Åsa M Larsson
Project leader at the Swedish National Heritage Board. Previously Director at SAU (Societas Archaeologica Upsaliensis), a foundation doing rescue archaeology, osteological analysis and research.
My dissertation is on the third millennium B.C. in South Sweden and the relationship between the Pitted Ware culture and the Corded Ware culture (Battle Axe culture). The theme that is explored is identity as created and altered through practice, as seen in pottery craft and the treatment of dead bodies.
My dissertation is on the third millennium B.C. in South Sweden and the relationship between the Pitted Ware culture and the Corded Ware culture (Battle Axe culture). The theme that is explored is identity as created and altered through practice, as seen in pottery craft and the treatment of dead bodies.
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Books by Åsa M Larsson
In South Sweden the third millennium BC is characterised by coastal settlements of marine hunter-gatherers known as the Pitted Ware culture, and inland settlements of the Battle Axe culture. This thesis outlines the history of research of the Middle Neolithic B in general and that of the pottery and burial practices in particular. Material culture must be understood as the result of both conscious preferences and embodied practices: technology can be deliberately cultural just as style can be un-selfconscious routine. Anthropological and ethnoarchaeological research into craft and the transmission of learning in traditional societies shows how archaeologists must take into consideration the interdependence of mind and body when interpreting style, technology and change in prehistory. The pottery crafts of the Pitted Ware and Battle Axe cultures were not just fundamentally different technologically, but even more so in the attitudes toward authority, tradition, variation and the social role of the potter in the community. The Battle Axe beakers represent a wholly new chaîne opératoire, probably introduced by a small group of relocated Beaker potters at the beginning of the period.
The different attitudes toward living bodies is highlighted further in the attitudes toward the dead bodies. In the mortuary ritual the Battle Axe culture was intent upon the creation and control of a perfect body which acted as a representative of the idealised notion of what it was to belong to the community. This focus upon completeness, continuation and control is echoed in the making of beakers using the ground up remains of old vessels as temper. In contrast, the Pitted Ware culture people broke the bodies of the dead by defleshing, removal of body parts, cremation, sorting, dispersal and/or reburial of the bones on the settlements. The individuality of the living body was destroyed leaving the durable but depersonalised bones to be returned to the joint collective of the ancestors. Just as the bodies were fragmented so were the pots, sherds and bases being deposited in large quantities on the settlements and occasionally in graves. Some of the pots were also tempered with burnt and crushed bones. At the end of the Middle Neolithic the material and human remains show evidence of a growing effort to find a common ground in the two societies through sharing certain mortuary rituals and making beakers with a mix of both traditions, stylistically and technologically.
Keywords: Middle Neolithic, Late Neolithic, Pitted Ware culture, Battle Axe culture, Corded Ware culture, pottery, pottery technology, craft, chaîne opératoire, mortuary archaeology, mortuary house, burial, ritual, defleshing, cremation, secondary mortuary practice, osteology, ethnoarchaeology, culture, culture change, identity, ethnicity, practice, cognition, body, embodiment
Papers by Åsa M Larsson
Authors: Kim Darmark, Fredrik Hallgren, Niklas Stenbäck, Åsa Larsson, Michel Guinard, Ylva Bäckström.
The Digital Archaeological Process (DAP) programme was initiated by the Swedish National Heritage Board in order to create a more seamless process for storing and sharing digital information generated through archaeological surveys and excavations. The programme aims to increase the availability of digital data as well as the quality and usefulness of the information. The Cultural Environment Register is being developed, which will contain and/or link to information about where fieldwork has been done and what was found: archaeological sites, field documentation, finds, as well as the reports and publications. In addition to creating a new system for storing this information, a large amount of old digital projects previously kept by museums and archaeological contractors is being collected to be made publicly available. Our goal is to make heritage management more efficient, and in the process the information will also become more useful to researchers, museums and the general public.
In South Sweden the third millennium BC is characterised by coastal settlements of marine hunter-gatherers known as the Pitted Ware culture, and inland settlements of the Battle Axe culture. This thesis outlines the history of research of the Middle Neolithic B in general and that of the pottery and burial practices in particular. Material culture must be understood as the result of both conscious preferences and embodied practices: technology can be deliberately cultural just as style can be un-selfconscious routine. Anthropological and ethnoarchaeological research into craft and the transmission of learning in traditional societies shows how archaeologists must take into consideration the interdependence of mind and body when interpreting style, technology and change in prehistory. The pottery crafts of the Pitted Ware and Battle Axe cultures were not just fundamentally different technologically, but even more so in the attitudes toward authority, tradition, variation and the social role of the potter in the community. The Battle Axe beakers represent a wholly new chaîne opératoire, probably introduced by a small group of relocated Beaker potters at the beginning of the period.
The different attitudes toward living bodies is highlighted further in the attitudes toward the dead bodies. In the mortuary ritual the Battle Axe culture was intent upon the creation and control of a perfect body which acted as a representative of the idealised notion of what it was to belong to the community. This focus upon completeness, continuation and control is echoed in the making of beakers using the ground up remains of old vessels as temper. In contrast, the Pitted Ware culture people broke the bodies of the dead by defleshing, removal of body parts, cremation, sorting, dispersal and/or reburial of the bones on the settlements. The individuality of the living body was destroyed leaving the durable but depersonalised bones to be returned to the joint collective of the ancestors. Just as the bodies were fragmented so were the pots, sherds and bases being deposited in large quantities on the settlements and occasionally in graves. Some of the pots were also tempered with burnt and crushed bones. At the end of the Middle Neolithic the material and human remains show evidence of a growing effort to find a common ground in the two societies through sharing certain mortuary rituals and making beakers with a mix of both traditions, stylistically and technologically.
Keywords: Middle Neolithic, Late Neolithic, Pitted Ware culture, Battle Axe culture, Corded Ware culture, pottery, pottery technology, craft, chaîne opératoire, mortuary archaeology, mortuary house, burial, ritual, defleshing, cremation, secondary mortuary practice, osteology, ethnoarchaeology, culture, culture change, identity, ethnicity, practice, cognition, body, embodiment
Authors: Kim Darmark, Fredrik Hallgren, Niklas Stenbäck, Åsa Larsson, Michel Guinard, Ylva Bäckström.
The Digital Archaeological Process (DAP) programme was initiated by the Swedish National Heritage Board in order to create a more seamless process for storing and sharing digital information generated through archaeological surveys and excavations. The programme aims to increase the availability of digital data as well as the quality and usefulness of the information. The Cultural Environment Register is being developed, which will contain and/or link to information about where fieldwork has been done and what was found: archaeological sites, field documentation, finds, as well as the reports and publications. In addition to creating a new system for storing this information, a large amount of old digital projects previously kept by museums and archaeological contractors is being collected to be made publicly available. Our goal is to make heritage management more efficient, and in the process the information will also become more useful to researchers, museums and the general public.
This paper was presented at EAA 2018 in Barcelona and outlines some conclusions and important considerations drawn from working in such a large and ambitious digitisation project.