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as a ‘primary’ religion, PCRN was above all defined by ritual practice. it was called siðr, meaning ‘custom’, ‘habit’, or perhaps ‘tradition’ (è25). However, very few written sources concerning rituals in scandinavia are preserved (Clunies Ross 2002a), which means that archaeology is very important in any attempts to characterize PCRN. Rituals may have been more or less imbed-ded in everyday life (cf. Carlie 2004), but they were also carried out in spaces that were set aside from mundane life (è25). in this context, above all more specific ritual spaces will be treated, apart from burials, which will be discussed elsewhere (è33).
There are several different ways to define rituals and ritual space in archaeology. for many decades, there has been a general archaeological discussion concerning rituals, trying to define this category cross-culturally, often in relation to ritual theories in religious studies (for a recent review, see swenson 2015). Primarily, the non-mundane character of rituals — and ritual traces
— have been emphasized. at the same time, problems in identifying different types of rituals (è25) in relation to ritual remains have been underlined as well (Renfrew 1985, 1994; Renfrew and Bahn 1991; stjernquist 1989, 1998; gibson and simpson 1998; insoll 2004; Kyriakidis 2007). in scandinavian archaeology, however, more specific discussions on rituals have also been carried out. Not least, the enigmatic weapon deposits in lakes and bogs in iron age southern scandinavia have been discussed as rituals and sanctuaries Torun Zachrisson, associate Professor of archaeology, stockholm University, and Head of Research, County Museum of Uppland, Uppsala
Anders Andrén, senior Professor of archaeology, stockholm University The Pre-Christian Religions of the North: History and Structures, Volume ii, ed. by Jens Peter schjødt, John lindow, and anders andrén, PCRN-HS 2 (Turn hout: Brepols, 2020) pp. 671–723
BREPols
PUBlisHERs
10.1484/M.PCRN-EB.5.116954
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(Engelhardt 1863; Worsaae 1865; Jankuhn 1936a; Jankuhn 1936b; Brøndsted 1966: 208–09; Hagberg 1961: 251; Hagberg 1967b; ilkjær 1994: 21; ilkjær 2000; lund Hansen 2008: 28–30; fabech 2009; Nørgård Jørgensen 2009).
Deposits of more ordinary objects in wetlands have been discussed in ritual perspectives as well (lindqvist 1910; arbman 1945; strömberg 1961: 80; geisslinger 1967; Becker 1971a; stjernquist 1963, 1973, 1997).
Charlotte fabech presents a model of ritual sites based primarily on wetland deposits in southern scandinavia, which has had a major impact. she argues for a shift in the middle of the first millennium, from ritual sites in wetlands to rituals on dry ground associated with elite settlements. at the latter sites, churches were later erected, emphasizing cult continuity into Christian times (fabech 1991: 291; fabech 1994: 169–70; slightly modified fabech 2006: 26; fabech and Näsman 2013: 85). Her model has been criticized, because archaeology clearly shows that wetlands were used in rituals until the eleventh century ce (Zachrisson 1998: 118; Hedeager 1999; stjernquist 2001: 22ff; andrén 2002; Jørgensen 2002; lund 2004; lund 2009; g. larsson 2007: 238–52; Monikander 2010: 94f; Eklund and Hennius 2015; fredengren 2015; cf. Hines 1989). some important changes, however, did occur in the sixth century. Huge weapon deposits ended, and later more formalized expressions of rituals can be traced (see below).
in earlier research, it was taken for granted that ritual buildings were important elements of PCRN (overview in McNicol 1997), but in a source critical investigation, olaf olsen dismisses most possible examples of specific ritual buildings (olsen 1966). in recent decades, however, unquestionably ritual buildings have been found, primarily in the so-called central places (è19).
These discoveries have renewed the debate, for instance, with respect to different old Norse concepts of ritual space and ritual buildings (sundqvist 2016).
another way of defining rituals and ritual sites in scandinavian archaeology is to use the few written sources that actually exist regarding rituals, as a kind of analogy. The earliest account of scandinavian religion is given by the greek historian Procopius of Caerarea ( c. 500– c. 554) in his History of the Wars from the 540s (è9):
θεοὺς μέντοι καὶ δαίμονας πολλοὺς σέβουσιν, οὐρανίους τε καὶ ἀερίους, ἐγγείους τε καὶ
θαλασσίους, καὶ ἄλλα ἄττα δαιμόνια ἐν ὕδασι πηγῶν τε καὶ ποταμῶν εἶναι λεγόμενα.
θύουσι δὲ ἐνδελεχέστατα ἱερεῖα πάντα καὶ ἐναγίζουσι, τῶν δὲ ἱερείων σφίσι τὸ κάλλιστον
ἄνθρωπός ἐστιν ὅνπερ δορυάλωτον ποιήσαιντο πρῶτον· τοῦτον γὰρ τῷ Ἄρει θύουσιν, ἐπεὶ θεὸν αὐτὸν νομίζουσι μέγιστον εἶναι. ἱερεύονται δὲ τὸν αἰχμάλωτον οὐ θύοντες
μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀπὸ ξύλου κρεμῶντες, καὶ ἐς τὰς ἀκάνθας ῥιπτοῦντες, ταῖς ἄλλαις τε
κτείνοντες θανάτου ἰδέαις οἰκτίσταις. οὕτω μὲν Θουλῖται βιοῦσιν.
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(They reverence in great numbers gods and demons both of the heavens and of the air, of the earth and of the sea, and sundry other demons which are said to be in the waters of springs and rivers. and they incessantly offer up all kinds of sacrifices, and make oblations to the dead, but the noblest of sacrifices, in their eyes, is the first human being whom they have taken captive in war; for they sacrifice him to ares, whom they regard as the greatest god. and the manner in which they offer up the captive is not by sacrificing him on an altar only, but also by hanging him to a tree, or throwing him among thorns, or killing him by some of the other most cruel forms of death. Thus, then, do the inhabitants of Thule live.) (6.15.23–26) apart from Procopius, other hints of rituals are mentioned by Tacitus, orosius, Jordanes, Thietmar of Merseburg, and adam of Bremen, as well as the icelandic sagas, and medieval prohibitions against pagan cults point towards certain recurring ritual aspects (è9, 20, and 25). according to these sources, humans, different kinds of animals, and weapons were sacrificed, and food and drink were consumed. These rituals could take place in holy groves, rivers, lakes, springs, holy places, and ritual buildings, and also at trees, barrows, stones, fires, and idols. These fragments of spatial references to ritual sites can to a large extent be confirmed by theophoric placenames (ahlbäck 1990; andersson 1992a, 1992c; Vikstrand 2001; è5). Different components of theophoric placenames refer to ritual settings such as holy places (- vi, -harg), settlements ( -löv, -tuna), buildings (- hov, -sal), arable fields or meadows (- åker, -äng, -vin), groves, woods or trees (- lund, -tved, -skog, -eke), water (- fors, -sjö), island (- ö), as well as rocks and hills (- hammar, -berg). in a few cases, in recent decades places with theophoric placenames have also been archaeologically investigated, suggesting more concrete links between material remains and ritually designated spaces ( Jørgensen 1998; andrén 2002; Zachrisson 2004a, 2004b; Nielsen 2005; andersson and skyllberg 2008; svensson 2008; Magnell and iregren 2010; Bäck and Hållans stenholm 2012; Hulth 2013; Holst and others 2017).
so far, these specific links between names and material remains point towards a high degree of complexity and variation regarding ritual space. By combining these different ways of defining rituals and ritual space in archaeology, it is possible to outline some general traits of ritual sites in PCRN.
Elements of Ritual Space
Rituals and ritual spaces are often set apart from everyday life (è25), and sometimes ritual spaces can be discerned by certain non-mundane qualities. Rituals could be connected with a spring of red water (stjernquist 1997); with small lakes surrounded by promontories or ridges (arbman 1945; Carlie 1998); with
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figure 27.1. The weapon deposit site of Ejsbøl mose in southern Jylland, surrounded by rising shore lines that created a natural theatre. Photo: anders andrén.
rushing rapids (Zachrisson 2004c); with unusually formed rocks and boulders; with rifts, cracks, and hollows that formed various openings to the underground (Carlie 2009; Petersson 2004; lindeblad 2009); and small hills covered with stones and boulders (andersson and skyllberg 2008). it seems that some of these places are still surrounded by some kind of numinosity or a sense of secludedness.
Many ritual deposits have been found in bogs and shallow lakes. Very few wetlands sites, however, have been totally excavated, which means that possible enclosures or fences have rarely been reported. in several cases, however, these wetlands were surrounded by ridges, where parts of the rituals may have taken place. in a few cases, fireplaces have been found on such ridges, supporting this interpretation. The surrounding ridges and promontories indicate that several wetland locations are set in the landscape as natural amphithea-tres, giving room for many participants as well as spectators of the rituals. one example is Ejsbøl mose, near Haderslev in southern Jylland, where deposits of weapons were made at the shores of a former shallow lake on six different occasions between the first century bce and 400 ce. The lake is surrounded on three sides by ridges rising at least six to seven metres above the lake (Nørgård Jørgensen and andersen 2014).
in the wetlands, wooden objects are among those most frequently found.
such objects can either be made of manufactured wood, such as planks, timber,
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and pointed stakes, or natural wood of both smaller
and larger dimensions. often sticks and twigs in verti-
cal positions have been found. Platforms of wood or
stone have quite often been recorded in southern and
eastern scandinavia. Wooden platforms were built up
of branches, logs, and stakes, while platforms of stone
were made with larger stones facing the waterfront. in
central sweden, the surface was often built up from
fire-cracked stones. These stone packings seem to have
been continuously added over time as ‘waste products’
from the fireplaces and cooking pits on the platform
where the meals were prepared. The sizes of the plat-
forms are often c. 20–15 m × 15–10 m (Zachrisson
2014b; Petersson 2013b).1
in a few cases, posts, wooden figures, and cairns
could mark the focal point of the ritual sites. Wooden
figures have primarily been found in Jylland, but
examples are also known from southern Norway2
and central sweden (Capelle 1995). Cairns could be
combined with a wooden image and deposited pots.
The cairns had a double function, partly securing the
wooden image, and partly serving as a ‘table’ for depos-
ited objects. The earliest figures are dated to about
500 bce, such as a male phallic wooden figure from
Broddenbjerg east of Viborg in northern Jylland.3
1 a platform at Hassle in Närke is dated to between the sixth
and eighth centuries, and its filling was made up of fire-cracked stones. in the platform were three large postholes, one of them
being 0.80 m in diameter and nearly 1 m deep. These posts were
probably part of the platform as a kind of ritual scene, but it is unknown if they were carved as well (annuswer 2007).
2 in Telemark, two wooden male images, suggesting inverted
trees, were placed in the same swamp Rotjørn upside down, the
head, i.e., root, in the swamp and legs in the air. one of them had a hole for a phallus to be fitted; the other image was phallic with figure 27.2. a wooden figure
marked pubic hair, and two phalluses were found beside them.
from the ritual site at forlev
The figures are dated to 950–60 ce (Dahl 2007: 35–38).
Nymølle in middle Jylland.
3 The image is rather small ( c. 0.9 m), standing on two Drawing: Jørgen Mührman-lund, pointed legs, and is dominated by its erect penis. The face is
Moesgaard Museum, Højbjerg.
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figure 27.3. Two stone heads from Ravlunda in skåne (sHM 16511: 44915 and 16525:44916). Photo: ola Myrin, statens Historiska Museum, stockholm.
Most figures, however, are dated to the period 200 bce–400 ce, but some were used until the late Viking age. some effigies are plank-shaped figures, and they are often androgynous, whereas trunk-shaped figures usually have marked genitalia. Most of these are male with a phallus and an expressive face (Capelle 1995; sanden and Capelle 2001: 9; Dahl 2007: 35–38). The marked sex of many figures indicates that they were connected to fertility rituals, most probably associated with early forms of the vanir gods and goddesses (è40, 43, 45, and 47).
a good example of a small ritual site with a wooden figure and a cairn is a former lake at forlev Nymølle in central Jylland. at the shore of the lake, a three-metres-high, trunk-shaped image of a woman with marked hips and naturally formed female genitalia was placed. it was secured by a stone cairn, on top of which were bundles of flax and a flax club, and around it stood broken pots, crushed bones from cattle, sheep/goat, hare, dog, horse and a human bearded and the right eye is slightly more marked than the left; a line at the neck can mark a neckring. Resin has been smeared at the groin and phallus (sanden and Capelle 2001: 9; Dahl 2007: 49–50).
