Session: #1057

Discussion session (with formal abstracts)

How were Scandinavian countries and the Baltic market connected with Mediterranean and Southern European regions over the previous thousand years? What are the material traces of these connections? Can these connections be viewed from archaeological remains, and what do these finds tell us of activity between the two regions?

Material culture will be the focus of this topic. This session seeks to investigate imported goods, trade and connections from the Mediterranean and Southern European region into the Scandinavian societies and the Baltic market. It endeavours to examine what was desired and what was used at Courts, churches and households in the North. We also seek to address the issue of status and discuss whether there are any differences between imports found in common and wealthy households? Are there changes in fashion or function that can be evidenced and used as explanations, can patterns be identified and did these patterns change over time?

Examples of Mediterranean goods found in Scandinavian contexts usually include pottery from Italian, Portuguese and Spanish kiln sites, glass from Venice, shoes made from cork from the Iberian Peninsula and olive, fig and grape seeds from soil deposits. What do these finds represent; do they imply status, diet, migration or new ways of living? Did these goods arrive directly, or did they come via secondary contacts (and from where, and when)? Lastly, what goods are missing from these contexts and how does this affect knowledge of these Mediterranean and Scandinavian connections?

Scandinavia, Mediterranea, Trade, Material Culture, Middle Ages, Early Modern Era

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Georg Haggren (Finland) ^1,2

Joakim Kjellberg (Sweden) ^3,4
Tom Wennberg (Sweden) ⁵