All in One Boat: How to Keep a Raiding Party Together in Bronze Age Southern Scandinavia

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Warfare and the Origins of Political Control " session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

For southern Scandinavia, the evidence of use-wear on weapons and of violent encounters settled the long debate over whether prehistoric warfare existed. Much of this violence was driven by waterborne raiding parties and maritime warriors and successful participation in fighting provided a path to social status. Each expedition lasted probably for several weeks during which the boat crew was in close confines and the members were perhaps never separated for extended periods of time. This volatile atmosphere in which every individual was used to carry out violence and such violence provided a pathway to personal advancement provided a social challenge that the leaders and organizers of these expeditions needed to solve. How to keep the cohesion and prevent the outbreak of inner-group competition that may spill over into violence? Looking at rock art and weapon depositions, the Turnerian concept of communitas among liminal agents is discussed as a possible answer that leaders of such raiding parties may have relied on. But how do we explain later depictions of large and highly detailed warriors onboard boats? Here it is argued that these may depict named ancestors rather than living leaders of such journeys.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Warfare and the Origins of Political Control   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 35698.0