Preliminary Report of Archaeological Fieldwork at Svalbard (Svalbardshreppur), 2008 (field report)
Part of the North Atlantic Biocultural Organization (NABO) project
Author(s): Jim Woollett
Year: 2008
Summary
This document is a preliminary report of archaeological fieldwork conducted at
and around the farm of Svalbard, Svalbardshreppur, in June 2008. An initial
evaluation of the archaeological potential of Svalbard was made by archaeologists of
the Iceland Palaeoeconomy Project (IPP) in 1986, revealing the presence of deep
midden deposits adjacent to the extant farm mound, on the bank of the bank of the
Svalbarsa River. Test excavations and then large scale excavations of this midden
were undertaken in successive projects in 1986 and 1988. The Svalbard project
yielded one of the largest faunal collections yet recovered in Iceland, the initial
analysis of which was instrumental in the development of methods and models of
reconstructing palaeoeconomies, landscape history and human-environment
interactions in the North Atlantic region. Since 1988, however, North Atlantic
archaeology has benefited from ongoing developments in palaeoclimatology,
palaeoenvironmental studies, tephrachronological dating, fieldwork methodologies
and a tremendous number of new survey and site-oriented field projects which have
brought new, data-rich regional perspectives on landscape change, subsistence and
social movements. While north Iceland has seen particular emphasis in these new
projects, the bulk of this work has been carried out in the Myvatn, Eyjafjordur and the
Westfjords regions. Despite the ambitious start made by the IPP project, the northeasternmost extremities of Iceland (Thistilfjordur, Oxarfjordur and Melrakasletta) have
seen little ongoing archaeological research and Svalbard remains the sole major site
excavated the region.
Due to its greater exposure and vulnerability to arctic climatic influences (air
masses, currents and sea ice, for example) relative to other parts of Iceland, the
extreme northeast remains an ideal region in which to examine human-environment
interactions, such as Little Ice Age climatic impacts on subsistence economies.
Furthermore, the diversity of economic activities based on the extraction or collection
of local biological resources, ranging from stock raising and dairying, to cod fishing,
to seal and sea bird harvesting practised at Svalbard possibly indicates an interesting
capacity for diverse adaptations to environmental variations through employment of
alternative economic strategies. With this in perspective, a new round of fieldwork
was conducted at Svalbard in 2008, intending to refine the stratigraphy and dating of
the midden excavated in 1987 and 1988, to gather new radiocarbon,
geoarchaeological and ecofact samples to supplement landscape history and site
formation reconstructions for the site and for the Svalbard region, and to identify
potential locations for further archaeological archaeological research.
Cite this Record
Preliminary Report of Archaeological Fieldwork at Svalbard (Svalbardshreppur), 2008 (field report). Jim Woollett. 2008 ( tDAR id: 3256) ; doi:10.6067/XCV8W0948T
Keywords
Site Name
Svalbard
Site Type
Agricultural or Herding
•
Domestic Structures
•
Hamlet / Village
•
Midden
Investigation Types
Data Recovery / Excavation
•
Systematic Survey
Geographic Keywords
Svalbardsa river
•
Svalbardshreppur
•
Thistilfjord region
Spatial Coverage
min long: -15.75; min lat: 66.2 ; max long: -15.6; max lat: 66.25 ;
Individual & Institutional Roles
Contact(s): Jim Woollett
File Information
Name | Size | Creation Date | Date Uploaded | Access | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
svb08_draftrept2.pdf | 1.23mb | Oct 16, 2010 10:43:14 AM | Public |