barrows have been excavated, created at the site of a Late Neolithic settlement. This is an evidence that the establishment of a cemetery at a site of an earlier settlement, although not a common phenomenon, did continue throughout the Iron Age.

A Deliberate Choice or a Fortuitous Occurrence? Since only a small proportion of Iron Age cemeteries were established on ear­ lier settlement sites, the question may arise, was such site chosen in the knowl­ edge of its previous use, or was this factor of no significance, i.e., was it fortuitous? Considering Early and Middle Iron Age barrows, we should bear in mind that they represented one of the several ele­ ments of a populated area. The central el­ ement was the residential site itself, with houses, outbuildings and a palisade. At various distances from this centre, there was a water source - a river, stream, or lake - as well as arable land, meadows, and pasture, as well as places of particular significance - a burial site and a cult site. The arrangement of these sites in physi­ cal space was largely determined by the particular landscape and terrain, but not only by that. The ancient man was, first and foremost, homo religiosus, and that determined his perspective on the world. It was possible to divide the world into the

profane or communal realm, where the members of the community undertook everyday activities that ensured their ex­ istence, and the sacred or mythical realm, which included the earth, heaven, and the underworld, and which was the abode of gods and supernatural forces. The inhabit­ ants of the sacred realm also included the ancestors. On earth, the elements of this sacred world might manifest themselves in the form of a tree, a grove, a spring, a stone, or the resting places of ones an­ cestors. The cemetery was not just a place where certain funerary rites were under­ taken, and where the dead were deposit­ ed, but also the locus of religious ceremo­ nies. Rituals and ceremonies were means of maintaining contact with the sacred realm. Accordingly, the choice of the bur­ ial site would probably have been made very carefully, taking into consideration various visible elements of the physical landscape and the invisible sacred realm. One of the constraints was evidently the distance of the barrow(s) from the living site. This distance separating the “realm of the living” from the “realm of the dead”, as indicated by a string of examples, might vary between 50 and 200 metres. Another precondition: the sacred space of the dead, which in this case was the barrow as the home of the ancestors, had to be separated from the profane com­ munal world. Along the perimeter these boundaries were symbolically marked by peristaliths, which were sometimes even built as a lm high ring with stones piled in several layers (Šņore, 1933, 15). From below, the realm of the dead was separat­ ed by a layer of ash and charcoal, which might be up to 20-25 cm thick (Snore, 1993, 35), testifying to quite impressive fire rituals during the time of preparation of the site. From above, the boundary was marked by the barrow itself. In view of all this, it is hard to imagine that in choosing the site for the barrow, the people would 91

Interarchaeologia, 3

not have noticed the cultural layer of an earlier settlement. The occurrence of flat cemeteries at settlement sites cannot be interpreted so clearly. For example, the 10th to 13th cen­ tury Liv cemetery of Laukskola was ad­ joined on the eastern and western side by villages of the same period. In the second half of the 11thcentury and in the 12th cen­ tury, when the cemetery grew eastwards and westwards, burial of people was begun in the oldest parts of the villages, which were no longer inhabited (Zarina, 2006, 9). It seems that in this case the growth of the cemetery at the expense of the ad­ jacent residential site can be explained in terms of purely rational considerations of land use. We need to bear in mind that the lower reaches of the Daugava, par­ ticularly the right bank of the river, was a relatively densely populated area in the Late Iron Age, and a shortage of free space could have played a role. A similar situation when a flat cemetery extended into the territory of a contemporaneous settlement site can be observed at other locations (Jaunāķēni, Kristapiņi). If we disregard ambiguous cases when it is difficult to distinguish whether the territory of the settlement site was being used for burial because of the shortage of space, or whether there were other rea­ sons for it, nevertheless, there are many flat cemeteries whose occurrence on ear­ lier settlement sites cannot be explained in terms of lack of space. From a purely rational point of view, the cultural layer of such a settlement site would be a very favourable location for cultivation. There are many examples from the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th century when people expressed their surprise at the fertility of the plateaux of hillforts even though the fields were not manured. However, there was no cultivation. In my opinion, in such cases the choice of the burial site was determined by its special 92

status in the minds of the people of the time. A vivid example of this is the cem­ etery of Kivti on the north shore of Lake Cirma. It was established at the site of an earlier settlement, which was situated on a slight hillock in a hollow between two hills of glacial till that are quite pronounced in the terrain (Snore, 1978, 52). Compared with the topography of other Latgallian cemeteries, the burial site chosen at Kivti is atypical, even inappropriate. Evidently, the main motivation for the choice of this location was the presence of a former set­ tlement; besides, it was located at a very suitable site for an open settlement.

Time Distance and Memory The time that separates the termination of habitation at a settlement site from the establishment or beginning of use of a burial site can vary considerably. In the cases when a small-scale test excavation was undertaken in the cemetery and the amount of archaeological material con­ nected with the settlement was not large, the dating of the settlement site and thus the time distance between the time when the settlement went out of existence and the beginning of use of the cemetery can be determined only approximately. The oldest settlements in whose territory a cemetery was established in the Late Iron Age date from the Middle Neolithic (LIcagals by the River Aiviekste) and Late Neolithic (Tojāti by the River Abava). The majority of Iron Age barrows and flat cemeteries (approx. 17) were, however, established at settlement sites post-dating the Neolithic. Most commonly, these are sites with striated pottery, dating from the 1st millennium BC and the beginning of the 1st millennium AD (barrow cemeter­ ies in Ķebēni, Melderišķi, Plāteri, Pungas and Ratulāni; flat cemeteries in Aizkrauk­ le, Aizkalne, Maskava, Maskevicišķi, and

Andrejs Vasks

Pļavniekkalns). In northeastern Latvia, settlement sites with textile-impressed pottery were also used as burial sites: these were inhabited in the 1st to 6th cen­ tury AD (the barrow cemetery at Ezēni; flat cemeteries at Kalnapiļas, Kivti, and Nukšas). The majority of the sites with striated pottery in this case may be ex­ plained in terms of the unequal level of study of the territory of the country, too. Northern Latvia, where textile-impressed pottery is characteristic, has seen less ar­ chaeological research than the southern part of the country, where striated pottery is characteristic. These data show that the time distance separating the abandonment of the settle­ ment from the establishment of the cem­ etery may be as much as 4-6 millennia, or about thousand years, and even as lit­ tle as one or two centuries. Is it true that in all of these cases when the site of an earlier settlement was chosen as a burial site, a memory of the settlement was pre­ served? It should be noted that there is no reason to assume that prehistoric socie­ ties had no historical memory. As noted by Chris Gosden and Gary Lock (1998), traditional societies had an understand­ ing of their land that was genealogically historical and at the same time mythical. In non-literate societies, the only kind of historical understanding was based on genealogy. Genealogies of blood rela­ tives and tribal members are the basis for stories about particular persons in the present and in earlier times. More­ over, this genealogical history is based not only on human memory, but also on mnemonic elements in the surrounding landscape (Gosden & Lock, 1998, 5). In this case such mnemonic elements could refer to various structures and the way they were prepared, among them burial structures, whose origin was connected with particular individuals. As noted by Michael Rowlands, such material objects

could have had an even greater role in cognisance of the past than the spoken word (Rowlands, 1993, 144). However, genealogical history is changeable, since the most distant ances­ tors disappear from human memory over the course of time, their place being taken by elements of mythical history. And in myths human society is viewed as the product of heroes, gods, or supernatural forces. Mircea Eliade argues that popular memory of a historical event or authentic individual persists no longer than three centuries. After that the historical indi­ vidual merges with its mythical model (a hero or god), and the event joins the cate­ gory of mythical events (Eliade, 1995,50). Thus, the earliest part of genealogical his­ tory is transformed into mythical history, which does not accept the individual but preserves only the model - the archetype. This mythical history is in fact ahistorical since it has no temporal dimension as we understand it today. For ancient so­ cieties, time is cyclical, and when some­ thing happens, it is only the repetition of an earlier model, or the ‘eternal return” (Eliade, 1995,42-43). From this perspective, the time inter­ val separating habitation at the site and the establishment of the cemetery is evi­ dently insignificant. If a cemetery was es­ tablished at a settlement site within 100 to 200 years after its abandonment (as in Plāteri and Kivti), the people who es­ tablished the burial site may still have at­ tached an importance to the site in terms of genealogical history. Some structural remains of the former habitation may even have been visible, and these could have served as a mnemonic element in genealogical history If a cemetery was established at a settlement site 500 years or more after habitation ceased, the peo­ ple who established it were most likely influenced by ideas of mythical history. If they observed the cultural layer with all 93

Interarchaeologia, 3

its features (dark, charcoal-rich earth, an­ imal and fish bone, artefactual evidence, etc), the people establishing the burial site may have regarded them as a special indi­ cation of the significance of this place as one that had been in existence ab originem (from the origin). The time distance in terms of our present understanding was of no significance in such cases.

Continuity or Dissociation? In order to try to discover the possible motives that made people choose an ear­ lier settlement site as a burial site, we may look into the structure of rituals of the fu­ neral process and its connection with var­ ious aspects of the social system as inter­ preted at the beginning of the 20th century by Robert Hertz (1960) and Arnold van Gennep (1965). Based on the research on traditional societies in Africa and south­ east Asia, they interpreted the death of an individual as a social and biological transformation. In the view of van Gen­ nep, the funeral, along with several other important events in the human lifetime (birth, initiation, marriage, pregnancy, and death), reflects an individuals trans­ formation from one quality into another. This transformation occurs by means of the rites of passage, which have three stages: 1) rites of separation, 2) transition rites, and 3) rites of incorporation (van Gennep, 1965,11). When an individual died, the social balance of a group (family or commu­ nity) was disrupted. Death was perceived as an external force that strikes the group and brings it up against various problems (Hertz, 1960, 78). This applies especially to small societies, such as those existing in the Iron Age in Latvia, particularly the communities of the open settlements of the Roman Period. The death of an indi­ vidual could have highly varied impacts 94

on others, depending on the social status of the individual within the group (Hertz, 1960,76; van Gennep, 1965,148). The de­ ceased, their souls, and the living relatives were connected by definite relationships, but these differed from the relationships existing between them prior to death. In order to alleviate the transition to a new status for each of the three parties affected and thus renew the disrupted balance and continuity in the new situation, changes had to occur in each party. Hertz consid­ ers that rites of passage served precisely this end: they were the means of restoring the established social order. During the rites of separation, the first stage of the rites of passage, the deceased was placed separately from the living members of the group. The location could be a building, a shrine, or any other place, where the body was kept for some time perhaps even several months. During this stage, the burial site was chosen and prepared. The funerary ritual as a whole had to facilitate the separation of the soul from the body. The next was the stage of transition, when the body was placed in its final resting place. The soul had left the body, but had not yet found a home among the souls of the ancestors. Hertz notes that the physical condition of the body and the condition of the soul are closely con­ nected in this stage. Only when the body attains a stable physical condition, either by decaying and turning into a skeleton or by being cremated, does the soul join the community of ancestors and become a full member of this community (Hertz, 1960,34). Here we may note that an inter­ esting view of Couronian beliefs regard­ ing the souls fortunes in such a state of transition is given in a description of cre­ mation by the French traveller Guillebert de Lannoy in 1413: "... they [Couronians] believe that if the smoke rises straight up to the heavens, the soul is saved, but if it is

Andrejs Vasks

blown aside, the soul must perish” (quot­ ed in Spekke, 1935, 98). However, the soul of the deceased was also connected with the living members of the group. The process of separation could be very pro­ tracted, and during this time the relatives of the deceased were themselves in a state of transition, being impure and polluted (Hertz, 1960, 38). Thus, in this stage the burial ritual had two objectives: to facili­ tate the separation of the soul from the body and to eliminate gradually the con­ nection between the soul of the deceased and the living members of the group. This could be achieved by correct observance of certain rituals. In the final stage - incorporation - the deceased, or the soul of the deceased, once again attained a stable condition, joining the other ancestors, but now in a different, sacred world. The living mem­ bers of the group were reintegrated into the community and regained a stable so­ cial position (van Gennep, 1965, 164). Of the three stages in the rites of passage, the second, or the transition stage, is the most important: in this stage both the deceased and the living members of the group are in an ambiguous state of transition. In order to regain stability, in this stage cor­ rect and precise observance of funerary rites was of great importance. An impor­ tant precondition for these rituals was the choice and preparation of the burial site (the barrow). From the perspective of the concept of the rites of passage, the decision to create a barrow or a flat cemetery at a site of an earlier settlement could have been made for a variety of reasons. In structural terms, the cultural layer of the settlement and the deceased individual are connect­ ed since both are excluded from active life: both are dead. A structural separa­ tion can also be observed here: the living remained in the world of the living, while the dead, by being placed in a new living

place that was dead, were consigned to the world of the dead. However, the cultural layer of the settle­ ment site was also a place where distant, mythical ancestors had once lived. By establishing a barrow or a flat cemetery here, as a death abode for ancestors whose memory was preserved in the memory of genealogical history, a symbolic link was established between the people living at the present, their known ancestors in the recent past, and the mythical ancestors in the distant past, ab originem. Thus, the genealogical link with the mythical past was established, and the groups collective social memory was deepened. As noted above, only a small number of Iron Age barrows or flat cemeteries were established at the sites of earlier set­ tlements, thus it cannot be regarded as a widespread practice. In the Iron Age, par­ ticularly in the Roman Period, agrarian expansion took place, i.e., the utilisation of previously unused areas where there were no remains of earlier settlements. However, this is probably an insufficient explanation to account for all those cases when no Iron Age cemetery was estab­ lished on the cultural layer of an earlier settlement site. Rather, the practice of utilising earth from the cultural layer for burial can be regarded as something spe­ cial, even as an exceptional measure in cases of tension and crisis. Such a situa­ tion could have come about in cases of competition among groups for domi­ nance and for rights to a particular ter­ ritory. By utilising an earlier settlement site for burial, and thus deepening the link with the distant, mythical ancestors, the group in question was legitimising its claim to this location and the use of the area. The case of Plāteri-Spietiņi serves as a good example. As already noted, the fairly extensive settlement site of Spietiņi had two adjacent contemporaneous cem­ eteries with three barrows; hence, it may 95

