Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2007, Page 83

A REASSESSMENT OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CATHEDRAL AT GaRÐAR, GrEENLAND
Greenland (Roussell 1941). Roussell
participated in the 1926 excavation and
also conducted his own excavations in
Greenland in the 1930’s. Roussell seems
to agree with Norlund regarding the inter-
pretation of the cathedral, at least on the
major points. After 1926, the church was
left untouched for almost 50 years. In
1974-75 Knud J. Krogh appears to have
excavated both inside and outside the
cathedral. Unfortunately these investiga-
tions have never been published and the
documentation is difficult to interpret.
A final discovery pertaining to
the church was published as late as 1999
after the bishop’s skeleton had been radi-
ocarbon dated (as presented below). This
happened as part of a project that aimed
to look at the Norse diet - particularly
the relationship between terrestrial and
marine components. This is significant
since marine components may affect the
results of carbon dating - the so called
“reservoir effect” (Arneborg et.al. 1999,
157). This potential source of error was
taken into account and the new datings
were corrected accordingly. The results
are discussed further in the following
sections.
The cathedral and its development
The cathedral was one of the main targets
of the 1926 excavation. It lay as a very
disturbed ruin at the time, most of the
stones having been used for new build-
ings by local residents after the settle-
ment at Igaliku was established in 1780
(Norlund 1930, 22, 29). Norlund states
that actual masonry was only preserved
in a few places, so the excavation aimed
at exposing the foundations and excavat-
ing the interior of the building. Based on
this, Norlund provided his interpretation.
He separated the two main phases, which
he discerned, primarily by examining
the nature of the foundations (Norlund
1930, 44^15). While this method may
give some indications, it is by no means
conclusive, and there are great problems
attached to it. Norlund’s conclusion was
that the cathedral had two main phases
(fig. 4 and fig. 5), both built in the local
red Igaliku sandstone. In the following,
Norlund’s view of the two phases will be
termed Garðar 1 and Garðar 2 respective-
ly, although he never used these names
himself.
Garðar 1 had a Romanesque
layout with a nave and smaller chancel.
According to Norlund the church had
been connected with a small enclosure
to the south, with buildings on the east-
ern, western and southern sides. Norlund
believed that the enclosure and some of
the buildings around it were erected at the
same time as the church itself (Norlund
1930, 42^17). The enclosure and its sur-
rounding buildings are completely unique
in a Norse Greenlandic context. Two
north-south oriented walls connected the
church with an east-west oriented wall.
Lying up against the western, southern
and, possibly, eastern side of these walls,
there were a number of buildings (fig.
4). The enclosure itself was roughly qua-
dratic, although the eastern wall is rather
skewed. The enclosure measured approxi-
mately 7.5-8,5 by 8-9.5 meters (Norlund
1930, 46).
Building no. 2, at the south-west-
em corner of the enclosure, was interpreted
by Norlund as a belfry, particularly due to
the fact that it was the only building at the
site where mortar of lime seems to have
been utilized. Norlund took this to mean
that the building had been of considerable
height. It was this fact, combined with
the small internal measurements that led
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