The Early Settlement of South Norway after the Last Deglaciation: A Diasporic Perspective

Selsing, Lotte

doi:10.1080/00293652.2012.721390

Cited by 8 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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“…The main territories may have represented a long historic tradition from the time of immigration to south Norway. The immigration in the west and north was probably from the south (Selsing 2012;Günther et al 2018), in the east from the north, east and south-east (Sørensen et al 2013;Günther et al 2018) and in the south-east from present-day Sweden (Schmitt et al 2006;Glørstad 2016).…”

Section: Discussion Of the Relationships Between Hunter-gatherers Mamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The lithic traditions may have been a remnant of people's origins, following their heritage on the Continent (Selsing 2012). In the new landscapes, the huntergatherers found lithic materials with the same qualities as those they originally used, primarily flint.…”

Section: Discussion Of the Relationships Between Hunter-gatherers Mamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Mikkelsen and Nybruget 1975;Hood 1991;Fuglestvedt 1998). Erratic flint may have symbolised the coastal landscapes and portable flint may have mediated coastinland relations (Hood 1988;Selsing 2012; see also Conkey 1984). This may explain why small amounts of flint are found at nearly all sites in the interior.…”

Section: Lithic Raw Materialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Identified house remains and processed lithic material may indicate traces of central meeting places that combined both sacral and profane activities (Martens and Hagen 1961;Indrelid [1986] 1994; Selsing 2012). Settlement sites close to the watershed between watercourses draining in different directions imply that people may have had routes crossing the water divide to other drainage systems (Selsing 2012). The activities did not leave much in the way of accumulated cultural layers and other physical material.…”

Section: The Role Of the Central Main Territorymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Fuglestvedt ([2005Fuglestvedt ([ ] 2017Fuglestvedt ([ , 2009) introduced a sociodemographic model of reindeer clans for the Early Mesolithic in the lowlands of south-west Norway. Selsing (2012) argued that hunter-gatherers with a diasporic reindeer culture originated from the Continent during the lateglacial time with flint as the important lithic raw material representing the area of origin. Thus the flint may have had a double function: as a religious marker for the origin myth and a good raw material for tools.…”

Section: Celebrating the Reindeer Diasporic Culturementioning

confidence: 99%

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Main Territories in South Norway in the Mesolithic

Selsing

2020

Environmental Archaeology

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The focus of this paper is on regionality, the use of main territories and how they are interlinked in the Mesolithic in south Norway during the culmination of the settlement of the mountain area, 8500-7600 cal BP. The main territories and their boundaries are identified by the distribution of specific lithic raw materials and one artefact type, distribution of ungulates and drainage systems. In the Mesolithic, south Norway corresponds to a language family with four dialectic tribes, each one corresponding to a main territory. Based on ethnographic analogies, the inegalitarian higher latitude boreal hunter-gatherer societies had delayed return. The subsistence strategy may have included the defence of resources which were plentiful, concentrated and predictable, with ownership of resource-rich locations such as salmon runs and quarries, while unreliable resources such as unpredictable ungulates may not have been defended. Storing may have resulted in a sedentary period during the yearly round close to resource-rich areas along rivers and coasts. The presence of a cemetery by the seashore at Hummervikholmen, indicates lineal descent groups, linking territories to funerary behaviour. Territorial lineages may have existed, with formal areas for disposal of the dead at least along resource-rich riversides and seashores. However, these may have been destroyed by erosion and other destruction processes. Lithic markers indicate that foragers from the four main territories maintained a network of links following the drainage systems and crossing the mountain area in the Central Main Territory, which was temporarily settled by people from the other main territories. Here, people from different directions could meet during the warm season hunting reindeer. In the river sources around the water divide areas, people may have had meeting places, exchanging information over large areas of south Norway. The activities at the meeting places were connected to a reindeer culture with long diasporic traditions reaching back to their origin at the lateglacial Continent. Reindeer are proposed to have had a central role in the grouping of the main territories.

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