Anette Sand-Eriksen

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2023). Exploring Affordances: Late Neolithic and Bronze Age settlement locations and human-environment engagements in southeast Norway. Norwegian Archaeological Review. ISSN 0029-3652. doi: 10.1080/00293652.2023.2262463. Full text in Research Archive
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette & Mjærum, Axel Johan (2023). Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age settlements and agro-pastoral developments in the Oslo Fjord area, southeastern Norway. Danish Journal of Archaeology. ISSN 2166-2282. doi: 10.7146/dja.v12i1.134206. Full text in Research Archive
• Szilágyi, Kata & Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2021). Medieval Norwegian Wooden (Stave) Churches: Built Heritage and Places of Memory. Hungarian Archaeology E-Journal. ISSN 2416-0296. 10(1), p. 30–40. doi: 10.36338/ha.2021.1.5.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette; Skre, Dagfinn & Stamnes, Arne Anderson (2020). Hvordan har metallgjenstander funnet veien til pløyelaget?Resultater fra et metodisk prøveprosjekt på Storhov i Elverum. Primitive tider. ISSN 1501-0430. 22, p. 75–94. doi: 10.5617/pt.8395. Full text in Research Archive
• Melheim, Anne Lene & Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2020). Rock art and trade networks: From scandinavia to the italian alps. Open Archaeology. ISSN 2300-6560. doi: 10.1515/opar-2020-0101. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  This article uses rock art to explore potential bonds between Scandinavia and Italy, starting in the second half of the third millennium BCE with the enigmatic Mjeltehaugen burial monument in coastal western Norway and its striking rock art images, and ending in the first millennium BCE with ship motifs in inland Val Camonica, Italy. While the carved dagger on the Mjeltehaugen slab is unique in its Nordic setting, such weapon depictions are frequently seen on the Continent, e.g. in South Tyrol, and more often in later Nordic rock art. Strong evidence of trade relations between the Italian Alps and Scandinavia is found c. 1500–1100 BCE when the importation of copper from South Tyrol coincided with two-way transmission of luxury items, and again in a different form, c. 1000–700 BCE when strong similarities in burial traditions between the two areas may be seen as evidence of direct cultural connections or a shared cultural koiné. In order to understand the social fabric of these relations and how they unfolded through time, the authors discuss several different models of interaction. It is hypothesised that rock art practices played a role in establishing and maintaining durable social relations, through what we consider to be a two-way transmission of symbolic concepts and iconography during seasonal meetings related to trade and travel.

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette & Nordlie, Erlend (2020). The High-Medieval Royal Manor Complex. In Skre, Dagfinn (Eds.), Rulership in 1st to 14th century Scandinavia. Royal graves and sites at Avaldsnes and beyond. Walter de Gruyter (De Gruyter). ISSN 978-3-11-042579-6. p. 395–463. Show summary

  This book discusses the 1st-11th century developments that led to the formation of the three Scandinavian kingdoms in the Viking Age. Wide-ranging studies of communication routes, regional identities, judicial territories, and royal sites and graves trace a complex trajectory of rulership in these pagan Germanic societies. In the fi nal section, new light is shed on the pinnacle and demise of the Norwegian kingdom in the 13th-14th centuries. The book seeks to revitalise the somewhat stagnant scholarly debate on Germanic rulership in the first millennium AD. A series of comprehensive chapters combines literary evidence on Scandinavia’s polities, kings, and other rulers with archaeological, documentary, toponymical, and linguistic evidence. The picture that emerges is one of surprisingly stable rulership institutions, sites, and myths, while control of them was contested between individuals, dynasties, and polities. While in the early centuries, Scandinavia was integrated in Germanic Europe, profound societal and cultural changes in 6th-century Scandinavia and the Christianisation of Continental and English kingdoms set northern kingship on a different path. The pagan heroic warrior ethos, essential to kingship, was developed and refined; only to recur overseas embodied in 9th–10th-century Vikings. Three chapters on a hitherto unknown masonry royal manor at Avaldsnes in western Norway, excavated 2017, concludes this volume with discussions of the late-medieval peak of Norwegian kingship and it’s eventual downfall in the late 14th century. This book’s discussions and results are relevant to all scholars and students of 1st-millenium Germanic kingship, polities, and societies.