Interarchaeologia, 3

be assumed that three kin groups inhab­ ited the settlement. The arrangement of the barrows is interesting. The Plāteri barrow was created at the margin of the Daugava River Valley, on the site of an earlier settlement; there is a wide view from the barrow across the Spietiņi set­ tlement and cemetery, which is situated a little lower. The view from the location could have been an important factor in the choice of the site. However, the view would have been just as good from the adjacent locations at the edge of the val­ ley. Evidently, the decisive factor in the choice of this location was the presence of an earlier settlement site. The inhab­ itants of the Spietiņi settlement had to look upwards in order to regard the rest­ ing place of their ancestors in the Plāteri barrow, but they did not have to do this when they looked towards the Spietiņi barrows located at the same level as the settlement. We can think that there was some deeper significance in the arrange­ ment of the two burial sites. The group that buried its dead in the Plāteri barrow could have indicated their dominant position in relation to the groups who buried their dead in the Spietiņi barrows, located at a lower level of the terrain. It is even possible that the people buried at Plāteri were the direct descendants of the former inhabitants of this settlement, while those buried at Spietiņi were new­ comers (Vasks, 2001, 44). The utilisation of earth from the cultur­ al layer in the barrows of four cemeter­ ies may have had a somewhat different significance. At Spietiņi, Barrow No. 1 was of such kind: it was quite clear that earth from the adjacent settlement con­ temporaneous with the barrow had been used for the barrow (Atgāzis, 2006, 35). Five barrows have been excavated at Pāķi and the same number at Pungas; both places lie about 5 km away. Here, burial had taken place in the period from the 96

2nd to the 4th century AD (Bresava, 1966). In all the barrows, dark, charcoal-rich earth from the cultural layer was found, along with sherds of smooth-walled and striated pottery. Actual settlements con­ nected with these cemeteries have not been identified. Judging from the pottery found here, the settlements could have been inhabited in both the Pre-Roman Period (striated pottery) and during the time of use of the cemeteries, i.e. in the Roman Period. At the cemetery of Volkarezi (Ludza District), 17 barrows have been excavated, where the dead were bur­ ied in the second half of the 1st millenni­ um AD (Radiņš, 1999,46). In at least one barrow, dark earth from a cultural layer was found, charcoal-rich in places, as well as sherds of smooth-walled, striated (or quasi-striated) or textile-impressed handformed pottery (Vasks, 1991, 139). These finds show that the settlement pre-dated the cemetery. The settlement from which the earth was used was not identified. The cemetery of Volkarezi was excavated in 1926, using the excavation methods characteristic of that time; for that rea­ son, the presence of the settlement site may not have been noticed, and it is not possible to ascertain whether the barrows had been created in the territory of the settlement, or the earth from the cultural layer had been brought from elsewhere. On the one hand, the use of earth from the cultural layer in barrows can be seen as a metaphoric reference to the past, de­ cay, and death (Gramsch, 1995, 76). On the other hand, striving to understand the symbolic significance of the use of earth from the cultural layer, it can be regarded as an offering to the dead. In a symbolic way, part of the persons living site - a site to which he had the right of ownership was given as an offering to that person. The link with the settlement site, i.e. the link between the world of the living and the world of the dead, is expressed quite

Andrejs Vasks

As we have seen, there are not many Iron Age burial sites established at the sites of earlier settlements, and created us­ ing earth from the cultural layer, perhaps for the reason that such cases have hith­ erto not attracted particular attention in the Latvian archaeology. However, these few cases cannot be regarded as fortui­ tous. This is clearly demonstrated by the topography of the Plāteri barrow and the flat cemetery of Kivti. In both cases, when the burial site was chosen, there was am­ ple possibility of establishing it at a loca­ tion without traces of earlier activity Such a choice of sites symbolically em­ phasises continuity with the ancestors - be they real or mythical. Taking into account the characteristics of historical memory in non-literate societies, the antiquity of the settlement, i.e. the time interval between

the abandonment of the settlement site and the initial establishment of the burial site, was evidently insignificant. To some extent, we can better understand the mo­ tives behind the choice of an earlier set­ tlement site as a location for burial if we analyse the funeral process from the per­ spective of the concept of the rites of pas­ sage. Of the three-stage rites of passage, the second stage is the most important: the state of transition, when the soul of the deceased has already left the body, but has not yet found its new abode with the souls of the ancestors. In order for that to happen, correct and precise observance of the funerary ritual is very important, including the choice of an appropriate burial site. The fact that a person was buried in an earlier settlement site is in itself an indication of memory as the most important factor in ensuring symbolic continuity both with the “immediate” ancestors who still had a place in memory, and with the distant mythical ancestors. In the conditions of agrarian expansion, the use of earth from the cultural layer may also be connected with a wish to legitimise a groups claim to a territory. On the other hand, the act of burial of a dead person in a dead location or the usage (offering) of earth from the cultural layer can be regarded as an expression of peoples wish to dissociate themselves from the realm of the deceased.

References

Bresava, M. 1966. Jauni materiāli par sēļu

clearly, but the question is: how might this link be interpreted? Possibly, it was a symbolic act, which, by indicating to the deceased the persons former place of abode, demonstrated continuity between the world of the living and the world of the dead. At the same time, such an act of offering may be regarded as expression of the desire on the part of the living mem­ bers of the group to dissociate themselves from the deceased, not giving them any reason to return and claim their due.

Conclusion

kolektīvo uzkalniņu kapulaukiem. Latvijas Atgāzis, M. 2006. Spietiņu uzkalniņkapi un to vieta Spietiņu un Plateru senvietu kopā. Arheoloģija un Etnogrāfija, XXIII, 16-40. Bērziņš, V. 2000. Izrakumi Vendzavu mezolitą apmetnē un tās teritorijā atrastais kaps.

PSR Zinātņu Akadēmijas Vēstis, 5, 41-54.

Daiga, J. & Atgāzis, M. 1962. Arheoloģiskie izrakumi Sēlpils Spietiņos un Plāteros 1961. gadā. Referātu tēzes zinātniskai atskai­

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Eliade, M. 1995. Mīts par mūžīgo atgriešanos. Rīga. Gennep, A. van 1965.The Rites of Passage. London. Gosden, C. & Lock, G. 1998. Prehistoric his­ tories. World Archaeology; 30 (1), 2-12. Gramsch, A. 1995. Death and continuity. Jour­ nal o f European Archaeology 3 (1), 71-90. Graudonis, J. 1989. Nocietinātās apmetnes Daugavas lejtecē. Rīga. Hertz, R. 1960. Death and the Right Hand. Aberdeen. LA (Latvijas PSR arheoloģija). 1974. Rīga. Loze, L / Лозе, И. 1979. Поздний неолит и ранняя бронза Лубанской равнины. Рига. Radiņš, А. 1999. 10.-13. gadsimta senkapi latgaļu apdzīvotajā teritorijā un Austrumlatvijas etniskās, sociālās un politiskās vēstures jautājumi. Latvijas Vēstures Muzeja Raksti, Nr. 5. Rīga. Rowlands, M. 1993. The role of memory in the transmission of culture. World Archae­ ology, 25 (2), 141-151. Spekke, A. 1935. Latvieši un Livonija 16. gs. Rīga.

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Šturms, E. 1927. Akmens laikmets Latvijā. I: Dzīvesvietas. Rīga.

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Series 1292). Oxford. Zarina, A. 2006. Salaspils Laukskolas kapu­ lauks. 10.-13. gadsimts. Rīga.

MEMORY AND ID E N TITY : G ENUIN E OR FAKE? ONCE MORE ON T H E Q U ES TIO N OF T H E “SELO NIAN” C U LTU R E Andra Simniškytė The analysis o f relationships between memory and identity includes the question o f authenticity: whether links to the past are established through experience and knowledge of the past or through its assimilation or falsification? Both opportunities are discussed in this paper once more returning to the century-old dilemma in Lithuanian and Latvian historiographies about the Selonians and/or Latgallians. In the framework o f the memory topics authenticity of identity is reviewed following the phenomenon o f reusing, which is considered neither in terms o f “the invention of tradition” nor as an evolutional cultural continuity. Instead, this paper shares the opinion that repetitive action does not simply imply continuity o f the past, but explicitly claims such continuity. Keywords: memory, identity, Selonians, barrow re-use, Iron Age.

Andra Simniškytė, Department o f Archaeology, Institute of Lithuanian History, Kražių 5, Vilnius LT-01108, Lithuania; [email protected]

Introduction Western sociologists and historians have been working on the different topics of memory since the 1980s. They have es­ tablished several interrelated and usually overlapping concepts, such as “the his­ toric memory”, “the social memory”, “the collective memory”, “the communicative memory”, “the cultural memory”, “the sociobiographical memory”, “the mem­ ory industry”, “the memoropolitics”, etc (e.g. Assmann, 1992; Connerton, 1989; Kansteiner, 2002, 181; Krukauskienė, Šutinienė, Trinkūnienė, Vosyliūtė, 2003, 5; Lee Klein, 2000; Olick & Robbins, 1998). The social memory is a social practice that makes apparent the shared cultural images through which personal, social and cultural identity is produced. Two types of social memory are usu­ ally distinguished: the collective memory and the cultural memory. The collective memory, according to Maurice Halb­ wachs (1992), the initiator of its socio­ logical research in the mid-20th century,

is a recollection of events shared by a group, perceived and acknowledged as common by its members. It is a reminis­ cence of the living generations spanning approximately 80 years and constructed through daily communication by people telling their stories. The cultural memory is formulated and articulated through cultural media - texts, material artefacts, social practices, monuments etc; thus, it can go back to a very distant past. Memory is important for the present and the future as a continuity-promoting link. The cultural memory reassures community members about their identity and makes them aware of unity and uniqueness in time and space. It includes all that is habitual in human activity. Much of what becomes established as “habitual” is acquired via repetition (cf. Bourdieu’s habitus in Bourdieu, 1977). These repetitive representations form the backbone of the social memory (Kansteiner, 2002, 190). On the other hand, memories are not merely stored and they are not history. A natural, direct 99

Interarchaeologia, 3

connection between the real and the remembered is not mandatory. Memory is not an accurate and true testimony of the past events; rather, it seeks to make meaningful statements about the past at the present. Such memory construction principle is close to the nature of culture itself, which is neither inborn nor instinctive, but acquired and custom instead (Murdock, 1993a, 168). Halbwachs (1992) has drawn attention to the fact that functioning of memory is closely linked with the power relations: memory is constructed by selecting and outlining those aspects of the past which match with the current social needs, values, and expectations. Historically, socially and geographically distant events might be adopted for identity purposes by groups which were not involved in them (Kansteiner, 2002, 190). Therefore, memory and identity relationship analysis includes the question of authenticity: whether links to the past are established through experience and knowledge of the past or through its assimilation or falsification?

Memory in Archaeology Obsession with memory spread by so­ ciologists and historians has affected the postprocessual community of archaeolo­ gists as well. During the last decades of the 20th century, both topical studies (e.g. Barrett, 1990; 1993; Bradley, 1987; 1991; Chapman, 1997, 139; Evans, 1985; Har­ vey & Jones, 1999; Hingley, 1996; Hodder & Cessford, 2004; Mizoguchi, 1993; Row­ lands, 1993; Wickholm, 2006, 201-202; Williams, 2003) and thematic compendiums were issued (Bradley & Williams, 1998). Usually the topic of memory was presented differently in terms of tradi­ tion, continuity, biographies of things, life-stories, knowledge of the past, reinvention, “fictitious genealogy”; yet it 100

sought to concentrate on the phenom­ enon of repetition or reusing. In the recent decade, a wide range of studies have also investigated changes of burial rites causing older monuments being brought back into use (Barrett, 1990; Bradley, 1987; Holtorf, 1998; Mi­ zoguchi, 1993; Semple, 1998; Van de Noort, 1993; Williams, 1998). For many prehistoric societies, rituals related to death played an important role in deter­ mining of how the past was remembered. The past of non-literate societies was pro­ duced and reproduced, and sometimes reinvented, through burial practices, which are sometimes called “technologies of remembrance” (Williams, 2003; 2004). Specific ritual practices as burial rites (furnishing of burial sites and graves) ap­ pear to have been preserved as particular knowledge or habits of a particular social or regional group. All rites are repetitive, and repetition is often the feature of mem­ ory making that can provide the sense of implying continuity of the past. Loss of this habitus might imply substantial changes in a society. On the other hand, stable cultural features cannot be trusted for sure, because they can reflect both inherited and learned (adapted) transfer. Hence, burial rites not only imply conti­ nuity of the past, but explicitly claim such continuity (Connerton, 1989, 45). To date, the suggestion of an immensely long continuity in local “ritual” observ­ ance has been considered to imply con­ tinuity in the intention of construction, social or cultural function. Proponents of ritual continuity sometimes have been forced to make imaginative leaps across impossibly long prehistoric periods. The criticism of long-term continuity argued against the misleading use of time con­ ceptions that treated the ritual or mythic time equally to profane or non-sacred lin­ ear time (Bradley, 1987; 1991). Continu­ ity in activity does not obligatory mean continuity of a particular status of the

