Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2002, Page 59

A Contribution To the Study of the Medieval Icelandic Farm: the Byre
byre, 70 and 80 m respectively.
In all these cases the byre seems to have
been inside the homefield and one expla-
nation that suggests itself for this
arrangement is that the inconvenience of
having to walk a long way to the byre
was offset by the benefits of not having
to carry the manure a long distance from
the byre to spread it on the field. In those
cases where the byre may have been at
the edge or even just outside the home-
field it is possible that keeping the ani-
mals, grazing and trampling away from
the homefield may have been a consider-
ation.
At Herjólfsdalur and Bergþórshvoll the
byres are closely associated with the
dwelling and at Þórarinsstaðir and
Laugar the byres actually form a part of
the dwelling complex. The latter sort of
arrangement is common on Norse sites in
Greenland and was also prevalent in
many parts of Iceland in early modern
times. At Herjólfsdalur the byre (IV) and
the dwelling (V) were connected by a
passage and at Bergþórshvoll the byre
may have been connected to the dwelling
complex. The benefits of this arrange-
ment are mainly ease of communication
between byre and dwelling, allowing
easy access for milk maids and cowboys
to go about their tasks. It is also possible
that the preservation of heat from the ani-
mals played a role, especially if there
were second storeys on these buildings -
an eventuality which the evidence cannot
preclude but does not support either.
Related to this may be those byres, both
those connected to the dwelling like
Herjólfsdalur VIII and those far removed
from it like Goðatættur and Hvítárholt,
where there is evidence for human habi-
tation in one end of the byre. In none of
these cases is the evidence for human
habitiation extensive and on all these
sites are there other more substantial
dwellings for the humans. It would
therefore be rash to interpret these hous-
es as combined dwellings and byres of
the type commonly found in Iron and
Viking age contexts in Scandinavia. The
similarities are however striking and they
suggest a degree of affmity and/or conti-
nuity of a construction heritage between
the Icelandic settlements of the Viking
and high middle ages and the
Scandinavian Iron age. It is possible that
the phasing of the Herjólfsdalur site
could be seen as an indication of a devel-
opment from a combined byre-dwelling
(as in structure VIII) to separate but con-
nected byre and dwelling (as in structures
IV and V). As most of the sites where the
byre is separated from the dwelling are
dated to the llth century or even later it
might be argued that this represents an
even more recent development. If that is
so, some particular Icelandic conditions
must have dictated this development - the
importance of manuring infields being
the one that springs most readily to mind.
The exceptions - Þórarinsstaðir and
Laugar - would then be explained by
their marginal locations and high altitude
which meant that the farms were snow-
bound for many months every year mak-
ing it troublesome in extreme to locate
the byres far away from the dwellings.
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