The settlement of Iceland

The aim of the project is to ascertain whether, in connection with the exploitation of natural resources, any special ties existed between the boat grave people of Vendel in northern Uppland, Sweden, and the Anglo‐Saxons in Sutton Hoo in East Anglia, England, during the pre‐Viking period. The existence of cultural ties between these areas has been assumed in earlier research. The scientific methods used in palaeoenvironmental mapping of the study areas include detailed stratigraphical examination of both biogenic and minerogenic sediments in the basin of Lake Vendelsjön and in the valley of the river Deben. Different types of scientific analyses are applied in order to reconstruct the geological background and the environmental, vegetational and settlement histories of the two areas.     

Reconstructing the past in medieval Iceland

Locating and dating sagas is a difficult but still important task. This paper examines the relationship between the Sagas of Icelanders, which are concerned with tenth‐ and eleventh‐century events, and the contemporary sagas of the mid‐thirteenth century. Drawing upon models from anthropology, it looks at how contemporary ideas permeated these historicizing texts and how genealogy and geography act as structures around which the past is remembered. The many political relationships which occur in Laxdæla saga are analysed in relation to those from contemporary sagas from the same area of western Iceland. Since it appears that there is relatively little in common between the political situations depicted in Laxdæla saga and those portrayed in the contemporary sagas, it is likely that Laxdæla saga and the contemporary sagas were actually written down in different periods. It is possible, therefore, that the Sagas of Icelanders give us a view of the past which originates earlier than is usually suggested.     

Iceland: A Comment

Abstract

North-West England was the site of Britain's first canal and of one of the last true canal warehouses. The Duke's Warehouse in the Castlefield Canal Basin in Manchester was the first canal warehouse to have the classic design features of internal canal arms, multi-storeys, split level loading, terracing and water powered hoists, and was built between 1769 and 1771. The Great Northern Warehouse, in the centre of Manchester, was the last of the monumental road, rail and canal interchanges to be built in the Victorian period. Finished in 1898, it marked the close of the canal warehouse tradition and the beginning of motorised road transport storage. Between the two buildings were nearly 130 years of innovation and change. With at least 58 surviving canal warehouses across the region, from Kendal in the north to Bunbury in the south, North-West England contains one of the largest, and most important, groups of canal warehouses in Europe (Figures 1 and 2). As general purpose redistribution centres they were a vital element in feeding the rapidly growing industrial urban populations of the region. Furthermore, their design influenced the building of the first railway warehouses, and later the textile warehouse, and although the canals were superseded by the railway, the canal warehouse remained an important element of the transport economy until the arrival of road haulage in the 1920s. This paper is based upon research undertaken by the author in 2000 and 2001 as part of the Tameside Archaeological Survey. This is a landscape archaeology project funded by Tameside MBC and undertaken on their behalf by the University of Manchester Archaeological Unit.     

Historical Osteoarchaeology in Iceland

Historical osteoarchaeology has not been at the forefront of archaeological research in Iceland. Large-scale excavations of historical cemeteries did not start until the mid-twentieth century, and all excavations of historical cemeteries until the early twenty-first century were development led. This fact means that many of the projects carried out did not have an osteoarchaeological focus, nor asked specific osteological questions of the material, as well as the fact that the state of the publication of these sites is very varied. This paper presents a summary of the larger excavations of historical cemeteries in Iceland alongside discussions of the various approaches to the presentation of the analysis of the skeletal remains of those sites that have been published from Jón Steffensen??s focus on identifying the individuals at seventeenth-to-eighteenth-century Skálholt and Hólar; to the evidence presented for the hospital in sixteenth-century Skrieuklaustur and the influence of increased urbanization in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Reykjavík on the palaeopathology of those buried there.     

Zooarchaeology and Modernity in Iceland

This paper follows the lead of the increasing numbers of scholars utilizing the methods and theory of environmental archaeology within historical archaeology. This paper addresses the issue of ??modernity?? in early modern Iceland through the analysis of faunal assemblages from historic sites in Iceland. It examines the idea of modernity through the ideas of commoditization of animals as well as the improvement of domestic animals as seen through these faunal assemblages. There are a number of possible faunal indications of processes associated with modernity in the existing historic assemblages of Iceland though at least some of these have deep roots in the medieval period. Examining the idea of modernity through the faunal assemblages of historic-period Iceland both help refine the idea of modernity as well as reveal the medieval roots of much of what we term ??modern??.     

