scholarly journals Anthropomorphic Images at the Padjelanta Site, Northern Sweden: Rock Engravings in the Context of Sámi Myth and Ritual

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-162
Author(s):  
Inga-Maria Mulk ◽  
Tim Bayliss-Smith
Keyword(s):  
Rock Art ◽  
Viking Age ◽  
Northern Sweden ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Middle Phase ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Tentative Hypothesis ◽  
Mother Figure ◽  
Reindeer Hunting ◽  
Human Burials

The paper discusses three phases of scratched images from the Padjelanta site of Sámi rock art in Laponia, northern Sweden. Pre-dating the middle phase of Viking Age/Medieval period sailing boats is a set of stylised anthopomorphs. These early images resemble certain petroglyphs from Alta, goddess motifs on Sami drums, and the Earth Mother figure in the Manrlajsmyths. Possible ritual contexts for the Padjelanta images are discussed, including autumn reindeer hunting, human burials, and smallscale quarrying for asbestos and soapstone. As a tentative hypothesis, a link between the early anthropomorphs and the Sami goddess Máttaráhkká is proposed.

scholarly journals Cult sites in northern Sweden

1990 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 458-489
Author(s):  
Stefan Brink
Keyword(s):  
Northern Sweden ◽  
Place Names ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Christian Religion ◽  
Almost All

The pagan cult in northern Sweden, i.e, Norrland, has for some decades been a neglected chapter in our history, a situation which unfortunately applies to Sweden as a whole, at least where onomastics are concerned. The aim is thus to deliver an overview of the evidence that we have of pre-Christian religious activities in these northern parts — in this aspect, onomastic material is nearly almost all we have got — and some general remarks about the conversion to the new Christian religion. The area of investigation is what in the (Swedish) medieval period was known as Norrland. In other words, the part of Sweden considered here is modern Central Norrland. With our state of knowledge of today it is not so easy to pick out the place-names that have denoted some kind of pagan cult activity. The place-name material can be divided into: 1. Theoforic place-names 2. place-names denoting the site of a pagan cult, which do not however contain theoforic elements 3. place-names with a possible pagan cultic element.

A portrait of the person as an ancient artist

2006 ◽  
Vol 78 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-64
Author(s):  
John G. F. Wilks
Keyword(s):  
Homo Sapiens ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Artistic Expression ◽  
Artistic Creativity ◽  
Homo Neanderthalensis ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Creative Methods ◽  
Human Creativity ◽  
Genesis 1 ◽  
Artistic Merit

This article explores the implications of personhood from artistic creativity. An investigation of the models of divine creative methods portrayed in Genesis 1 suggests that human creativity is comparable to that employed by God on days 5 and 6, where the waters and the earth are reshaped to produce something new. Consideration of Paleolithic rock art shows just how ancient artistic expression is, and that it is something unique to Homo sapiens, with no evidence that Homo neanderthalensis was artistically creative. The importance of artistic creativity within a community has further implications for our investigation of personhood. Even if the artistic merit of the art produced is far short of great, the desire to express oneself artistically is widespread.

Old Norse Mythology as Sacred Narrative

2021 ◽  
pp. 65-102
Author(s):  
John Lindow
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Deep Sea ◽  
Old Norse ◽  
Viking Age ◽  
Chronological Order ◽  
Simple Fact ◽  
The Earth ◽  
The World ◽  
Norse Mythology

This chapter presents a case study of one myth that we have from pictorial sources in the Viking Age, from poems almost certainly composed in the Viking Age, and from thirteenth-century sources, namely the encounter between the god Þórr (Thor) and his cosmic enemy, the World serpent, a beast that encircles the earth, in the deep sea. In this myth, Þórr fishes up the serpent, and depending on the variant, Þórr may or may not kill the serpent. I present and analyze the texts in more or less chronological order, from the older skalds through the Eddic poem Hymiskviða, through Snorri Sturluson in Edda, and compare the texts to the rock carvings that portray the myth. I argue that the issue of the death or survival of the serpent is less important than the simple fact that Þórr had the serpent on his hook.