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shoulder bone, as well as several ski-like stakes of ash, two metres long. These and other objects were spread around several cairns by the lake shore (J. lund 2002; Jensen 2003: 192).
apart from wooden figures, stone heads are known from a few wetland sites, primarily in Jylland. one interesting case is a large boulder found in a bog at Brønderslev in Vendsyssel. The boulder was hewn to form a head with a grim smile and one eye. The boulder was surrounded by masses of pottery from about 200 bce to 200 ce (Becker 1961: 102; friis 1971: 49–50; Ross 1967: pls 1b–1c). The image indicates that the site could have been an early dedication to the god Óðínn.
Ritual sites on dry land have been more difficult to discern, but in recent decades many activities around solid rocks and large boulders as well as on hills covered with stones have been interpreted as religious rituals. a special case on dry land is the newly discovered ritual buildings. some of them seem to have been used exclusively for rituals, whereas others seem to have used ritually only periodically and at other times functioned as the main building in a settlement.
Basically, all kinds of ‘objects’ could be used in rituals, but ritual objects were clearly set apart from ordinary everyday contexts such as settlements and burials. Humans or parts of humans were deposited in wetlands, and sometimes on dry land, throughout the entire iron age ( c. 500 bce– c. 1050 ce), although human remains are fairly unusual in ritual sites. Bones of all types of domesticated animals have been found recurrently at most ritual sites, and in a few cases bones from wild animals have been discovered as well. Pottery, probably originally containing food, and different types of tools made of iron and wood are common deposits during parts of the iron age. Weapons constitute the main part of deposits from c. 350 bce to c. 550, but small amounts of weapons and single weapons have been deposited later as well. a few weapon deposits include whole ships, but smaller boats could be deposited without other objects. gold was rare in ritual deposits, but many gold objects seem to have been deposited during a short period of time, constituting a kind of ‘gold horizon’, in the sixth century. finally, special ritual phenomena in the late iron age (550–1050 ce) were miniatures of mythological figures and other special ritual objects, such as amulet rings of iron.
Many of the different types of ritual ‘objects’ could be deposited at the same places, whereas others were clearly spatially separated. some humans, such as the enigmatic ‘bog bodies’, were deposited separately in different bogs, whereas other human remains were deposited at the same places as animals and weapons. Many weapons seem to have been deposited at ritual sites with older deposits such as pottery or animal remains. The gold objects, however, were
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often deposited at special places, with no earlier or later ritual remains. finally, miniatures and special ritual objects have mostly been found at central places, manors, and places with theophoric placenames.
although there are different ways of defining ritual sites, the classification of different forms of rituals and the sequences of different rites at these places are much more difficult to discern. The main problem is that archaeology always works with final deposits (è6). Consequently, finds at ritual sites could be ‘ritual waste’ from concluding rites, rather than the main rituals per se. it is possible, however, to partly overcome this inherent bias by thoroughly investigating the remains that are actually found. for instance, a single horse skull represents much more than the skull, although no more horse bones might have been discovered. The skull presupposes the killing of a horse, often represented by a visible blow at the skull, and the butchering, distribution, cooking, and eating of horsemeat. in similar ways, collections of destroyed weapons in weapon deposits imply rituals, which included cutting the weapons into pieces, sometimes with the help of fire, collecting them in bundles, and throwing these bundles into the lakes. occasionally, it is also possible to infer something about the type of rituals that took place at certain places. The age of young slaughtered animals may sometimes indicate the season of the rituals and consequently make it feasible to discuss cyclical rituals. in other cases, the dating of specific deposits may show ritual activities at very irregular intervals, such as the weapon deposits, which clearly indicates crisis rituals. at some complex rituals sites, however, such as the central places, several different types of rituals were undoubtedly carried out in the same location.
An Overview of Ritual Places
The following survey will be based on different types of rituals sites, rather than different types of rituals, because the ritual places and the different activities at these places are much more easily to define archaeologically than the rituals themselves. as far as possible, though, indications of different categories of rituals and sequences of rites will be presented. The overview will be confined to ritual space in scandinavian settlements during the iron age ( c. 500 bce–
c. 1050 ce), that is, to the period that is most relevant in relation to written sources about PCRN (è9). general traits as well as temporal changes, regional variation, and social differences in scandinavia will be presented. There will be more examples from southern and eastern scandinavia than from western scandinavia, since ritual sites and rituals have received more attention in Danish and swedish archaeology than in Norwegian and icelandic archaeology.
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figure 27.4. important ritual sites from the iron age in scandinavia.
1 = central place, 2 = weapon deposit, 3 = other ritual site.
Map: Disir Productions, Uppsala, based on draft by anders andrén.
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Ritual Places with Food, Vessels, and Tools
Most ritual sites in small lakes and bogs contained animal bones, and many of them household pottery, containers, drinking vessels, and tools for an agrarian economy. The ritual remains varied, but most of these places were probably connected with cyclical fertility rituals. Domesticated animals, primarily horses and cattle, but also sheep/goats, pigs, and dogs, have often been found in bogs, lakes, and waterholes all over southern scandinavia. The sites are found in Denmark, in southern Norway, and in southern and middle sweden and can be dated to the iron age as a whole (cf. lundholm 1947; strömberg 1961: 83–84; geisslinger 1967: 63; Hagberg 1967b: 69–78; Monikander 2010: 54–76; Carlie 2013; fredengren 2015). further north the situation is less clear, but the tradition of depositing animals in wetlands does not seem to be present there.
The selection of animals in the ritual sites was clearly different from that of ordinary settlements. young or very young animals were preferred, and horses were much more present than in everyday life. an example is a bog at stange by lake Mjøsa in southern Norway, where animal bones were deposited c. 330–
780 ce. around 50 per cent of the bones were from horses, whereas the rest were mainly cattle, but also sheep/goat and pig. Most of the animal bones were extremities, which shows that the other parts of the animals were eaten at communal meals and deposited elsewhere (Bukkemoen 2016). at ordinary settlements, the amount of horse bones was usually low, which shows that there was a striking difference between the animal bones deposited in wetlands and in the ordinary settlements (Vretemark 2013: 53).4 Normally the animal remains tend to be the remains of cooked and consumed meat from gatherings, but in some cases parts of whole animals were deposited as well (Jørgensen and others 2014; Magnell 2019: 312–14). Bones from wild animals were very rare and only occurred at a few sites (cf. strömberg 1961: 84; stjernquist 1973).5
4 When studying how frequent the various species are that were ritually deposited in wetlands in sweden, the horses dominate in shallow lakes and bogs, whereas in wells both horse and cattle occur. smaller animals like pigs, sheep, and goat recurrently occur in wells. Even though there are few sex determinations of the animals chosen, generally mares and bulls/oxen are more often chosen than cows (Magnell 2019: 310).
5 a special form of deposited food remain was the so-called bog butter that occurs sparsely in Norway from the first centuries bce to the fifth and sixth centuries ce. The largest find is a deposit of nearly 1 kg of butter found in a bog in Madla in sola on Jæren. The butter, which was placed in two wooden containers and in an oxen horn, is Carbon-14 dated to 532–620 ce (Næss 1969; fredriksen 1982; figure è8.2). Bog butter is a Western phenomenon, since it has been found in the British isles and in the Netherlands as well. it is debated, however, if bog but-
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other ritual remains are pots, probably containing food, that were placed in bogs and lakes from about 500 bce onward. There are up to four hundred locations in Denmark with deposits of one or more pots, and sometimes they can amount to a hundred (Becker 1971a; Jensen 2003: 189). The tradition was most common in central Jylland during the pre-Roman iron age (500–1 bce), while it was located primarily in northern Jylland during the early Roman iron age (1–200 ce). There are indications, however, that the tradition was more extensive than was previously thought, and it may have continued into the Viking age (Becker 1971a; lund 2002). The tradition of placing pots in bogs was maintained along the coast of western Norway as well, whereas such ritual sites are rare in the eastern parts of Denmark6 and in sweden.
apart from ceramic pots, a few large Celtic cauldrons of bronze or occasionally silver were also deposited in Jylland and fyn in a few places, such as the huge cauldrons from Brå in central Jylland and gundestrup in Himmerland (Jensen 2003: 202–06).7 Roman cauldrons have been deposited in bogs, along the Norwegian coast, and also in central sweden and on gotland (Hauken 2005: 80, 90, 92). one uncommon find is a set of two drinking horns, from about 1 to 200 ce, which has been found in a bog at skrydstrup, in southern Jylland. The horns as well as the mounts were preserved. an analysis of the crusts on the inside of the horns showed that one horn had contained mead made from honey, whereas the other had contained beer made from emmer wheat (grüss 1931: 180ff ); thus the horns were used for different beverages (Brøndsted 1966: 161;è54).8
ter should be regarded as a ritual deposit or if it was only kept in bogs for storage reason (Næss 1969: 245–50).
6 one example is a wetland at Bukkerup on fyn. Here the front- and hindlegs of thirteen oxen, tied together with ropes at tethering poles, were placed next to some fifty pots; a ritual that was upheld for three to four hundred years (adamsen 1994; Jensen 2003: 190–91).
7 foremost amongst the vessels is the famous gundestrup silver cauldron, probably produced c. 150 bce in south-eastern Europe. on the different panels deities from the Celtic world are depicted, as well as a probable sacrificial scene where warriors are sunk head forward into a large vessel. The gundestrup cauldron was destroyed before being placed on the surface of the small, high-lying saucer-bog Rævemosen in Himmerland, around 1 ce. Close by was the rural settlement of Borremose. The village was surrounded by a moat with thousands of pointed oak sticks meant to hinder intruders. it had been a thriving settlement that somewhere around 125
bce was abandoned. This has been viewed in connection with the migration of the tribe of Cimbri that through plunder and warfare became known to Rome and its neighbours in the first century bce (cf. Jensen 2003: 221).
8 a similar division between different beverages may be the background for two famous
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figure 27.5. Plan of Käringsjön in Halland, with ritual deposits along the shorelines.
Point = ceramic vessel; triangle = wooden object; circle around the symbol = object from the third century; square around the symbol = object from the fourth century. after Carlie 2009: 257.
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Connected with food production were ards and shares (cutting parts of ards), which have been deposited in bogs in basically the same western region as the ceramic pots. Complete ards as well as shares for ards have above all been found in bogs in Jylland and Norway. Normally shares are found as singles, but on Karmøy, in western Norway, four ards have been deposited, indicating a grander ritual, or ard depositions repeated several times (Zachrisson 2017b: 692–98). occasionally finds have also been made in sjælland, Halland, and skåne (glob 1951; fleseland 2014; Carlie 2014). on sjælland the shares could be combined with parts of wagons, as in a bog at Jørlunde.
apart from an ard share, about forty wheels have been deposited in a 60 × 8
m large area over a long period of time. as part of the agrarian economy, tools and raw material for textile production were deposited in wetlands as well.
in some rituals sites in Denmark, sweden, and Norway, spindle whorls, as well as bundles of flax, flax seeds, hoops, hemp, and nettles have been found (Halvorsen 2008).
a good example of a complex small ritual site is the well-excavated Käringsjön (‘old woman’s lake’) in southern Halland, dated to about 200–400
ce (arbman 1945; Carlie 1998). The closest settlement name is Älvasjö (in 1569 Elffuessiø, ‘Elf lake’), which might have been the original name of the lake.
The site consists of a round lake, 50 m in diameter, surrounded by ridges on all sides. Close to the lake, fireplaces for cooking have been found. at the shore of the lake there were wooden platforms used as ritual scenes. around the platforms more than two hundred pots, originally containing food9 and possibly drink, were deposited.10 all the pots were locally made, possibly from a settlement 3 km away (stilborg 2009). apart from the the pots, bundles of flax, stones wrapped in bast rope, and various wooden tools were deposited, such as a spade, two rakes, a flail, a trough, and a tether stake. The rituals seem to have taken place in the spring as well as in the autumn (Carlie 1998, 2000, 2009).
all objects deposited in the lake were connected to female work in a traditional agrarian society, which could explain the present name Käringsjön. if Älvasjö gallehus horns from the fifth century. Both were decorated with figures, but only one had a runic inscription (axboe and others 1998; Jensen 2004: 121).