Tephrochronology,Environmental Change and the Norse Settlement of Iceland

Abstract

The first human impacts on the Icelandic environment came with the Norse colonisation or Landnám of the ninth century AD. The colonisation represents a fundamental environmental change that is both rapid and profound. In this paper we assess geomorphological dimensions of the initial settlement period using a tephrochronology that includes the Landnám Tephra, erupted ca. 870 AD, two tenth century AD tephras KR 920 and E 935, and 11 other well dated tephra layers. We report a new ¹⁴C age of 1676 ±12 ¹⁴C yr BP (cal AD 345 (400) 419) for the tephra SILK-YN which forms a key prehistoric marker horizon that constrains rates of environmental change in the centuries before Norse Settlement. Aeolian sediment accumulation rates show five geomorphological responses to settlement that differ in the rate and trajectory of change. These distinct anthropogenic signals are the result of spatially variable sensitivity to grazing and deforestation, and reflect the extent of local soil erosion. This critical erosion threshold is variable in space and time.     

蓝色沸腾爆发球!冰岛最忠实的间歇喷泉

冰岛虽然叫“冰”岛,但地热喷泉却是一大特色,境内很多地方都有丰富的地热和温泉资源,以及间歇喷泉,举世闻名.要知道“间歇喷泉”的英文Geyser就是从冰岛这里的间歇喷泉以及冰岛语而诞生,可见这里间歇喷泉的鼻祖地位.这其中最著名的便是Strokkur Geyser(史托克间歇喷泉),它的特点之一就是喷得够高,可以达到20～30米以上,但更重要的是它的“忠实”,比美国黄石公园的“老忠实”喷泉还勤勉,每5～7分钟就喷一次,所有游客可以看到爽为止,而且可以近距离拍摄,无人不大呼过瘾. 间歇喷泉位于冰岛首都雷克雅未克东北约70公里处,乘大巴一个多小时就可以抵达,很方便.冰岛天气多变,在去之前就有所耳闻,此番夏季前往,没想到就这一个多小时的车程沿途就经历了从万里无云,到时阴时晴,到了山谷区域更是大雨夹带雪珠,令人难以想象.不过好处就是看到了多处彩虹,在一片开阔地带拔地而起,非常壮观.这条景观大道也被称为冰岛旅游黄金圈,因为同时还可以前往距离间歇喷泉不远处的黄金瀑布.     

论光绪朝的继统之争

在慈禧的操弄下,光绪继位,但留下诸多危机变数,从而引发摇荡朝局数年的继统立嗣之争.先有广安、潘敦俨的奋起,继有吴可读尸谏,最后以群臣参政的方式得以解决.而类似吴可读这样愚忠以至不惜舍生事君者也渐成末世绝响,清流们的"烟墨烂然"不过是传统社会向近代转型时期的回光返照.     

梵净山与佛教缘

章对佛教圣地梵净山的佛教起源、化、建筑等方面的兴衰作了一定的探考,对于研究梵净山佛教化以及旅游化业的开发利用有一定的参考意义。     

The church and sexuality in medieval Iceland

Although the Church's regulation of marriage and sex was felt by all Germanic tribes, this subject can be studied most closely in Iceland because of the richness of its source material. Four problems are examined here, from literary, legal, and historical sources, namely marriage, divorce, clerical celibacy and extramarital sex. All three categories of sources agree that marriage was a contractual arrangement between the families of the bride and the groom, as known elsewhere among Germanic tribes. They likewise concur that divorce was possible and easily obtainable. Clerical marriage, among both bishops and priests, was seen as acceptable in the legal and historical sources; the literary sagas do not deal with this issue. That extramarital sexual activities were common, is clear from the legal and historical sources but, in contrast, the literary materials depicts Icelandic couples as largely monogamous and faithful. This discrepancy between the historical and literary sagas, both products of the thirteenth century, can be explained by the growing influence of the Church, which by this time was attempting to introduce clerical celibacy and marital fidelity into Iceland. The thirteenth-century clerical authors of the literary sagas, set in ancient times, provided models intended to improve the sexual behavior of their audiences.     

The church and sexuality in medieval Iceland

Although the Church's regulation of marriage and sex was felt by all Germanic tribes, this subject can be studied most closely in Iceland because of the richness of its source material. Four problems are examined here, from literary, legal, and historical sources, namely marriage, divorce, clerical celibacy and extramarital sex. All three categories of sources agree that marriage was a contractual arrangement between the families of the bride and the groom, as known elsewhere among Germanic tribes. They likewise concur that divorce was possible and easily obtainable. Clerical marriage, among both bishops and priests, was seen as acceptable in the legal and historical sources; the literary sagas do not deal with this issue. That extramarital sexual activities were common, is clear from the legal and historical sources but, in contrast, the literary materials depicts Icelandic couples as largely monogamous and faithful. This discrepancy between the historical and literary sagas, both products of the thirteenth century, can be explained by the growing influence of the Church, which by this time was attempting to introduce clerical celibacy and marital fidelity into Iceland. The thirteenth-century clerical authors of the literary sagas, set in ancient times, provided models intended to improve the sexual behavior of their audiences.