Andra Simniškytė

location (Evans 1985, 85-86, 88). Thus, it would be difficult to discuss ritual conti­ nuity in the same terms as continuity of land use or domestic settlement. It was recently proposed that burial rites be considered less the rituals promoting maintenance of the social order and links with the static and familiar past and more a means of reconstructing the perceptions of the past in response to contemporary concerns. Mortuary practices can be re­ garded as techniques allowing social mem­ ories and identities to be transformed and reconstituted. The link between the past and the present thus was suggested to be not a passive continuity, but an active re­ play, selecting and transforming the past by means of manipulating ancient cultural features (Bradley, 1987; 1991, 211; Chap­ man, 1997, 139; Evans, 1985, 88; Loveluck, 1995; Randsborg, 1991, 151; Van de Noort, 1993). Hence, the burial sites were not only and not so much the sites for burying, but served as mnemonic places sustained group history and ideals, i.e. collective identity. The question of identity is the backbone of memory studies. In archaeology it is usually resolved in terms of social rela­ tionships (single versus community; elite versus the commoners), religion (Pagan­ ism versus Christianity), origin (indige­ nous versus immigrant), etc. Yet the con­ nection between memory and identity in ethnic terms is discussed quite seldom, although these two issues are indivis­ ible in the post-modern society (Olick & Robbins, 1998, 122-126), where ethnic­ ity is interpreted as a particular state of mind entangled with collective memory, cultural heritage, and common fate. The past of the group and its social memory is deemed to be invented; in other words, it is only imagined to be true and common. This becomes the basis of ethnic identity (Čiubrinskas, 2008, 213). Despite the risks facing ethnic studies in archaeology, the scientific community

works on such issues as well. One of them is the long-lasting dilemma of “Selonians or Latgallians” in the Latvian and Lithua­ nian archaeology. The Selonians (Latin Selones, German Selen) are supposed to be the inhabitants of the historic land of Selonia (Zeleny Selenland) (modern Lithua­ nian Šėla and Latvian Sēlija) mentioned in the 13-14th century sources and locat­ ed on the left bank of the Daugava River. Selonians are regarded as an ethnic unit alongside with other tribes mentioned in the written sources. Despite the pre­ caution that there is no direct/automatic connection between ethnic identity and culture (Barth, 1969), scholars research­ ing Baltic tribes of the 5/6-12/13thcentury are more or less successful in identifying cultural features of different groups. Yet the case of Selonians or, more precisely, that of the Selonian culture is an excep­ tion because the material culture identi­ fied on the left bank of the Daugava River was similar to the one identified on the opposite bank populated with the Latgallian communities. Having originated in the early 20th century, the problem still remains unsolved. Traces of the Selonian past identified in the Roman Period with the help of linguistic data fail to reach the Selonians mentioned in the written sources of the 13-14th century. Histori­ ography offers a complicated model of the Selonian ethno-genesis, which can be summarised as follows: Proto-Selonians -> Latgallians (or Latgallians/Selonians) Selonians, where shifts from one stage to another (not necessarily chronological) fail to be specified more explicitly. Ethno-cultural studies are complex and often very speculative. Ethno-cultural developments are discussed in the frame­ work of migration and assimilation proc­ esses and involve large cultural complexes and abstract arrays of archaeological and linguistic data. Discussing the interaction of such abstractions, the impact of the sup­ posed influence is estimated. Naturally, at 101

Interarchaeologia, 3

the meeting point of the old and the new perspective, new features look more ob­ vious even if they are a minority: they overshadow the old features and make us draw conclusions on an uneven effect on the cultural change. In the light of change, innovations have the initiative; continuity and traditions are ignored, leaving them only an abstract and passive role. There­ fore, this paper is going to concentrate on the field which is traditionally overlooked when cultural interaction is assessed. The key feature of this work is not so much that it provides new answers to old questions (i.e., whether a certain type of artefacts might be defined as Selontan)y but that it changes the way in which the questions are formulated. Still open dis­ cussion on the Selonian culture in archae­ ology is reviewed from the perspective of memory. What role did remembering, ar­ ticulated through revival of the ancient, namely revival of old burial practices, play in the reproduction of ethno-cultur­ al identity?

The Cultural Changes in the Middle of the 1st Millennium AD The barrow-burial tradition prevailed in Selonia for about two thousand years or so. Barrows occurred sporadically in the 1st millennium BC and it was not unu­ sual to bury the dead in prehistoric barrows still in the 16-18th century AD. The upsurge of the barrow-burial tradition, however, occurred during the 1st millen­ nium AD, i.e., the Iron Age. More than a hundred barrow cemeteries are known in Selonia. Certainly, they were neither used permanently nor reused constantly. Some of the previously used barrows were aban­ doned, while others took their place. In the Roman Period, the so-called Cul­ ture of Barrows with Stone Circles involv­ ing multiple or the so-called collective burials were widespread in the territories 102

of the present-day Lithuania and Latvia, including “terram, quae Selen dicitur”. Later this culture declined, and burying in barrows was replaced with burying in burial grounds. In Samogitia and Semigallia this happened already in the first half of the 1st millennium AD (Vaškevičiūtė, 2004, 31). In the eastern and northern part of the area of the Culture of Barrows (Selonia and south-western Vidzeme) this process took longer. It is said that since the 4th century no new barrows were mounded, but burying in the old ones continued: first in the barrow, then in the place of the stone circle, and then outside it moving further from the barrow itself. This process continued up to the 6 -7th century, when burial grounds finally prevailed (LSV, 2001, 268-269, 284-286; Urtāns, 1970, 68-69; Vasks, 1997, 64). Yet recently researchers of the evolution from barrows to burial grounds have stopped attributing this process to internal cultur­ al evolution, as in the case of western ter­ ritories. Instead, the external impulses are more often stressed: first, impulses from Semigallia and central Lithuania relating to certain types of artefacts and burying in burial grounds, later - impulses from the territories of the Eastern Balts, which caused adoption of new artefact forms, an opposite orientation of male and female burials (to the east and to the west, respec­ tively), and positioning of weapons in the graves (the spearhead at the foot) (Ciglis, 2004, 39-42; Radiņš, 1999, 155-157). As a result of these cultural interactions, in the 5-7^ century, the early Latgallian Culture of Burial Grounds developed westwards from the Aiviekste River. The 7th century burials in older barrows are al­ ready attributed to the Latgallians. In the 8th century, burying in barrows stopped, and burial cemeteries finally prevailed. In the 7- 9th century, flat cemeteries spread to eastern Latvia, and burying in burial grounds remained the only Latgallian burial form up to the 10th century.

Andra Simniškytė

In the late 4-5th century AD, use of the Roman Period barrows declined in Selonia and the previously densely populated region was labelled as under-populated due to the lack of archaeological evidence from burials (Simniškytė, 1999). Never­ theless, the region was not deserted. Due to thorough archaeological investigation combined with the C-14 dating and pol­ len analysis (Simniškytė, Stančikaitė, Kisielienė, 2003), clear traces of anthro­ pogenic activity were detected at habita­ tion sites. Although scarce, artefacts of the middle of the 1st millennium AD are still found in older barrows. These popu­ lation continuity traces do not necessar­ ily imply successive development in the ethno-cultural or socio-political field. At some locations in south-eastern Selonia, new barrow burial rites emerged: each barrow was built for one non-cremated person buried in the pit under the mound. According to the C-14 analysis, these mounds can be dated to the 5-6thcentury (Simniškytė, 2005a). The new burial pat­ tern, however, did not spread and soon disappeared. The time-span of approximately 450-600 AD should have been the pe­ riod of significant changes and trans­ formations, inasmuch a new stage at the threshold of the 6/7thcentury began with a new settlement pattern, a new territorialadministrative organization (Simniškytė, 2005b, 32), and new material culture, the latter analogous to the Latgallian sites on the right bank of the Daugava River. Con­ sequently, a new cultural stage in the ter­ ritory of Selonia in the late 6 -7th century was simultaneous with the formation of the Latgallian culture in south-eastern Vidzeme; furthermore, it was almost the same in its essence. This permits us to speak about formation of the Latgallian culture not only in Latgallia but also in Selonia. In the light of these alterations, the striking contrast reveals itself in the revival of archaic burial rites and burial

monuments of the Roman Period at the end of the 6th century.

Recalling the Past: Reused Monuments and Burial Rites Until recently historiography failed to outline the changes of the middle of the 1st millennium AD sufficiently. For a long time ancient barrows with the 6-7th cen­ tury burials were considered in terms of cultural persistence, although the Latgal­ lian style of burial inventories was also stressed. Mixing cultural evolution and cultural change concepts into one caused contrasting ambiguity. It seems to be more properly to speak about the strategy of reusing the past rather than of cultural continuity or cultural change. “The revival of antiquity” took differ­ ent forms after a pause of about 150 years. First, there were graves of the second half of the Middle Iron Age (MIA2) in the Roman Period barrows. We usually find one or two MIA2 graves (e.g. Ķebēni, Melderišķi, Spietiņi, Vaineikiai, and Pa­ juostis). It is often hard to identify the precise number of burials, as only stray grave-goods from disturbed graves are discovered. The reuse of barrows is also indirectly witnessed by collections of stray artefacts, including the Roman Period and MIA2 finds. By the way, some of the Ro­ man Period barrows appeared to contain not only MIA2, but also (or merely) Late Iron Age (LIA) burials or artefacts. Sometimes the numbers of the MIA2 graves in barrows are much larger (Boķi, Ķunci, Ratulāni). It was the Boķi barrow cemetery (Vankina, 1961), namely some of its barrows distinguished by a large number of dense graves, which was turned into an argument for barrow -> burial ground evolution in Selonia; yet revision of the investigation layouts (al­ though published only fragmentarily; see, e.g., Balode, Ciglis, Ziņģīte, Žeiere, 2005, 103

Interarchaeologia, 3

Fig. 17) reveals that such interpretation is poorly founded. Roman Period barrows with MIA2 graves were large, about 17-20 m in diameter. Their mounds had stone circles of much smaller “traditio n ar diameter (~ 12 m). It was once thought to be caused by natural levelling of the mounds and excavation of pits for later graves. Most of the MIA2 graves were located following the line of stone circles and in this way forming the “cir­ cles of the deceased” that repeated the stone circles. The radius of the circles of graves was by about 4 m shorter than the edge of the barrows, whereas the external side of the barrows remained empty, with no burials. This implies that during the burial process going outside the mounds was avoided. It also seems that the MIA2 graves were not only dug (which typical of burials in flat cemeteries), but also cov­ ered with extra mounds (which is typical of barrow cemeteries). Excavation of the archaeological site of Ķunci, which was identified as a flat cem­ etery, took place in 1981 (Snore, 1993, 21-23). 73 graves were investigated, 17 of them were dated to MIA2 and several to LIA. It was discovered that originally there were some barrows of the Roman Period which were later transformed into a burial ground. This transformation was dated to MIA2, although it could have happened much later, during in­ tensive burying in the 17-19th century. In Ratulāni, the 3rd to 4th century barrow has preserved in its shape much better, al­ though burying took place here for about 1500 years with pauses. The excavations of 1978 revealed 76 graves, most of them dated to the historical times, 1 - to the Roman Period, 11 - to MIA2, and 7 - to LIA (Šņore, 1993, 17-21). Not only old barrows were reused for burying; new ones were made as well. Following the ancient tradition, they were surrounded with stone circles. New barrows that were mounded next to the 104

old barrows are known, for example, in Slate and Boķi; moreover, in Visėtiškiai and Miškiniai (Lithuania), entire barrow cemeteries emerged (Kazakevičius, 2000a; 2000b). It is interesting that the MIA barrows (Group 2) in Visėtiškiai were mounded next to the group of the BC barrows (Group 1); as an exception, one of the latter barrows was reused as well. In the MIA2 barrow group, the dead were buried in accordance with the rites of the Roman Period. All the barrows were surrounded with stone circles (with an exception of the above-mentioned4re­ used” barrow in Group 1). The barrows contained from 4 to 13 graves. Numer­ ous stray finds imply that the number of graves is not exact. The dead were buried both inside the stone circle and outside it. As in Boķi, the barrow mounds were much larger (10-16 m) than the stone circles (5-7.5 m) (Simniškytė, 1999). Hence, here new graves were also cov­ ered with extra earth mounds. At about the same time, a barrow cemetery of 6 or 7 mounds emerged on the opposite side of the Jara River in Miškiniai. In 1989, ex­ cavations of one of the barrows revealed 14 graves. 12 of them were late, dating to the 12-13th century, while two other burials were dated to the 7-8th century. Stray finds implied that there could have been more MIA2 graves, but they were destroyed by later burials. Some barrows at the Lejasdopeles barrow cemetery on the bank of the Daugava River were mounded in the 7th century as well. This is substantiated by some stray finds of this period. The investigated graves dated to the 10—13/14th century (Šņore, 1997). They included cremations, inhumations, and even horse burials. After investigating one fourth of the cemetery, it was discovered that some of the barrows were surrounded with stone circles. Be­ sides the barrows containing one or two burials, there were three other barrows containing from six to 18 burials. Burial

