Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2005, Page 102

Garðar Guðmundsson, Gavin Lucas, Hildur Gestsdóttir and Sigréur Þorgeirsdóttir
er), rope handles, and coffín bedding in
the form of wood shavings and, in one
case, heather (burial 8.4). Textiles did not
preserve well except as small scraps,
save the fíne shroud wrapping the infant
burial 7.1.
Apart from coffín fumiture, the
only other remains were chiefly window
glass - both 18th/19th century types of
blown glass, and 20th century machine-
rolled glass. Only one fragment was
stratifíed, and that was 20th century glass
from the constmction layer associated
with the current church. All these frag-
ments may be associated with the present
or earlier church buildings. Only one
fragment of pottery was retrieved, a
German stoneware sherd, and is unstrati-
fíed. It is hard to date but probably is
broadly within the span 17th-19th centu-
ry. Finally there was a cast iron finial,
probably associated with grave fumiture
(fencing/border) rather than a coffin; this
is likely to be 19th or 20th century in
date.
Concluding Remarks
The work at Hólskirkja, though not under
ideal conditions, has nonetheless
revealed a great deal of information on
burial customs and human demographics
in the last two centuries. Despite the rel-
atively small number of burials, the
potential for exploring a variety of issues
is opened up by this investigation, both
by comparison with other cemetery sites
of the same period and for future studies.
In these closing words, we can only out-
line this potential. Starting with the
skeletal remains, obviously some basic
data on mortality rates and general health
of the population provides the basis for
studying comparative demographics
around Iceland for the 19th century. Of
course as was noted, the high number of
juveniles at Hólskirkja may be a bias
imposed by the limits of excavation, but
other factors should be considered. In
medieval times it was certainly common
for segregation of burials by sex within
the churchyard while children tend to be
buried closer to the church. Curiously,
although the number of sexed skeletons
was small from Hólskirkja, those present
did not suggest any sexual division of the
churchyard, with both males and females
on the south side. More work is clearly
needed here, but a key theme will be
understanding if there is any intentional
variation in the location of burials around
a church in post-medieval times, and not
simply by sex or age, but also by status.
Understanding status within a
community based on burial might be dif-
ficult in the absence of grave goods and
grave markers or headstones, but the
excavations at Hólskirkja have demon-
strated that there is still a lot of variation
in terms of coffins and coffin fumiture,
which is not all linked to chronology.
Different coffín types might be looked at
in terms of labour investment and there-
fore value, and coffin fittings like brass
finials or leather attachments and coffin
fillings such as wood shavings, heather
or textiles might further testify to differ-
ential investment. Of course reading such
investment in terms of status is compli-
cated, especially as it might reflect emo-
tional investment by relatives as much as
financial assets, and in deciding this, sta-
tistical measures may be more useful
than individual cases. However, this in
itself is an interesting avenue for archae-
ology to explore, namely the emotional
and aesthetic attitudes to death and mor-
tality in post-medieval Iceland and
understanding how this changed over
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