9 at Hulje in Östergötland, large cooking pits were found in a wetland. Macrophossile analyses have shown that not only meat but also grain was part of the ritual food (Heimdahl 2012; Petersson 2013a).
10 five of the pots had holes in the bottom, which would enable the pots to sink, or the food in the pots to sink, as if consumed by the powers of the lake, or as ‘killing holes’ for ritual purposes (arbman 1945: 104–06; Carlie 1998: 21–23; Botwid 2009).
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was the original name of the lake, however, the site can be interpreted as a material expression of a calendrical alfablót, carried out mainly by women (è63).
Ritual Places with Humans, Human Remains, and Bodily Objects
Humans or parts of humans were deposited in wetlands from the Bronze age until the eleventh century ce. in Denmark, and above all in Jylland, more than a hundred bog bodies and whole skeletons have been found, and they are dated between 800 bce and 200 ce. among these finds are the well-preserved Tollund man and grauballe man from central Jylland. generally speaking, more women than men were deposited in wetlands before 1 bce, while more men than women were deposited after 1 ce (Monikander 2010: 89–91; cf. Jensen 2003: 176–86; glob 1965, 1969). for some of the bog bodies, it has been possible to establish the cause of death: these individuals have been either strangled, hanged, or had their throats cut. some of them were naked, while others were fully dressed. The bodies were often carefully positioned in the bog, usually without other surrounding deposits. sometimes the bog bodies were placed in bogs that had been in use earlier for other ritual depositions.11
Parts of humans, such as skulls, were deposited at the same time as the bog bodies and later, down into the eleventh century ce. an example is provided by a bog at Jerslev in Vendsyssel, where pits at the bottom of a bog were filled with six human skulls of young persons, a skull of a dog, and a skull from an older stallion. Pots had also been deposited. The ritual site was in use about 1–150
ce. analyses have shown that the humans were between eighteen and twenty-five years old at the age of death (Wåhlin, Vendsyssel Historiske museum).
another example is a wetland at Hundstrup on south-west sjælland, where remains of twelve humans have been found together with wooden objects, fragments of pots, and a wooden arrow. The humans have been dated to 500–830
ce. Three of the individuals have been analysed to determine whether they were locals or not. The strontium isotope values show that only one young male was local (sjælland), while an eleven- to thirteen-year-old child did not grow up in Denmark, and an old man came from totally different geographical surroundings, with very different isotopic levels. The latter individual is interpreted as a possible slave taken on journeys abroad and later sacrificed (Jørgensen and oth-11 The famous Huldremose peplos dress was thought to have belonged to the bog body of a woman. Carbon-14 datings have shown that the peplos dress dates back to 350–30 bce, while the woman placed a couple of metres away is dated to 350–40 bce (Mannering and others 2009, 2010); despite overlapping dates, the two are considered as separate depositions.
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figure 27.6. The bog body from grauballe in central Jylland, dated to the early third century bce.
Photo: medie Moesgaard, Rógvi N. Johansen, Moesgaard Museum Højbjerg.
ers 2014: 193). in skåne, humans were deposited in springs and bogs until the Viking age (strömberg 1961: 84–85; stjernquist 1997, 2001).12
in central sweden, humans seem to have been deposited in wetlands already in the early Bronze age, and the tradition continued into the Viking age. apart from lakes and bogs, several humans were also deposited in rivers, such as Äverstaån in Närke, fyrisån in Uppland, and Motala ström in Östergötland (Petersson 2013b; fredengren 2015). on the islands of Öland and gotland, humans were deposited in wetlands during the iron age. at the former lake of skedemosse huge amounts of animals were deposited, but also remains of thirty-eight humans, dating from about 400 bce to about 1050 ce. They represent old men and women as well as children and young adults (Monikander 12 at Röekillorna (‘the red springs’) in south-eastern skåne, rituals took place around a wooden phallus and a wooden image of a face. animal bones and objects were deposited from the Neolithic until about 200 ce. in addition, some humans were thrown into the spring. one man had received a severe blow to the skull. Thereafter the skull was smashed and the parts were spread over the site. Parts of the long bones were also broken and spread out, and afterwards gnawed by dogs (Møhl 1997: 126–27; stjernquist 1997).
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
figure 27.7. Excavation of deposited human bones at alken Enge, in central Jylland, from the early first century ce. Photo: Ejvind Hertz, Museum skanderborg.
2010: 77–91). on central gotland, skulls from the Viking age have been found in a bog close to the gotlandic general assembly at Roma (Thunmark-Nylén 1995–2006: iii, 460; see below).
in Norway, preserved skeletons have been found in lakes and bogs from Jæren in Rogaland in the south to Nord-Trøndelag and Nordland in the north (sellevold 2011; Henriksen and sylvester 2007). They have been dated from the sixth century bce through the eleventh century ce. The five oldest skeletons, of both men and women, belonging to the period 500–1 bce, come from lakes in Hedmark. None of the skeletons had marks of violence, but one was found together with a rope, indicating that the person was killed by hanging (Resi 2011). one was a man of higher stature than normal at that time.
He was between thirty and forty years old, was well nourished, and was not used to hard physical labour. in contrast, another man of the same age had been exposed to illness or famine as a small child (sellevold 2011).13
13 Unique is the find of four, perhaps five crania from infants dated to the period 90/120–
410/30 ce found in a bog located on marginal land belonging to one of the most prosper-
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The interpretation of the bog bodies, skeletons, and other human remains is disputed, and the background of human deposits was undoubtedly varied.
a few isotope analyses indicate the individuals killed were non-locals. some could have been punished, and others could have been sacrificed, for instance, as prisoners of war or as hostages. it is difficult, however, to find much evidence of sacrificed prisoners of wars among the old men, old women, and children.
instead, many could have been part of cyclical rituals, crisis rituals, or divinations concerned with the well-being of larger groups of people.
The only clear example of human deposits related to warfare is a unique find at the bog alken Enge, formerly a calm inner lagoon of lake Mossø in central Jylland (Holst and others 2016, Holst and others 2018). Remains of about two hundred men14 — many with wounds — between thirteen and forty-five years old have been found, dating from about 1 ce. Most of them seem not to have been trained and were inexperienced warriors. The human remains were dismembered and collected in different groups: for example, pelvic bones of four different men collected on one stick. Most of the skulls were fractured, and crushed on purpose, while still fresh. it is plausible that the men died at a battlefield, and that the decomposed remains were later picked up and brought to the site. The deposits at alken Enge were clearly parts of crisis rituals. Pots and animal bones were also deposited at alken Enge, which shows that the site was a ritual place for a long time.
a special form of deposited human remains was human hair, sometimes plaited, probably from women. such deposited bundles of hair have been found in several wetlands in northern Jylland and at frøya in sør-Trøndelag. They have been dated to about 400–200 bce (ingstad 1961: 33; Halvorsen 2008: 68; Ebbesen 2008). Normally they are believed to represent a single woman’s coiffure and are interpreted as belonging to passage rituals (Ebbesen 2008: 82).
But recently the cut-off plaits have been viewed as traces of humiliating acts connected to the taking of hostages (Randsborg 2015: 14).
Wetland sites in scandinavia have also yielded objects connected to the human body. several deposits of clothes and textile production date to the period 500 bce–200 ce. The finds consist of pieces of fabric or garments such ous farms, Bø, ‘the outmost farm’, in Hå on Jæren, southern Norway. The body parts had been placed in the swelling Tviodlo, two natural springs in a bog situated where the fertile plain changes into hilly landscape. The infants were not accompanied by adults or material objects.
The crania from the children may have been placed there in repetitive rituals (sellevold and Næss 1991; lillehammer 2011; sellevold 2011; Zachrisson 2017b).
14 osteological analyses show that only 5 per cent were women (Holst and others 2016).
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
as a peplos dress, a cloak, a carpet with
fringe, and a mantle. They could pos-
sible be connected to passage rituals.15
other objects related to the body, such
as neckrings, arm rings, finger rings,
brooches, bracteates, and beads, have
been deposited in wetlands as well.
in the period 500–1 bce about 80
per cent of all neckrings of bronze in
Denmark were deposited in wetlands
(Hedeager 1999: 237). Many arm-
rings and neckrings of gold from about
200 to 550 ce in scandinavia have
also ended up in wetlands (andersson
2011: 94–107). During the sixth cen-
tury, brooches in combination with
beads, bracteates, gold coins, and fin-
ger rings were placed in bogs in Jylland
and sjælland (geisslinger 1967: 47–48,
50). Neckrings of bronze could also
be deposited in wetlands in the period
550–800. Many of these finds have been
interpreted as possible female offerings
(geisslinger 1967: 113–14). it is also
possible that some of them were part of
15 a unique find from Tegle in Time on
Jæren, dated to the sixth century, consists of
a woollen bag with fragments of textiles, rep-
resenting different weaving technics, such as
tabby, twill, tablet weaving, and plaited/net-
ted work. The bag also contained a ball of yarn,
loose yarn, unspun wool, and a bone needle.
Two twisted cords 30–35 cm long are probably
human hair. The deposition was supposedly
made by a young and inexperienced woman,
because the yarn was unevenly spun and small
figure 27.8. Roman bronze figure
pieces of textile could represent work samples
from lake fysingen in Uppland (sHM
(Halvorsen 2008: 31, 64–65, table 1). Conse-
7414). Photo: Jan Eve olsson, statens
quently, the deposit could have been part of a
Historiska Museum, stockholm.
passage ritual for a young woman.
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689
complex burials, representing objects that were not put into a formal grave. in this case, the bodily objects could have been part of passage rituals.16
finally, images of human figures could also be deposited in lakes and bogs.
These could be imported Roman bronze statuettes of gods, goddesses, and house deities ( lares), or locally manufactured bronze figures. These statuettes could have been used as representations of different gods and goddesses in the wetlands. lakes and bogs, however, could also have been regarded as sites of suitable final depositions for such figures. one example is a figure of a Roman house deity, carrying a sacrificial bowl in his outstretched hand, which was deposited in lake fysingen in Uppland (andersson 2013: 50–51). an example of a local bronze figure, possibly a deity, was found in a bog at Norra Möinge in skåne. The man is dressed in a short tunic, wearing a neckring of a type from about 200 bce to 200 ce (arne 1909: 183). a hole indicates that the figure once had been phallic.17
Rituals with Weapons
large deposits of destroyed weapons, interpreted as war booties, have been found in bogs and former shallow lakes in Denmark and southern sweden, but not in Norway and iceland. about fifty different deposits are known from somewhat fewer than thirty places, dating from about 350 bce to about 600
ce. This means that several different deposits could be carried out at irregular intervals at the same place. Complete weapon deposits, representing war booties of fully equipped armies, have only been found in a few places, in about 350 bce and from about 200 ce to the late fourth century or about 400 ce.
Extensive but not complete weapon deposits have been discovered in several locations from the first century ce to about 475 ce. selected smaller deposits comprising mostly weapons can be dated from about 1 ce to about 600 ce (Nørgård Jørgensen 2009).
The oldest war booty, from about 350 bce, has been found in a bog at Hjortspring on the island of als. The find consisted of a war canoe for a crew of twenty-four men. apart from the boat there were weapon sets consisting of 16 interestingly, objects associated with men seem more often to have been deposited in moving waters such as rivers, streams, and lakes, while objects associated with women more often in stagnant waters as in some lakes, bogs, and marshes (andrén 2002: 317).
17 other indigenous bronze statuettes, probably representing local male deities, are found on fyn and Öland; two islands with marked Roman influences (andersson 2013: 98–102).
The find contexts of these bronze figures, however, are in many cases uncertain.
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
figure 27.9. Destroyed weapons and other equipment from the former lake at illerup.