Andra Simniškytė

rites largely depended on chronology: sin­ gle burials dated to the 10-11th century, whereas multiple burials in Lejasdopeles dated to the 12-13/14th century. A purposeful research to prove the theo­ ry of transformation of barrow cemeteries into burial grounds fails as well. Neither the Pajuostis nor Visėtiškiai barrow cem­ eteries had graves between their barrows (Kazakevičius, 1987, 19; Michelbertas, 2004, 4 pav.). Concerning the Boķi barrow cemetery, we can only be sure about the barrows, but what lies between them remains unknown. Barrow 8 was investi­ gated by making an irregular section out­ side the barrow (Balode, Ciglis, Ziņģīte, Žeiere, 2005, Fig. 17). There were some stone constructions and a 7th-century child burial between them. The research report says that the burial was discovered between Barrow 8 and adjacent Barrow 6 (Vankina, 1961). The grave was the only one located outside the barrows. On the other hand, the distance between Barrows 8 and 6 is not specified, thus it is not clear whether the discussed child burial is not attributable to the latter one. Attempts to identify the type of some stray finding places of MIA2 (Kryliai, Dumblynė), which used to be considered to be evidence of cemeteries, also gave little result. As the sites are destroyed, the theory can be neither rejected nor proven. Yet it must be stressed that in Selonia flat cemeteries emerged only in the 10th century (e.g. Beteļi, Strautmaļi) (Radiņš, 2006; Šņore, 1987). They were established at new sites and had no rela­ tion with the ancient barrows. Thus, in Selonia the destiny of the Cul­ ture of Barrows with Stone Circles was different from that in Latgallia, where in the 7th century burying shifted from barrows to burial grounds simultaneously with the change of other burial practices (i.e., positioning of male and female buri­ als in opposite directions was started males to the east and females to the west;

spearheads were usually placed at the foot of deceased, etc). In Selonia the 6/7th century burials opened a new stage in the history of barrows, which were the main burial type in Selonia up to the 10thcentu­ ry. In fact, the construction of the barrow mounds as well as the burial practices repeated the rites of the Roman Period. The tradition of barrow burials was pre­ served; other mortuary features changed little as well (Simniškytė, in print). In off­ shore Selonia, namely in the Visėtiškiai barrow cemetery, the dead were buried in accordance with the ancient rites, usually orientated north-westwards. The female burial customs were especially conserva­ tive. Male burials were more diverse and unsystematic, usually orientated south­ wards, south-westwards, and westwards. No apparent changes were recorded in the placement of weapons as well. As a matter of fact, in off-shore Selonia buri­ als with weapons were very scarce. In 15 barrows (about 60 burials) investigated in the Visėtiškiai barrow cemetery, only sev­ en spearheads were found; three of them were found in MIA2 graves: two spear­ heads were placed at the head, and the third spearhead was placed at the foot. Selonian communities that lived on the bank of the Daugava River were much “better armed”, and male burials were orientated to the east. Yet the position of weapons (spearheads) did not change: it was diverse in the Roman period and it remained diverse in MIA2. 18 MIA2 graves of the Boķi barrow cemetery con­ tained spearheads placed at the head, and 14 - at the foot. Spearheads in the Ro­ man Period graves of the same site were recorded only twice: in one of the graves the spearhead was placed at the head and in the other - at the foot. Changes become more obvious if the MIA2 pe­ riod is broken down to separate phases. In the Boķi Barrow 3, where most of the graves date to 7-8th century, spearheads were placed at the head (nine graves). In 105

Interarchaeologia, 3

Barrow 8, which revealed intensive bury­ ing in the 8th century to the first half of the 9th century, spearheads were placed at the head in seven graves, and at the foot in 13 graves. It seams that at least in this Daugava River Basin community, place­ ment of spears did not change during the cultural shift of the 6/7th century but later - approximately in the 8th century. Concerning the character and contents of the burial inventories, both old and new elements can be identified. Although new costume details and ornaments (belts, head-covers, and footwear decorations) appeared, the main types of jewellery and their proportions remained about the same; however, it is not the case with their typology. The Roman Period neck-rings with cone-shaped terminals were replaced with neck-rings with overlapping flat ter­ minals (45% popularity), saddle-shaped terminals (27%), overlapping moulded terminals (18%), etc (Simniškytė, in print). The absence of typological se­ quence was stressed by R Jakobsons (1929, 6) as an argument against the ethno-cultural continuity between the Roman Period and MIA2. Sets of burial inventories were highly determined by the age, sex, and status of the dead, not by the factor of ethnicity itself. Crook-like pins were very popular in Selonia at all times, but eventually their use changed accord­ ing to different social groups: during the Roman Period they were an attribute of child burials and burials of the common­ ers that contained no weapons, whereas in MIA2 they were more often placed in graves containing weapons. Bracelets were treated as more female than male attribute already in the Roman Period, but in MIA2 this trend became more pronounced. In the 6/7th century, bracelets with thickened terminals were still included into both male and female burial inventories, but soon men refused this ornament totally. Only those belonging to the elite contin­ ued to wear fragile hollow bracelets with 106

narrow ends and bow profile in longitudi­ nal section. The number of neck-rings in burial inventories decreased considerably. This ornament became rare even in fe­ male graves, whereas for males neck-rings became a top status sign. Proliferation of silver neck-ring hoards of that period proves their symbolic meaning. Agricul­ tural tools, which previously were popular both in graves with weapons and without them, turned into an exclusive attribute of female graves. Belts absent earlier became popular among men. The population be­ gan to wear rings, which was unpopular in the Roman Period. In the early MIA2 both adults and children wore rings, and in the second half of the period, rings became a male attribute. The above-mentioned examples show that changes took place not only and not so much during the cultural shift at the be­ ginning of the new epoch but also during its full-blown phase in the 8th century.

Memory and Identity: the Question of the Authenticity of the Link to the Past Cultural memory includes every­ thing that is habitual and ritualized in human activity, i.e. habit and ritual are the substance of identity that people in­ herit. Burying the dead in old barrows, mounding new ones, and furnishing graves in accordance with the Roman Period rites - all this proves, or at least does not deny, survival of the ancient tra­ ditions in a new cultural environment. Return to the archaic burial rites looks rather controversial in the light of sub­ stantial changes in other objective condi­ tions. Nevertheless, this fact was neither a rare nor a local phenomenon. In Eu­ ropean practice, there were many cases when links with the past were revived through ancient burial rites, monuments, or works of art and literature. Continuous

Andra Simniškytė

revival of ancient monuments, symbols, customs and rituals is related with the social group memory, which sociologists describe as a means of formation, con­ solidation, and maintenance of personal and social identity. Nevertheless, as it was said before, memories (things that are or are preferred to be recalled) may not be equal to the past (things that happened in reality). Socially and geographically alien events can be adopted by groups which had nothing to do with them (Kansteiner, 2002, 190). For example, it is as­ sumed that immigrant Germanic groups in the Anglo-Saxon England might have reused older sites to portray themselves as the legitimate heirs of the ancient peo­ ples and supernatural beings that origi­ nally built these structures (Williams, 1998, 104). No doubt that in Selonia so-called col­ lective burying and formation of new burial sites took place in accordance with the archaic examples related to the tradi­ tions of the Roman Period, which could have been forgotten during the cultural transformation period in the middle of the 1st millennium AD that lasted for ap­ proximately 150 years, but were due to some circumstances revived in the mem­ ories and customs of the local people. On the other hand, cases of one or several burials of the 6/7th century located in an­ cient barrows can be a good example of the “fake” strategy in adopting links with the past. In any case, reuse of barrows in the light of the changes in the middle of the 1st millennium AD has a symbolic meaning which overshadows the natu­ rally determined need to bury the dead. Stressing the link to the past, its monu­ ments, and traditions was the major goal, whereas reusing ancient monuments and rites was a way to reach it. It is natural to suppose that the “fake” strategy was important for the commu­ nities which had no actual links with the past, struggled to settle into a new

territory and take control over its land­ scape; hence the manipulation of the past and adoption of burial sites of indigenous ancestors. Consequently, reuse of barrows in Selonia might be called a strategy of “latgallization”, when new communities pursued to establish themselves by claim­ ing the past by deliberately adopting the identities of the indigenous culture by way of reusing long-abandoned sites. How­ ever, this strategy of transformation and simulation usually explains the situation of the “first generation” (Scull, 1995, 79). Only the form of the custom is adopted, not is meaning or collective ideas related to that (Murdock, 1993b, 223). Yet in Se­ lonia the tradition of burying the dead in the Roman Period barrows was sustained for at least 200 years and, with some paus­ es, survived up to the 14th century. Barrows remained barrows, with no signs of gradual transformation into flat cemeter­ ies. The revival of the ancient multiple or “communal” burying practice together with the mounding of new barrows in the 6/7th century make an even stronger argument for the indigenous origin of those who reused the barrows. It is hardly credible that newcomers could be famil­ iar with the burial traditions which had been abandoned for a time prior to their invasion. Otherwise we would have to say that Latgallians, which spread the Latgallian-type material culture in Selonia (the culture which could spread through trade and exchange of ideas as well), adopted the local customs of an earlier period, in this way articulating collective ideas and language and in fact turning into the in­ digenous folk. In such case the very dis­ cussion on “Selonians or Latgallians?” loses its meaning. Ethnicity is a situational construction. Changing circumstances sometimes cause transformations of ethnical identity and affect the efficiency of conventional symbolic identity structures. New situa­ tions, events, and trends may awake the 107

Interarchaeologia, 3

sleeping and hidden identities and cause reassessment of their new features lead­ ing to their demonstration or, on the con­ trary, concealment. It seems that in the 5- 6th century Selonia experienced one of such conflict situations. Whatever were the reasons - external (the movement of Slavic tribes and Latgallian migration), internal (changing social relations), or both - they shook the cultural stability. Return to the ancient traditions and their public demonstration must have been a natural reaction to the change. Burials of the later period discovered in older barrows should be treated not so much as a sign cultural continuity but more as its guarantee. Links with the past articulated via recalled burial rituals can be assessed as a kind of strategy that aims to re-estab­ lish stability. The process of Latgallization under­ stood not in terms of the material culture but in terms of customs and traditions is not the right definition to describe the MIA2 situation in Selonia. New barrows with stone circles were mounded in off­ shore Selonia; burials in ancient barrows also continued; orientation of the buri­ als remained the same; armament, style of the decorations and garments contin­ ued to differ from the Latgallian in their simplicity. The communities living by the Daugava River were the exception. Disintegration of the Selonian tribal ter­ ritory into the Daugavian Selonia and off­ shore Selonia began in the late 6th to 7th century. The process of “Latgallization” accelerated in the 8th century and in the first half of the 9th century and was more pronounced among males. A new wave of “Latgallization” reached the region in the mid 10th century to the second half of the 11th century, when major changes were taking place in the entire Baltic region. The beginning of the stage was marked with the appearance of extremely rich and luxurious burials. They were often lo­ cated in new burial sites that had nothing 108

to do with the past - in new barrow cemeteries or flat burial grounds. How­ ever, even in the face of these substantial changes, old burial sites and traditions were remembered at the beginning of the 2nd millennium. The 12-14th century burials in barrows did not constitute the last stage of barrow reuse. In the terri­ tory of the Barrow Culture, the ancient barrows were used for burying even in the 16-18thcentury. This phenomenon of barrow reusing was inherent in the area of the Roman Period Barrow Culture.

Conclusion The Selonian barrow tradition, which was lasting for so many ages, implies cer­ tain continuity, but it would be a mistake to identify that with a continuous cultural evolution straightforwardly. In Selonia traditions that go back to the Roman Period were recalled with certain breaks in time. Although the ancient barrows, which were reused more sporadically than systematically, could be a good example of the “fake” strategy of adopting links with the past, the revival of the ancient multiple or so-called communal burying practice together with the mounding of new barrows according to the ancient tra­ dition make an even stronger argument for the indigenous origin of those who reused the barrows. It is hard to say why these customs re­ mained meaningful for the inhabitants of Selonia for such a long time and how they were transferred. No doubt, a region distanced from the main transit routes of­ fered better conditions for preservation of the traditions. Nevertheless, it seems that in Selonia traditions were maintained not in their pure form, but were in effect more similar to a certain strategy, help­ ing to realise the public identity of the country and exposing the legitimacy of its links with the past.

Andra Simniškytė

References Assmann, J. 1992. Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen. München.

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national Series 617). Oxford, 84-98. Michelbertas, M. 2004. Pajuosčio kapinynas. Vilnius. M izoguchi, K. 1993. Time in the Reproduc­ tion of Mortuary Practices. World Archaeol­ ogy, 25 (2), 223-235. Mugurēvičs, Ē. & Vasks, A. (red.) 2001. LSV = Latvijas senākā vēsture 9. g. t. pr. Kr. 1200. g. Rīga.

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(Muinasaja Teadus, 18). Tartu 8c Tallinn, 193-207. Williams, H. 1998. Monuments and the past in early Anglo-Saxon England. World Ar­ chaeology, 30 (1), 90-108. W illiams, H. 2003. Material culture as mem­ ory: combs and cremation in early medi­ eval Britain. Early Medieval Europe, 12 (2), 89-128 W illiams, H. 2004. Potted histories - crema­ tion, ceramics and social memory in early Roman Britain. Oxford Journal of Archaeol­ ogy, 23 (4), 417-427.

