The settlement mounds in Divtasvuona/Tysfjord, North Norway. Traces of a Sami fisher-farmer economy

ABSTRACT

In Tysfjord Municipality, North Norway, written sources mention Sami farms in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The farms had a mixed economy, with an emphasis on agriculture, fishing, hunting and gathering. On some of these farms there are documented settlement mounds. Minor excavations have been carried out on several of these archaeological sites. A pollen sample has also been taken from one of these locations. By using radiocarbon dating and artefact analyses it is possible to date the settlement mounds back to the Early Middle Ages. The establishment of these cultural monuments documents a change in the economy, with animal husbandry becoming more important. During the Middle Ages, cultivation of barley arose as a new element of the economy. The article addresses the question of whether this change in the economy can be linked to a Sami or a Norwegian population.

KEYWORDS:

• Settlement mound
• Sami
• farming
• Middle Ages
• trade
• agriculture
• grain cultivation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 A retrospective method is known in international historical research as retrogressive method (Gjerpe 2014).

2 The Sami outfields lie above the coastal farms, in the forest valleys, at the isthmus or in the low mountain areas, from a few kilometers to a few miles from the sea.

3 The dates are calibrated by Beta Analytic using Oxcal version 4.3.2 with the latest calibration curve. The dates used in the text are stated in the 2 sigma range.