Copyright C 2001

Acta Archaeologica vol. 72:2, 2001, pp. 91107

Printed in Denmark All rights reserved

ACTA ARCHAEOLOGICA
ISSN 0065-001X

LONG-TERM HISTORY ON A DANISH ISLAND:

THE ALS PROJECT
by
M.L.S. S, J.D. H & S.J. L

INTRODUCTION
The Als Project is a regional study based on field survey. Its aims, in addition to investigating the development of the local cultural landscape, are to contribute
to ongoing discussions of field methodology and theoretical debates. Field survey has been widely used
within archaeology. Through the use of different techniques for collecting and sampling surface material
(including standing monuments), such surveys have
typically aimed to locate sites and to investigate the
relationships both between them and with the natural landscape (see various discussions in Fabech and
Ringtved 1999). Recently, however, this approach has
been intensively debated, both in terms of appropriate methodologies and their theoretical foundation.
One concern has been with the definition of sites, in
particular in terms of whether, and how, they can be
delimited from their surrounding landscape. In response to this, concepts such as off-site archaeology
have been introduced (cf. Kuna 1998: 7778), although this has often merely served to reify the distinction between sites and landscapes (but see, for example, Fokkens 1996). Another concern, based on developments within theoretical archaeology, has been
whether interpretations of archaeological distributions correspond to any prehistoric reality (Neustupny 1998); of what are archaeological data a reflection? There has also been increased critique of socalled rational approaches that see the landscape as
an objective phenomenon or in terms of its economic
potential (cf. Antiquity No. 281 special section, Roym-

ans 1995, Tilley 1994). These underlying concerns, in

conjunction with changes in information technologies, have resulted in much theoretical debate, as well
as methodological developments.
There have, in particular, been calls for greater
attention to be paid to the cultural dimension of
space, including the recognition that people may perceive landscapes in culturally-specific ways (e.g. Roymans 1995). One of the most radical challenges to
more traditional landscape studies has been drawn
from phenomenology (Tilley 1994), which seeks to interpret the prehistoric landscape through the bodily
experience of space. In theory, this seems to offer an
approach which will bypass the problems of archaeological constructions such as sites, since the landscape becomes the stage of action, rather than the
individual site. It is notable, however, that the case
studies so far offered from this perspective have focused exclusively on fossilised landscapes, with upstanding monuments. By definition, these are often
upland areas, where the prehistoric landscape is not
noticeably overlain by recent agricultural and industrial activities, or by urban development. Such studies
offer little guidance on how to recover the prehistoric
landscape in more typical geographical contexts,
which have experienced these modern transformations. In areas where it is not obvious how one can
experience the prehistoric landscape, it is therefore
necessary to continue to employ other strategies, such
as field survey.
There has also been considerable discussion of

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sampling techniques and field survey strategy (cf. Berglund 1991, Edmonds et al. 1999, Haselgrove et al.
1985, Kuna 1998, Shennan 1985, Steinberg 1996,
Thrane 1987). Alongside these developments has also
come the increasing use of GIS, which in the main
has been concerned with predictive modelling and
testing of correlations between different variables
(Nielsen 1999, Wansleeben and Verhart 1997). Overall, these recent developments have resulted in a curious tension between an emphasis on predictability of
human behaviour on the one hand, and on cultural
contingency on the other.
In order to advance applications of field survey,
developments of techniques and approaches must
be coupled with discussion of the insights which
these methods can offer (and, indeed, of what they
cannot). It will be argued in this paper that field
survey, when employed at the appropriate scale, offers the potential both to resolve the tension between predictability and contingency, and to bridge
the characteristic archaeological divide between detailed site-based work and general models of cultural behaviour. Therefore, to understand the contribution that field survey may make, one must be
explicit about the scale at which societies are explored. Rather than focus on single events, these
methodologies can detect both a range of simultaneous actions and the traces of their changes over
time. The Als Project, through its use of very intensive field survey within a limited area, produces
data which have the potential to demonstrate this
complexity. Such approaches tally well with, and
may even necessitate, a theoretical perspective that
sees both the constitution of society and social
change as arising from the interplay between a
number of localised factors. This perspective neither
presumes that local development is dictated by generalised processes, nor does it accept that the individual actions which lie behind social change are
independent from the contexts in which they take
place. By looking beyond the bounds of the immediate community connected with the site, different local and regional landscapes are instead taken
as the unit of analysis. Through this, wider social
relationships, and their articulation through space
and time, can be taken into account in interpretations of social processes, and in exploring the causes

of change. Such interpretations can be subtle and

locally informed, yet able to offer a perspective on
wider developments, such as regional changes in
settlement type or burial rites. They can also circumvent the commonly made distinction between
site and off-site, for humans are seen as engaging
with all aspects of a landscape, rather than just
living in a series of well-defined settlements, with
empty, unimportant space between them.
The Als Project, located on an island off the east
coast of Jutland, is an attempt to employ field survey
in pursuit of such layered interpretations (Srensen
1992). It aims to explore the transformations within
local history, as found expressed within a range of
activities. The project, now in its second stage, was
originally instigated at Cambridge University in 1989,
later becoming a joint enterprise between the universities of Cambridge, Durham and Southampton, in
collaboration with Haderslev Museum, Denmark.
The results of the first stage of the project, which consisted of six field seasons of intensive fieldwalking and
test excavation in the north-west part of the island,
are preliminarily reported on here.