Photo: Moesgaard Museum, Højbjerg.
equipment for about ten officers and eighty enlisted men, enough to accommodate four or five such war canoes (Kaul 1988; Randsborg 1995). Three large boats were also deposited with substantial numbers of weapons at different occasions in the bog at Nydam in sundeved, just opposite als. These boats were deposited in the early third century, the early fourth century, and about 350
(Vang Petersen 1988, 1995; Jørgensen and Petersen 2003; Rau 2010; Rieck and others 2013). although there was a long time-span between Hjortspring and Nydam, it seems that a local tradition of depositing boats with weapons was maintained in this region, because it is not known anywhere else.
other large weapon deposits have been found at Thorsbjerg in angeln (Engelhardt 1863) and Ejsbøl outside Haderslev, both in southern Jylland (ørnes 1988; Nørgård Jørgensen and andersen 2014); at illerup in central Jylland (ilkjær 1993, 1994, 2000; Carnap Bornheim and ilkjær 1996); at Kragehul on western fyn (iversen 2010), at Vimose on northern fyn (Jensen
27 – Ritual Space
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2008); at skedemosse on Öland (see below); and at finnestorp in southern Västergötland (Nordqvist 2007a, 2007b; Vretemark 2013). one of the largest deposits was made at illerup in the beginning of the third century. Roughly ten thousand weapons (spears, lances, arrows, swords, shields, and riding equipment) have been found. The deposit may represent a defeated army of an estimated two or three thousand men (ilkjær 2000). apart from weapons, additional booties also include male clothes, combs, strike-a-lights, different tools, and surgical instruments.
several weapon deposits occurred at places with other ritual remains that were older, as well as younger, than the war booties. one example is Vimose on fyn, where animals, humans, food pots, and jewellery, from different periods, bear witness to a long-term use of the bog. another example is skedemosse on Öland, where animals and humans were deposited before as well as after the weapons. This mixture of different types of deposits indicates that the war booties were deposited at already well-established ritual sites. Therefore, the weapon deposits should be regarded as ritual sites to which the weapons were brought after a war, rather than signifying battlefields close by. in that sense the weapon deposits can be regarded as scandinavian parallels to Roman triumphs, where spoils were brought to central sanctuaries, often far away from the battle fields.18
The rituals connected to the weapon deposits were focused on the destruction of the weapons and of their fighting efficiency. Wooden handles of spears and lances as well as wooden shields were cut to pieces, and spearheads, lance heads, and swords could be bent or cut to pieces, sometimes with the help of fire. The higher the value of the weapon, the heavier was the destruction. Top military personal equipment of silver and bronze for ‘commanders’ or ‘officers’ was exposed to particularly violent destruction, which shows that objects were perceived as having agency (Nørgård Jørgensen 2011). axes seem often to have been the preferred cultic tool (Dobat 2006). fragments from different 18 analyses of the weapon chronology and the soldiers’ personal equipment at illerup have revealed the provenience of the armies and thus the geographical areas whence the objects derive. These analyses show that the fallen troops originated from western Norway and sweden, as well as the Baltic region. This has been interpreted as meaning that the defeated enemies were killed in battles in the vicinity of the sacrificial lakes (ilkjær 1994: 21; ilkjær 2000; fabech 2009). other scholars have argued against this position and suggested instead that the war-booty offerings can be viewed as conquered victory goods carried home (Jørgensen 2001: 14–16; andrén 2014: 93–95; cf. Herschend 2003) equivalent of Roman triumphs, where war booty was carried home and used in the important victory processions, and thereafter sacrificed to the gods at the capitol (lund 2003; Östenberg 2009).
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
figure 27.10. an exquisite Viking age sword,
with a gilded sword-hilt, deposited at Dybäck in
skåne (sHM 4515:108809). Photo: Ulf Bruxe,
statens Historiska Museum, stockholm.
destroyed weapons were collected
in bundles with ropes or cloths
and thrown into the shallow lakes
(ilkjær 2000; Jørgensen and oth-
ers 2003). apart from weapons,
horses could also be deposited.
in some cases, horses were ritu-
ally killed in two ways simultane-
ously: with a sword on one side
and a spear on the other (Rau
forthcoming). White stones were
thrown into some of the lakes,
presumably by the participants
(ørsnes 1959: 107; Nørgård
Jørgensen 2011: 312). in a few
cases, runes were inscribed on the
destroyed objects. at Kragehul on
fyn, for example, a complicated
runic inscription is carved on a destroyed spear handle: ‘i ansugisl’s eril called Muha. i give luck, gagaga. Hail i consecrate the spear’ (DR 196, Samnordisk runtextdatabas; Hultgård 1984: 69; Hultgård 1998b; sundqvist 2007: 200–
05). Behind such inscriptions could be ritual specialists (è29). The complex rituals around the war booties clearly indicate crisis rituals carried out mainly by men in connection with warfare, above all sacrifices of gratitude to a war god after a successful battle (cf. lund Hansen 2003).
although the interpretation of the weapon deposits is fairly straightforward, they nevertheless represent an enigma. There are no indications in the extant scandinavian written sources of rituals with mass destruction of weapons, and the sites with weapon deposits do not stand out in respect to placenames, apart from a few indications.19 This means that the weapon deposits represent rituals that disappeared so early that not even faint echoes survived into the later written sources. The only written account that can be related to 19 Very few of the locations with weapon deposits seem to have sacral names, but two possible exceptions are Thorsbjerg in angeln and Vimose (allese mose) on fyn (Jensen 2008).
27 – Ritual Space
693
the weapon deposits is orosius’s description from the fifth century ce (based on earlier sources) of the rituals carried out by the Cimbri after their victory in 105 bce over a Roman army at arausio (orange) in southern france: hostes binis castris atque ingenti praeda potiti noua quadam atque insolita exsecra-tione cuncta quae ceperant pessum dederunt; uestis discissa et proiecta est, aurum argentumque in flumen abiectum, loricae uirorum concisae, phalerae equorum disperditae, equi ipsi gurgitibus inmersi, homines laqueis collo inditis ex arboribus suspensi sunt, ita ut nihil praedae uictor, nihil misericordiae uictus adgnosceret.
( Historia adversus Paganos 5.16)
(Having gained possession of both camps and of a huge amount of booty, the enemy seemed driven by some strange and unusual animus. They completely destroyed everything they had captured; clothing was cut to pieces and strewn about, gold and silver were thrown into the river, the breastplates of the men were hacked to pieces, the trappings of the horses were ruined, the horses themselves were drowned in whirlpools, and men, with nooses fastened around their necks, were hanged from trees. Thus the conqueror realized no booty, while the conquered obtained no mercy.)
single weapons continued to be deposited during the late iron age (550–1050
ce) in scandinavia, but usually new sites were chosen, and the weapons were normally not destroyed (geisslinger 1967: 107). in many cases very exquisite swords, with gilded hilts and pommels, sometimes with inlaid precious stones, were involved (androshchuk 2014). in Viking age Denmark about 140 finds of weapons are known, which have been deposited in water, often near communicative spots in the landscape such as bridges, fords, and seashores (lund 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007). scabbards, lances, and axes were placed in wetlands in Viking age skåne as well (strömberg 1961: 85), and swords and axes were deposited in water in Västergötland and Värmland (Widéen 1955: 61–65), while axes were placed in a river in södermanland (Zachrisson 2004c), and swords, spears, and axes in the river fyris, Uppland (ljungkvist 2006: 173–77).20
in some cases, several weapons were placed in lakes, bogs, and waterholes in the Viking age, such as Råbelövssjön in Vetland in skåne, gudingsåkrarna 20 The ford Hyndevadet in western södermanland was used repeatedly from the late Neolithic to the Middle ages for depositions of mainly stone, bronze, and iron axes, strike-a-lights, and jewellery. Close by the ford there was a dramatic rapid, which seasonally could be very powerful (Zachrisson 2004c). Weapons and weapon miniatures were probably deposited recurrently in the Viking age harbour area close to the royal manor at the fyris river-mouth (ljungkvist 2006: 175–77). Remains of humans were also deposited; some contemporary with the weapons (fredengren 2015: 169–71).
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
on gotland, and Tissø on sjælland21 (strömberg 1961: 83–86; lund 2009: 77–79, 82–83; Thunmark-Nylén 1995–2006: iii, 460; Holst and others 2017: 162). in these cases of single weapons or small amounts of weapons, the rites were probably not related to crisis rituals but rather to passage rituals, such as initiations, burials, or final depositions of special objects, with certain histories (lund 2009; androshchuk 2002).
Deposits of Boats
in Norway and central sweden there were no war booties, but instead several deposits of ships in wetlands. Boats or parts of boats like oars or oarlocks occur in wetlands and were an important part of the ritual traditions along the entire western coast of Norway from c. 200–1050 ce (Müller-Wille 1970; Nordeide 2011a: 250, map 12; shetelig and Johannessen 1929: 34–56). This tradition might have started earlier, since parts of a boat from the late pre-Roman iron age resembling the Hjortspring boat type have been found in Haugvik on the Helgeland coast (sylvester 2009: 54, 59). at Kvalsund in Møre and Romsdal a ship from about 620–760 was metriculously destroyed and deposited in small pieces together with hazel rods, sticks of young deciduous trees, and nettle (shetelig and Johannessen 1929).22 at other places, stones as large as a fist, often of white colour of quartzite, chalk, or flint, were thrown from the shore, as in the depositions from the fifth and sixth centuries at Bårdset in Norway (gjessing 1941; cf. g. larsson 2007: 251). Presumably the pointed sticks and 21 at gudingsåkrarna, in the parish of Vallstena, around a thousand iron objects have been found, among them 225 spearheads, some swords, an axe, as well as some horse harnesses, and some female and male brooches, tools, weights, and iron slag. The finds were concentrated in a 200 × 100 large area around a water hole, and a stone-paved road ran through the site. The weapons were not placed randomly, but along certain stretches of the ground. south-west of the water hole eight large spearheads were placed in a ring with the points downwards. The weapons have been dated mainly to c. 750–1000 ce, but a few weapons belong to the period 400–750 as well as to the eleventh century (stenberger 1943; Thålin-Bergman 1986: 263–64; Thunmark-Nylén 1995–2006: iii, 460).
22 ‘ikke et eneste spant er helt, kjøl og stevn brukket, årene knekket, klædningen flekket op så ikke noget sted to bord fantes sammenhengende som de hadde sittet i fartøiet. Bara roret og et par av årene er hele, ellers er hvert stykke mishandlet. Vi møter en gjennemført ødeleggelse…
…stykkene er knekket og brukket med vold, et arbeide som må ha krevet adskillig strev…’ (Not a single rib is complete, keel and stern broken, oars are cracked, the lining is torn to pieces. only the rudder and a pair of oars are complete, otherwise every piece is abused. We meet a consistent destruction… …the pieces are broken by violence; works that must have cost great strive …’) (shetelig and Johannessen 1929: 34).
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figure 27.11. Remains of a boat deposited at Kvalsund in Møre and Romsdal.
Photo: Universitetsmuseet, Bergen.
the stones indirectly point to spectators taking part in the rituals. Boat deposits are also known in central sweden. in gästrikland, the small lake igeltjärn was virtually filled with about twenty deposited boats (Zachrisson 2014b: 98–100; g. larsson 2007: 244).
A Golden Horizon
in the sixth century many deposits of gold, some of them huge, were put in wetlands and on dry land. The gold deposits include one or many gold coins, gold bracteates, gold rings, gold collars, sword parts, as well as so called gold currency rings, and gold ingots (axboe 1999b; Hedeager 2003; Resi 2005). Usually, the gold deposits are single events, without any earlier or later deposits in the same places. on fyn, the largest gold deposits in Denmark were placed around the central place of gudme (Thrane 1998a, 1998b). in skåne, the heaviest golden neckring was deposited close to the central place Uppåkra (strömberg 1963: 77), and six gold bracteates were deposited at Kläggeröd, the highest point in south west skåne, where three medieval hundreds later met (l. larsson 2015: 113).
at söderby in southern Uppland several gold bracteates were deposited, after the images on the largest bracteate were ritually ‘killed ‘by being cut with a knife and having its loop slit off, and the whole piece finally crumbled up (lamm and others 1999). Three outstanding gold collars with anthropo-morphic and zoomorphic figures (horses, boars, birds, serpents/lizards) were
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
figure 27.12. gold collar
deposited at Ålleberg in
Västergötland (sHM
492:108861). Photo: sören
Hallgren, statens Historiska
Museum, stockholm.
deposited as singles on Öland and in Västergötland. They could have functioned as regalia of secular or sacral elites (Holmqvist 1980: 99–100; Pesch 2015: 668). The gold collar from färjestaden on Öland was deposited close to the shores of Kalmarsund, while the gold collar from Ålleberg in Västgötland was found among stone slabs below a scree at the northern end of the hill.23
in södermanland, at Tuna in Västerljung, a large golden neckring and several golden mounts were placed, and in other parts of central sweden, several gold objects were deposited close to hillforts (andersson 2011: 178–29; for depositions at hillforts; Zachrisson 2017b: 705; olausson 2007, 2008).
