{"title":"Pirates in the Age of Populism","authors":"S. Sindbæk","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.01","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.01","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49031378","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Viking Brand in Crisis?","authors":"Chris Tuckley","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.04","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.04","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48428614","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In discussing two new major exhibitions on the Vikings – ‘Join the Raid’ in the Danish National Museum Copenhagen and ‘The Viking World’ in the Swedish State Historical Museum Stockholm – Søren M. Sindbæk addresses what is currently the most important question for museums concerning the presentation of the Vikings: how should we as an academic community impart knowledge of the Viking Age to the interested public? And, do we want to act formatively, bringing our research into the public discourse, or do we agree to be passively driven by current socio-political discourses, popular myths and new focuses and habits in media behaviour? At the end of his short introduction, Sindbæk poses a provocative question: ‘Will Vikings free museums – or turn them into captives?’ (Sindbæk 2022:11). Upon reflection, a slightly rephrased version of this thorny question seems more to the point: ‘Will museums free Vikings – or will popular perceptions of the Vikings turn museums into captives’? Sindbæk rightly notes that ‘the Viking Age is one of the world’s most well-known and popular historical brands’ (Sindbæk 2022:11), and the Vikings are omnipresent in many aspects of daily life, from media to commercials. Globally-known glossy media formats such as the TV series ‘Vikings’ enshrine a glorified and romanticized version of the Viking Age in
{"title":"Victims of Their Own Success - Academia and Public Research on 'The Vikings'","authors":"Matthias Toplak","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.06","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.06","url":null,"abstract":"In discussing two new major exhibitions on the Vikings – ‘Join the Raid’ in the Danish National Museum Copenhagen and ‘The Viking World’ in the Swedish State Historical Museum Stockholm – Søren M. Sindbæk addresses what is currently the most important question for museums concerning the presentation of the Vikings: how should we as an academic community impart knowledge of the Viking Age to the interested public? And, do we want to act formatively, bringing our research into the public discourse, or do we agree to be passively driven by current socio-political discourses, popular myths and new focuses and habits in media behaviour? At the end of his short introduction, Sindbæk poses a provocative question: ‘Will Vikings free museums – or turn them into captives?’ (Sindbæk 2022:11). Upon reflection, a slightly rephrased version of this thorny question seems more to the point: ‘Will museums free Vikings – or will popular perceptions of the Vikings turn museums into captives’? Sindbæk rightly notes that ‘the Viking Age is one of the world’s most well-known and popular historical brands’ (Sindbæk 2022:11), and the Vikings are omnipresent in many aspects of daily life, from media to commercials. Globally-known glossy media formats such as the TV series ‘Vikings’ enshrine a glorified and romanticized version of the Viking Age in","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49116013","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In the last two decades, the body has emerged as a rich field of theorization and scholarly exploration in archaeology. This paper is an excursion into a consideration of two bodyobjects of prehistoric Denmark: an anthropomorphic bronze figurine from the Fårdal assemblage dating to the late Bronze Age, and a figural gold foil with an anthropomorphic stamp from Sorte Muld, created perhaps as much as 1 500 years later, in the Merovingian period (550–750 CE). The two images are made in very different materials, in distinctly different forms, and belong to different historical situations. Nevertheless, the two artefacts render what are likely women’s bodies with clear differences, but also some uncanny similarities.This article explores these artefacts from a more-than-representational perspective. Moving beyond a taxonomic approach, it focuses on aspects of these images beyond what or who they ‘represent’. What can such an approach tell us about the capacities of bodies, as well as the capacities of the artefacts themselves? This entails, following the work of Donna Haraway, worlding them in two vastly different social, material and political worlds; drawing out their making from two very different technological processes; engaging with the similarities and differences of their biographies; and, crucially, thereby contemplating their kinship.