scholarly journals Consideration of Freshwater and Multiple Marine Reservoir Effects: Dating of Individuals with Mixed Diets from Northern Sweden

Radiocarbon ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 60 (5) ◽  
pp. 1561-1585 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jack P R Dury ◽  
Gunilla Eriksson ◽  
Markus Fjellström ◽  
Thomas Wallerström ◽  
Kerstin Lidén
Keyword(s):  
18Th Century ◽  
Isotope Analysis ◽  
Bone Collagen ◽  
Mixed Diet ◽  
Northern Sweden ◽  
Late 18Th Century ◽  
Freshwater Reservoir ◽  
Human Burials ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Age Estimates

ABSTRACTHuman burials from the cemetery at the Rounala church, northern Sweden, were radiocarbon (14C) dated to shed light on the use of the cemetery. Carbon, nitrogen and sulfur stable isotope analysis of bone collagen from 19 distinct individuals indicated that these individuals had a mixed diet consisting of freshwater, marine and terrestrial resources. Dietary modeling using FRUITS was employed to calculate the contributions of the different resources for each individual. These data were then used to calculate individual ΔR values, taking into account freshwater and multiple marine reservoir effects, the latter caused by Baltic and Atlantic marine dietary inputs, respectively. 14C dating of tissues from modern freshwater fish species demonstrate a lack of a freshwater reservoir effect in the area. Two OxCal models were used to provide endpoint age estimates. The calibrated data suggest that the site’s cemetery was most likely in use already from the 14th century, and perhaps until at least the late 18th century.

scholarly journals Isotopes and human burials at Viking Age Birka and the Mälaren region, east central Sweden

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 ◽  
pp. 19-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Douglas Price ◽  
Caroline Arcini ◽  
Ingrid Gustin ◽  
Leena Drenzel ◽  
Sven Kalmring
Keyword(s):  
Viking Age ◽  
East Central ◽  
Human Burials

Periods versus Concepts: Space Making and the Question of Postcolonial Literary History

PMLA ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 127 (2) ◽  
pp. 342-348 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ato Quayson
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Literary History ◽  
World Literature ◽  
World History ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Spatial Practices ◽  
Spatial Logic ◽  
Princeton University ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Colonial Encounter

After being exiled from nazi germany and completing the extraordinary mimesis in istanbul in 1946, erich auerbach wrote from Princeton University in 1952, “Literary criticism now participates in a practical seminar on world history. … Our philological home is the earth: it can no longer be the nation.” Auerbach, who must be reckoned one of the great synthesists and literary historians of the twentieth century, was expressing a sentiment that will be familiar to anyone who has thought about world literature from a postcolonial perspective. While postcolonial literary studies may have helped define the parameters of the practical seminar on world history, its full implications are still somewhat obscured by the arguments about periodicity that are often taken as a terminological necessity in applications of the term postcolonial. This is the burden imposed by the temporalizing post-. However, closer scrutiny of the postcolonial suggests that it contains mutually reinforcing periodizing and spatial functions. Many of the most common ideas that circulate in the field, such as colonial encounter, neocolonialism, nationalism and postnationalism, hegemony, transnationalism, diasporas, and globalization, are organized around often unacknowledged spatial motifs. The concept of space that implicitly structures usages of postcolonialism is far from inert: there is an active dimension of spatializing in them that helps shape the field's distinctiveness. This is because even when the term is deployed exclusively for periodizing purposes, as in showing that the medieval period or Russia today is amenable to a postcolonial analysis, the nature of what is highlighted insistently invokes spatial practices. Once the spatial logic of postcolonialism is brought to the foreground, the complexity of its critical diagnostic as applied in the practical seminar on world history becomes clearer.