The background of these gold deposits is disputed. some regard them as hidden hoards of precious metal, whereas others see them as responses to fundamental crisis in the middle of the sixth century. Climatic hardships (Büntgen and others 2016; axboe 1999b; B. gräslund 2008; gräslund and Price 2012) hit globally, resulting in crop failure, possible famine, and death, that struck at the same time as the Justinian bubonic plague affected parts of Europe (frankopan 2015: ch. 4). at the same time the power structures and networks in many parts of Europe changed. Consequently, the gold deposits may have been desperate crisis rituals at a time when demography, economy, and politics suddenly changed.24 one of the consequences of the mid-sixth century crisis 23 Much later oral traditions at this place indicate some knowledge of gold deposits. The scree was regarded as a symbolic gate, that suddenly could open and reveal a whole army of sleeping warriors in gilded helmets, as well as horses equipped in silver and gold (cf. Klintberg 2010: 391).
24 a special case is a goldsmith’s hoard, deposited in the middle of the sixth century at syre on Karmøy at the westcoast of Norway. The objects have been wrapped up in something, pos-
27 – Ritual Space
697
was that gudme disappeared as a central place (è19). The many gold deposits around this site could thus be an illustration of how the leading groups in gudme actively tried to handle the crisis.
**Central Places **
Central places were large and stable settlements, with thick cultural deposits and extremely rich material culture. They existed between the second century bce and the eleventh century ce, although many of them emerged in the second and third as well as the sixth centuries ce (è19). The material culture consists of numerous imports and remains of craft production, and therefore the central places are understood as hubs for both local and long distance networks and trade. There are usually strong Roman influences on the material culture ( Jørgensen 2011), such as signs of the consumption of bread and the use of surgical instruments for healing cuts and wounds, and Roman glass and sometimes unique bronzes together with many Roman silver and gold coins. Many of these traits and the organisation of the central places as such indicate that they could have been established by returning individuals who had been mercenaries serving in imperial bodyguards in the Roman Empire or had belonged in its auxilia-troops (lund Hansen 2001b; frölich 2010, 2011; Jørgensen 2011; andersson 2013: 59–79; Zachrisson forthcoming).
Many different rituals were carried out at the central places, and the clearest ritual remains have been found in and around Uppåkra, Helgö, Tissø, and gamla Uppsala. Uppåkra, in south-west skåne, was established as a central place in the second century bce and was contemporary with the late Celtic oppida in Central Europe (lund Hansen 2001b: 83; è19). it is therefore interesting that male violence comparable to that of Celtic oppidas have been found in the surroundings of Uppåkra (cf. Magnusson staaf 2003). Within a 10 km radius from Uppåkra, wetlands have yielded seven to eight depositions of skulls dated to the period 500–1 bce. The skulls were all from adult men, whose heads had been exposed to blunt force trauma and cuts (fredengren 2018).25
sibly cloth, and placed on a layer of white quartz stones. This single but meticulous ritual was probably performed as a crisis ritual, but perhaps also as a closing ritual for a craft with direct religious implications. The contexts of the craft changed dramatically, since for many generations afterwards gold objects were not deposited in the region (Kristoffersen 2012: 172–74; Zachrisson 2017b: 706).
25 Especially one bog, gullåkra mosse just east of Uppåkra, shows a long-term use, with a deposited bronze horn from the mid-Bronze age near a wooden construction in the bog, an
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Torun Zachrisson and Anders Andrén
figure 27.13. Plan of the ritual
building at Uppåkra with
distribution of gold foil figures
and a tentative reconstruction
of the house. The beaker (lUHM
31251:1522) and the glass bowl
(lUHM 31251:1523) were found
together inside the building.
illustration: loïc lecareux.
Plan after Watt 2004: 169.
Photo: Bengt almgren,
Historiska museet vid
lunds universitet, lund.
27 – Ritual Space
699
in the central part of Uppåkra, there were several hall buildings26 and an excellently preserved ritual building. it was rebuilt at exactly the same spot seven times between c. 200 and 950 ce. The building was 13.5 × 6 m large, heavily built with large roof pillars that indicated that it had been a very tall building. The hall had two entrances in the south and one in the north. a large door ring probably marked the main gate at the south-western entrance.
a unique silver beaker with ornamented gilded panels in animal style and a blue glass vessel, which date to about 450–500 ce, imply ritual drinking probably formalized at the latest during this period.27 These objects were thereafter used until the late Viking age, when they were ritually ‘buried’ in the floor of the house. Crucibles and slag were found in the floor levels of the building from the Migration Period, and traces of gold from the manufacturing of gold-foil figures from the Merovingian period (larsson 2004; larsson and lenntorp 2004: 7, 18, 31; Kresten and others 2001: 163–64; axboe 2012: 129). These gold foil figures, approximately 100 in number, were concentrated around the north-western posthole, where a high seat probably stood. The ritual building has been compared to contemporary temples in the Roman world (andrén 2004b; andrén 2007: 31; larsson 2006b; larsson 2016: 147).
The ritual building was surrounded by thick deposits of unburnt animal bones, which must have shone white to anyone approaching the house. The animal bones were mainly from cattle, sheep, and pigs, but were dominated by cattle bones cut into portion pieces — remains of meat that had been cooked in vessels. age determination of the animal bones indicates slaughtering all year round, but primarily in the late summer and early autumn (Magnell 2011).
isotope analysis indicates that animals were brought from the surroundings to enable the large-scale feasting. The bones from inside the building consist of a large proportion of fowl and fish from the coast. The bones from the post-hole fillings were dominated by pig bones (60 per cent) of pigs from only days old up until six months, of a breed that was large sized and had a boar-like look (Magnell 2011, 2013; Jennbert 2011: 96–98). The specific selection of animal bones inside the ritual building indicates that luxury consumption took place axe and sword from the late Bronze age, and a la Tène torques neckring. in the Migration Period when the central place was functioning, spears were still deposited (stjernquist 1996; stjernquist 1998: 176; stjernquist 2001: 13ff; fredengren 2018).
26 for halls in general, see Herschend (1993, 1999).
27 The different forms of the two drinking vessels at Uppåkra (Hårdh 2004) indicate that they were used for different beverages, possibly ale and mead respectively, as was the case with the two drinking horns from skrydstrup (see above).
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figure 27.14. Plan of the central part of Helgö, building group 2, including the main hall and distribution of ritual deposits.
illustration: lars Jørgensen/Pre-Christian Cultsites, Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen.
there, such as banquets for the chosen. among the animal bones outside the building, there were also human bones, some of which had been gnawed by dogs while relatively ‘fresh’, while others had been trampled. at the periphery of the cover of animal bones, there were also deposits of over three hundred weapons, north, west, and south of the ritual building. These weapons include spears and lances and a gilded eyebrow of a parade helmet (Helgesson 2004: 226; Helgesson 2010: 108; figure è23.2).
The finds in and around the ritual building at Uppåkra indicate different complex rituals that included slaughtering, butchering, cooking, and eating of meat, fowl, and fish as well as drinking of mead and ale, probably in connection with cyclical rituals and recurrent gatherings and assemblies. some humans were also killed and cut apart, possibly in relation to weapon deposits and crisis rituals after victories in warfare. The gold foil figures, finally, indicate passage rituals of the elite groups that dominated the place (cf. stolt 2001).
at Helgö, in southern Uppland, the settlement started around 200 ce (è19). several generations of halls seem to have been used periodically for rituals. in a late phase of the building, gold foil figures have been found as well
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figure 27.15. Plan of the central part of Tissø during phase 2
(primarily from the eighth and possibly from the beginning
of the ninth century), including the main hall and the ritual
building within an enclosure. illustration: lars Jørgensen/
Pre-Christian Cultsites, Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen.
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as different types of exotica, such as a Buddha statuette from Pakistan, a bronze spoon from the Mediterranean, an irish crozier, and silver plates. The main rituals, however, seem to have taken place at the foot of a bare rock immediately east of the hall. stone constructions, perhaps functioning as altars, were found on all sides of the bare rock. iron amulet rings and a charred ditch and traces of postholes seem to have separated the open-air ritual site from the hall buildings. The charred ditch could represent the remains of repeated fires, and the amulet rings may have been fastened to a fence that enclosed the ritual site (Zachrisson 2004a: 352–75; Zachrisson 2004b:146–58; Zachrisson 2011a: 79; Jørgensen 2009: 329–54; synthesized in Clarke and lamm 2017: 60–63).
on a shelf below the rock, animal bones and objects were placed around a post in thick deposits from about 200 to 850 ce. about every hundred years or so the site was ‘renewed’, when clay was carried up to the shelf and evened out and covered over the older deposits. The clay was in itself clean and contained no finds. Between the clay layers, animal bones were deposited, mostly unburned, cleaved, and some with slaughtering marks. They were mainly from cattle, pigs, and sheep. Crania were prominent at the site (stolle forthcoming; olson 2004: 24). fragments of rotary querns together with seventy pieces of bread and the remains of clay linings for ovens were deposited in the different layers (Bergström 2007: 41–43). Throughout the deposits was an extensive amount of ceramics, probably repeated food offerings; the pots seemed to have been thrown against the bare rock (Zachrisson 2004a: 355; Zachrisson 2004b: 148; Zachrisson 2011a: 79–80). The animal bones, bread, and ceramics were deposited recurrently, as well as surgical instruments, but other deposited objects were only deposited in certain period.28 When the rituals stopped, a three-pointed stone setting was placed on top of the ritual deposits as a lid covering the depositions that had been formed during the previous six hundred years.29 The rituals that took place at Helgö could have been cyclical rituals 28 During the period c. 200–400 ce, dress accessories, beads, shears, knives, and birch-bark cakes were placed there. around 500 to 600 ce knives were still deposited, but now accompanied by numerous iron objects, such as nails, tongs, various tools, mounts, iron, rods, beads, and crucibles from metal working. in the top layers, dating to c. 700–850 ce, many iron objects continued to be deposited, such as arrows, spikes, and Þórr’s hammers, shears and arrows, but also amulet iron rings, mounts, iron bars, rods, rivets, nails, beads, and amber. old gold and silver objects, as some kind of antiquities, from the Migration Period were also placed in the top layer (lundström 1970: 155, 159; Zachrisson 2004a: 353–54; Zachrisson 2004b: 147–48).
29 along the eastern side of the three-pointed stone setting were five small pits with burnt objects. in the points of the stone setting there was an arabic silver coin, minted in 819 ce, and wheel-turned pottery from frankia (Holmqvist 1964: 57; arrhenius 1964: 278–79).
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including eating and drinking, but also passage rituals connected to humans as well as to production of different objects.
Tissø on western sjælland functioned as a central place about 600–1050 ce (è19). The entire area covered an estimated 500,000 sq m, but only about 20 per cent of the area has been excavated. The buildings and material culture show that it belonged to the highest strata of central places, presumably royally founded.
The first central building complex functioned until 700 ce, when it was burnt down, and then it was moved 600 m to the south, where it stood until 1050. in the different phases, the main hall of the site was in the south-west combined with a smaller fenced area, and inside this area stood a small building. This small building has been interpreted as a ritual house, and it was rebuilt several times. in one phase from about 850 to 950 it was a square building, with four freestanding posts in the interior, resembling preserved Norwegian stave churches (Jørgensen 1998, 2002, 2009, 2010; Holst and others 2017: 89). in the fenced area around the ritual building, traces of iron production as well as miniatures with mythological motifs have been found. Very similar layouts, of a huge hall combined with a fenced area surrounding a small building, have been discovered at lejre on sjælland (Christensen 1991; Christensen and others 2015, figure è31) as well as at Järrestad in skåne (söderberg 2005: 192–97, 277).
apart from the ritual building and the surrounding fenced area, rituals took place at other locations at Tissø as well. in waterholes in the southern part of the settlement, skulls of young animals, primarily pigs, were deposited (Jørgensen and others 2014; Holst and others 2017), and west of the ritual building horses were placed in a bog. Jewellery and numerous weapons were deposited east of the ritual building, at the shores of lake Tissø. and at the south end of the settlement, a sword, a huge gold neckring, and decapitated humans have been found (Jørgensen 2009; Jørgensen and others 2014; Holst and others 2017).
