Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1998, Page 226

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LANDSCAPES AT LANDNÁM: PALYNOLOGICAL AND
PALAEOENTOMOLOGICAL EVIDENCE FROM TOFTANES; FAROEISLANDS
been wooden. The floor was paved with flat
stones covered with thick layers of ashes
and charcoal. There was a small stone-built
ember-pit at the east end. The building is
interpreted as a fire-house (= kitchen).
A paved staircase joins buildings I and II.
Building II appears also to be linked to XI
and XII by an entrance to the south. The
four buildings are all part of same farm-
stead. I and II were built first and XI and
XII added later.
Finds
Thousands of finds were retrieved, espe-
cially from the floor layers of the buildings.
There were more than 700 objects of
steatite (soapstone), a material unknown in
Faroe, but it was quarried in Norway and
Shetland. Objects included bowl fragments
and saucepans of west Norwegian types,
spindle whorls, line and net-sinkers of
Norse type. Local (Faroese) stone (tuff and
basalt) was used for spindle whorls, loom
weights and line or net sinkers. There were
hones and querns of schist, a rock type un-
known in Faroe. An arm ring/bracelet of jet
probably came from England or Scotland.
Few metal objects were unearthed, but
included a bronze brooch of Scandinavian
type, two ringed pins (also known from Ire-
land, Isle of Man, mainland Scotland, He-
brides, Orkney, Iceland, Newfoundland)
and from one other Faroese location (Tjør-
nuvík).
Wooden objects were preserved in huge
numbers. Many were waste material from
building construction but several artefacts
were also found, e.g. a door plank with a
carved wooden handle, spindle whorls, a
box, counting sticks, model boats, bowls,
spoons, a gaming board, and barrel staves.
Preliminary identification of wooden ob-
jects shows Quercus (oak), Picea abies
(spruce), Pinus sylvestris (Scots pine),
Corylus avellana (hazel), Larix (larch),
Sambucus (elder), Betula (birch) and Alnus
(alder). Much of this wood, where not drift-
wood, would have been imported or re-
used. Driftwood unsuitable for boats or
roof supports could also be used for fuel.
There was a total of more than 100 m of
cords (in lengths up to 2 m) made of twined
juniper (Juniperus communis) branches, in-
cluding a rope tied to a roofing stone
(Stummann Hansen, 1989;Larsen, 1990).
The acid soil conditions at Toftanes
would not have been conducive to the sur-
vival of bone, and there is no surviving
bone artefact industry, a contrast with as-
semblages from Orkney and Shetland.
Burnt bones incluđe those of sheep (domi-
nant) and a few bones of cow and pig. The
absence of skeletal material extended to
fish remains. This may be as much a recov-
ery problem as preservational, in that mate-
rial would need to be sieved. It is not possi-
ble to say whether fishing played a major
role in the economy of Viking-age Tof-
tanes, although, as noted above, line or net
sinkers were present at the site.
Dating
On the basis of the finds, the settlement has
been dated to the Viking (= Early Norse)
period and this is corroborated for house I
by three radiocarbon dates which provide a
calibrated date spread of AD 870-1020 (1