BACKGROUND
Als is situated just north of the Danish-German border. It is an island with a maximum width of 17 km
and is up to 35 km long. It has several characteristic
features which are key for understanding the nature
of the area being studied. As an island, it has distinct
physical borders, which would have affected peoples
mobility and perceptions of the landscape. Although
a big island, within a day a substantial part could be
covered on foot, or by boat around the coast. Furthermore, it is a young moraine landscape created at the
end of the last Ice Age, which means it is fairly undulating with a maximum altitude of 81 m OD. The
landscape has a relatively gentle topography, with
only a few distinct features, in particular beach
meadows, cliffs and the system of tunnel valleys. The
landscape would thus have imposed few obvious
physical constraints on the location of settlements and
other activities, apart from the clear distinction between coastal and inland areas.
The island has a rich archaeological heritage, although it is becoming clear that from the Neolithic

Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

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Fig. 1. Elevation map of Als.

onwards the recorded archaeology has been heavily

biased towards burials and ritual deposits, including
the famous Hjortspring boat offering of the Pre-Roman Iron Age. In its material culture Als constitutes,
at least in certain periods, a well-defined local area,

with the development of specific forms and practices.

An example of these is the distinct local assemblages
found in Early Bronze Age graves (Asingh and Rasmussen 1989). However, prior to the project, the
existing data gave a confusing impression of a cultural

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landscape with extremely few settlements, but many

burials scattered in the landscape.
In this area the physical landscape does not provide an obvious guide to the nature and development of settlement organisation. This is in direct
contrast with the starting-points of many of the
well-known field-survey projects such as those conducted in areas around the Mediterranean (Barker
and Lloyd 1991), where dramatic topography and
other physical constraints, such as water sources,
can have a direct bearing on the location of settlements. Moreover, the lack of a known or presumed
settlement core, evidence which so often has been
used as the starting point for other field surveys
carried out in southern Scandinavia (e.g. Thrane
1990), also makes the Als Project distinctive. The
challenge facing the Als Project was therefore to
produce archaeological data which would help to
investigate issues of settlement location and landscape development, with the subtlety and depth
called for above. This involved working at a much
finer resolution than has been common in many
studies (for a discussion on a similar point for Italian archaeology see Terranato 1996), and included
moving the focus from the identification of sites to
looking at activities in terms of densities within the
landscape. The aim of the project is thus to understand long-term history within an area that was experienced as a spatial entity in the past, investigating in particular how people interacted with a
physical environment which itself was affected by,
and inscribed with the traces of, previous actions.
The project deals with the period from the Neolithic to the beginning of the Viking Age. The societies whose long-term histories are investigated therefore have in common that they were agricultural, but
not urbanised, communities. To attain its objectives
the project has developed a research framework that
has divided the work into two stages, and the island
into three research areas. Stage One, discussed in this
paper, focused on the Primary Area, which consists
of the western part of Nordborg parish. This area will
remain the most intensively investigated area, using a
range of techniques. The Secondary Area (which lies
immediately to the south of the Primary Area) and
the Tertiary Area (the rest of the island) are the focus
of Stage Two of the project. During this stage less

intensive field-walking methods are used to test and

adjust the models arising from the study of the Primary Area.
The Primary Area is geographically defined by the
coast to the north, west and south, and by a more
arbitrary border towards the east, roughly following
the dividing line between clay and sand. The latter
limit was chosen in order to include the change in
soil type and the level land to the north-east of the
tunnel valley system within the Primary study area.
This area is dominated by sandy soil, although experience of working there has shown that there is a
greater preponderance of clay than the surface soil
map suggests. This has been confirmed by information from local farmers. In addition, prior to modern drainage and agricultural levelling, the land
would have been dotted with small bogs, dead ice
holes and localised marl deposits, all of which would
have created discrete ecological habitats. There are
at present no watercourses within this landscape,
apart from the streams connected with the tunnel valleys. Studies of aerial photographs and field observations make it clear, however, that prior to modern
drainage there was a more extensive water system,
and natural springs have so far been documented in
one location (Srensen 1992).

CONSTRUCTING A PREHISTORIC
LANDSCAPE
Within the parameters outlined above, the aims of
Stage One of the Als Project were to identify traces
of a range of human activities within the landscape
and to characterise and analyse these further in terms
of their nature and changes through time and space.
To this end Stage One used a combination of intensive fieldwalking, test excavation, and recording of local collections. During this stage, about 25% of the
available land (i.e. excluding permanent grass,
meadows, forest and urban areas) within the Primary
area was fieldwalked in 100 m lanes with walkers
spaced 5 m apart. Through this method several continuous blocks of ploughed land, amounting to a total
of 505 hectares were surveyed. In comparison with
most field-survey projects in southern Scandinavia,
this represents extremely intensive surface collection.
It is furthermore distinct in not being directed to-

Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

wards the identification of discrete sites, but rather is
concerned with establishing the nature and density of
activities in the landscape, wherever they take place.
This is in contrast to, for example, the strategy employed by the Danish Natural Gas Project (Vorting
1984).
The collection policy used in fieldwalking was informed by practical considerations, such as the ability
to make decisions in the field, and changes in
fieldwalking personnel between seasons. With regard
to worked flint, many of the areas fieldwalked contained enormous amounts, and thus realistic collection criteria had to be developed. The decision was
made not to collect primary reduction stage flint, so
the material collected and analysed comprised only
secondary reduction stage flint. Primary reduction
debris is here used to refer to pieces which are the
result of the initial preparation of flint for further
work. This produces flakes, blades, chips and rejected
nodules. Secondary reduction stage flint implies the
further modification of pieces of flint in order to prepare them for immediate use, such as flakes with retouched edges, or to make artefacts, such as scrapers,
retouched blades, arrowheads or axes. In practice,
this means that only pieces showing some degree of
working, in addition to their initial removal from a
core or similar nodule, are collected. The only exceptions to our collection policy are core rejuvenation
flakes and fragments of cores. Following the common
definition of primary and secondary production stages
these are primary pieces and should be considered
waste. The reason for including them amongst the
bulk finds is that they are likely to represent, or to be
connected to, an activity area in a more direct fashion
than can be argued for other pieces belonging to the
primary production stages. As they may indicate
where tool production was carried out they are of
special interest to the project.
The collected flint was further divided into bulk
finds (BF) and special finds (SF). The bulk finds consist of undiagnostic secondary reduction stage flint,
and are collected and recorded in terms of general
type, weight and number for each 5100 m collection lane. The bulk finds provide the quantitative
basis for the analysis of different types of densities and
correlations in the landscape, but without an immediate association to either date or activity. One of the

95

main aims of the future analysis of this material is to

explore the potential chronological or cultural signatures within this data, as variables such as the presence/absence of cortex, or the combinations of types,
are likely to be more informative than is immediately
obvious. The special finds are objects diagnostic of a
particular time period or are distinct formal artefacts,
such as axes. They were, therefore, individually recorded in the field and their location eyed-in as precisely as possible within their particular 5100 m collection lane. Their function is to provide a spot-location which may help to identify and date an activity
or event. In addition to the large amount of worked
flint, other categories of material were also collected.
These comprise burnt flint and burnt stones, the
weight of which were recorded under general BF
data, as well as pottery (which, due to its relative scarcity, was included under SF), and a few rare and distinctive objects, such as glass beads (also included
under SF).
This collection policy has produced approximately
18,000 (432 kg) of secondarily worked flint, of which
some 2,000 were special finds. In addition, during
field-walking and excavation we have found around
2,500 (12 kg) pottery sherds (mostly very fragmented).
All the data collected are subject to a number of wellknown biases and influences brought about by such
things as the weather, soil conditions and personnel.
The project recognises these, but after much consideration the decision was made not to try to compensate for them, as their influence on the overall
picture is thought to be limited, as has also been recognised by other projects (Clarke 1978, Neustupny
pers. comm.).
In addition to the collection of material, the individual fields were also described. This means that
general topography and soil conditions, as well as obvious patterning within the surface archaeology, such
as clusters of burnt stone or burnt flint, were recorded. Further analysis of the relationship between
BF and SF and such localised aspects will take place
during the final stage of the project.
Guided by the fieldwalking data, a number of test
excavations have also been carried out. Their aims
have been to investigate whether clusters of material
on the surface had any associated stratigraphy, and
to confirm the date and characteristics of particular

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Fig. 2. Map of north-western Als showing dividing line between the Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Study Area. Sites mentioned in the
texts are indicated.

elements of our surface collection. These excavations

have focused upon clusters of burnt stones, pottery
scatters, and at one location investigation of ploughdamaged barrows. One result emerging from these
excavations is that burnt stones on the surface appear to be consistently associated with cooking-pits
or fire-places, and that these often seem to be arranged in small clusters. It is reasonable to assume
that such clusters were related to domestic structures
and/or other types of maintenance activities, but so
far none of our investigations have recovered any
such associated structures. It is probably the case
that such pits were either placed in particular activity zones, or on the margins of domestic areas, as
observed, for example, on some Bronze Age sites
(e.g. Lomborg 1982, Rasmussen 1995). Their location does not, therefore, give direct guidance to the

location of other structures. This is in contrast to

the results from the investigations of surface pottery
scatters, which have at this stage been carried out
at four locations (see Fig. 2). Three of these investigations, at Bushjvej, Dyvigvej and Tontoft, produced material and structures from several periods
from the Bronze Age to the Later Iron Age or Viking Age. These three sites are, as discussed below,
clearly part of a changing settlement dynamic during later prehistory which in time resulted in the formation of early medieval villages in both Holm
(Bushjvej and Dyvigvej) and Nordborg (Tontoft). At
a fourth site, Uldbjergvej, features dating to the second half of the first millennium BC were recovered
including a large pit with fragments of several preRoman Iron Age pots; as no other finds were made,
this may have been an isolated farmstead.

Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

As a further part of the project, local farmers were
contacted and interviewed before work started on
their fields. Usually, they were later shown the finds
collected from their land to demonstrate the range of
prehistoric traces present in their surroundings. The
farmers provide important information ranging from
data on drainage and landscape alterations, traces of
archaeological features, and other local knowledge
deriving from their detailed observations of the landscape. The traditional farmers thus have knowledge
and insight that can supplement archaeological
understandings in important ways.
The interpretation and results that have emerged
from the analysis of this material has made it possible
to build an interpretative model of cultural activities
from the early Neolithic to the Viking Period in the
Primary Area, as outlined below.

THE LONG-TERM TRANSFORMATION OF A

LANDSCAPE
THE TRANSITION TO AGRICULTURE

While the project did not set out to study the Mesolithic, fieldwork has nonetheless furthered our understanding of the pre-agricultural cultural landscape.
The Mesolithic in this area is well known both from
the Sites and Monuments Record (SMR, in Danish
Sognebeskrivelserne or Sb), and from local collections. These show a concentration of activity around
streams and river valleys, lakeshores and the coastal
zone, including sites now underwater. The amount of
material, especially from the underwater sites, suggests that they were substantial, and this corresponds
with the general nature of Mesolithic coastal sites in
other parts of the country (Andersen 1993). While the
project has not focused on these waterside locations,
some obvious Mesolithic artefacts have been collected
during fieldwalking in other areas. These, however,
seem mainly to comprise stray finds, such as fine
blades and transverse arrowheads, which may have
been lost during hunting, or other such discrete episodes of activity. None of these Mesolithic finds appear to represent any kind of substantial activity in
the Primary Area away from the coast. This, in a
sense, negative evidence provides confirmation of
existing models that depict a close association between Mesolithic activity zones and the ecological

97

habitats found in connection with water (Andersen

1975, 1993).
This distribution of Mesolithic finds stands in
sharp contrast to that of the Neolithic, which, as
discussed below, is located in different zones and is
characterised by larger spreads of material, which
do not easily dissolve into well-defined sites. This
raises the question of the changes taking place between these two periods, in a sense a local version
of the long-running discussion regarding the transition to agriculture in southern Scandinavia. It is
important here to point out that our field-walking
has produced no finds which can be unambiguously
assigned to the earliest Neolithic period, and nor
have any been observed in private collections or indicated in the Sites and Monuments Record. Moreover, when surveying areas adjacent to known
Mesolithic sites (i.e. areas to which one might expect settlement to have shifted if the transition was
a gradual one), we have found very little prehistoric
material, and none securely dated to the Neolithic
(compare Fig. 3A with 3B).
The areas neighbouring those with classic Mesolithic distributions are, in effect, almost empty of
finds. While this confirms that the landscape use and
attitudes of these two cultural phases are, as one
would predict, very different, it also suggests a radical
change in the areas that were inhabited. There was a
clear-cut switch from the northern, exposed coast and
associated river- and lake-system, to settlements
centred on the sheltered fjord of Dyvig. One of the
traditional topics in discussions of the transition is
how farming was introduced. In the local case, the
consistent lack of overlap between Mesolithic and
Neolithic activity, and the absence of any early Neolithic indicators, makes it tempting to propose that
agricultural communities came from outside and
settled into discrete parts of the island that were wellprotected against the sea and wind. Moreover, as Als
is an island, domesticated species would have had to
be imported at some point. It is, therefore, interesting,
without taking this line of reasoning any further, how
working on an island challenges explanatory models
that assume continuous land contact. While the argument that agricultural communities came to Als
through distinct events does not in itself affect general
models for the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition, it does

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Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

99

Fig. 3. Sets of maps showing the Primary Study Area with the area of fieldwalking indicated. Symbols show the presence of datable finds.

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emphasise how local conditions affect the ways in

which processes unfold.

THE ESTABLISHED NEOLITHIC LANDSCAPE

Prior to the project, the Neolithic was already a richly

documented period, and our data has further confirmed the impression of thriving communities, certainly from the Middle Neolithic onwards. One
source (Aner and Kersten 1981) records 628 known
megalithic graves and more than 1200 Neolithic barrows from the island as a whole (although many of
these have now disappeared). Some of these are found
in large clusters, with up to fifty graves together. The
existence of further unrecorded monuments must also
be acknowledged. Such numbers, along with the
knowledge that the building of the megaliths took
place primarily during the earlier parts of the Middle
Neolithic (35003200 BC, Skrup 1993), suggest that
an average of two megaliths were built each year. Due
to the obvious possibilities for contact between different parts of the island, this makes it feasible to suggest
that during this period most people would have seen,
or heard about, a megalith being built. This contrasts
with our common preconception of such constructions as special and rare, and confirms the impression
of active communities with time and resources to
spare.
It is always tempting to interpret the Neolithic,
whether its social organisation or its economy,
through analysis of the centralised organisation that
such monuments suggest (Madsen 1982, Renfrew
1973). This, however, presumes that the Neolithic is
characterised by chiefdom-like social structures,
causing settlement evidence to be fitted into such centralised interpretations, without consideration of how
everyday life is structured by, and structures, local
concerns. The traditional dominance of the funerary
monuments in interpretations, therefore, makes it
even more significant that the fieldwalking has helped
to provide an insight into another aspect of the life of
these societies.
The fieldwalking data has demonstrated two distinct forms of Neolithic activities. The first is characterised by a high density of flint, both bulk finds and
special finds, over an extensive area, apparently without lacunae or obvious clustering, while the second