The ritual remains at Tissø suggest cyclical rituals, passage rituals connected to the elite groups that dominated the place, as well as crisis rituals having to do with warfare. The decapitated humans could represent capital punishment.
The oldest remains at gamla Uppsala are dated to about 200 ce, but the location became an important central place only in the fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries ce (è19). gamla Uppsala is well known from adam of Bremen’s description of the rituals there (è25), but paradoxically very little of these rituals has been confirmed through archaeology. instead, recent excavations have primarily uncovered the complex scenes of such rituals. from the fifth century, gamla Uppsala began to be dominated by different large monuments. Huge halls were placed on two or three terraces, probably representing the original Upsalir (Duczko 1996; ljungkvist 2013; sundqvist 2016: 124–27, 208).
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figure 27.16. Plan of gamla Uppsala, including grave mounds, house terraces, ritual roads, ordinary settlement, and minor burial grounds. Hall = hall, gård = farm, Möjlig gård = possible farm, Bebyggelseyta = settlement area, gravfält = burial ground, Kungshögarna = the royal mounds, Känd gräns för bebyggelsen = known boundary of the settlement, Marknadsplats =
market place, förundersökningsområde utan bebyggelse = Excavation area without settlement traces, stolprad = alignment of wooden posts. after Beronius Jörpeland and others 2017: 360.
a main hall from about 600 to 800 has been excavated. it was 60 × 10 m, with white-coloured walls, huge doorways decorated with iron spirals, and a long fireplace (ljungqvist and frölund 2015: 11–13, 26). Remains of two older halls, however, have been traced below the investigated hall. The oldest hall is dated to the fifth century. These halls may have been predecessors of the ‘temple’ or ‘triclinium’ mentioned by adam (cf. Dillmann 1997: 65–69, 72).
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south-west of the main halls, four enormous grave mounds were erected as well as a possible thing mound from about 600. into this central area, a ritual road was constructed in a straight line running 900 m north to south, with huge wooden posts along the western side of the road. as a border to the south was another ritual road built in a straight line running 500 m east to west, with huge wooden posts along the north side and fireplaces along the south side.
The straight roads indicate different processions in cyclical and passage rituals, inside as well as around gamla Uppsala, with associations to the story of gunnarr helmingr (è25; Nygaard and Murphy 2017).30
The only traces of rituals at gamla Uppsala are animal deposits in some wells and abandoned pit houses. age determinations of the animal bones indicate that the deposits were made in March (seiler and Magnell 2017), which coincides with the written sources describing calendrical rituals at the dísablót (Nordberg 2006a: 156; sundqvist 2002: 186–93; è28). around the central part of gamla Uppsala, ordinary settlement with workshops and smaller burial grounds were situated. at one of the eastern burial grounds, small amulet rings were deposited that seem to have been manufactured in the gamla Uppsala workshops. analysis shows that they were made of ‘low quality iron’ and seem to have been produced solely as ritual objects (Englund and Hjärthner-Holdar 2017).
Effigies of divine figures are mentioned in the ‘temple’ of gamla Uppsala, which means that halls have housed such figures of gods and goddesses. a possible example of such an effigy is a wooden figure found in a bog at Rude Eskildstrup on northern sjælland. The figure depicts a sitting man in a robe or gown, who is folding his hands around an object in his lap that is not identifiable. around his neck he is wearing a gold collar of a type from the late fifth cen-30 linear monuments are also known from a handful of other places. at Badelunda in Västmanland, a straight road with one row of erected stones delimits a huge grave mound and ship-formed stone-settings. geophysical surveys have shown that the row of stones replaced an earlier alignment consisting of a row of posts, just as in gamla Uppsala. at Rösaring in southern Uppland another straight road from the early Viking age has been found. it is 500 m long, running north to south, with traces of about 150 posts placed along the eastern side of the road. it is placed on top of a ridge, starting at a small house in the north and ending at a grave mound in the south. The ritual road could have been used in burial rituals but also in connection to gatherings on or around the grave mound, from which there is a grand view over lake Mälaren, which at that time was an inlet of the Baltic sea; figure è25.6. Earlier linear monuments are known from skåne. at Degeberga and Önsvala roads with posts, pits, and fireplaces have been dated to about 200–600 ce. There are different indications that these roads were parts of assembly places (Beronius and others 2013; Björck and Wickberg 2015: 246–51; svensson 2015: 96–97, 115).
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tury or about 500 ce (Mackeprang 1935;
Capelle 1995; Zachrisson 2007; fabech
and Näsman 2013: 83–85). other wooden
effigies may have had real gold neckrings,
such as the huge gold ring found at Tissø.31
Manors
apart from the large central places, ritual
remains have also been recovered from
other large farms or manors. Primarily gold
foil figures have been found in settlements
and large halls in all parts of scandinavia,
such as slöinge in Halland, ströja on
Visingsö, Eskilstuna in södermanland,
Hov in oppland, Mære in Trøndelag, and
Borg on lofoten (lamm 2004: 42). other
ritual remains have been found in some
places, such as Hoby on lolland, Rossland
in Rogaland, Runsa in Uppland, Borg in
Östergötland, and Hofstaðir in iceland.
Hoby on lolland is best known for an
extremely rich grave with Roman imports
from the first century ce ( figure è13.2).
Recent excavations, however, have uncov-
ered a large manor with three huge halls.
North of the settlement a ritual site was
located, with two large man-made water-
figure 27.17. Wooden figure
holes, several cooking pits, and deposi-
from a bog at Rude Eskildstrup
tions of animal bones. one of the water
on sjælland (Nationalmuseet no.
holes had a wooden platform in the middle
B4283). Photo: lennart larsen,
(Holst and others 2017: 46).32
Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen.
31 Effigies may also have been made of stone. at the central place of Ravlunda in eastern skåne, two stone heads have been found. one of the heads is cut as a male wearing a helmet with cheek guards, possibly symbolizing a Roman auxilia-soldier (Zachrisson 2017c; cf. Hedeager 2001b: 80, 84).
32 Wells and water holes for ritual purpuses have also been found close at a settlement preceding the ringfort at Trelleborg on sjælland. several animals (a dog, a horse, a ram, and a per-
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figure 27.18. a stone altar, with a stone face and stone troughs at Rossland in Rogaland.
Photo: Barbro i. Dahl, arkeologisk museum, Universitetet i stavanger, stavanger.
at Rossland in Rogaland, house foundations from about 200 to 550, as well as mounds, cairns, and standing stones are preserved (Broby-Johansen 1967; Dahl 2003). above the settlement, on top of a hill which dominates the surroundings, a stone table called Skammelen is placed on two stone legs. Beyond that, a stone head, a stone base, and two or three stone troughs of a local rock have been found on the top and by the slopes of the hill. The unique site has been interpreted as an altar with a stone effigy and troughs connected to food offerings (Birkeli 1944: 106). This unique stone altar was probably based on Roman models.
one of the few permanently settled hillforts in central sweden was Runsa in Uppland. it was used in the sixth and early seventh centuries. inside the walls of the hillfort, a hall was situated at the highest location. Below the hall, a ritual site was placed in an opening between rocks. it was partly terraced, but it is uncertain if it ever carried a building ( figure è24.4). at this site, depositions of animal bones, especially horse bones, took place, as well as a large amount egrine falcon) had been thrown into the wells in intact condition, as well as four children, four to seven years old, together with a lot of objects (gotfredsen and others 2015). Horseshoe-shaped ditches were located near the water holes and could possibly be understood as fenced areas used for the ritual killing/slaughtering that took place (Nørlund and others 1948: 44; Jørgensen 2009: 329–30).
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figure 27.19.
Reconstruction of
a ritual building at
Borg in Östergötland.
illustration: Richard
Holmgren/aRCDoC.
of iron objects. among these iron objects is a miniature Þórr’s hammer amulet from the sixth century, one of the earliest that is dated.33
at Borg, a ritual site from the Viking age consisted of a fireplace by a large rock, an open space, and a small house with a stone pavement. in an area west of the house and north of the rock, amulet rings of iron, slag, pottery, and bones, primarily of pigs, have been deposited. The pig bones were spatially divided between bones of boars to the north and bones of sows to the south. at the east end of the house was a small cairn, but apart from an amulet ring the house was empty of objects (a. Nielsen 1996, 1997, 2006; lindeblad 1996). This site can be interpreted as a small ritual building associated with the slaughtering, cooking, and eating of meat. at the fireplace by the rock, amulet rings were forged and then used in the rituals inside and outside the house. Probably, the 33 another example of a ritual site located at a rock and a boulder is abbetorp in Östergötland. at a cleft boulder by the shore of a wetland, fireplaces were located, and pottery was thrown at the boulder. in another area was a post erected between a rock and a horseshoe-shaped stonewall. around the post, animal bones of cattle and horse were deposited (Petersson 2004: 36–67).
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figure 27.20. Plan of Hofstaðir in northern iceland. Drawing: gavin lucas.
ritual practice at Borg can be associated with cyclical rituals, perhaps directed towards fertility.
at Hofstaðir in the Mývatn region in northern iceland, a three-aisled hall was erected in a dominant position around 940 ce (lucas 2009: 62–64, 402–
04). The building functioned as the main building of a chieftain’s farm that was transformed seasonally into a sanctuary. it was divided into three rooms, and the northern room had two large cooking pits that had been in recurrent use and repeatedly cleaned. The centre was the hall proper with a hearth where the high seat probably stood. There was also a small hall with a room with a hearth and traces of two supporting roof-posts, that had direct access to the larger hall. in two deposits at least twenty-three skulls of cattle were found, but the weather-ing on the skulls indicated that they had once been placed outside. Probably the skulls were originally displayed along the turf walls of the major hall and were the remains of large scale feasting. The slaughtering seems to have been meticulous: first came a crushing blow to the forehead of the animal, then the animal was decapitated, probably with a broad axe which caused a lot of blood-letting.
This slaughter would have required two persons (lucas and Mcgovern 2007).
analyses conducted on the cattle bones from Hofstaðir indicate that the animals were bigger, stronger, and better bred than the usual kind of animals (lucas 2011: 285). it is thus reasonable to presume that the animals were tributes, or part of gifts, that were given to the farm and the chieftain when the rit-
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uals took place. The dating of individual skulls indicates that the rituals ended around 1000 ce, and this finding has therefore been viewed in connection with the Christianization of iceland. The word hof in icelandic written sources is used for the pre-Christian multifunctional hall buildings, where the representations of gods were kept and the cultic meals were consumed. The hall at Hofstaðir was probably perceived as such a building. But the word hof carried a double meaning and could sometimes refer to a more specific ritual building detached from the hall. The latter could also be referred to as goðahús. in the sagas of icelanders the term blóthús occurs for a separate ritual house, detached from the main building (sundqvist 2016: 104, 155–56).34
Ritual Sites with Theophoric Placenames
several of the central places had general theophoric placenames, such as gudme, Vä, and Helgö. However, other types of rituals have been found in recent decades in smaller settlements with placenames connected to named gods and goddesses. Most of these excavated locations belong to the period 550–1050 and are situated in present-day sweden.
at frösvi (freyr’s holy place) in Närke, a ritual place was excavated in 1910
(è42). in a wetland, a stone platform of 15 × 11 m was built up from the remains of hearths as well as cooking-pits and fragmented burnt animal bones from young pigs and sheep/goats. The platform was nearly empty of objects, but a brooch placed at the bottom layers dates its construction to 550–600 ce.
from the platform an eighty-metre long footbridge of split oak logs stretched out to the wet part of the bog (lindqvist 1910; for placenames, Vikstrand 2001: 326–30). This indicates that the movements on the footbridge were connected to communal meals at the platform, but as the footbridge was not wide, a single person walking out to the bog centre perhaps could have performed special rituals there.