• Prescott, Christopher; Sand-Eriksen, Anette & Austvoll, Knut Ivar (2018). The Sea and Bronze Age Transformations. In Holt, Emily (Eds.), Water and Power in Past Societies. SUNY Press. ISSN 9781438468754. p. 177–198. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Along the western Norwegian coast, in the northwestern region of the Nordic Late Neolithic and Bronze Age (2350–500 BCE) there is cultural homogeneity but variable expressions of political hierarchy. Although new ideological institutions, technology (e.g., metallurgy and boat building), intensified agro‑pastoral farming, and maritime travel were introduced throughout the region as of 2350 BCE, concentrations of expressions of Bronze Age elites are intermittently found along the coast. Four regions—Lista, Jæren, Karmøy, and Sunnmøre—are examined in an exploration of the establishment and early role of maritime practices in this Nordic region. It is argued that the expressions of power and material wealth concentrated in these four regions is based on the control of bottlenecks, channels, portages, and harbors along important maritime routes of travel. As such, this article is a study of prehistoric travel, sources of power, and maritime landscapes in the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age of Norway.

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2017). Avaldsnes - Et ukjent kongsgårdsanlegg. Alle tiders. ISSN 1891-9219. p. 48–50.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2017). Mjeltehaugen: Europe’s northernmost Bell Beaker expression? In Bergerbrant, Sophie & Wessman, Anna (Ed.), New Pespectives on the Bronze Age. Proceedings of the 13th Nordic Bronze Age Symposium held in Gothenburg 9th to 13th June 2015. Archaeopress. ISSN 9781784915988. p. 7–19.

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• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2023). Skogsbønder på Østlandet? Klassekampen. ISSN 0805-3839. 12(67), p. 12–13.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2023). Temmet vi grisen, eller var det omvendt? Klassekampen. ISSN 0805-3839. 53(7), p. 12–13.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2022). The Case of Sus . Show summary

  The relationship between humans and pigs predates most, if not all other human relationships with domesticated food animals. Already around 8,500 years ago, wild pigs/boars (Sus scrofa) became domesticated in multiple sites around the world, subsequently entering Europe during the Mesolithic period and Northern-Europe from around 4000 BCE. In a longue duree perspective, however, the domestication history of the modern pig (Sus scrofa domesticus) is a bit of an archaeological puzzle. This is partly a result of pigs being one of the few animals domesticated several, independent times across the globe and partly due to the difficulties distinguishing between the wild and the domestic Sus in the archaeological record. Setting the osteological and natural science aside, what made humans decide to domesticate the pig? An animal, which compared to all other domesticated food animals, do not have a by-product. So why did humans transcend from hunting to husbandry? Could it perhaps be that pigs actually domesticate themselves? Alternatively, was it a co-constructive domestication, and subsequently a more-than-human effort? In this paper, I will apply a combination of Niche Construction Theory (NTC) and Optimal Foraging Theory (OFT) alongside Assemblage theory to explore the prehistoric relationship between humans and pigs from a conceptual point of view. Within this framework, I will consider both primary and compounding / secondary dynamics in this particular domesticating relationship. Drawing on archaeological examples, I will explore how the long history of the human-pig relationship challenges our idea of a clear boundary between nature and culture, and human and nature.

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2022). Scaling and evaluating Late Neolithic and Bronze Age settlement sites in South-Eastern Norway . Show summary

  In South-Eastern Norway, rock art sites, grave mounds, and various stray finds and hoards point to extensive networks and activity during the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age. What we have had little knowledge about in this region, however, are the actual settlements and the daily way of life in and around them during the LN and BA. However, since the first evidence of farm-based settlements in South-Eastern Norway were excavated in the early 2000s, the known number of buildings dated to LN and BA has increased considerably. A recent aggregation of the settlement material, mainly through reviewing unpublished excavation and survey reports, have resulted in a database of a little over 100 buildings from South-Eastern Norway. Based on this material, this paper has a two-folded purpose. Firstly, through in-depth analysis of the placement of the settlement material in GIS (overlay), the paper will present some preliminary results scaling the settlements’ location type, placement, patterns and (likely) subsistence strategies. Secondly, based on these observations, an evaluation whether these settlements are results of elite authorities or cooperative polities will be undertaken, seeking to explore (overarching) interaction networks and examine the dynamics of organizational variability within human groups over time.

