Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2006, Page 31

THE LEIRVÍK “B0NHÚSTOFTIN” AND THE EARLY CHRISTIANITY OF THE FaROE ISLANDS, AND BEYOND
sites (for instance in Leirvík on the island
of Eysturoy, in Húsavík on the island of
Sandoy, and so forth)” (Bruun 1929, 166;
authors’ translation from Danish).
Dahl, the State Antiquary of
the Faroe Islands from 1952, produced
a rough sketch-plan in 1956 of a “Bon-
hús” at the site Bonhústoftin (English: the
prayer-house ruin) in Leirvík on the island
of Eysturoy, and in the following year of
the site of Prestbotoft (English: ruin in
the field of the priest) in Oyndarfjorður,
also on Eysturoy (Fig. 1). None of these
sites were, however, fully planned and
surveyed (Stummann Hansen, forthcom-
ing A). In 1968 Dahl stated: “It seems,
that throughout the medieval period there
were churches or prayer-houses attached
to all the central farms in the ancient set-
tlements. Supposedly they were all demol-
ished by the time of the Reformation, and
all that is left are a few ruins situated in
grass-covered churchyards surrounded by
circular enclosures”. Dahl furthermore
stated: “Investigations of these bonhús-
sites have now been initiated” (1968, 207;
authors’ translation from Danish). How-
ever, while church topography has been
a very important issue in the archaeol-
ogy of medieval Greenland and Iceland
for a long time, very little research has
been conducted to date on this topic in the
Faroe Islands.
The Bonhústoftin site at Leirvík
consists of a small rectangular structure,
which is located towards the centre of a
sub-circular enclosure (Figs. 2-3). To
date, it has never been fully described or
surveyed. It is not referred to in any known
historical source and its existence is first
noted inprint in 1929 (Bruun 1929, 166).
More recently Arge has referred to it in
his consideration of the nearby settlement
site of I Uppistovubeitinum, dated to the
twelfth/fourteenth centuries, suggest-
ing that together they formed ‘an entity’
(1997, 39). This may be so, but it seems
equally likely that the Bonhústoftin may
have formed part of either við Garð or á
Toftanesi, another two ancient settlements
in Leirvík. The latter site, better known
as Toftanes, is the location of an excava-
ted Viking-age settlement (Stummann
Hansen 1991).
The only record of the Leirvík
Bonhústoftin that exists in the archives
of the National Museum of the Faroe
Islands (Foroya Fornminnissavn) is the
sketch plan made of it in 1956 by Sverri
Dahl. This plan is of particular impor-
tance because it shows the site as it
existed prior to the alterations that took
place, especially to the northern part of
its enclosure, in more recent times. Dahl,
however, omitted to include the entrance
to the enclosure in his plan. There are also
two photographs of the site on file but,
unfortunately, neither of them shows this
section of the site.
There is a number of surviving
local traditions concerning the Leirvík
Bonhústoftin, all of which refer to it in
the context of burial. According to one
of these, stillborn and unbaptised infants
were buried there clandestinely up until
the early twentieth century1. Another
holds that victims of the Black Death,
which took a heavy toll on the Faroese
people in the mid-fourteenth century,
were buried there. This tradition may,
however, actually represent a conflated
account of a later event, namely the
In modern times there was no church or cemetery in Leirvík until 1906. Before that time people would have been buried in
the neighbouring settlements of Fuglafjorður or Gote
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