34 in recent decades, ritual buildings have primarily been connected to central places and other major settlements or farms. it cannot be excluded, however, that certain ritual buildings existed in more ordinary settlements as well. an example is the large village of Vallhagar on gotland, dated to about 200–550 ce. The village consists of farms of different sizes located at some distance from each other. in the central part of the village, away from other farms, a small square house is located. it has yielded some two thousand pottery shards, bones of sheep/goat, and human bones from two individuals. in contrast to the other houses in the village, it was not burnt down but decayed gradually into a ruin. in local tradition it was known as ‘the church’ of the abandoned village. This name together with the finds could indicate that the building had some ritual functions (Nylén and Nylén 1955).
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figure 27.21. Plan of frösvi in Närke. a= cultural deposits.
b = wooden footbridge. after lindqvist 1910: 120.
at frösthult in northern Uppland, a ritual place was recently excavated. The site was probably used from the eighth to the tenth century. on a stone foundation and in a cultural deposit interpreted as a ‘holy field’, knives, arrowheads, spikes, rods, sickles, and amulet rings, as well as an oval brooch, a sword, and a shield buckle, have been deposited. Remains of horses were also found. The original form of the name was frøstolft, which can be interpreted as ‘freyr’s twelfth’, alluding to a territorial district of twelve levy men. Therefore, the site could have been the gathering site for levy men, going out to or returning home from levy duties (appelgren and Evanni 2016).
another ritual place connected to freyr was frösö (freyr’s island) in Jämtland. Under the chancel of the Romanesque stone church of frösö, a birch stump has been found. around the stump, bones from domesticated as well as wild animals were deposited. Pig bones were most common (65 per cent of all bones), and they represented a special breed of pigs with marked tusks, more like boars than ordinary pigs. in addition, the pigs had been reared on a sweet diet so that they had a tendency to develop caries. Most were pigs younger than twelve months old, but several were younger than three months. There was a high proportion of wild animals as well, especially brown bear. although hunting was fairly important for households in contemporary settlements in Jämtland, remains of brown bears were never frequent in any period. The bears had been skinned and the meat consumed with bones cleaved for marrow. The age of the slaughtered animals indicates rituals in april and around Midsummer. The bones do not show traces of scavengers, which indicates that the ritual tree was enclosed by a fence (Magnell and iregren 2010: 233–36). in the Middle ages, frösö was the assembly and market place of the province of Jämtland, and the finds show us cyclical rituals at a holy tree at this place in the Viking age.
a ritual site possibly related to freyr was lunda (grove, possibly holy grove) in northern södermanland. a settlement, a burial ground, and a stony hill have been excavated there. The main building in the settlement was a large hall from
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figure 27.22. aerial view of the sacred grove in lunda, northern södermanland, during excavation. Photo: Michael lyckholm, sky Movies. after andersson and others 2004: 18.
the third to the seventh centuries. inside the house and in a fenced area outside the building, small phallic gold figures have been found which have been interpreted as representations of the god freyr (andersson and others 2004; skyllberg 2008: 17; figure è43.4). The nearby natural hill, about 140 m long, was covered with a ‘stone carpet’ that was partly man-made, partly natural. in this stone carpet, birch-bark resin, beads, knives, and bones from humans and animals were spread out in the period 200–750. some of the objects on the hill could have been part of complex burial rituals that took place in part on the hill.
Many of the unburnt animal bones, however, could have been remains of ritual meals. The high proportion of suckling pig (86 per cent of all animal bones) again indicates rituals connected to freyr (andersson and skyllberg 2008). The stony hill probably represented the grove behind the placename lunda.
Rituals directed toward Óðinn (è42) are more difficult to discern, but a possible site related to Óðinn was götavi (gautr’s [Óðinn’s?] holy place) in Närke (Vikstrand 2010a). This place consisted of an artificial and fenced platform 18 × 15 m, which was built up in a swamp, surrounded by small hillhocks.
The platform of a thick clay layer rested on nine stone ramps serving as a foundation. No animal bones or specific ritual objects were found on the platform,
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figure 27.23. Plan of götavi
in Närke. a platform of clay
superimposed a stone foundation
consisting of stones laid out in
nine segments from north to
south. illustration: Kenneth
svensson, arkeologikonsult,
Upplands Väsby.
but there were concentrations of what was probably fat and blood around a huge posthole. These traces indicate rituals including smearing a post with fat and blood. The site was constructed and used in the last part of Viking age, the eleventh century (svensson 2012). apart from the name, the nine ramps in the hidden foundation suggest association with transformation and possibly Óðinn.
Three excavated locations that are linked to the god Ullr are known (è49).
at Ullevi outside linköping in Östergötland, a rectangular fenced area from about 400 bce to 400 ce has been found. inside the fences were about forty pits and fireplaces, indicating cooking of sacrificial meals (Nielsen 2005). at lilla Ullevi in southern Uppland a highly complex location from about 650 to 800 has been investigated. in the centre were a large solid rock and a stone pavement with a small wooden platform ‘anchored’ to the rock. south of the stone pavement were several post holes and sixty-five amulet iron rings, with smaller rings attached. some of the rings could originally have been attached to the posts. This central area was fenced off on three sides with boulders, fireplaces, cooking pits, and post holes, with a formal entrance to the site from the east (Bäck and others 2008; Bäck and Hållans stenholm 2012). finally at Ultuna in central Uppland a square area (10 × 10 m) of thick ritual deposits from about
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figure 27.24. Plan of the ritual site at
lilla Ullevi in southern Uppland. sixty-five
amulet rings were distributed within an area delimited
by a fence of posts in the east and a stone fence in the
south. The plan is based on Bäck and others 2008: 42.
600 to 1100 has been discovered. The square was located in the yard of the contemporary settlement, which is otherwise known for a large burial ground with a boat grave. The ritual deposits consisted of spears, arrowheads, silver coins, amulet rings, and miniature weapons, horse pendants, and equestrian equipment, as well as animal bones from ritual meals (Hulth 2013: 65–68).35
all the ritual sites with theophoric placenames show that rituals continued to be carried out in the open air, while ritual buildings were simultaneously used. in many places, the rituals were probably a combination of indoor and outdoor activities. Besides, rituals combined with different gods as well as with 35 apart from Ultuna, rituals in wetlands have been found at several other Tuna settlements in Uppland. Horses and boats were deposited in a wetland at stora Ullentuna, animals were placed placed in a wetland at Tuna in alsike and other wetland deposits were made at Närtuna (perhaps ‘Njǫrðr’s fenced area’; fredengren 2015). in the present churchyard of Estuna, many hundreds of unfinished weapons, mainly arrows and spears, were placed in a cultural layer at what was then probably the yard of a former Tuna settlement (Rydh 1969; Müller-Wille 1999: 63; Notelid 2009; cf. androshchuk 2002: 12).
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figure 27.25. large rings
with three smaller rings
attached from lilla Ullevi
in southern Uppland.
This combination of rings
was most common at
the site. Photo: Mathias
Bäck, arkeologernaa,
statens Historiska
Musuem.
different second placename components, such as -vi, show complex variations with few general patterns.
a recurrent pattern at ritual sites with theophoric placenames in central sweden is the use of amulet rings of iron, also found in some central places and manors in the same region.36 Plain amulet rings of iron, with or without smaller attachment rings, were objects that during the seventh century started to be produced solely for the rituals, and as far as we know had no other function.
They are normally of arm ring size (Bäck and Hållans stenholm 2012). fire-shaped rings can have twisted rods and often carry pendants of different shapes: sickles, smaller fire-shaped rings, axes, spades, short scythes, or spears, but they never have hammer-form (ström 1984). amulet rings have also been found at small ritual sites between burial grounds and ordinary settlements.37
36 iron rings have also been found on gotland. at Dungårde in Dalhem seven to eight hundred rings of different size were placed in circles in several horizontal layers. some of the rings had folded sheet iron attached. at Rosarve in Havdhem iron rings on top of each other were placed in a bog. The largest ring was placed at the bottom, and in a row there were animal teeth, and finally the smallest rings on top. sometimes the iron rings were accompanied with gold objects from about 550 to 750 (Thålin-Bergman 1986: 260–63).
37 at Kymlinge, in Uppland, amulet rings and tools, and miniatures with edges, were thrown at a three-metre-large boulder that dominated the burial ground (Biuw 1992: 134; Zachrisson 2004a: 374–75; Zachrisson 2004b: 162). Recent excavations at nearby Hjulsta shed further light on this. around two hundred fire-steel shaped amulet rings were found, especially in connection with a boulder, and a foundation for a possible altar 0.5 × 0.5 m, between two settlements. at a burial ground, on a slope below, amulet rings were deposited as well (Har-rysson 2017). The amulet rings at the boulder and possible altar could have been deposited at burial rituals, or also at cyclical rituals.
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Between Centre and Periphery
in the late iron age, it is possible that there existed a hierarchy of ritual places in certain regions. This is indicated by the so-called Guta Saga, a mythological-historical addition to the provincial law of gotland. in the Guta Saga ch. 1, pagan rituals before the Christianization of the island are described as follows: firir þan tima ok lengi eptir siþan troþu menn a hult ok a hauga, vi ok stafgarþa ok a haiþin guþ. Blotaþu þair synum ok dytrum sinum ok fileþi miþ mati ok mungati.
Þet gierþu þair eptir vantro sinni. land alt hafþi sir hoystu blotan miþ fulki. Ellar hafþi huer þriþiungr sir. En smeri þing hafþu mindri blotan miþ fileþi, mati ok mungati, sum haita suþnautar, þy et þair suþu allir saman.
(Prior to that time, and for a long time afterwards, people believed in groves and grave howes, holy places and ancient sites [ stafgarþar], and heathen idols. They sacrificed their sons and daughters, and cattle, together with food and ale. They did it in accordance with their ignorance of the true faith. The whole island held the highest sacrifice on its own account, with human victims, otherwise each third held its own. But smaller assemblies held lesser sacrifice with cattle, food, and drink.
Those involved were called ‘boiling companions’, because they all cooked their sacrificial meals together.) (Peel 1999: 5)
The centre of the island was Roma (literally ‘room’), where the general assembly was held and a market place from the Viking age recently has been found (Östergren 1992, 2005; Myrberg 2009a; cf. lindroth 1915). Roma was surrounded by huge wetlands to the north, east, and south, and at the north end of these wetlands, human skulls, together with animal bones and a few weapons, were deposited in the Viking age. This deposit could possible be related to the
‘highest sacrifice’, with human victims according to the Guta Saga. No remains of the rituals sites of the three thirds of the island have been discovered. Traces of the smaller assemblies, or ‘boiling companies’, however, should probably be found among groves and at grave mounds, holy places, and stafgarþar, which seem to have been enclosures with one or several staves, constructed in remains of older ruined settlements (andrén 2020). in addition, remains of ritual meals have been found at places where gotlandic picture stones were erected during the Viking age (andrén 1989a, 1993).38
38 Most of the gotlandic picture stones have been found in secondary contexts, such as medieval churches. The original locations, however, are known for a handful of monuments.
These show quite clearly that the picture stones from the Viking age were erected at roads, often in relation to older settlement remains. Charcoal and animal bones have been found at several of these places. The best-preserved location is at stora Hammars in the parish of lärbro, where
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figure 27.26. Map of the
former lake skedemosse
and its surroundings. on the
small peninsula Kvinnö in the
northern part of the former
lake are the probable remains
of sörby ringfort, and in the
southern part of the former
lake is the site of the ritual
deposits. East of the former
lake are two narrow ridges
with roads (dashed lines) and
a paved road (solid line) going
from Bo mosse to skedemosse.
around the lake are several
burial grounds (black areas).
south of the former lake is the
location of the village Tjusby,
which in its name preserves the
concept þjóð (folk, people),
indicating that skedemosse
played a central role on Öland.
The plan is based on a map
made by ylva Bäckström
in fallgren 2020: 77. Disir
Productions, Uppsala.
another example of a central ritual site is the former lake at skedemosse in the middle of the neighbouring island of Öland. The lake was continuously used as a ritual site from about 300 bce until about 1100 ce. a stone-paved road led from contemporary settlements in the east to the lake. along the eastern shore of the lake was a long dry ridge, and the ritual depositions were most frequent along the ridge in the eastern parts of the lake. only a small part of five picture stones originally were erected (today they are placed in a local open air museum at Bunge). They were placed in a row from west to east, only a few metres east of a house foundation from about 200–550 ce. The row started in the west at a limestone block with polished flat surface, which is interpreted as an altar stone. around the site of this stone there remain heaps of charcoal with animal bones. The row ended in the east at a cairn, where the largest and best known of the picture stones, was ereceted ( figure è25). The location can be interpreted as a memorial place, where inhabitants from the surrounding settlements met for cooking and eating (andrén 1989, 1993, 2020; cf. lindqvist 1964).
