Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2010, Page 71

SMALL HOLDER FARMING IN EARLY MEDIEVAL ICELAND: SKUGGI IN HÖRGÁRDALUR
ages to aid a comparison with other
assemblages although the total NISP of
115 gadid físh elements represents only a
fragment of the marine fish NISPs from
other sites presented in the graph.
The graph in fígure 14 compares the
small scale, inland site of Skuggi with
several other sites that exhibit a clear
gadid skeletal element profile: Sveigakot,
Hofstaðir, and Hrísheimar are all farm-
steads with cultural layers dating to the
Viking Age and containing considerable
proportions of marine físh, and especially
gadids in their archaeofaunas (Perdikaris
and McGovern 2008). At Hofstaðir, a
medieval farm was established across the
home field around the time of destmction
of the Viking Age chieftain’s hall in ca.
AD 1000, and Hofstaðir itself has been in
use as a farmstead ever since (McGovem
et al. 2009, Lucas and McGovem 2008).
These inland sites are compared to ones
form the coasts of the Icelandic West
Fjords. Akurvík is a fishing station with
Égg
VertebralSeries
□ Phaseli ®PhaselV iPhaseV
Figure 15. Skuggi gadids. Vertebral Series
comparison.
medieval cultural deposits from the 12th
- mid-15lh c, and Gjögur is a medieval
fishing farm with access to coastal areas
(Krivogorskaya et al. 2005, 2006).
Finnbogastaðir is an early modern coastal
farmstead whose inhabitants may have
mostly used a dried fish product for sub-
sistence (Edvardsson et al. 2004). The
gadid fish signatures for all these sites
have been well researched and docu-
mented and they can thus be utilized for a
comparison with the ones at Skuggi,
although there may not be an overlap in
time for the sites from the West Fjords
(Perdikaris and McGovem 2008:66-67).
The graph above indicates that far
more gadid post-cranial bones than cra-
nial elements were present in the Skuggi
faunal collection, especially in the early
medieval phases. Premaxillae usually are
found with discarded fish skulls in pro-
cessing sites such as the ones in Akurvík,
Finnbogastaðir, and Gjögur in the
Westfjords. Cleithra frequently travel
with a processed fish product to con-
sumer sites such as the Mývatnssveit sites
of Hofstaðir, Hrísheimar, Sveigakot, and
also Skuggi in Hörgárdalur. When only
comparing these two elements, the
Skuggi gadid skeletal element distribu-
tion clearly resembles a consumer profile
as displayed in the Mývatnssveit sites. As
is tme for Sveigakot, however, this rela-
tively higher abundance in cleithra vs.
premaxillae does not necessarily translate
into a round dried fish product resem-
bling stockfish (skreið), but can simply
indicate import of a processed fish filet
without the usual skeletal elements pres-
ent that are associated with a fresh fish
product (for more detailed discussion see
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