consists of more delineated clusters of flint with lower

general densities in locales with otherwise no Neolithic material. The most obvious example of the former is the stretch of land located between the northern coast of Dyvig fjord and the central spine of the
northern part of the island (see Fig. 2). The SMR
furthermore shows that during the Neolithic one or
perhaps more megaliths (now destroyed) at the western tip of the island demarcated this area towards the
west. Evidence of an area of megalithic structures in
a similar location, outside the actual area of high flint
density, but to the east, has recently been recovered
during fieldwork. One might suggest that in this case
these monuments, rather than being the central features of the settlement structure, as various models
propose (e.g. Madsen 1982), instead symbolically and
practically marked its limits. The density and spread
of material in this area is here suggested to represent
repeated and shifting use (in the sense of a range of
connected activities) of different locations within a
clearly limited cultural landscape, and not the result
of a number of discrete single settlements. Over time
this would, by repeated superimposition, have erased
the specific signatures of single houses, farmsteads or
activities, thereby creating the continuous spread now
observed. Within such an area, we therefore see longterm attachment (i.e. of many generations) to the general part of the landscape, but not long-term continuity (i.e. probably not more than a single generation)
of individual structures, apart from those represented
by the burial monuments outside its bounds.
Parallel with this development, Neolithic communities also used other parts of the landscape, and
here we see the second form of activity. Sometimes
this was a question of a one-off event, such as the
deposition of an axe in a bog (an activity which is
often suggested by information offered by farmers,
who find single whole axes in now-drained depressions and next to small water-holes). At other
times, however, this seems to have involved settled
activity of some duration in other parts of the island,
resulting in the discrete clusters which are observed,
for example, to the north of the central spine. This
second form of landscape use may be interpreted
through using ideas such as Ingolds concept of
taskscape (1986). The interpretative potential of this
has been explored in discussions of, for example, the

Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

East Anglian Neolithic in terms of: landscapes that were
diverse in social, as well as practical, terms. Some places were
visited only sporadically. Some saw occupation and activity on
a seasonal basis, while others persisted for a generation or more.
Under these circumstances, communities would have divided and
recombined with occupation shifting from year to year and at
the time scale of generations ... Like hunters and gatherers,
herders and small-scale cultivators often tend to think in terms
of the tenure that they have over particular places and pathways, rather than ownership of discrete and demarcated territories (Edmonds et al. 1999: 74).
It is not suggested that all the activities of this
period can be classified into one or other of these
basic forms, nor is it at this point proposed that Neolithic activities on other parts of the island related in a
similar way to topographical and geological features.
Rather, the intention is to stress the co-existence of
different types of settled activities that do not automatically, or with ease, fit into a hierarchical territorial settlement model. Observation of private collections and SMR data, together with selected
fieldwalking in other parts of the island, testifies to
Neolithic activities also being present in the interior
of the island and on heavy clay. Thus, the pattern
observed in the study area illustrates how localised
environmental aspects are integrally involved with the
decisions which communities make regarding their
activities. The effect of such local variation should
thus continue to be investigated. How far these two
forms of settled life during the Neolithic were associated with episodes of forest clearance and other environmental changes is a question that Stage Two of
the Project hopes to address through a programme of
pollen and macrofossil analysis.

THE BREAK-UP OF COMMUNITIES, COLONISING THE

ISLAND: THE LATE NEOLITHIC AND EARLY BRONZE
AGE

One of the most obvious ruptures in landscape use

occurs in the later part of the third millennium BC
and the earlier part of the second (i.e. the Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age). The characteristic
artefacts of this period flint daggers, certain types of
arrowheads and sickles are often found in locations
different to those where axes and other Neolithic
types occur. This means that, while such objects are

101

still found in the Neolithic landscape (where construction of Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age
monuments continued), they are also found in areas
with no previous traces of routine human activity.
Areas that saw regular use by farming communities
for the first time in this period include parts of the
northern section of the primary study area, such as
the exposed coast (lacking the shelter provided by
fjords and inlets). In terms of variables such as soil
type, access to fresh water, slopes and general topography there is much similarity between these locations and the area in which the previous Neolithic
activity was focused. The landscape, in terms of its
appearance and potential, must have seemed familiar,
although it would have been more vulnerable to the
sea and the wind (and therefore to soil exhaustion). It
also lacked the monuments of earlier generations and
other evidence of human impact that would have imparted a sense of tradition. At the same time, in total
contrast to the previous period, groups also ventured
further into the island, exploring the heavy clay,
thereby cutting the visual links, both to previous
settlements, and to the coast and sea. This new landscape would have had a different vegetation from the
western sandy region, and the sharp contours of the
tunnel valley and the presence of a large lake would
have affected various activities, for example those relating to the communitys domestic needs.
One interesting observation is that these newly-colonised areas seem not to have become involved with
barrow-building, or at least not for a few centuries.
There are no known barrows or other types of ritual
monument from the entire northern part of the Primary Area prior to the later part of the Early Bronze
Age, when a few are placed on prominent points of the
landscape overlooking the large tunnel valley systems
which include the lake at Nordborg. This seeming lack
of ritual monuments in an area with domestic activity
is striking, and may suggest that links were maintained
between these new areas and the earlier settlement
core, where monuments continued to be constructed.
The older settlement area may thus have played an important role in providing a continuing focus for the ritual concerns of the larger, and now more dispersed,
community. While many studies of the Bronze Age in
southern Scandinavia (e.g. Thrane 1981, 1987) interpret the settlement organisation as basically hierarch-

