My name is Nico Pace, and I am a junior at Marshall University studying Anthropology and History. I first learned about Vikings in middle school and I have always been interested in learning more about their culture and history. This interest was further sparked by watching the show Vikings and by reading a novel which detailed their time in the North American Arctic and subsequent interaction with local Inuit people. Working on this project will allow me to satisfy this interest through conducting research on archaeology sites associated with Norse presence and will help me learn more about the Viking culture through a research lens rather than through the content-oriented lens I have viewed the culture in the past.
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Slowly the dirt was removed, then sifted—a process that was repeated endlessly. Minute amounts of dirt were moved with the scrape of the trowel. Suddenly there was a slight noise. A slight pressure against the trowel. It had hit something. Switching to a brush, the rest of the dirt was slowly brushed away from the object. The light color and smooth surface were revealed. It was a skull. This was the day when the Nivågård child saw light for the first time in over 7000 years.
This is the site of Nivå 10 which is located on a small island mouth of a former Niva fjord. The site was excavated in the 1990s by Ole Lass Jensen. It dates to the Mesolithic period, specifically from the middle of the Kongemose period to the early Ertebølle, and more precisely 5600 BC. Nivå 10 contains at least four round pits, which were determined to be the floors of semi-subterranean huts that the inhabitants would have lived in. These structures were determined to have both a residential and a ritual function for the inhabitants. In total there are twelve graves with a total of fifteen individuals located at the site.
Another grave of interest is the grave of individual H and individual O. Individual H is a man who is holding individual O, a four-year-old child. The head of the man is placed on top of a large stone and a flint phallus. There is a pendant of red deer teeth that was placed with both individuals. The man has a very large head fracture, and his ankles show evidence of sitting in a squatting position for long periods of time. The stomach contents of the man included fish scales and bones from flounder and eel. This, combined with the location of the site, provides evidence that the community’s subsistence strategy was largely based on fishing.
The grave of the Nivågård child illustrates that the child was first wrapped in an animal skin before being placed in the grave. Beneath their head lies a flat stone. A similar stone being found underneath the head of individual H indicates that this was likely a common tradition within the community. Perhaps these stones were meant to act as pillows, or perhaps they have a different symbolic meaning among this culture. The child has a small stone that has been filled with gouges placed in their mouth. This likely has some symbolic or ritual meaning, but what that meaning is we do not know. The child also had ochre powder sprinkled onto their body. The use of ochre powder spread onto dead bodies is very common in the ancient world, but the meaning behind this action can be very specific to each culture. Thus, we do not know the exact reason why ochre was spread on this body, and what the importance of this practice was to this culture. A recent study was able to identify the Nivågård child as female from enamel peptides. The cause of death for the child is still unknown.
The site of Nivå 10 provides a glimpse into the history of the earliest peoples who would become those we now know as Vikings. Sites like Nivå 10 can help us understand how their culture developed into that of the iconic Viking culture that we celebrate today. There are still many questions left to answer at the Nivå 10 site such as: How did the Nivågård child die? What is the significance of the stone placed under the heads and the stone placed in the mouth? And: What is the symbolic meaning behind the spreading of red ochre on the body? Some of these questions may be answered with future research, some may never be answered due to a lack of available artifacts, and more questions may still be asked about the site. We do know that this site was once the home for individuals who were the ancestors to the Vikings and that these individuals lived and died at the site. Now, the site can only tell us its story through the archaeological remains that fill the site.
Additional readings
https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/206886/1/Gron_et_al._2023b.pdf
https://splashcos.org/sites/splashcos.org/files/gron/2003-Gron-Dwellings_Antiquity.pdf
Ancient Scandinavia: An Archaeological History from the First Humans to the Vikings by T. Douglas Price