scholarly journals ГЕОМЕТРИЧЕСКИЕ ФИГУРЫ ФЕННОСКАНДИИ

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Е.М. Колпаков
Keyword(s):  
Rock Art ◽  
World Heritage ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Northern Sweden ◽  
The World

По сути, к геометрическим, или абстрактным, фигурам относят те фигуры, реальные прототипы которых нам неизвестны (ср.: Helskog, 2014, p. 95). Например, к геометрическим фигурам не относят изображения копий, гарпунов, луков, стрел, следов снегоступов и следов животных, хотя обычно они выглядят довольно абстрактно. Целый ряд таких непонятных фигур имеется в наскальном искусстве Фенноскандии. Какая-либо их интерпретация оказывается весьма проблематичной. Единственные зацепки для этого можно найти в сочетаниях таких абстрактных фигур с другими, относительно понятными для нас. Разумеется, плодотворнее анализировать не единичные фигуры, а типы фигур в типах композиций. На этом направлении есть ряд полезных наблюдений, возможно приближающих нас к обоснованной интерпретации некоторых геометрических фигур. Кресты и крестообразные фигуры в петроглифах Альты уверенно связываются с изображениями северных оленей и лосей. На Канозере кресты связаны с мифическими персонажами. Колёса могут быть связаны с представлениями о загробном мире по аналогии с формой каменных выкладок над погребениями. Овальные и круглые фигуры с точкой внутри интерпретируются как изображения вульвы на основании типологического ряда (Колпаков, Шумкин, 2012, с. 293 Колпаков и др., 2018, с. 109). На таком же основании крюки и серпы Вингена (Lden, Mandt, 2012, p. 107), как и уголки (angular figures) Нэмфоршена (Hallstrm, 1960, p. 310311), относятся к группе топоров-жезлов, которые представлены ещё в Альте, на Выге и Канозере. Онежские солярно-лунарные знаки в композициях связаны с животными и занимают место топоров-жезлов. Фигуры в Альте, которые можно было бы считать изображением сетей, связаны не с ихтиоморфами, а с лосями/оленями. Непонятными остаются каплевидные ожерелья (droplet shaped fringed pattern) Альты, так же как зигзагообразные и ромбические фигуры (Helskog, 2014, p. 9597). В Альте окружности и овалы с какими-то фигурами и линиями внутри, по всей видимости, обозначают жилища по аналогии с несколькими изображениями, где это кажется очевидным. В то же время они достаточно разнообразны, чтобы из них можно было построить ясный типологический ряд. Есть трехлепестковые геометрические фигуры, которые интерпретируются как стилизованное изображение головы медведя. Их всего три на Канозере. Кроме фигур, которые встречаются хотя бы небольшими сериями, имеется немалое количество геометрических фигур, представленных одним экземпляром, как, например, знак ( 142) на Старой Залавруге, напоминающий египетский анх. Разумеется, к их интерпретации подступиться ещё труднее, чем к фигурам, которые можно свести в типы. Hallstrm, G. (1960). Monumental Art of Northern Sweden from the Stone Age. Nmforsen and other Localities. Stockholm: Almqvist AND Wiksell. Helskog, K. (2014). Communicating with the World of Beings. The World Heritage rock art sites in Alta, Arctic Norway. Oxford AND Philadelphia: Oxbow Books. Колпаков, Е. М., Шумкин, В. Я. (2012). Петроглифы Канозера. Rock Carvings of Kanozero. Санкт-Петербург: Искусство России. Колпаков, Е. М., Шумкин, В. Я., Мурашкин, А. И. (2018). Петроглифы Чальмн-Варрэ. almn-Varr petroglyphs. Санкт-Петербург: ЛЕМА. Lden, T. K., Mandt, G. (2012). Vingen et naturens kolossalmuseum for helleristninger. Instituttet for sammenlignende kulturforskning. Serie B: Skrifter, CXLVI. Akademika forlag, Trondheim.

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