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ical, with certain places having central functions in

terms of religious (and possibly economic) activities, the
detailed picture revealed here adds a new dimension
and subtlety to these models. Due to the emphasis on
tracing long-term transformations, we can suggest that
rather than interpreting the patterns solely in terms of
hierarchy, they must also be understood in terms of the
fragmentation of previous communities. This gives a
glimpse of a settlement dynamic played out between
the power of established settlements with associated
special places, such as burials, and newly-established
sites whose inhabitants were not so directly restrained
by either previous activities around them or by the duty
to tradition.
In seeking explanations for these expansions of
settlement area one should consider a number of different factors. One obvious influence would have been local ecological conditions, with the sandy soils having
obvious attractions for early agricultural activities, but
also being prone to rapid soil exhaustion. It is therefore
extremely likely that by this time agricultural activities
within the area extensively used during the Neolithic
would have been under stress, perhaps helping to
stimulate change. In addition, the fact that people were
now living at greater distances from each other, and
possibly in smaller groups, may suggest that the composition of the core domestic unit had changed. This
change in the relationship between people and land (in
its widest sense) may have been integrally involved in
changes in inheritance patterns and other related aspects of social organisation. The traditional ties to a
particular landscape must have been weakened, or
maybe even challenged. Around this time, similar ruptures in settlement organisation, of different intensity,
have been detected from analyses of a wide range of
landscapes, such as Thy (northern Jutland; Earle et al.
1998) and Wessex (England; Brck 1997). This may
suggest a general restructuring of society at this time (at
least in large parts of temperate Europe), most especially the emergence of greater internal differentiation
in terms of power and resources.

CONSOLIDATING INLAND COMMUNITIES: FROM THE

LATE BRONZE AGE TO THE VIKING AGE

This pattern of colonisation of the island was further

consolidated during the next two millennia. As there

are very few upstanding monuments, this period had

been hitherto almost invisible on Als. Some of the few
exceptions are the well-known Pre-Roman Iron Age
Hjortspring deposit, some Late Germanic Iron Age/
Viking Age burials, a few old settlement excavations,
and evidence from a few recent rescue projects, not
many of which are from the Primary study area. As
there are no obvious diagnostic flint types associated
with any phases of this period, and most of its pottery
rapidly disintegrates once in the ploughsoil, it is difficult to use surface observation to locate activities that
belong to it. In response to this, any evidence dating
from the Late Bronze Age onwards recovered during
fieldwalking has been further investigated. In particular, clusters of material, such as a spread of pottery
on the surface, have been subjected to trial excavation. This means that locations such as Ulbjergvej,
which probably represents a single household of
limited duration (hence leaving very few traces on the
surface) have on occasion been identified.
The data collected suggest that there are at least
two different settlement forms during this period.
One, of limited duration and in locations that were
not revisited, consists of single households/farmsteads with a small number of associated features
such as clay-taking pits, cooking-pits and rubbishpits, and occasionally even a few contemporary
cremations. An example of this settlement form is
seen at Uldbjergvej. The other form shows continuous or recurrent occupation over a longer time
period. This form is found at Tontoft and at
Bushjvej, although these two sites show interesting
differences in the dynamics of their long-term development. At Tontoft, which is located on heavy clay
in the interior of the island on level land north of
the lake and tunnel valley system, evidence of occupation from the Early Bronze Age to the Early Medieval Period has been found within a limited area.
So far, no physical overlap between remains of different periods has been observed during excavation.
It is therefore not a question of long-term continuity
of individual structures prior to the Medieval Period,
when the present farm of Tontoft was founded
(Huhle 1956). Rather, within the limited area
studied, structures have been continuously built and
settled activity has shifted around. Due to the development of the town of Nordborg, it is not possible

Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

to investigate whether neighbouring areas similarly
close to the early Medieval town show the same development during this period. It is therefore not
possible to establish whether Tontoft was part of a
larger settlement system, and what characteristics it
might have had. This, however, does not affect the
observation that at Tontoft we have continuous and
recurrent settlement activity within the limited area
studied, from the Early Bronze Age onwards.
Around Holm (where Bushjvej is located), on the
other hand, a different settlement dynamic is seen,
prior to the development of the early Medieval village. While the same phases are represented here as
at Tontoft, no single area has so far shown evidence
from all periods. Rather, remains from different
periods are seen in distinctly different locations, on
the outskirts of the village. Some locations clearly represent very substantial and long-lived settlement, but
only at certain times. A very clear example of this is
seen at Bushjvej to the north of the village, where a
limited Bronze Age presence is apparently the sole
predecessor to an extremely large and materially rich
Early Roman Iron Age site, which is overlain by the
modern village towards its southern edge. This, furthermore, seems to be the last trace of settlement in
this particular location, while material from the Germanic Iron Age and Viking Age has been found at
several locations to the south and east of the present
village, for example during the excavations at Dyvigvej. Possible Viking Age material has also been
found west of the village and a rich female Viking
Age burial is recorded in the Sites and Monuments
Record even further to the west.
Our data suggest that in the Primary Area, the locales which became occupied by the two Medieval
villages were already becoming settlement areas in the
first millennium BC, although the earlier sites do not
represent the roots of the Medieval villages in terms
of direct continuity of location. Thus, the origins of
these Medieval villages were grounded in areas with
long-term settlement histories, although their foundation per se might be directly related only to activities
within the first millennium AD. Another important
point that the data suggest is that while different
forms of settlement organisation may be found during
the first millennium AD, they may nonetheless result
in similar long-term trajectories.

103

INTERPRETATIVE ANALYSIS: LANDSCAPE

PERCEPTION AND SOCIAL ORGANISATION

The communities of the Primary Area were, of

course, part of larger social organisations, and they
were affected by and involved with what happened in
other parts of the island, as well as occasionally on
the mainland. Through time, this involvement would
have taken particular forms. During the Bronze Age,
for example, the distribution of bronze hoards was
limited to the centre of Als, suggesting that this area
played a role for all the islands communities (Srensen 1992). Another case might be the clustering of long
barrows at particular locales, which similarly suggests
that these were sites that had importance beyond
their immediate surroundings. While these observations are of interest, the central issue is how widespread and general processes were articulated within
local communities operating in their particular environments. The preliminary interpretations offered
above of the data from the Primary study area have
begun to show some of these local reworkings of
wider processes, and it is such local detail which offers
the potential to place human activities at the heart of
explanations of social change. It is also through such
detail that the contribution of intensive field survey is
demonstrated.
The data from the Primary study area clearly indicate changes over time in the location and density of
activities from the Neolithic to the Viking Age, although these are not in any way argued to be simplistic or linear developments that can be characterised
by gradual growth or expansion from a centre. Complexity is suggested by how, in some periods, radical
changes can be seen in terms of where settlements
are located and activities carried out. These distinct
thresholds are not just times when settlement location
changes, for they can also be argued to be involved
with substantial changes in social interaction and the
perception and use of the landscape. There is not one
single explanation that can account for the developments that we have outlined above, although a number of both material and cultural dimensions of the
world in which these shifting communities lived can
be highlighted. These would include substantial elements of the environment. The coast, for example,
with its associated resources, and also its potential
both to act as a barrier (physical and cognitive), and

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Acta Archaeologica

as a route of communication, clearly had different importance for different communities. While the Middle
Neolithic is focused on the land overlooking the coast,
all evidence from the Iron Age suggests a withdrawal
inland. Other factors would have been those dependent on specific local knowledge of the physical environs, such as water sources and clay deposits in the
sandy areas. It is interesting here to note that the Late
Bronze Age pits at Bushjvej explored one of the few
clay sources available in that area.
The long-term impact of the agricultural potential
of different soil types (including the effect of climatic
changes) must also, as commonly recognised, have
been a substantial influence on how the farmers of
these different periods organised subsistence activities,
including making choices about moving the domestic
unit. For the Primary study area, one issue is how the
difference between a sandy soil and a heavy clay soil
affected farming activities and settlement organisation
through time. So far analysis suggests that, while there
is a substantial expansion of settlement at the end of
the third millennium BC and the beginning of the
second millennium BC, it is not until the first millennium BC that the clay soils were intensively used for
settlement, and thus presumably agricultural, activity.
Even then, some sites, such as Bushjvej, remained
located on sandy soils. It is also clear that in other
parts of the island, where the choice of sandy soil was
not available, prehistoric activities, including Neolithic ones, still took place. While soil type is clearly
of importance, and affects long-term trajectories, it in
no way determines them and its importance is dependent on other local factors.
The cultural and cognitive dimensions of the longterm development, while no doubt of substantial importance, are harder to demonstrate, as they do not
necessarily correspond clearly to particular types of
archaeological observations. In a sense, it is the mental map which people would have used to understand
and respond to their environment that is of interest
here. While we do not propose that such maps can
be reconstructed, it is nonetheless realistic to point to
certain aspects that would have influenced the ways
in which people saw their world. One of these would
have been how communities organised the various activities in which they were involved within their immediate environs, and during their annual cycles.

