Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2004, Page 141

The Visual Archive in Icelandic Archaeology
associated with the origins of Icelandic
culture, especially those referred to in lit-
erary sources, by 1950, it was more
important to inventory the specific mate-
rial elements of this 'original' Icelandic
culture: its house forms, its artefacts.
From the mid 20th century, the focus
on detail in archaeological illustration
reflects a wider concem for the detail of
the material culture of Iceland. It
arguably remained however, fundamen-
tally nationalistic and originary in con-
ception, seeking the essential qualities
which constitute Icelandic material cul-
ture - and where better to look than the
origin of Iceland itself, the Settlement
period. The focus on the typology and
development of Icelandic vernacular
architecture (from skáli to burstabær), is
just one of the more obvious examples of
this perspective (Ágústsson 1982;
Eldjám 1958; also see Vésteinsson, this
volume for a more detailed commentary
on this issue). Eldjám however also pro-
moted archaeological research on later
periods, such as later medieval or early
post-medieval times, and here the
emphasis was very much on common
farms of ordinary people, which can be
seen as a nationalist attempt to counter a
political history of foreign (i.e. Danish
colonial) rule. Ironically though, at the
same time there is often the promotion of
a timelessness or lack of change to
Icelandic material culture and landscape,
that pattems of life established during the
settlement have more or less endured
unaltered, all subsequent change a mere
footnote to this initial colonization. This
is nowhere more clearly expressed than
in the lack of phase plans or appreciation
of stmctural stratigraphy.
Archaeology in Iceland is changing
however - since the 1990s, new excava-
tions with new agendas have been devel-
oping, and this is revealed in some of the
later illustrations, but is even more evi-
dent perhaps in the 'grey' literature and
current ongoing projects not surveyed in
this paper. To what extent a new, post-
nationalistic or non-originary narrative
will emerge in Icelandic archaeology
remains to be seen, but one thing is cer-
tain: the images produced by such narra-
tives will play a major role in constitut-
ing this change.
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