Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2011, Page 82

DOUGLAS J. BOLENDER, JOHN M. STEINBERG AND BRIAN N. DAMIATA
SASS project was designed to address the
problems in survey bias by augmenting
existing survey methods with a suite of
subsurface methods - primarily soil coring
and reconnaissance geophysical surveying
- that can identify and map buried sites
(Steinberg and Bolender 2005). The
protocol can provide basic variables on the
Viking Age components of both
farm-mounds and buried farmstead sites:
location, date of establishment (and
abandonment), and an estimation of the
area covered by the farmstead buildings
and middens. Viking Age farmstead size is
estimated by modeling the distribution of
turf, midden, and other cultural debris
found below the 1104 Hekla in geographic
information systems software. The model
was based on the results of systematic
coring, geophysical sui-veying, and test
excavations in and around each Viking
Age farmstead. These variables yield a
settlement pattern and allow for a
comparative basis for site assessment.
As a second phase, more intensive
geophysical surveying of selected sites
was conducted to map individual buildings
and help target excavations. Efforts to map
sites have had mixed results; ones that
largely mimic the existing biases in survey
methodology. Single or relatively simple
Viking Age farmsteads can be largely
mapped using coring, geophysical
surveying, and targeted test excavations at
a substantially lower cost in labor and time
than traditional excavation but so far it has
been difficult to interpret the geophysical
results ffom complex farm-mounds into
coherent structures or occupational phases,
especially in the earliest and deepest
layers. As a result, in the survey area we
know more about the relocated Viking
Age farmsteads, which are located away
ffom the contemporary fann-mounds, than
the earliest structures underlying mounds.
Nonetheless, the survey has produced a
map of all substantial domestic sites in the
region, essentially all of the farmsteads,
from the original settlement to the
contemporary farms of today. The map
includes abandoned and relocated
fannsteads and provides a starting point to
assess the impact that these more
accessible sites have on Icelandic
archaeology.
We began the SASS project in 2001
with a strong preconception that the
Viking Age settlement landscape was
different than the medieval and early
modem settlement pattem that is more
readily apparent in the archaeological and
historical records. It seemed unlikely that
the farms established by the first settlers
would remain in the same place for
millennium. Vésteinsson (1998) has
suggested that the first settlers might have
initially chosen land that was amenable to
immediate farming, such as wetter,
low-lying grasslands. As lands were
cleared, a preference for drier, easier to
intensify lands, emerged that would have
favored later farms or created an incentive
for earlier settlers to relocate their
farmsteads to different parts of their
property. The devastating impact of
settlement and early production practices
on the environment is also difficult to
reconcile with a high degree of spatial
stability in early farmsteads (Amorosi, et
al. 1997; Ámalds 1987; Dugmore, et al.
2005; McGovem, et al. 1988; McGovem,
et al. 2007; Simpson, et al. 2003; Simpson,
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