{"title":"Body-Worldings of Later Scandinavian Prehistory: Making Oddkin with Two Body-Objects","authors":"M. Eriksen","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.09","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.09","url":null,"abstract":"In the last two decades, the body has emerged as a rich field of theorization and scholarly exploration in archaeology. This paper is an excursion into a consideration of two bodyobjects of prehistoric Denmark: an anthropomorphic bronze figurine from the Fårdal assemblage dating to the late Bronze Age, and a figural gold foil with an anthropomorphic stamp from Sorte Muld, created perhaps as much as 1 500 years later, in the Merovingian period (550–750 CE). The two images are made in very different materials, in distinctly different forms, and belong to different historical situations. Nevertheless, the two artefacts render what are likely women’s bodies with clear differences, but also some uncanny similarities.This article explores these artefacts from a more-than-representational perspective. Moving beyond a taxonomic approach, it focuses on aspects of these images beyond what or who they ‘represent’. What can such an approach tell us about the capacities of bodies, as well as the capacities of the artefacts themselves? This entails, following the work of Donna Haraway, worlding them in two vastly different social, material and political worlds; drawing out their making from two very different technological processes; engaging with the similarities and differences of their biographies; and, crucially, thereby contemplating their kinship.","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45621157","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper offers an in-depth exploration of a group of small Viking Age figurines commonly referred to as ‘valkyries’ in Viking and Old Norse scholarship. After presenting an overview of the long research history pertaining to these finds and their varying definitions, this study re-analyses their various formal and stylistic features and proposes a new typological system based on a comprehensive investigation of the current find corpus. This is followed by a deconstruction and discussion of the ambiguous gender characteristics of the figurines and an exploration of the potential new avenues of their interpretation. The study is supplemented by detailed catalogues of all presently known finds of so-called armed ‘valkyrie’ figures as well as high-quality illustrations that demonstrate their great iconographic value for studies of Viking Age clothing, martial equipment and ritual behaviour.
{"title":"Revisiting the ‘Valkyries’: Armed Females in Viking Age Figurative Metalwork","authors":"Leszek Gardeła, Peter Pentz, Neil Price","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.10","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.10","url":null,"abstract":"This paper offers an in-depth exploration of a group of small Viking Age figurines commonly referred to as ‘valkyries’ in Viking and Old Norse scholarship. After presenting an overview of the long research history pertaining to these finds and their varying definitions, this study re-analyses their various formal and stylistic features and proposes a new typological system based on a comprehensive investigation of the current find corpus. This is followed by a deconstruction and discussion of the ambiguous gender characteristics of the figurines and an exploration of the potential new avenues of their interpretation. The study is supplemented by detailed catalogues of all presently known finds of so-called armed ‘valkyrie’ figures as well as high-quality illustrations that demonstrate their great iconographic value for studies of Viking Age clothing, martial equipment and ritual behaviour.","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42782998","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"This Belongs in a Museum","authors":"S. Sindbæk","doi":"10.37718//csa.2022.08","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718//csa.2022.08","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45423487","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Public Viking Research in Museums and Beyond","authors":"H. Williams","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.02","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.02","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48574938","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Søren Sindbæk has written a thorough and thought-provoking review of the Viking Age exhibitions at the Swedish History Museum in Stockholm and the National Museum in Copenhagen. Of course, a review like this is a personal interpretation. Still, I think that Sindbæk has outlined some important challenges for those involved in the creation of large culturalhistorical museum exhibitions in our time. For me, his keynote is particularly interesting, as the Museum of Cultural History at the University of Oslo is currently planning exhibitions for the new Museum of the Viking Age in Oslo. How to deal with the challenges Sindbæk identifies in Copenhagen and Stockholm? Sindbæk (2022) sums up his critical review under two banners – consumerism and populism – two concepts that are not held in high regard in academia. I will primarily add some comments to those two subjects from my point of view. Over the last few decades, archaeology and the cultural heritage sector have been heavily influenced by globalism, identity thinking (in particular, individualism) and capitalism/market ideology. The interplay and inertia of these forces are of course multi-faceted and complex, but they have all weakened the strong connection between nationalism and heritage/archaeology that was once very evident in Scandinavia. Nationalism therefore stands out as a troublesome relic that cannot be taken for granted anymore, nei-
