Iconography of colonialism as production and reproduction in early modern Sweden

Summary

Images, pictures and urban poems were important tools in the production and reproduction of early modern Swedish colonialism and the Age of Great Power. Urban images of Erik Dahlberg in the volume Svecia Antiqua et Hodierna and poems of Olof Hermelin in Hecatompolis Suionum, for example, were productions of the period when Sweden was at its most powerful.

We will discuss how these images reflect the archaeological record of northern towns in the coastal area of the northern Baltic Sea. We will combine the iconography of poems and images to cartographical records and archaeological finds to discuss how these images of contemporary colonialist ideas were used inside Sweden. The archaeological finds from northern towns, like Tornio and Oulu, do correlate with the written record of poems, which in turn relates to the trade connections inside contemporary Sweden and further into the colonial world outside of northern Europe.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2013   •
• Colonial Scandinavia and Scandinavian Colonialism: Archaeological aspects of a forgotten past

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 304