M AR TIAL TH EM E S OF T H E IRON AGE: T H E C O N S TITU T IO N OF A WARRIOR Sami Raninen Anthropological and historical studies challenge archaeologists to recognize that the concep­ tion of personhood in prehistoric societies was probably very different from the self-authorized individualism of the present-day ideologies. The concept o f dividual personhood may be helpful to the prehistoric archaeologists. A dividual type o f personhood exists in those socio-cultural settings where the relational aspects o f personhood are stressed more strongly than the autono­ mous aspects. The article suggests that the high-status male in Iron Age northern Europe can be perceived as a dividual whose personhood was constituted by gift-exchanges and other ritualized cycles that promoted ancestral and other-world values and qualities among living persons. Keywords: personhood, Iron Age, weapons, burials, northern Europe.

Sami Raninen, Department o f Cultural Studies, University of Turku, Valajankatu IB 17, 40600 Jyväskylä, Finland; [email protected]

Introduction The article published in the previous volume of Interarchaeologia, I present­ ed among other things a careful sug­ gestion that the Merovingian Period (c. 550-800 AD) swords known in south­ ern and western Finland were considered to be parts or components of persons: instead of just symbolizing the high sta­ tus of the male carrying it, the sword was actually considered to constitute and generate a distinct type of person­ hood, associated with prestige, reputa­ tion, and external contacts (Raninen, 2007b). Consequently, the sword had to be “killed” (bent and broken in parts) af­ ter the death of the male whose person it constituted. In the aforementioned ar­ ticle, my argument remained brief and perhaps not entirely clear. Thus, I take this opportunity to expand and elaborate my hypothesis in this article in the third volume of Interarchaeologia. Although my discussion here is mostly related to the Iron Age weapon-finds from Finland, I believe that the theoretical background of this article might result into new and

exciting interpretations of many Baltic materials as well - not only of weapons, but also various other categories of mate­ rial culture. Two relatively recent monographs have been my major source of inspiration: By Weapons Made Worthy: Lords, Retainers and Their Relationship in Beowulf by Joz Bazelmans (1999, summarized in Bazelmans, 2000) and The Archaeology of Per­ sonhood: An Anthropological Approach by Chris Fowler (2004). Although they dis­ cuss very dissimilar materials - the Old English epic poem Beowulf in one case and Mesolithic burials in the other - the authors in question present largely par­ allel ideas of formation of personhood in the respective cultural environments they are studying. Both of them note that prehistoric and non-modern socie­ ties must have maintained conceptions of personhood very different from the present-day philosophies and ideologies of individualism. In our contemporary societies, an individual is considered to have a fixed and stable biographical self­ hood, his/her personhood is contained within his/her body, and his/her life 111

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is seen as a partly biological and partly self-authorized process with self-induced failures and achievements. However, even the contemporary Western socie­ ties tend to stress the relational instead of autonomous, individual aspects of a human life in some social contexts, and in other cultures the relational view on personhood has often been predomi­ nant. The emergence and development of the Western individualism can be traced back to the medieval to the post-modern history (Fowler, 2004, 11-19; Gurevich, 1995; Stark, 2006, 60-79). Archaeologists studying any prehistoric culture will be aware that the prehistoric persons who provide them with their source materi­ als probably operated within a very dif­ ferent conceptual framework concerning personhood than the present framework within which the archaeologists live. This may have very interesting im­ plications for social archaeology. It is also a relevant issue for the studies address­ ing social and individual memory in the past societies. Commemorative practices in the present-day Western societies are, like everything else, strongly influenced by individualism. A biographical, indi­ vidual person such as a late president, general, or an artist is often a focus of collective memory-making. Individual memories are arranged into linear, bio­ graphical order. Indeed, commemorative tools focusing on the biographical indi­ vidual - diaries, autobiographies, and portraits - were important elements in the development of individualism. However, even on the present day the participants of certain commemorative practices are presented as inter-related members of a collective instead of auton­ omous individuals that they are in most other contexts of social life. It may be worthwhile to think how the memories are made in cultures where the relation­ al concept of personhood is dominant. 112

Although all members of the human species share the same cognitive “hard­ ware”, one would expect that memories are selected, elaborated, and constructed in different ways in cultures maintaining different modes of personhood.

Constitution of an Aristocrat­ ic Personhood in B e o w u lf In his analysis of Beowulf, Bazelmans presents an approach to non-modern so­ cieties largely based on the theories of the late Dutch anthropologist Louis Dumont (1911-1998). Bazelmans insists that the indigenous systems of ideas and values should be taken seriously in the analysis of societies. He suggests that the socie­ ties of the non-modern world should not be seen merely as complexes constituted of relations between individuals, but rather as socio-cosmic wholes, wherein the human persons are inter-related not only with each other, but also with supra-normal entities - deities, spirits, and ancestors. In the conceptual uni­ verses of non-modern or non-Western peoples, exchange of gifts and services reaches into supernatural domains ly­ ing outside of the human society, but within the same socio-cosmic universe. Since the classic essay of Marcel Mauss (1924; translated into various languages including English as The Gifi: The Form and Reason of Exchange in Archaic Socie­ ties), anthropologists have often stressed that exchange of gifts among non-mod­ ern peoples is not just re-arrangement of material objects between individuals: in fact, the non-modern persons exchange parts of themselves. The artifacts given as gifts are inextricably bound to the giver's person. By giving gifts one can mediate and extend ones personality outside of ones own body and influence the consti­ tution of other persons. Different persons

Sami Raninen

became entangled and enmeshed with each other. However, Bazelmans stresses that in the socio-cosmic whole, values of exchanged artifacts also originate from supernatural agents, not only from the history of relations between the human participants (Bazelmans, 1999,13-68). In a non-modern society, the con­ stitution and development of a person are not an autonomous, automatic, and biological process; rather, it is realized through gift-exchange and life-cycle ritu­ als. A person is constituted of several components which are valorized in the objects of exchange (see Harke, 2000 on exchange, circulation, and deposition of weapons among the Anglo-Saxons in the light of archaeological and documentary evidence). The constituents are brought together and separated in rituals. Pro­ ceeding to the analysis of Beowulf, Ba­ zelmans shows that according to their own conceptual framework, the early medieval Anglo-Saxons were constituted of five components: mind, body, life, soul, and worth. The Christian Anglo-Saxons believed that the constituents originate from God, but they were connected by ritualized exchange whose traditions had pre-Christian origins. For example, body and life became united in conception and pregnancy, resulting from exchange of marriage partners. During his life, an aristocratic man had to acquire the con­ stituent of worth, valorized in the weap­ ons and other prestigious gifts he obtained from the king whose follower he was or, if he was a king himself, from other kings and from his followers. A worthy male was by necessity also a wealthy male with valuable weapons, horses, and ornaments (Bazelmans, 1999,149-188). The prestigious objects and the person constituted each other: the worth of a war­ rior depended on the artifacts obtained as gifts; at the same time, he influenced the value of those possessions, something

which was reflected in the worth of their later possessors, and furthermore in the value of their possessions. In other words, worth came from other persons, ulti­ mately from heroic ancestors. Cowardly behavior induced loss of worth of the possessions (Bazelmans, 1999, 160-181). Valuable weapons and other objects had their own biographies; previous owners of gifts are often mentioned in Beowulf On the other hand, Bazelmans notes that in the poem the biographies of artifacts never reach further than two generations back in history. Often the heirlooms are just described as old without further de­ tails; hence, it seems that worth contained in gifts might have turned anonymous as time passed (ibid., 163, 190-191). With death, life vanished and the per­ son became an ancestor. The mortuary rituals aimed at the separation of the constituents of body and soul The body was corrupted; the soul was taken to heaven or hell. The only constituent that a deceased person could leave behind on earth was his worth, which was expressed as his reputation and fame. It was objec­ tified in his burial place and in those arti­ facts of his which were kept as heirlooms or redistributed in new cycles of rituals and gift exchanges. Ancestral worth was preserved and circulated in them (Bazel­ mans, 1999, 170-188). Even if the person who was constituted by regulated ritual cycles and exchanges was not the autonomous, self-directing individual of the Western ideologies, the keen interest in personal worth and its pervasiveness after death prove that there was room for individual self-conscious­ ness and initiative. In this sense, the socio-cultural environment of Beowulf is contrasted with those cultures that are not focused on retaining memories of individual ancestors. Moving from epic poetry to Anglo-Saxon archaeology, Howard Williams (2006) has discussed 113

Interarchaeologia, 3

mortuary rituals and material culture re­ lated to burials in early medieval Britain as technologies of remembrance which were used to create and maintain selec­ tive memories of deceased persons. According to theories of the famous Russian medievalist Aaron Gurevich, the Old Scandinavians views of personhood and its relation to material culture share interesting similarities with the Anglo-Saxon views described by Bazelmans. This is not surprising considering the close linguistic and historical relation between the two cultural areas. The Old Scandinavian personhood, reconstructed from epic Edda poems and Icelandic sa­ gas, was less self-contained and distinct than the modern one, being inwardly de­ pendent on and restricted by the closeknit kinship group. On the other hand, the “pre-Christian pagan ethos” also at­ tributed great importance to personal fame, so there was dialectic of the indi­ vidual and group perspectives (Gurevich, 1995, 50-53, 87-88). In some Edda po­ ems, weapons and other material artifacts are not portrayed as passive objects but rather as extensions of the hero, exert­ ing a mystical influence over him, even determining his actions (Gurevich, 1992, 147-159). The personal success and luck of a wealthy man were absorbed into his possessions, especially in the prestigious metals. Thus, the gifts he gave carried a portion of his personal essence to the re­ cipient. A man deprived from his valu­ ables lost his success and manly warrior s prowess as well (Gurevich, 1985,218-219, 222; 1992, 180-185).

The Concept of Dividual Per­ sonhood The archaeologist Chris Fowler refers to Bazelmans only in passing, but they share some of the anthropological sources 114

of inspiration. Fowler discusses the con­ cept of dividual personhood, which is contrasted with individuality: the dividuality is a state of being in which the person is recognized as composite and multiply authored. In other words the person is not a distinct individual with innate unity. A dividual person gets some of the components of his/her person­ hood from the parents, but he/she is also constantly recomposed and reconstituted during the life as he/she forms new rela­ tionships with the other similarly consti­ tuted persons (Fowler, 2004, 8, 24). Fol­ lowing this definition, the Anglo-Saxons described by Bazelmans and probably also the Old Scandinavians discussed by Gurevich can be characterized as dividuals. Fowler makes the important observa­ tion that even where the dividual concept of personhood is dominant, certain ten­ sion between the dividual and individual characteristics is present (ibid., 33-37). Fowler describes two specific modes of dividual personhood as examples. One of them is permeability, in which the divid­ ual person is influenced by flow of sub­ stances that cannot be identified as dis­ tinct objects (Fowler, 2004, 31-32). The other is the partible personhood known from the Melanesian ethnography. It is a mode in which the person can temporar­ ily move himself from the state of dividuality (being constituted of multiple rela­ tions) to partibility (being one in a pair of relations). Partibility is attained when the person gives as gifts material or animate objects that are identified as extracted parts of his/her person. Being a dividual, his/her person originates from all other persons in a network of relations; thus, a dividual cannot simply “own” his/her person. However, in gift-exchange he/she treats his/her multiply-authored person according to his/her own intention. In other words, in these exchanges the per­ son presents a “unitary version” of his/her

Sami Raninen

multiply-constituted dividual self, and the relationship between the giver and the recipient is accentuated above the other relations that constitute their persons and the gift given (ibid., 25-41, 48). In this way, the partible persons in the Highland of Papua New Guinea individuate them­ selves temporarily in gift-exchange. In cer­ emonial exchange, these partible Melane­ sian males transform material wealth into a “singular entity” standing “for the part of themselves which is then construed as their whole self, their prestige”. However, this singular identity is temporary and transient (Strathern, 1988, 159, a classic study quoted in Fowler, 2004, 30). The aristocratic Anglo-Saxon and Scandina­ vian males could extend or transform their personhood and component quali­ ties by giving and receiving gifts, but the notion of a distinct part of person being identified as an object, extracted, and giv­ en away does not appear in the works by Gurevich and Bazelmans. In this sense, their mode of personhood differs from the Melanesian partibility. Among the Anglo-Saxon males discussed by Bazel­ mans, the biographical and singular as­ pect of personhood was expressed above all in their worth. However, the personal worth of the Anglo-Saxons had some temporal permanence; it was even main­ tained after death. The exchanged gifts encapsulate the same relations and efficacy as the partici­ pants of exchange do. Thus, the gifts can be seen as dividual persons themselves. Often they are even believed to have souls and desires. The dividual person of a gift artifact carries a part of each human per­ son who has authored its history: it is in­ alienable from the human persons, even if it can be detached from their physical bodies and given away (Fowler, 2004, 5565). However, not all artifacts are inalien­ able and not all exchanges are gifts: ex­ change of alienable commodities (trade)

has often also occurred in non-capitalist societies. The same artifact can move from the sphere of gift exchange to the sphere of commodity exchange, and vice versa. Some of the inalienable artifacts are also withdrawn from exchange: these are kept as heirlooms or sacred treasures within the group so that their qualities can have a constant influence on the constitution of the human and non-human members of the group (Fowler, 2004, 58-59; Godelier, 1999; Weiner, 1992). The concept of dividuality is also re­ lated to the collective personhood, in which the partible and dividual persons come together to constitute a larger, col­ lective person, such as a clan, family, or a community. Such persons can be rep­ resented by a singular “fractal” person, a leader who incorporates the relations that constitute the collective person in a single body (Fowler, 2004, 48-49).

