Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2002, Page 111

Enduring Impacts: Viking Age Settlement in Iceland and Greenland
Major Domestic Mammals - 9th to Early 12th Century
NORWAY
ICELAND
8-9th Cent. 9-10th Cent. 9-10th Cent. llth Cent.
Chieftain's South North Northeast & East
GREENLAND
llth
Century
I I Caprine
■H Pig
I I Horse
r~l Cattle
Fig. 4. Major domestic mammals in bone assemblages in settlement sites in Iceland and
Greenland.
southem Icelandic sites of Tjamargata 4
and Herjólfsdalur have assemblages
where nearly half the livestock are cattle,
much as in the southem Norwegian site.
Pigs are present in some numbers but
caprine bones are relatively scarce. These
patterns are similar to near-contemporary
sites in Northern Norway (Perdikaris
1997), as well as sites in the Norse
colonies in northern Britain (i.e.
Freswick - Morris et al. 1995) and other
parts of Scandinavia (McGovem et al.
2001). The northern Icelandic sites of
Hofstaðir, Sveigakot and Granastaðir
have very similar proportions of
caprines, cattle and pigs, with a greater
dominance of caprines than in the south
(ratio of cattle to caprine bones on the
three sites is about 1 cattle to 2 caprine).
In the initial period of 9th-1 Oth century
settlement, cattle, pigs, and caprines
appear in mixed quantities partly inílu-
enced by local ecology (southem Iceland
is in the boreal climate zone, while north-
ern Iceland is in the low arctic), but clear-
ly also influenced by settlers’ intention to
duplicate a cattle and pig-rich farming
model based in part on mainland
Scandinavian models. Caprines do not
dominate the collections, even in areas
like in northeast Iceland, today recog-
nized as poor cattle country.
By the 11 th-12th centuries, some sites
in the northeast (Svalbarð) and eastern
interior (Aðalból) had shifted towards a
greater emphasis on caprines, and pigs
appear to decline sharply. While the 12th
century inland site at Aðalból has the
highest relative percentage of caprines of
any medieval collection from Iceland yet
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