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the lake has been excavated, but it has yielded almost one ton of animal bones from an area of 90,000 sq m. These comprise horse bones (35 per cent), cattle bones (28 per cent), and sheep or goat bones (22 per cent) (Boessneck and others 1968). in the neighbouring settlements, cattle and sheep bones dominated, and horse bones made up only 4–5 per cent. This clearly shows that horses were especially selected for the rituals in skedemosse, possibly for horse racing on the ridge along the lake. The skulls of the horses show no signs of damage from crushing, which could mean that exsanguination was practised via a cut to the throat (Vretemark 2013: 53–54). it may also indicate that blood could have been an important part in the rituals. age determination of some animal bones indicate that rituals took place in the autumn. apart from animals, at least thirty-eight humans were killed and deposited in the lake over the course of the entire period. several gold armrings were placed in the lake during the third and fourth centuries, and weapons from war booties were deposited in the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries. skedemosse can be envisaged as the central ritual place for the island of Öland as a whole. Cyclical rituals, primarily during the autumn, were carried out at the shores of the lake, possibly in combination with horse racing as part of divinations (Hagberg 1967b:79–84, 108–10).
Crisis rituals, however, also occurred at the site in some periods, when gold rings and weapons were deposited.
as a contrast to skedemosse, local ritual places too have been found on Öland. outside the ringfort of Eketorp on southern Öland, a water-hole with deposited animal bones has been investigated. Especially pig bones and skulls of horses were deposited, in contrast to the kitchen waste in the ringfort, which consisted primarily of sheep or goat bones (Vretemark 2013: 54). The rituals seem to have been linked to gatherings and communal meals, rather than to activities in the ringfort, as the deposits started in the early Roman iron age, before the ringfort was built, and continued after it was deserted up until the Viking age (Backe and others 1993).
apart from the examples from gotland and Öland, central places, other manors, and places with theophoric placenames were clearly centres of regions or smaller settlements regions, where important rituals were carried out.
in other cases, it is less clear whether the ritual sites were centrally placed or located in the periphery. Many ritual sites, above all in wetlands, were located at later attested borders between parishes, hundreds or larger regions such as syssels. it may well be that some of these ritual sites actually marked out border zones from the beginning. an interesting case is a valley in central Jylland, where the well-known sites at alken Enge, forlev Nymølle, and illerup are located (see above). This valley, which is a tributary of gudenå (god’s river),
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was also the border between two of the syssels in Jylland. Perhaps the valley was a liminal zone that was protected by powers of the other World. Considering the gruesome fate of the young men from alken Enge, it is quite possible that humans and objects on display at that place acted as warning examples for those approaching a tribal region. a border zone like gudenå in Jylland, dense with cultic sites of various types in active use, would then be a real hindrance for an intruder to pass.39
The relation and possible interaction between different ritual sites in scandinavia is much less known. it is quite possible that some of the weapon deposits were made at the same time in different places. for instance, some of the deposits at Nydam and Ejsbøl, situated 35 km from each other, show interesting similarities (Nørgård Jørgensen 2011: 304). it is also plausible that some of the rituals in the central places could be related to rituals in the surroundings, such as the gold deposits around gudme and the human skulls deposited around Uppåkra.
The End of Ritual Places
at some ritual places there are traces that can be interpreted as ritual actions
‘closing down’ the cultic sites. These rituals primarily consisted of covering the former site, either by soil or by stones. The ritual site at lilla Ullevi in Uppland was covered with one metre of soil, and the ritual building at Borg in Östergötland was covered with one metre of gravel (Nielsen 1996: 102). a hall building at Hov in Vingrom by lake Mjøsa in eastern Norway was covered with fire-cracked brewing stones. it has not been possible to date the layers covering these sites more precisely, but it is assumed that this was done during the Christianization process (è64, 65, 66, 67).
Digging down ritual objects and remains was another way of changing the appearance of an old ritual site. in iceland the skulls of bulls in Hofstaðir, which had been on display outside the hall, were deposited in two assemblies when the hall was demolished in the late Viking age (lucas and Mcgovern 2007).
other objects from ritual buildings could be ‘buried’ in wetlands, when the 39 an interesting parallel to these liminal zones of deposits are anglo-saxon deviant burials that appear from c. 600 ce onwards. formal judicial execution cemeteries in the seventh to ninth centuries were placed at later known borders of administrative territories. These boundaries were associated with the haunt of the malevolant dead and not the sphere of the living. for persons entering a certain territory, the execution cemeteries would also manifest the law and order of that territory (Reynolds 2009).
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ritual buildings ceased to function. The wooden image of a seated figure from Rude Eskildstrup could be such an example. some of the gold deposits with oversized gold neckrings, for instance, from Tissø and Tuna in Västerljung, may also have originated from effigies from closed ritual buildings.
Ritual sites in wetlands seem more often to have just been left untouched.
götavi in Närke, where rituals with meat and blood took place in the late Viking age, was later left as an untouched piece of land. Even in the earliest cadastral maps from the seventeenth century the site was uncultivated, possibly because a taboo was connected to it (svensson 2012).
The last dated depositions at different ritual sites may also indirectly shed light on the process of Christianization. at skedemosse on Öland the depositions of humans and horses went on until the eleventh century (two datings from 990 to 1150 and 1040 to 1160 respectively). By that time there were Christian rune stones and wooden churches on Öland (ljung 2016). The latest humans and animals deposited in skedemosse coincide approximately with the construction of the oldest stone church in Resmo, on which construction began in the 1080s (Boström 1999).40
at a central place such as Uppåkra, a decrease of ritual activitities could be viewed in relation to the Christianization. When the ritual building went out of use around 950, another site was used as a final ritual place at Uppåkra.
West of the former cult building, a small stone paved gable room of a former hall was used. in this area, a spear, a sword, a Þórr’s hammer and a richly decorated mount, interpreted as a figure of the legendary Vǫlund, have been found (Helmbrecht 2010; T. Zachrisson 2017a; figure è36.3). This gradual diminishing of the ritual site coincided with the Christianization of skåne and the rise of the early Christian town of lund, which was established about 980, only 4 kilometres north of Uppåkra (Hårdh and larsson 2006).
although there are archaeological datings for the closing down of certain cultic sites and of objects and humans/animals deposited in wetlands at the latest in 1050–1100 ce, it is evident that the cultic sites were still an important issue when the early provincial laws of the North were written down in 40 similar situations are attested at Mjölkholmen in Närtuna and in Knivsta träsk in Uppland. Humans were deposited at the shores of the island Mjölkholmen in the Viking age, and the last human to be placed there can be dated by Carbon-14 to about 990–1150, whereas the last human was placed in Knivsta träsk about 1030–1200 (fredengren 2015: 167, appendix 1; larsson 2007: 237–36). These places are located close to the early Christian town of sigtuna, established around 980. in the late eleventh century, stone churches probably started to be built in sigtuna (Tesch 2016).
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the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Provisions in these laws set forth which objects and sites were no longer to be invoked after Christianity was accepted (Brink 2013a: 40; è20).
Concluding Remarks
although ritual practice varied in time and space, there are some general trends concerning rituals and ritual space in scandinavia. Different forms of food remains were deposited in wetlands and sometimes on dry land during the entire iron age (500 bce–1050 ce). The food remains could be animal bones from communal meals or pots for food and drink. Remains of ritual food could also be cooking pits close to wetlands or large fields of cooking pits, used for preparing communal meals in the open air in connection with large gatherings.
Different aspects of these food remains have been found in different parts of scandinavia. Deposited animal bones have been found everywhere, whereas pots were mainly deposited in Jylland and large fields of cooking pits have primarily been discovered in Norway. Ritual sites with food remains were probably above all connected to powers of fertility in cyclical rituals.
Humans were killed and deposited during the entire iron age as well, except in northern Norway and northern sweden, which are lacking human deposits.
overall, human remains are much less frequent than animal bones. in some cases, such as the bog bodies and whole skeletons, humans were deposited as whole bodies, but in other cases the humans were disarticulated, and the remains only consisted of skulls or other body parts. These killed humans could represent legal punishment or cyclical sacrifices in relation to fertility or to crisis rituals linked to warfare and hostage.
Weapons and boats were deposited from about 350 bce until 600 ce in Denmark and southern sweden, while boats were deposited in Norway and central sweden in the same period. single weapons or small amounts of weapons continued to be deposited from about 600 to about 1100 in southern scandinavia. The huge war booties from 350 bce to 600 ce represented crisis rituals, at irregular intervals, which were connected to warfare, whereas the later small weapon deposits probably were linked to passage rituals for humans and objects.
specific ritual buildings and halls, which were periodically used for rituals, can be traced from about 200 ce in central places. This ritual invention was probably modelled on different forms of ritual buildings in the Roman Empire.
Rituals took place inside as well as outside these ritual buildings, probably in relation to cyclical rituals as well as crisis and passage rituals. from the sixth
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century and onwards, the rituals inside and outside the ritual buildings were more formalized, with the use of miniatures of weapons, tools, and figurines of mythical images as well as formalized drinking vessels.
apart from the central places, a formalization of ritual practice during the late iron age (550–1050 ce) can be traced in other manors as well as in places with theophorical placenames. in these place, animal bones, gold foil figures, and amulet rings of different shape often have been deposited.
finally, the Christianization can be indirectly traced at several ritual places.
some of them were covered by thick layers of sand, gravel, or stone, whereas others were left untouched for centuries. in a few cases, datings of the last deposits are contemporary with the earliest signs of Christian activities, indicating complex religious transitions.
Knowledge of ritual space will be expanded from new excavations as well as new analysis of old material. The complex spatial settings of different ritual sites have to be further studied, and future rescue excavations will undoubtedly yield new perspectives from different periods and regions. The fundamental problem of final deposits in archaeology (above and è6) must be further discussed in relation to rituals. it has to do with issues such as ritual practices before the deposits as well as the participations at the ritual sites: Who had access to the rituals? only free men? Women and children on certain occasions? foreigners?
Who performed rituals, who participated, and who was only viewing from a distance? all these questions are difficult to answer but fundamental in trying to understand the ritual sites in long-term perspectives. Written sources indicate that some people were clearly able to enter many different types of ritual space, while others, due to age, gender, and social status, may have had access to only few of them — or none. an aspect of the participation at the ritual sites concerns the hierarchical level of the rituals, and whether they were performed by a farming household, by a local community, by a manor or central place, or by a whole region.
New types of scientific analyses will be important in studying ritual sites, such as osteology, isotope analysis, and ancient DNa (è6). from osteological analyses, it is possible to determine the season of cyclical rituals, to figure out the size of livestock, and to reveal how deposited humans and animals were exposed to violence. isotope analysis on animal teeth can be used to determine the origin of the animals: that is, whether they were locally bred or delivered as tributes or gifts from distant regions. analyses of ancient DNa will be able to answer questions concerning the colouring and descent of animals, for instance, if white horses were used in divinations or if a certain breed of horses was preferred.
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Today we know fairly little about the humans found in wetlands or in various dry-land contexts, such as the central places. isotope analysis will give hints of their dietary pattern through life as well as their mobility, that is, whether they were local or from distant regions. analysis of ancient DNa will determine their maternal and paternal biological ancestry as well as their biological sex, which osteological analysis cannot determine for small body parts or children.
if ancient DNa of an individual is well preserved, deep sequencing of the data is possible, yielding detailed knowledge of eye, hair, and skin colour of a person, and also if the individual could develop diabetes or was lactose intolerant. The genetic information of an individual does not stop there: bacteria and viruses that individuals might carry can contribute to their life stories — did they carry bubonic plague bacteria in their bodies or leprosy? if the skeletal remains of an individual are well preserved, it is possible to go further by doing either a facial reconstruction or a reconstruction of the whole body, making him or her ‘come to live’, in the same way as the well-preserved bog bodies. Consequently, ritual practice will come to be much more concretely reconstructed in the future.