Árbók Hins íslenzka fornleifafélags - 01.01.2007, Page 169

Summary
It has generally been accepted that the pre-Christian Viking period Icelandic burials
are not wealthy and exhibit little differentiation in rank or status. Although the Icelandic
pre-Christian burials have been a major focus of research in past half-century, it has only
truly begun to flourish in the last decade with various scholars employing new strategies
to better understand the Vikings through their burials. The theoretical framework of a
gendered archaeological perspective has not been thoroughly employed to understand
the societal constructions in the Icelandic Viking period. Indeed, history, contemporary
thought and the sagas themselves have provided the leading interpretations of societal
relationships and organization regarding this period. Whereas the concepts of wealth, rank
and status are well-perceived, gender is still overlooked in the archaeological assessment
usually as a result of preconceived notions of division of labor and gravegood associations
as well as misconceived notions of the definition of the term “gender.” These mis- and
pre-conceived notions of gender associations are, in part, a result of the many decades of
archaeology wherein gender was associated solely with biological sex and women were
invisible. Such a combination still has an affect on the interpretation of mortuary contexts
today. Further complications arise with the difference between a feminist perspective
and a gendered perspective wherein the approaches are confused. Although still in its
preliminary stages, the long-term goal of this research aims to add to the study of the
settlement, settlers and societal constructions by focusing on the burials themselves and
including the gendered perspective. The first part of the research was to understand the
data at hand within the gendered framework, which is the basis of the following article.
A gendered archaeological perspective is sometimes a very confusing focus of study
because of the overlapping use of the term “gender” in modern society. In the wide
sense of the term and to the general public, the term is used to describe the difference
between male and female. However, in the humanities, social sciences and archaeological/
anthropological sciences this term does not mean the difference between male and female,
it is much broader and carries with it the social constructions created within societies. The
term “sex” is used to describe the biological differences between male and female while
“gender” is reserved to indicate the political, social, cutural and symbolic constructions
created by the society in question.
By using some of the preliminary results of the research project, the following paper
attempts to place the pre-Christian Icelandic burial record into a gendered perspective by
introducing some of the pitfalls of using sex to understand the society as a whole, as well
as using artefacts to assume the sex of the individual. Also, discussion of sex, artefacts and
age which are represented in the burial record to date and the direction this research is
taking.
168 ÁRBÓK FORNLEIFAFÉLAGSINS