{"title":"Populistic Exhibitions or Dedicated to a New Elite of Consumers?","authors":"Håkon Glørstad","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.05","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.05","url":null,"abstract":"Søren Sindbæk has written a thorough and thought-provoking review of the Viking Age exhibitions at the Swedish History Museum in Stockholm and the National Museum in Copenhagen. Of course, a review like this is a personal interpretation. Still, I think that Sindbæk has outlined some important challenges for those involved in the creation of large culturalhistorical museum exhibitions in our time. For me, his keynote is particularly interesting, as the Museum of Cultural History at the University of Oslo is currently planning exhibitions for the new Museum of the Viking Age in Oslo. How to deal with the challenges Sindbæk identifies in Copenhagen and Stockholm? Sindbæk (2022) sums up his critical review under two banners – consumerism and populism – two concepts that are not held in high regard in academia. I will primarily add some comments to those two subjects from my point of view. Over the last few decades, archaeology and the cultural heritage sector have been heavily influenced by globalism, identity thinking (in particular, individualism) and capitalism/market ideology. The interplay and inertia of these forces are of course multi-faceted and complex, but they have all weakened the strong connection between nationalism and heritage/archaeology that was once very evident in Scandinavia. Nationalism therefore stands out as a troublesome relic that cannot be taken for granted anymore, nei-","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41461894","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Sindbæk has seen the new Viking-themed exhibitions in Stockholm and Copenhagen and concludes, after a brief analysis, that they are expressions of populism, created out of a will to meet consumerism and international tourism. He detects lurking danger here: museums are ‘repositories of accumulated knowledge, study, evidence’ (Sindbæk 2022:21) – to embrace anti-elite populism, he suggests, puts them in a precarious position, treading a perilous path to the future. I have seen these exhibitions myself, and share some of Sindbæk’s concerns, both about the exhibitions and regarding wider developments in major museums. However, I think some of his conclusions may be questioned, while I wish to expand a little on other parts. In my opinion, what is most lacking in both exhibitions is overall context and story. Both seemed to me to be compilations of the finest Viking Age artefacts from each museum rather than objects selected to tell a (new? urgent? important?) story of the Viking Age based on latest finds and results from archaeology and history. Instead of providing perspective and story, the museums seem to have put all the traditional highlights on display, letting the story come second. What is the message? What do they want to say to me as a visitor on a more profound level? Indeed, in concurrence with Sindbæk, the lack of clear message and story may be an expression of the museum having capitulated from a position of telling the story, towards letting the visitor create her own meaning out of the bits and pieces served, while not challenging prejudice or expanding a general frame of reference.
{"title":"Hip Viking Heritage","authors":"Fredrik Svanberg","doi":"10.37718/csa.2022.07","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37718/csa.2022.07","url":null,"abstract":"Sindbæk has seen the new Viking-themed exhibitions in Stockholm and Copenhagen and concludes, after a brief analysis, that they are expressions of populism, created out of a will to meet consumerism and international tourism. He detects lurking danger here: museums are ‘repositories of accumulated knowledge, study, evidence’ (Sindbæk 2022:21) – to embrace anti-elite populism, he suggests, puts them in a precarious position, treading a perilous path to the future. I have seen these exhibitions myself, and share some of Sindbæk’s concerns, both about the exhibitions and regarding wider developments in major museums. However, I think some of his conclusions may be questioned, while I wish to expand a little on other parts. In my opinion, what is most lacking in both exhibitions is overall context and story. Both seemed to me to be compilations of the finest Viking Age artefacts from each museum rather than objects selected to tell a (new? urgent? important?) story of the Viking Age based on latest finds and results from archaeology and history. Instead of providing perspective and story, the museums seem to have put all the traditional highlights on display, letting the story come second. What is the message? What do they want to say to me as a visitor on a more profound level? Indeed, in concurrence with Sindbæk, the lack of clear message and story may be an expression of the museum having capitulated from a position of telling the story, towards letting the visitor create her own meaning out of the bits and pieces served, while not challenging prejudice or expanding a general frame of reference.","PeriodicalId":38457,"journal":{"name":"Current Swedish Archaeology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47712223","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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