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette & Mjærum, Axel (2022). Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age agricultural developments in the Oslo Fjord area, Norway. Show summary

  Like in most other parts of northwest Europe the transition to the Late Neolithic (c.2350 BC) was a time with large-scale cultural and economic changes in the Oslo Fjord area. A significant part of this watershed was the final breakthrough of farming. Over the last decades, scholars have strongly argued that these changes were initiated by a northward migration of agro-pastoral people. For long it has been a lack of data from the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age farming societies in the Oslo Fjord area, and therefore also an absence of detailed information that can be used to study the outcome of the Late Neolithic transition in the region. However, recent archaeological excavations have provided data that bring nuances to the developments in the early farming communities. As we will argue, this could point towards a more complex development trajectory than hitherto stated. Drawing from cases studies and aggregated data from the region, our aim is to provide a better understanding of the agricultural developments in the aftermath of the Late Neolithic revolution. With two newly excavated complex settlements at Løveskogen and Opstad as vantage points, as well as by implementing the historical process prior to the Late Neolithic transition, we seek to demonstrate how farming societies gradually and in (balanced?) steps adapted to their new environment in the Oslo Fjord region.

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2021). Graver og smievirksomhet fra (eldre) jernalder på Ringerike. Norark.no.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette & Koxvold, Lucia Uchermann (2020). Hva er det vi har funnet på Kanten? Norark.no.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2020). Med sjøutsikt i mesolitikum. Norark.no.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette; Koxvold, Lucia; Hårstad, Silje & Granados, Tina Jensen (2020). Arkeologi på Kanten. Norark.no.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2019). Fra null til gull – ei smedgrav på Harkmark. [Internet]. Norark.no.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette & Mjærum, Axel (2019). En dolk, en åker og mange stolper – spor av brosealdergården i Tjølling. [Internet]. Norark.no.
• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2017). Kongsgårdsanlegg på Avaldsnes graves frem. [Internet]. Norark.no.
• Prescott, Christopher; Austvoll, Knut Ivar & Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2016). The Sea and Late Neolithic/Bronze Age transformations. Show summary

  Den tidligste metalltiden i Norge innledes langs norskekysten. Gjennom sen-neolitikum og bronsealderen (2350-500 f.Kr.) er den materielle kulturen langs kysten bemerkelsesverdig homogen mens uttrykkene for politisk hierarki varierer. Selv om nye politiske institusjoner, teknologier (metallurgi og båtbygging), gårdsbasert jordbruk (korn og tamdyr) og maritim reise er introdusert gjennom hele regionen, så er uttrykkene etter bronsealdereliten kun funnet stedvis langs kysten. Fire regioner – Lista, Jæren, Karmøy og Sunnmøre – er brukt for å utforske etableringen og den tidlige rollen til maritime praksis i de kystnære strøkene. Vi argumenterer for at maktuttrykket og den materielle rikdommen, som konsentreres til disse fire regioner, er basert på kontroll over flaskehalser, seilingsled, båttrekk og havner langs viktige maritime ferdselsårer.

• Sand-Eriksen, Anette (2015). De dekorerte Mjeltehaughellene - et klokkebegeruttrykk? Show summary

  Mjeltehaugen er et gåtefullt og enestående gravfunn i norsk forhistorie, og den monumentale haugen er sentralt plassert langs skipsleden i Vest-Norge. Den har inneholdt en eller flere rikt dekorerte gravkister bestående av båtfigurer og geometriske bånd, og dekoren virker å representere en blanding av lokale eller regionale ristningstradisjoner med kulturpåvirkning langveis fra. Det har blant annet blitt hevdet at båtfigurene trolig tilhører den tidlige utviklingen av bronsealderbåtene, mens det har blitt påpekt at de geometriske båndene har tilsynelatende likheter med dekor typisk for klokkebegerkulturen. Det er resultatene fra undersøkelser av disse dekorerte gravhellene jeg vil legge frem. Gjennom komparative analyser av sammenlignbare mønster satt i et handlingsteoretisk rammeverk skal jeg vise hvordan dekoren er et uttrykk for sosial identitet, der stil fungerer som et aktivt kommunikasjonsverktøy. Målet er å teste ut om det er mulig å identifisere kulturhistoriske forbindelser i de dekorerte Mjeltehaughellene, som forhåpentligvis ikke bare bidra i diskusjonen om, men også i etableringen av den kontinentale klokkebegerkulturens tilstedeværelse i Skandinavia.

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