Were There Dividuals in Iron Age Scandinavia? According to the Swedish archaeolo­ gist Ing-Marie Back Danielsson (2007, 91-92, 226-227), the Late Iron Age (AD 500-1000) Scandinavians indeed had dividual perception of personhood. Probably there was no concept of stable, fixed, and unchanging self. Back Daniels­ son stresses instead ritualized “transitions and transformations” of human persons and bodies from one state to another as an important feature of Scandinavian cul­ ture. According to her, non-human ob­ jects such as swords could also be consid­ ered persons and associated with agency (ibid., 248). She also suggests that the concept of the fractal person - a group of people represented by one person - may have been familiar in Iron Age Scandina­ via (ibid., 149, 226-227). Lotte Hedeager has also stressed that dividual personhood 115

Interarchaeologia, 3

is a relevant concept regarding Iron Age Scandinavia (Hedeager, 2007, 45). Back Danielsson especially points to the ritualized use of animal and human bone. In some contexts bone appears as an object used in ritualized transitions, in others it is rather a generative substance which was necessary to give birth to new persons or produce partible parts of per­ sons, for example, ceramic objects (bone as temper), steel used in weapons (bone in carbonizing process), and human an­ cestors (bone in burials). Back Daniels­ son suggests that there was a metaphori­ cal association between bone, flour, and semen (Back Danielsson, 2007,245-253). In other words, bone was a fertile and growth-inducing substance necessary to create human or non-human bodies. Per­ haps parts of animals could also constitute the person of the Scandinavian dividual, as is suggested by intermingling of human and non-human bone in burials and the human-animal hybrids portrayed in the Germanic Animal Art (ibid., 252-255). A dividual person might also incorporate both male and female components and substances (Fowler, 2004, 42-44), and there is both archaeological and written evidence of certain gender ambiguity in Middle and Late Iron Age Scandinavia (e.g. Back Danielsson, 2007; Clover, 1993; Price, 2002; with references). Apparently reflecting the Euro-Asian shamanic her­ itage, the Scandinavians also believed that the human soul has several differ­ ent parts or projections, some of which could move from one person into another (Price, 2002).

Exchange of Prestige Goods, Mortuary Record, and Modes of Personhood in Iron Age Northern Europe It might be questioned if the theoreti­ cal concept of dividuality is relevant to 116

the context I am applying it in, i.e. Iron Age Finland. I tend to believe it is. Types of weapons and prestige goods in Finland during the 1st millennium AD were to a great degree the same as in North Ger­ manic Europe. On a very general scale, we can state that Iron Age Finland shared much of the martial culture widespread in Late Iron Age and early medieval Eu­ rope; thus, it was not completely unrelat­ ed to the world of Beowulf. Presumably, the Baltic countries can also be included in the same north European whole, where cultural and material exchange created and maintained similarities in systems of ideas and values, and high-status males were deeply involved with martial and aggressive practices. However, it is in­ sufficient to describe general likenesses. Even if we accept it as a working hypoth­ esis that dividuality was the predominant mode of personhood in Iron Age north­ ern Europe, it remains an important and interesting task to seek contrasts and dif­ ferences in the ways the dividuals formed in various temporal and regional settings. For example, the social systems in Fin­ land during the Middle and Late Iron Age were much simpler and of smaller scale than the system described in Beowulf It is very unlikely that an elevated kingly figure could have been the focus of lifecycle rituals and gift exchanges in the same way as it was among Anglo-Saxons. There must have been a large number of various socio-cosmic systems in northern Europe, each of them having their own distinctive features that can be possibly discerned in patterns of archaeological material (cf. Theuws & Alkemade, 2000; Svanberg, 2003). Chris Fowler suggests that burials may offer fruitful opportunities to interpret prehistoric views of personhood, as mor­ tuary rituals are the final phase in the formation of a dividual (Fowler, 2004, 79-100); a person can be constituted as an

Sami Raninen

ancestor with separate identity and repu­ tation, as in Beowulf\ or “de-constituted” as part of anonymous, collective mass of ancestral spirits. According to a hypoth­ esis presented earlier, Finnish cemeteries include examples of both ways to handle the persons of the dead (Wickholm & Raninen, 2006; see also Jonuks, 2006, and Lang, 2007 regarding related interpreta­ tions of mortuary rituals in Bronze and Iron Age Estonia). According to Beowulf travelling and the service in the retinue of a lord, often a foreign one, were an important part of the life-cycle of a young warrior (Bazelmans, 1999, 175-188; see also Halsall, 2003). In this respect, it might be of consider­ able interest to examine the relationships between different socio-cosmic systems, which might have dissimilar ritual cycles and ideas of the constitution of person­ ality. Also, the inter-relations of different spheres and cycles of exchange should be considered. For example, we cannot say for certain that the rewards of a war­ rior were always conceived as exchange of gifts articulating the constituents of personhood. There might also have been a sphere of mercenary activity, where the fighting prowess was exchanged as a commodity. In Iron Age Finland, the elite participat­ ed in material and cultural exchange both with the gradually emerging Scandinavian petty kingdoms and with the societies on the present-day Estonian and Latvian ter­ ritories. It has been determined that dur­ ing the Merovingian Period elite males from Finland visited and served in the retinues of Scandinavian kings, gaining prestigious weapons as gifts (SchaumanLönnqvist, 1999; Hoilund Nielsen, 2000). This is quite plausible, although it must be said these adventuresome males from Finland might not have been included among the greatest champions of the era: the relatively simple economic systems in

Iron Age Finland probably ensured that the degree of military professionalism was lower than among the elites of more complex polities. Local leaders from Fin­ land or their relatives might also have been fostered or lived as hostages in the retinues of North Germanic magnates and rulers (Vilkuna, 1964). In any case, prestige goods of foreign origin were tak­ en out from their original socio-cosmic circulation spheres and included into lo­ calized ritual and exchange cycles operat­ ing in Finland. A considerable part of this material wealth was relatively soon taken out of circulation and destroyed during ostentatious mortuary rituals, but there are suggestions that some objects might be kept for considerable periods of time before deposition. An illustrative example of this is the prestige sword from Burial A5 in the Köyliönsaari inhumation cem­ etery that I have discussed in earlier ar­ ticles (Raninen, 2007a; Raninen, 2007b). A pommel from a Migration Period weapon was incorporated in a late 6th- or early 7th-century sword (Erä-Esko, 1973). It is possible that the sword was seen as a partible, composite person. The old pom­ mel was not just a piece of recycled metal; rather, it carried ancestral value and pow­ er into the “body” of the new sword.

Concluding Hypotheses of Dividuality in Iron Age Finland The Finnish-American ethnographer Laura Stark has discussed extensively the body schemata in early modern Finnish folklore (Stark-Arola, 1998; Stark, 2006). The human body was considered not to have a sharp boundary with the environ­ ment; instead, the body was considered to be “open” and “fuzzy”, permeable to the dynamistic supernatural force (Finnish vāki) that could influence it either by caus­ ing illness or empowering it magically. 117

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The different types of vāki force emitted from different substances, elements, ob­ jects, persons, and topographical catego­ ries. For example, iron was a substance of strong vāki. We can compare these Finn­ ish notions to the mode of permeable di­ vidual personhood described by Fowler. It is, no doubt, quite daring to draw con­ clusions concerning the prehistoric pe­ riod on the basis of folklore documented mostly during the 19th and 20th century. However, it is usually accepted that the concept of vāki must be of archaic, preChristian origin. According to folklore researcher Anna-Leena Siikala (2002), the power of an early modern Finnish sorcer­ er (Finnish tietäjä) was based on secret magical and shamanic knowledge and ex­ ceptional amount of personal vāki force. According to Siikala, an early form of the tietäjä tradition must have existed already in the Iron Age. Tietäjä could be seen as a kind of fighter who combated against supernatural agents of harm and illness. The pugnacious concepts expressed in the Finnish-Karelian epic poetry as well as in the rituals and other-world knowledge of an early modern tietäjä reflected to an ex­ tent the worldview of an Iron Age warri­ or. It is perhaps not too speculative to as­ sume that already in Iron Age Finland the person was considered to be permeable by different types of dynamistic force. In the circulation of different substances and artifacts, the internal composition of the person was influenced. The martial Iron Age male presumably sought to maintain and increase those qualities of his person that would make him strong and willful. Interesting exceptions to the general picture in Finland are the inhumation cemeteries known in the neighboring districts of Eura and Köyliö in the inland area of south-western Finland. These appeared already during the Meroving­ ian and Early Viking Periods, when the

118

cremation rituals dominated in all other agricultural settlements known in the country. As the ritualized handling of a dead human body is often related to con­ cepts of personhood, it is possible that Eura and Köyliö formed a separate ritual system, in which the singular or individ­ ual facet of a person was affirmed more persistently than in those systems that fa­ vored collective and dispersive treatment of cremated bodies. The metal artifacts included in inhumation burials did not decay rapidly, so they were not necessari­ ly “killed” in the act of deposition. Instead they could live on as persons or parts of persons even in the grave. In this sense, the grave gifts could have been seen as the ultimate inalienable possessions of the group (Diepeveen-Jansen, 2001, 28). However, even the artifacts deposed in burials were not always removed from use or circulation. In the continental ear­ ly medieval cemeteries, graves were often opened and valuables taken away. In Fin­ land, observations made in the inhuma­ tion cemetery of Luistari in Eura suggest that some male burials were deprived of their weapons around the year 900 (Lehtosalo-Hilander, 1982, 63). It is not cer­ tain that this was always an expression of irreverence or hostility. Instead of looting, it might have been perceived as exchange between the living and the dead. This can be contrasted with the cremation cem­ eteries, in which the grave gifts were bent and fragmented, i.e., definitely killed. We know that metal was sometimes col­ lected from cremation cemeteries and re­ circulated (Taavitsainen, 1992), but there must have been different motives behind it than the regaining of intact valuables from inhumations. Detailed contextual analyses might result into more nuanced views on the prevailing modes of person­ hood and their influence on various po­ litical, economic, and social practices.

Sami Raninen

References Back Danielsson, L-M. 2007. Masking M o­ ments. The Transitions of Bodies and Beings in Late Iron Age Scandinavia (Stockholm

Studies in Archaeology 40). Stockholm. Bazelmans, J. 1999. By Weapons Made Wor­ thy. Lords, Retainers and Their Relationship in Beowulf (Amsterdam

Archaeological Studies 5). Amsterdam. Bazelmans, J. 2000. Beyond Power. Ceremo­ nial Exchanges in Beowulf. Theuws, E Sc Nelson, J. L. (eds.) Rituals of Power from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Lei­ den, Boston, & Köln, 311-376. Clover, C. J. 1993. Regardless of Sex: Men, Women, and Power in Early Northern Europe. Speculum , 68, 363-387. Diepeveen-Jansen, M. 2001. People, Ideas and Goods. New Perspectives on ‘Celtic Barbarians' in Western and Central Europe

(Amsterdam Archaeological Studies 7). Amsterdam. Erä-Esko, A. 1973. Köyliön Kjuloholmin haudan A5 miękka. Suomen Museo 1973 , 5-22. Fowler, C. 2004. The Archaeology of Personhood: An Anthropological Approach. Lon­ don & New York. Godelier, M. 1999. Enigma o f the Gift. Cam­ bridge. Gurevich, A. 1985. Categories of Medieval Culture. London, Boston, Melbourne, & Henley. Gurevich, A. 1992. Historical Anthropology of the Middle Ages. Cambridge. Gurevich, A. 1995. The Origins o f European Individualism. Oxford 8c Cambridge. Halsall, G. 2003. Warfare and Society in the Barbarian West, 450-900. London & New York. Hedeager, L. 2007. Scandinavia and the Huns. Norwegian Archaeological Review, 2, 42-58. Hoilund Nielsen, K. 2000. The Political Ge­ ography of Sixth- and Seventh-Century Southern and Eastern Scandinavia on the Basis of Material Culture. Archaeologica Baltica, 4 , 161-172.

Harke, H. 2000. The Circulation of Weapons in Anglo-Saxon Society. Theuws, F. & Nel­ son, J. L. (eds.) Rituals o f Power from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Leiden, Boston, & Köln, 377-399. Jonuks, T. 2006. Principles of Estonian Pre­ historic Religion with Special Emphasis to Soul Beliefs. Lang, V. (ed.) Culture and Material Culture. Papers from the First Theo­ retical Seminar of the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at the University o f Tartu, Es­ tonia, October 17-1 9 ,2 0 0 3 (Interarchaeologia, 1). Tartu, Riga, Vilnius, 87-96. Lang, V. 2007. Joining Together Graves and Souls. Merkevičius, A. (ed.) Colours of Ar­ chaeology. Material Culture and the Society. Papers from the Second Theoretical Seminar of the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at the University of Vilnius, Lithuania, October 21-22, 2005 (Interarchaeologia, 2). Vilnius,

Helsinki, Riga, & Tartu, 79-92. Lehtosalo-Hilander, R-L. 1982. Luistari III. A Burial Ground Reflecting the Finnish Vi­ king Age Society (Suomen muinaismuistoyh-

distuksen aikakauskirja 82: 3). Helsinki. Mauss, M. 1924. Essai sur le don. Paris. Raninen, S. 2007a. Kovia ja nimekkäitä miehiä. Persoonan konstituutio rautakaudella. Muinaistutkija, 1,18-28. Raninen, S. 2007b. Weapon Burials in Merov­ ingian Finland: Towards an Interpretative Archaeology. Merkevičius, A. (ed.) Colours of Archaeology. Material Culture and the Society. Papers from the Second Theoretical Seminar of the Baltic Archaeologists (BASE) Held at the University o f Vilnius, Lithuania, October 21-22, 2005 (Interarchaeologia, 2). Vilnius, Helsinki, Riga, & Tartu, 127-136. Price, N. S. 2002. The Viking Way. Religion and War in Late Iron Age Scandinavia

(AUN 31). Uppsala. Schauman-Lönnqvist, M. 1999. The West Finnish Warriors and the Early Svea Kingship (550-800 AD). Dickinson, T. & Griffiths, D. (eds.) The Making o f Kingdoms. Papers from the 4 7 h Sachsensymposium York, September 1996 (Anglo-Saxon Studies

in Archaeology and History 10). Oxford, 65-70.

