Interpreting the Viking Age to Medieval period transition in Norse Orkney through cultural soil and sediment analyses

Abstract

The transition from the Viking Age (ca. A.D. 800-1050) to the Medieval period (ca. A.D. 1050-1500) saw the development of widening trade activities that incorporated peripheral North Atlantic polities into mainstream Europe and contributed to the intensification of marineresource exploitation and agricultural production in these localities. As yet, there is only limited understanding of these intensification processes and their interrelationships, particularly at a local, site-based level. Through the micromorphological analysis of cultural soils and sediments at Quoygrew, Westray, Orkney, we explore the characteristics of farming and fishing activity during the Viking Age-Medieval transition period and establish their chronological relationships. The study demonstrates: (1) that intensification took place from ca. A.D. 966-1162 on an already existing Viking Age settlement, (2) that intensification of fishing activity occurred prior to the intensification of arable agriculture, and (3) that the Quoygrew site continued throughout this period as an economically diverse permanent settlement. When viewed in a wider North Atlantic context, these findings indicate that intensification of different economic activities proceeded at different rates and that intensification of specialized economic activities during the transition from the Viking Age to the Medieval period was dependent on existing knowledge of local environments.

Marine resource intensification in Viking Age Europe: the molluscan evidence from Quoygrew, Orkney

“…Some studies (e.g. Simpson et al, 2005) have interpreted them as bait for fishing based on ethnohistoric analogy from more recent centuries in Orkney (e.g. Fenton, 1978).…”

“…Overall, the site represents a well-preserved Viking Age, medieval and post-medieval rural settlement, but it is the Viking Age and early medieval phases that are of present concern. The site is dominated by a coastal midden (composed predominately of peat ash, shell and fish bone) and by an inland 'farm mound' (composed of midden which is rich in fish bone and shell in its upper strata, but also includes more diverse farmstead refuse) (Barrett, 2005;Simpson et al, 2005). Both middens have associated buildings and are finely stratified (Figs.…”

“…These deposits, designated phase 1, consist of a range of domestic occupation debris, including turf construction materials, animal bedding material, peat ash and food debris (Simpson et al, 2005) with measurable, but not abundant, quantities of fish bone (0.9 AE 0.7 g/l) and marine shell (19.0 AE 15.1 g/l). Slightly higher in the farm mound, there is an abrupt stratigraphic transition to deposits with the same sediment matrix, but abundant fish bone (8.9 AE 5.4 g/l) and shell (70.7 AE 44.4 g/l).…”

Becoming Christian: A Matter of Everyday Resistance and Negotiation

“…However, less, but growing, attention has been devoted to the way the Europeans organized their day-to-day life in accordance with Christian doctrine without making binary distinctions between churchly and worldly activities (see, e.g., Simpson et al 2005, Pluskowski 2010, Gilchrist 2012, Milek 2012. In fact, becoming Christian need not have involved greater religiousness or a deeper devotion to the Christian faith, although such devotion must surely have existed in many cases.…”

Characterizing anthropic sediments in north European Neolithic settlements: An assessment from Skara Brae, Orkney

“…This technique holds the potential to provide information about source, physical relationship between mineral and anthropogenic components, and any postdeposition disturbances or soil-formation processes that may have taken place. Furthermore, this approach has been successfully applied to the analyses of onsite anthropic sediments in a range of north Atlantic contexts (Simpson et al, 1999(Simpson et al, , 2000(Simpson et al, , 2005Simpson and Barrett, 1996), and clearly held promise for understanding site-formation processes associated with the Skara Brae sediments.…”