In Scandinavia as elsewhere, cryptocrystalline rocks such as flint were an integral part of peoples' lives during prehistory. Knowledge about flint, its properties, its uses, and its many names, was no doubt transmitted through the generations as part of everyday life. As archaeologists, we are interested in how prehistoric people dealt with flint and what they might have seen as the strengths and weaknesses of the various kinds of flint available. But in order to answer such questions it is necessary that we are able to talk to each other about flint in an informed and informative manner. Scandinavian Flint proposes a classification into 17 types for use by archaeologists. Flint types are described and evaluated in terms of knappability, limitations posed by nodule size, and prehistoric availability, rather than in terms of morphogenesis or chemical composition. Flint formation, geographic distribution of flint sources in Scandinavia, provenience studies, and patination are discussed in detail. Scandinavian Flint is a useful guide for archaeologists working with flint.

This book is devoted to flintworking encountered in the so-called cult houses and ritual zones from the Late Bronze Age in southern Scandinavia, where thousands of barrows were built in the period from the Neolithic to the end of the Early Bronze Age

Scandinavia, a land mass comprising the modern countries of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, was the last part of Europe to be inhabited by humans. Not until the end of the last Ice Age when the melting of huge ice sheets left behind a fresh, barren land surface, about 13,000 BC, did the first humans arrive and settle in the region. The archaeological record of these prehistoric cultures, much of it remarkably preserved in Scandinavia's bogs, lakes, and fjords, has given us a detailed portrait of the evolution of human society at the edge of the inhabitable world. In this book, distinguished archaeologist T. Douglas Price provides a history of Scandinavia from the arrival of the first humans to the end of the Viking period, ca. AD 1050. The first book of its kind in English in many years, Ancient Scandinavia features overviews of each prehistoric epoch followed by illustrative examples from the region's rich archaeology. An engrossing and comprehensive picture of change across the millennia emerges, showing how human society evolved from small bands of hunter-gatherers to large farming communities to the complex warrior cultures of the Bronze and Iron Ages, cultures which culminated in the spectacular rise of the Vikings at the end of the prehistoric period. The material evidence of these past societies--arrowheads from reindeer hunts, megalithic tombs, rock art, beautifully wrought weaponry, Viking warships--give vivid testimony to the ancient peoples of Scandinavia and to their extensive contacts with the remote cultures of the Arctic Circle, Western Europe, and the Mediterranean

For more than a century flint daggers have been among the most closely studied and most heavily published later prehistoric lithic tools. It is well established that they are found across Europe and beyond, and that many were widely circulated over many generations. Yet, few researchers have attempted to discuss the entirety of the flint dagger phenomenon. The present volume brings together papers that address questions of the regional variability and socio-technical complexity of flint daggers and their production. It focuses on the typology, chronology, technology, functionality and meaning of flint and other lithic daggers produced primarily in Europe, but also in the Eastern Mediterranean and East Asia, in prehistory. The 14 papers by leading researchers provide a comprehensive overview of the state of knowledge concerning various flint dagger corpora as well as potential avenues for the development of a research agenda across national, regional and disciplinary boundaries. The volume originates from a session held at the 2011 meeting of the European Association of Archaeology but includes additional commissioned contributions.

This two volume monograph about the region of Thy in the early Bronze Age provides a high resolution archaeological and ecological model of the organisation of landscape, settlements and households during the period 1500-1100 BC. Bordering the North Sea to the west, and the calmer waters of the Limfjord to the east, the region of Thy in Denmark experienced four centuries of intense economic and demographic expansion. By combining results from environmental and economic research (pollen and palaeo-botanical analyses) with intensive field surveys and excavations of farmsteads with exceptional preservation, it has been possible to open a window to the changes that transformed Bronze Age society and its environment during a few centuries of exceptional expansion and wealth consumption. The results from this interdisciplinary venture made it possible to link together the histories of local farmsteads with the wider regional and global history of the Bronze Age in North-western Europe during this period. Here is much to feed on for students and researchers of the Bronze Age alike.

This book focuses on the introduction of Neolithic extraction practices across Europe through to the Atlantic periphery of Britain and Ireland. The key research questions are when and why were these practices adopted and what role did extraction sites play in Neolithic society. Neolithic mines and quarries have frequently been seen as fulfilling roles linked to the expansion of the Neolithic economy. However, this ignores the fact that many communities chose to selectively dig for certain types of stone in preference to others and why the products from these sites were generally deposited in special places such as wetlands. To address this question, 168 near-global ethnographic studies were analyzed to identify common trends in traditional extraction practices to produce robust statistics about their motivations and material signatures. Repeated associations emerged between storied locations, the organization of extraction practices, long-distance distribution of products, and the material evidence such activities left behind. This suggests that we can now probably identify mythologized/storied sites, seasonality, ritualized extraction, and the use-life of extraction site products. The ethnographic model was tested against data from 223 near-global archaeological extraction sites, which confirmed a similar patterning in both material records. It was used to analyze the social context of 79 Neolithic flint mine and 51 axe quarry excavations in Britain and Ireland and to review their European origins. The evidence that emerges confirms the pivotal role played by Neolithic extraction practices in European Neolithization and that the interaction of indigenous foragers with migrant miners/farmers was fundamental to the adoption of the new agropastoral lifestyle.

Copper is a metal that currently is a key element in the field of electricity, although it has significant importance in other fields, particularly when it is alloyed, due to its mechanical properties and corrosion resistance. Moreover, copper and some of its compounds are gaining importance in other topics due to their antibacterial properties. Nevertheless, this metal, which was one of the first used by humans, has been crucial for their development, and for this reason, two periods of history are called the Copper Age and Bronze Age due to the importance of Cu and Cu-Sn, respectively, in the fabrication of utensils, weapons, and ornamental objects. From that moment, the utilization of copper has significantly grown to an actual production approaching 30 Mt, of which around 80% corresponds to the mine production while the rest comes from recycling. The reutilization of copper (or the exploitation of secondary resources) is a topic of increasing importance due to both the depletion of high-grade deposits and the importance of environmental aspects in metallurgical industries. This book provides a collection of research works and reviews that emphasize some of the above-reported topics.