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Siikala, A.-L. 2002. Mythic Images and Sha­ manism. Helsinki. Stark-Arola, L. 1998. Magic, Body and Social Order. The Construction of Gender Through Womens Private Rituals in Traditional Finland

(Studia Fennica Folkloristica 5). Helsinki. Stark» L. 2006. The Magical Self. Body, Society and the Supernatural in Early Modern Fin­ land. Helsinki.

Strathern, M. 1988. The Gender of the Gift: Problems with Women and Problems with Society in Melanesia. Berkeley.

Svanberg, F. 2003. Decolonizing the Viking Age. Vol. 1 (Acta Archaeologia Lundensia Series in 8° No. 43). Lund. Taavitsainen, J.-P. 1992. Cemeteries or Refuse Heaps? Archaeological Formation Process­ es and the Interpretation of Sites and Antiq­ uities. Suomen Museo 1991, 5-14.

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Theuws, F. & Alkemade, M. 2000. A kind of mirror for men: sword deposition in Late Antique northern Gaul. Theuws, F. & Nel­ son, J. L. (eds.) Rituals o f Power from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Leiden, Boston, & Köln, 401-476. Vilkuna, K. 1964. Kihlakunta ja häävuode. Tutkielmia suomalaisen yhteiskunnan järjestäytymisen vaiheilta. Helsinki.

Weiner, A. 1992. The Inalienable Possessions. The Paradox o f Keeping-While-Giving. Ber­ keley. W ickholm, A. & Raninen, S. 2006. The Bro­ ken People: Deconstruction o f Personhood in Iron Age Finland. Estonian Journal of Ar­ chaeology, 10 (2), 150-162. W illiams, H. 2006. Death and Memory in Early Medieval Britain. Cambridge.

(TH E ) MEMORY REMAINS: T H E IM M ATERIAL REM NANTS OF T H E TO L L FENCE IN TO R N IO TOW N Risto Nurmi This paper will briefly discuss the concept of material culture in archaeology. The concept is traditionally very broadly understood; it could be described as the basis o f archaeological re­ search. The present archaeological research, especially in historical archaeology, does not neces­ sarily deal with the excavated tangible remains of material culture, but attempts interpretations through historical documents that must also be considered to be artefacts and contemporary material culture, not just historical sources. In this paper, the term ‘immaterial’ stands for the disappeared features that are only interpretable through secondary or even tertiary evidence. The case study of this paper discusses the biography of the toll fence o f the town of Tornio in Northern Finland in 1621-1750. There is no excavated research material available, but the maps and illustrations from the 1620s to the present have preserved information that can be used to reveal the biography of the fence. Keywords: material culture, historical archaeology, memory, toll fence, Tornio.

Risto Nurmi, University of Oulu, PO Box 1000, Oulu 90014, Finland; [email protected]

Introduction It has become popular in historical ar­ chaeology to study various topics without any direct archaeological or artefactual evidence. If we look at the works of, for example, Shammas (1993), Weatherill (1993), or Scott (1997), we can say that it is actually a very useful way to expand the field of research. Likewise, such an approach concretely brings historical material closer to archaeology. One could say that studies without excavated mate­ rial are not archaeology at all but just a different approach of historical research. The discrepancy is evident if we stick to the general definition of archaeology. The Oxford English Reference Dictionary reads shortly: “Archaeology is the study of human history and prehistory through the excavation of sites and the analysis of physical remains” (Pearsall & Trumble, 1996, 68). Well, for me at least, archae­ ology is, in essence, a term of historical research. Maybe the difference is in the

methods eventually. For example, we could look at the aforementioned paper by Elisabeth Scott. She studied the 19th century cooking books and the use of ves­ sels and vessel types that were recorded in them. She managed to find a lot of inter­ esting and useful information that is hard or virtually impossible to interpret form conventional archaeological research ma­ terial. It could be said that she excavated the books rather than used them as a sim­ ple source of information. Historical archaeology is a young field of research and, as I see it, it is still look­ ing for directions in theory (see also Mayne, 2008). The boundary between history and archaeology is not clear and fixed anymore (if it has ever been) as ar­ chaeologists have penetrated deeper and deeper into fields of history and adopted the methods and sources from there. A big issue has always been the balance between these two fields (see Johnson, 1996, 3-5; Orser, 1996, 1-28) - how to study historical and archaeological 121

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material in a balanced fashion and objec­ tively together. It has become relevant to determine the role of historical sources in research. One of the problems lies with the definition of the concept of material culture. What is regarded as material cul­ ture? In prehistoric ‘traditional’ archaeol­ ogy, the definition is not a problem due to absence or rarity of historical sources and the generally limited amount of material. In historical archaeology, however, the amount of artefacts and finds and other relevant sources commonly “overflows”, meaning that there are so much possi­ ble information sources that they appear hard to handle.1 The written sources are another extra dimension to discuss. In this paper, my intention is to trace the biography of the toll fence of Tornio from the 1620s to the late 18thcentury by “excavating” the available documenta­ tion. Today the fence has completely dis­ appeared from the townscape and there is no traditional archaeological evidence available. Thus, I also need to discuss the terminology.

Material Culture and Archaeology Material culture research has recently become more and more popular, and new schools of material culture studies in archaeology have steadily emerged. In general use, the concept of material cul­ ture is, however, often inadequately de­ fined. The concept is sometimes used like a buzzword that is presently common in technological jargon. Is that because the concept is not properly defined, or should it be said that it is loosely defined, and

hence it could be used more freely? Ar­ chaeologists have also widened their per­ spective, coming out of the trench and starting to analyse the existing structures by archaeological methods. As Newman (2001, 10) stated, the presently standing buildings and structures are the mega­ fauna of material culture. Material culture can be interpreted in different ways in different academic fields (see Orser 2002, 339-342) so what is ma­ terial culture in archaeology? In “Encyclo­ pedia of Historical Archaeology”, Charles Orser shortly writes that “Material culture constitutes the main subject of archaeolo­ gists discipline [..] archaeologists do not necessarily agree either about what ma­ terial culture means or how it should be studied” (Orser, 2002, 339). James Deetz (1977) earlier saw material culture as a sector of our physical environment that we modify through culturally determined behaviour. Basically, the term already re­ fers to all tangible aspects of culture and it can be broadened to almost everything (Orser, 2002, 339). Brian M. Fagan (1997, 62) explained the role of material culture in archaeol­ ogy so that the relationship between hu­ man behaviour and material culture in all times and places is what archaeology is all about. In the same volume he also present­ ed another, more limited view that some scholars see as applying only to technol­ ogy and artefacts (Fagan, 1997,177,252). Orser (2002, 341) keeps options open for scholars saying that historical archaeolo­ gists are free to choose among different perceptions of material culture and many distinct ways of interpretation that cur­ rently exist in the field. If we agree that

1 This is the case especially from the Early Modern Period to the present, which is understood as a period of historical archaeology in Anglo-American research. The continental European traditional view considers the whole era of written documentation to belong to the historical period, starting from Mesopotamia 3500 BC (see Orser, 2002; Andren, 1998).

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material culture is the basis of archaeo­ logical research and we consider material culture in its widest definition, it could be said that archaeology is the study of mate­ rial culture in the past, or more precisely, the study of human past through mate­ rial culture. This view leads us to face at least two questions. Firstly, is it necessary to mention material culture together with archaeology, since it would be simply tau­ tology? Secondly, if everything eventually ends up to material culture, is there im­ material culture?

Memory of Material Immaterial If material culture is considered to be everything that is tangible, the immate­ rial could easily be defined as spiritual or religious. In this paper, however, I use “immaterial” as lost material culture which is accessible only through second­ ary or tertiary evidence: nothing tangible has preserved to the present day and so far we do not have any archaeological evi­ dence. In one sense, this is very close to the study of spiritual aspects of religions in the past, since they are commonly in­ terpreted through the preserved mate­ rial culture, such as burial deposits. The lost material culture, like the toll fence discussed in this paper, is also studied through material culture. The preserved maps and illustrations are material culture as well and they have to be considered as such, as artefacts (Johnson, 1996, 118; Ylimaunu, 2007, 20-22). The informa­ tion they carry is not only the readable information and the information they were meant to preserve. Memory plays a significant role in the preservation of information. A diction­ ary describes memory as an organism’s ability to store, retain, and subsequently retrieve information. Some sources also discuss how memory is both a source

of retained information and a cognitive mentor (Simpson & Weiner, 1989, 597). We remember things, and we remember to do things. The title of this paper is two­ fold: it implies the multi-meaning of the term; the remains of the fence are them­ selves a memory; at the same time, the remains are stored in memory. Retaining and retrieving of this information could be done in many ways. Direct retrieving is possible, for example, from the records or oral tradition. Then the memory of the feature has been consciously passed through time. Unfortunately, the quantity and quality of information declines with time and it is eventually lost or reinter­ preted. Luckily all memory retaining is not conscious. People preserve bits and pieces of memory information in their daily lives without realising it. The ground similarly preserves features, structures, and artefacts - partially through the influence of human behaviour and par­ tially through biological processes. This memory of landscape, and the ability to read it, is one of the bases of landscape archaeology. The actual material culture I am about to discuss shortly is presently immaterial. That is, no physical remains of the toll fence have preserved and no excavated archaeological evidence has been found. However, a memory of the fence has been preserved in the landscape through the collective memory of the society, and the physical features that have been preserved and documented in records are actually traces of features that have only originally been based on the studied structure. Such traces could be considered immaterial re­ mains of the structure. Like Scott exca­ vated the cooking books, I am about to excavate the pictorial material of the toll fence in northern Sweden of the Early Modern Period. 123

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Maps and Illustrations as Archaeological Sources

Thus, rather than objective, maps were meant to illustrate the view and situation that was expected or desired, not the ac­ tual situation at the time of the mapping (Ylimaunu, 2007, 107).

Maps and illustrations are pictorial representations of the cultural environ­ ment, and they are produced through the social relations of their time (Smith, 2002; Ylimaunu, 2007, 20). Since the ear­ Tornio ly 17th century, maps have been increas­ ingly used in civil administration besides The case study of this paper focuses the military (Kostet, 1995, 26). Maps are on the small Swedish town of the Early generally used as a supplementary mate­ Modern Period, Tornio, in present north­ rial in archaeological research. They have ern Finland (Fig. 1). Tornio was founded a great importance in locating research on the Suensaari Island at the estuary of sites, and they are com­ monly used to support the interpretation of archaeologically studied structures. However, scholars have recently increasingly empha­ sised that the pictorial documentation should be studied and inter­ preted as its own group and only then the results analysed together with the other data (Nordin, 2005; Smith, 2002; Yli­ maunu, 2007). The depictions of the environment and land­ scapes in maps should be regarded critically, since they represent the contemporary val­ ues and social view and are thus not necessarily realistic (Smith, 2002). This realism should nonetheless be the fo­ cus of discussion (Anttonen, 1996, 21-23). Every map and picture was made for a purpose and in this sense it was Fig. 1. Location of Tornio at the top of the Gulf of Bothnia. Draw­ generally very accurate. ing: Timo Ylimaunu

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the River Tornio in the early phase of the modernisation process of the Swed­ ish Empire in 1621. The area had a long history as a seasonal medieval market place. The town was the focal point of Lapland trade and the majority of the Lappish goods were traded through this town. Despite its apparent prosperity, es­ pecially during the latter half of the 18th century, the town remained small in size and population. The mercantile ideol­ ogy and its influence on domestic trade policy, together with the local conditions, restricted or restrained growth. Popula­ tion stayed around few hundred people throughout the Swedish rule, and the ap­ pearance of the town remained humble, with wooden houses - features that were typical of all the newly founded towns on the coast of the Bothnian Gulf (Ahlberg, 2005, 55; Mäntylä, 1971). The archaeological field works in Tornio began in 1966, when part of the old mar­ ket square area was excavated. The main concern then was to find and study the remains of the town halls that had been located in the square (Kommen, 1968; Ylimaunu, 1999). It took another thirty years before archaeologists returned to the town in 1996 to carry out rescue ex­ cavations; since 1999 several small scale rescue excavations have been executed in the old town area (Herva, 2000; Nurmi, 2005; Ylimaunu, 1999). Only the 2002 rescue excavations can be considered ex­ tensive (Herva, 2002), and largely due to these excavations this town has aroused a lot of research interest and brought about several research publications (e.g. Ikäheimo, 2006; Herva & Nurmi, 2009; Herva et al., 2007; Nurmi, 2007; Puputti, 2006; Ylimaunu, 2007). The results of archaeological research have proven that the town was finally built

during the first half of the 17th century. It appeared that the site had an extensive building phase and the town was actu­ ally built in a decade (see Herva, 2000; Ylimaunu, 2007), as the historical docu­ ments had suggested (see Mäntylä, 1971, 28-29). Archaeological interest has con­ centrated on residential areas, and only one site crosses the possible line of the toll fence. However, in the Kristo plot all the preserved cultural layers date to 1720 or later (Nurmi, 2005).