Some of the variation of flint density in certain areas

may be the result of such temporal localisation of different types of activity (polished axe fragments may
indicate forest clearance, for example, while isolated
small whole axes associated with boggy areas may
suggest individual episodes of ritual deposition).
Moreover, the spatial relationships between what appear to be domestic and burial areas relate to the
conscious categorisation and subsequent creation of
places with different cultural meanings, resulting in
certain activities taking place in distinct locations. For
many Neolithic barrows, for example, it seems to
have been important to overlook the sea, while Early
Bronze Age barrows tended to be sited on higher
ground and on hill-tops. So far the spatial relations
between settlements and burials of later periods remain unknown, however. Such variability through
time and space will be subject to further analysis in
the next stage of the project.
Tradition and memory would also have been
highly influential in the structuring of communal activities. One indication of this is the range of secondary activities carried out around and on top of barrow
mounds, as suggested by the flint-working debris that
is frequently found in such locations. Another, and
quite different, indication is the reworking of particular objects, such as the fragment of a Neolithic polished flint axe which had been carefully remodelled, and
deposited in what appears to be a later post-hole or
small pit at Dyvigvej (see Fig. 4). Similarly, the radically different settlement pattern seen during the second half of the first millennium BC, as discussed
above, is significant in also suggesting that traditions
were being broken. Again, this is an aspect that we
intend to continue investigating during Stage Two of
the project.

MOVING FORWARD

The settlement models emerging from Stage One of

the project have been particularly significant in
identifying apparent thresholds in settlement organisation, when the cultural landscape appears to
have been reorganised, and new parts colonised.
Amongst other changes, the largely coastal focus of
the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, with activity
mainly concentrated in large territories, can be

Long-term history on a Danish island: the Als Project

seen to shift to a pattern of dispersed settlements of
much smaller size located in the interior during the
Later Bronze Age. In the Pre-Roman Iron Age
some of the locations which later saw the development of nucleated Medieval villages became a focus
of settlement activities, and from then onwards
most settlements (and other activities) remained in
close proximity to these locations. Changes over
time in the relationship between ritual and domestic activities have also been observed, although as
yet it is not possible to follow this through the later
periods, due to the lack of evidence.
These interpretations, and the detailed correlation
between various aspects of the landscape and the archaeological data, provide the foundation for Stage
Two of the project. The aims of this second stage are
to investigate whether a similar long-term development is suggested by the archaeology of the areas immediately to the south of Dyvig fjord (the Secondary
study area) and, if not, to analyse the nature of the
differences and similarities between the two study
areas. On this basis, it will be possible to gain a better
insight into which aspects of the long-term history of
these two areas are due to similar processes, and are
thus possibly part of more general developments, and
which aspects are the result of specific local factors
and strategies. It is also our hope that this will add to
our understanding of different time periods, in terms
of their internal differences. For example, the Mesolithic may emerge as being genuinely very similar in
different areas, while the Early Iron Age may prove
to be more open to specific local conditions constituted both by the environment, and by the contemporary social make-up.
The value of fieldwalking data is, at times, questioned, based on the argument that finds on the surface do not necessarily correspond to any underlying
archaeological features (Ejstrud 1999, Madsen 1976).
Aside from the problematic assumption of this critique that the purpose of such surveys is to find sites,
it also collapses different aspects of the problem of
archaeological representativity. One of these aspects
relates to what finds on the surface represent. It
should be pointed out that, whether or not they correspond to an underlying feature, they do represent
something in their own right. The presence of an axe
always shows that an axe was left, by whatever means,

105

Fig. 4. Reworked Neolithic polished axe.

in that general location. With regard to the issue of

how they relate to underlying features, several studies
have established that the movement of artefacts in the
ploughsoil is limited (Boismier 1997, Haselgrove et al.
1985), and that field survey data therefore represent
real artefactual distributions, at least at some level. To
ignore these data, because they have been disturbed
from their original contexts (or, in fact, never had
what we would consider context), is to remove a substantial aspect of what happened in the past from our
data-set.
The fieldwalking strategy of this project, as described above, is clearly very intensive, and thus timeconsuming, but otherwise has demanded few resources. The rewards, however, brought about by not

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Acta Archaeologica

focusing on sites, as they are usually narrowly defined,

but by investigating the landscape itself as a forum for
activities which was used more or less intensively at
different times, are becoming obvious. The common
reliance on the Sites and Monuments Record alone is
also shown to be problematic as, for example, hardly
any finds were known from this area for the later
periods, thus providing no starting-point from which
interpretation could begin. Based on the detailed data
produced by this fieldwork, the project can now
attempt to tease out the detailed history of how local
communities interacted and responded to various factors affecting their worlds. Through this, we start to
see the root of social changes as being the complex
and locally-situated decisions of people within com-

munities, rather than just the result of generalised

processes.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We gratefully acknowledge financial assistance from the following:
Danfoss (Nordborg, Denmark), The McDonald Institute (Cambridge), Scandinavian Studies Fund (Cambridge), The Society of
Antiquaries (London), Universities of Cambridge, Durham and
Southampton. We would also like to thank NordAls Tekniske Forvaltning for practical assistance. We would also like to thank Haderslev Museum for collaborating with the project, and N. H. Andersen, P. Ethelberg, M. Rasmussen and J. Ringtved for their help
with pottery identification. Graham Earle is thanked for his help
with the GIS, and Corinne Roughley for producing the final version of the illustrations.

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Contact address:
University of Cambridge
Department of Archaeology
Downing Street
Cambridge CB2 3DZ
England
mlss/cam.ac.uk

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