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

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.     

Environmental interpretation is flowering in Denmark

Abstract

Environmental interpretation is flowering in Denmark. In 1986 it was decided to carry out a three‐year experimental project with 14 environmental interpreters. Today the number of environmental interpreters has grown to 230. The inspiration came from abroad, but the project is established according to Danish cultural and democratic traditions. Some Environmental Interpreters are employed by the State in the National Forests, others by counties, local authorities, museums or ‘green associations’, but they are all linked together in the Environmental Interpreter Service with secretariat in The National Forest and Nature Agency. A modern organisation provides training courses for the interpreters and has developed a series of active interpretation methods in order to make experiencing nature an important tool in modern Danish environmental management and inspire a positive attitude to the future—to sustainable development and management. The aim of setting up an Environmental Interpreter Service was to give people interesting experiences in and knowledge of the countryside and thereby a greater understanding of the complexity of nature, the conditions for agriculture and perhaps an increased environmental consciousness. It was also the hope that if people had a greater understanding of nature, they will love and care for it better. The Brundtland Report ‘Our Common Future, the conference in Rio in 1992 and Agenda 21 has changed the Environmental Interpreters’ work. We have recognised, that it is important to use live Interpreters and not only technical media in this important work. People respond best to personal, face‐to‐face interpretation. The interpreters try to create a love of nature, and at the same time, create an understanding of local and global environmental conditions.     

Exploring the Concept of (Un)familiarity: (Un)familiarity in Border Practices and Identity-Formation at the Slovenian–Croatian Border on Istria

In border region studies, the concept of (un)familiarity is applied in empirical studies of consumer culture across borders, illustrating how feelings of unfamiliarity can have an off-putting influence on cross-border interaction (e.g. because of dislike of or lack of attraction to the other side) at the same time as it can be an incentive for people living at borders to cross them (e.g. to explore the exotic other side). The concepts explanatory scope has, thus, far responded to the normative claim that a borderless Europe encourages and increases mobility. However, in previous studies applying the concept of (un)familiarity, an explanatory problem remains concerning people's unarticulated and perhaps deeper reasons for mobility and lack thereof. This leaves a question mark as to why feelings of (un)familiarity occur in the first place as well as the actual degree to which they constitute barriers and provide incentives for mobility. The concern in this article is to deepen our understanding of the concept of (un)familiarity. It enriches the bandwidth of the unfamiliarity concept by relating it to a notion of socio-spatial identity-formation, which takes into consideration the psychological aspects involved when identities form. By doing so, the concepts explanatory scope is extended, making it possible to explain some of the complexity involved when feelings of (un)familiarity occur. It, thus, also answers the question why (un)familiarity cannot be translated into normative claims about cross border mobility.     

Focus: sulphur isotope variation in archaeological marine fauna from northern Europe

We undertook combined stable carbon, nitrogen and sulphur isotope analysis of marine and terrestrial faunal remains from two prehistoric coastal shell middens in Denmark. The aim of the investigation was to establish whether sulphur isotopes were useful in discriminating terrestrial and marine consumers in this region. We found that sulphur isotopes do separate marine and terrestrial fauna but, contrary to our expectations, we observed a negative correlation between δ³⁴S and δ¹³C values for marine fauna. We conclude that similar studies over a broader geographical range are needed before sulphur isotopes can be reliably used to study coastal resource exploitation.     

SARUP REVISITED: ARCHAEOLOGICAL REALITY AND REALITIES OF ARCHAEOLOGY

In the second half of the 4^th millennium BC, we see significant changes in the early Neolithic culture. These take place some centuries after the initial introduction of agriculture and sees striking developments such as the apparent opening‐up of the landscape, involving forest clearance, the introduction of the ard for ploughing and the construction of regular houses. The transition to a settled and sedentary farming lifestyle must also have demanded mental adaptations, whereby the farmers were required to forge new and stable alliances. These alliances appear to be forged by a series of communal works, involving monumental structures, such as the building of dolmens and passage graves as well as the extensive and land‐demanding causewayed enclosures. The causewayed enclosures were essentially used for only a few days but were remembered for centuries. Since the 1970s, excavations have been undertaken in the Sarup area, on the island of Funen, Denmark, to obtain more detailed information about the activities that took place there between c. 3600 and 3000 BC. This paper presents the results of excavations and studies of two well‐preserved causewayed enclosures, the Barkaer‐structures and more than 30 megalithic monuments, as well as investigations of several settlements. This research has provided insight into a complex farming culture, which appears to have been firmly consolidated by major communal construction works, whereby teams and networks were created within an evolving cooperative social structure.     

Modeling thermal convection in supradetachment basins: example from western Norway

The juxtaposition of fault‐bounded sedimentary basins, above crustal‐scale detachments, with warmer exhumed footwalls can lead to thermal convection of the fluids in the sediments. The Devonian basins of western Norway are examples of supradetachment basins that formed in the hanging wall of the Nordfjord‐Sogn Detachment Zone. In the central part of the Hornelen and Kvamshesten basins, the basin‐fill is chiefly represented by fluvial sandstones and minor lacustrine siltstones, whereas the fault margins are dominated by fanglomerates along the detachment contact. Prominent alteration and low‐greenschist facies metamorphic conditions are associated with the peak temperature estimates of the sediments close to the detachment shear zone. Fluid circulation may have been active during the burial of the sediments, and we quantify the potential role played by thermal convection in redistributing heat within the basins. Different models are tested with homogeneous and layered basin‐fill and with material transport properties corresponding to sandstones and siltstones. We found that thermally driven fluid flow is expected in supradetachment basins as a transient process during the exhumation of warmer footwalls. We demonstrate that the fluid flow may have significantly affected the temperature distribution in the upper five kilometers of the Devonian basins of western Norway. The temperature anomaly induced by the flow may locally reach about 80°C. The sedimentary layering formed by sand‐ and siltstones strata does not inhibit fluid circulation at the scale of the basin. The presence of fluid pathways along the detachment has an important impact on the flow and allows an efficient drainage of the basin by channelizing fluids upward along the detachment.     

Diaphyseal remodelling in leprosy: A radiological and palaeopathological study

Diaphyseal remodelling is a pathological process of the proximal phalanges, metatarsals and metacarpals in all established types of clinical leprosy. It is suggested that the changes are the result of sympathetic neuropathy and alteration of peripheral vascular bed dynamics selectively stimulating extracortical osteoclastic and endosteal osteoblastic activity. There is an overall loss of diaphyseal cortical diameter, either in concentric or knife-edge pattern. There is extracortical absorption of bone and coincident endosteal bone deposition. Ultimately, there is diaphyseal pathological fracture, and subsequent resorption of the distal and proximal remnants due to combined continued diaphyseal remodelling and achroosteolysis.