Small Toll Edict The toll fence is one of the four ele­ ments that constituted the concept of town in medieval and early modern Sweden. The others were the town privi­ leges, the market square, and the town hall (Ahlberg, 2005, 59, Nordin, 2005, 149-150). Toll fence became compulsory with the Small Toll Edict issued by King Gustav II Adolph in 1622 (see e.g. Ahonen, 1988, 234; Kirjakka, 1982, 135). Ac­ cording to this, Tornio should have had the fence practically since the beginnings of the town. Town fences or town walls2 never had any defensive function in early modern towns along the Gulf of Bothnia. They were simply meant to direct the flow of market goods through toll gates, where they were taxed and charged. The building of the fence was an administrational brief of inhabitants, and it was fulfilled but only with minimum effort. The toll fence set the physical limits of the town. It separated the urban and ru­ ral areas from each other. Some aspects of laws and regulations were different inside and outside the fence (Hellspong, 1974, 188; Mäntylä, 1971, 29-30; Yli­ maunu, 2007, 71).

2 The term town wall in this case is anyhow misleading. Customs fence or toll fence or just fence would be more correct.

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Because toll fence was a statutory fea­ ture, it was also always marked into the maps of this era. Earlier, when maps were considered simply historical sources, the actual existence of fences and their true appearance was not much questioned. However, recent research of the fences on the maps of Tornio has revealed a series of questions, and showed a new image of the townscape and meaning of the maps (see Ylimaunu, 2007).

Toll Fences on the Maps and Pictures of Tornio The 17th Century

The oldest of the maps is an outline drawing of Tornio street grid (Fig. 2). This map was previously dated to the early 1640s (Kostet, 1995), but Ylimaunu (2007, 123-125) has recently questioned this dating; he dates the map to the 1620s instead. Whether the map is from the 1620s or the 1640s is irrelevant here, since we agree that the street grid illustrated on this first map repre­ sents the original planned layout of the town, not the actual town as it was built. It is most likely an original sketch or line map by Olof Bure who was ordered to stake off the town plan at the site (Mäntylä, 1971,26). This map already includes the toll fence. The toll fence on this map is depicted as a semi arch around the town, leaving the nearby fields in­ side it. The type of the fence seems to be a wooden pole fence. Ylimaunu (2007, 108, 125) argues that the depicted fence is just a car­ tographic symbol that indi­ cates the limits of the town. It would not represent the actual fence at all if it even existed at this time. A simi­ lar type of fences has been used on the maps of other towns as well (see Kostet, 1995, 37-39, 60-62). So did this fence exist? Probably not in the man­ ner it is illustrated. Firstly, if this map truly is the Fig. 2. The earliest preserved plan of Tornio. Presumably drawn Bures original sketch, it is only a plan. Secondly, if in the 1620s (Riksarkivet, Sweden)

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Ylimaunus dating is correct, this sketch would have been drawn before the small toll edict and the fence would not have been a compulsory feature. It must be noted here that the toll fence is not men­ tioned in the Crown inspection report of the town in 1623, although all other build­ ings and their current stage are accurately recorded (Mäntylä, 1971, 29). Thus, the fence was most likely not built until later. It is, however, possible that some kind of feature was truly present in the landscape during the early 17th century. This can be seen on one of the later maps that will be discussed further. The next map of the town was drawn in 1647 by Erik Widman (Fig. 3). This is the first map that illustrates the actual town plan. It is notable that the blocks had al­ ready altered from the original plan and some blocks of the planned town were not built at all yet. The northern part of the town was low and wet until the latter half of the 17th century, when it was drained (see Ylimaunu, 2007, 57). The most inter­ esting feature of the map for the purposes of this article is the line of the toll fence. The fence on the 1647 map looks more like a representation of the actual fence. Here the fence closely follows the bor­ ders of the built-up area, leaving the open

fields outside it. This has traditionally been interpreted as if the fence had been moved between the making of this and the previous map. However, why should the fence have been moved so drastically between these two decades? The inhabit­ ants did not move the fence later at the turn of the 18th century, even though the King Carl XII himself personally insisted it (see Mäntylä, 1971, 194-196). The new rules of regularization during the 1640s demanded that the toll fence follow the outermost street alignment of the plan (Kirjakka, 1982, 135-136). This map might have something to do with these edicts, although the order was given only to the towns that were to be regulated. The first regulation of Tornio was issued only as late as 1725. It is also known that the Crown sent an official to Tornio to rebuild the toll fence in 1648 because it was not considered extensive enough (Mäntylä, 1971, 29-30). The toll fence in the map of 1647 could also be re­ lated to this incident, and this map would also be a sketch, because the fence that is drawn on the map encircles the town well and is overall in accordance with the prevailing edict. Previously the fence on the Bures map has been considered a merely figurative

Fig. 3. The Tornio town plan of 1647 by Erik Widman (Riksarkivet, Sweden) 127

Interarchaeologia, 3

map symbol, but the issue is slightly more complicated than that. Widman also drew the field map of Suensaari on a separate sheet (Fig. 4). This was a common prac­ tice at that time (Kostet, 1995). The fields around the town form a semi-circle be­ tween the town and the new church and correlate well with the line of the fence on the Bures map (Ylimaunu, 2007, 80). Thus, it is possible that something like the fence had had influence on the form of the fields. The influence of the fence on the field grid and its visibility in the landscape seem a bit far fetched at this point, but we will see further how endur­ ing such features can be. As it was said, the street grid of the Widmans town map is definitely based on the true structures,

Fig. 4. A detail of the Tornio field map drawn in 1647 by Erik Widman. The lines of the southern field lots indicate the possible ex­ istence of an earlier toll fence (marked with dashed line) (the north is on the top of the figure) (Riksarkivet, Sweden) 128

but the depiction of the fence must be still considered questionable. Fifty years after the previous map, Hans Kruse drew the next map of the town (Fig. 5). If the fence on the Wid­ mans map illustrates the true structure, then the toll fence had been moved be­ tween these years again. The reason may be that people wanted to integrate the church into the town. At least the fence is integrated as part of the church fence, or vice versa. One possible dating and rea­ son for moving the fence again might be the change of maintenance obligations in the 1660s. Maintenance obligations were transferred from peasants to burghers solely (Mäntylä, 1971, 155). This might have encouraged the burghers to integrate their fields and the church into the town. Whatever the actual line of the fence was during the first half of the 17th century, the fence was moved to integrate the church and fields into the town already when the old church (built in 1645) was in use. Mäntylä (1993, 212) dates this change to the end of the 17th century and the build­ ing of the new church (built in 1682), but if we look at the boundaries of the field plots in the map of 1698 (Fig. 5), there is a straight diagonal line which cuts through the fields from the northern corner of the town to the northern corner of the old church yard. This alignment of the fields indicates that the old church was already integrated inside the fence. Later, after the old church burned down in 1682, a new one was built in a higher location (see Ylimaunu, 2007, 84). The northern part of the fence would have been naturally moved to meet the new church. The southern corners of both the old and the new churchyard are approximately in the same line with the southern part of the fence, and it would only have needed to be extended. After the fence was moved, the reminder of the old fence was preserved in the field plot

Risto Nurmi

Fig. 5. The Tornio town plan by Hans Kruse in 1698. This map is the first map to illustrate the field lots inside the town fence. The presumed line of the older fence is marked with dashed line (Riksarkivet, Sweden)

boundaries. These fields were very im­ portant to the Tornio burghers up to the latter half of the 19th century, even to the wealthiest of them (see Perälä, 1921). The 18th Century The alignment of the fence that is illus­ trated on the map of 1698 (Fig. 5) existed until the very end of the existence of the toll fence. The fence had been destroyed at least twice before 1750, after that time it was possibly demolished again at least once. The first destruction took place at the time of the Russian occupation (1714-1717) during the Great Northern War (1699-1721), after which the align­ ment was slightly changed, and the sec­ ond in 1744, when the fence was used as firewood during the war (Mäntylä, 1971, 318). The first illustration of the post war town was a bird’s-eye view by Reginald Outhier in 1736 (Fig. 8). Outhier was a

French priest and worked in Tornio with the astronomer Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis during the years 1736-37 for the French Academy of Sciences. Outhier documented the research project and published it a few years later in French (Outhier, 1744). This axonometric pro­ jection is the first somewhat realistic il­ lustration of Tornio. Another illustration was published a few years earlier by Erik Dahlberg in “Suecia Antiqua et Hodierna” (1731), but this image is highly exaggerated and shows more of an im­ age of what the Swedish elite wanted to show rather than anything realistic. The original sketch of this image was drawn already in 1661, and even that is extrava­ gant (see Mäntylä, 1993, 214). The only detail worth of note in these pictures is that neither the published picture nor the sketch has any signs of the fence. The fence in the Outhier’s picture of the town looks like a palisade structure. It is, 129

Interarchaeologia, 3

however, more likely that it had actually been a board structure or some other, slightly lighter type, possibly even a plain pole fence. After the destructions of the Great Northern War, the fences in Finnish towns were rebuilt very lightly and they were poorly maintained (Ylimaunu, 2007, 150; Ahonen, 1988, 234-240). Building a fence was a compulsory injunction, and the locals generally observed it with the smallest possible effort and investment. The reason why the fence in the Outhier s picture looks dubiously strong could be that the author was French and thus not necessarily familiar with the local build­ ing traditions.

According to historical records, the fence was demolished for good during the Russian occupation in 1743-1744 (Mäntylä, 1971, 318). However, there is a slight contradiction. On the map by E. Hackzell drawn in 1750, the fence still exists (Fig. 6). There it looks like a pole fence again, similar to the Bures first sketch of the 1620s (Fig. 2). It re­ mains questionable whether this is a map symbol again, or an indication that the fence was rebuilt once more after 1744. Anyhow, on the next map of Tornio from 1782 drawn by Merckell (Fig. 7), there are no signs on the fence. The fence remained as a required ele­ ment of the Swedish town up to the early 19th century. It was, however, a relic of the imperial mercantilism, which the Crown did not want to resile, since it made such a profit. Because ma­ rine trade had already adopted the modern free trade methods, the execution and control of the inland trade and the toll edict was much related to the officiousness of the customs officer of the town. Merchants and burghers as well as peasants commonly neglected the fence as well as the toll, and the fence was commonly punctured full of passways (Jokipii, 1958, 578-580; Mäntylä 1971, 155). Eventually the Tornio toll fence disappeared from the townscape after the mid 18th century, but it did not disappear from the land­ scape.

The Memory of the Fence

Fig. 6. The Tornio town plan of 1750 by Esaias Hackzell

(Tornionlaakso Provincial Museum, Finland)

130

The previous discussion reveals how complex a source of infor­ mation the map actually is. The true existence and biography of

Risto Nurmi

Fig. 7. The Tornio town plan of 1782 by A. Fr. Merckell (Riksarkivet, Sweden)

Fig. 8. A birds-eye view of Tornio town drawn by Reginald Outhier during his visit to the town in 1736-37 (Outhier, 1744)

the toll fence, for example, remains am­ biguous throughout its lifecycle from the 1620s to the latter half of the 18lh century. On the other hand, the same sources give information about the fence alignment as an echo through other features; in this case the field boundaries drawn on the Kruses map (Fig. 5). As was mentioned before, the field boundaries in the Widmaris field map (Fig. 4) fit well inside the

toll fence line of the earlier map, and the field boundaries in the Kruses town map also show an anomaly that could be ex­ plained as an earlier fence line. It is ques­ tionable how long the features like field boundaries could truly sustain traces of earlier features. How constant the field grid actually was in the town? The fence has been gone for 250 years now, but the landscape was able to 131

Interarchaeologia, 3

Fig. 9. The view of the Tornio town from the church tower in the early 20th century (photog­ rapher unknown). The line of the old town fence crosses the fields and is clearly visible in the landscape (Tornionlaakso Provincial Museum, Finland)

maintain its memory for at least 150 years. Some aerial photos were taken from the Tornio church tower at the beginning of the 20th century (Fig. 9). These pictures show lines on the fields between the town and the church. These lines represent the old field plot boundaries, which were in use until the end of the 19th century. By the time these pictures were taken, the field grid had been completely renewed, but some of the old boundary lines were still clearly visible in the landscape. One probable major factor why some of these lines were still visible so clearly is that they have been used as footpaths. By compar­ ing the lines and identifiable landmarks on the Kruses map (Fig. 5), we can see that the pre-1682 line of the fence is still clearly visible in the landscape. It goes from the northern corner of the town to the Porthän School, which was built straight on top of the older church yard and church in 1907-11. Some other lines that fit in the Kruse’s map are also visible, but this one is the most distinct. It can be 132

seen clearly even through the ploughed field. Soon after these pictures were taken it all vanished when the area between the town and the church was built up, and the visible remains of the Tornio toll fence were finally cleared from the townscape. However, before that the memory remains of the fence passed through several stages of human activity. The re­ minder of the actual fence remained in the alignment of field boundaries, which were used as footpaths. They turned one by one into biological anomalies that were captured in photographs just be­ fore they disappeared. It is a matter of opinion whether the field boundaries and footpaths are considered material culture, but they carried the immaterial remnants of the fence. The photographs again are material culture that have to be studied, as well as maps or illustrations, not as a source of “innocent” informa­ tion, but like artefacts that bear the in­ formation within.

Risto Nurmi

Acknowledgements I would like to thank Dr Timo Ylimaunu and Dr Vesa-Pekka Herva for reading and commenting this paper. I would also like to thank the Science Council of the University of Oulu, Finnish

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