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War Canoes or Social Units? Human Representation in Rock-Art Ships

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

Johan Ling
Johan Ling*
Affiliation:
Department of Historical Studies, University of Gothenburg, Sweden
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Abstract

Scandinavian rock art may in general be regarded as idealized depictions of a social world, not a direct description of concrete social matters. Even so, rock art does convey important social information that calls for more thorough comment. This study concerns almost 1700 ship depictions from western Sweden that include human representations. The average ship is depicted with a crew of six to thirteen individuals and these craft may have represented prevailing ideals about the crewing of ships. The large ship images with numerous crews in clearly defined positions may be depictions of war canoes, staged for special maritime events. The study shows that the visual proportions of the rock-art ships are similar to those of the prehistoric war canoe from Hjortspring, Denmark. It is argued that the praxis of pecking ships into the rocks could have served to manifest the agency of the maritime social world and, to some extent, to make this ideology more dominant.

L'art rupestre scandinave est considéré généralement comme représentation idéalisée d'un monde social, et non pas comme une description immédiate de questions sociales concrètes. L'art rupestre transmet toutefois d'importantes informations sociales qui exigent des commentaires plus approfondis. La présente étude traite de presque 1700 représentations de bateaux incluant des représentations humaines en Suède occidentale. Ces bateaux comptent en moyenne un équipage de 6 à 13 individus, ce qui pourrait correspondre aux idéaux en vigueur. Les grandes représentations de bateaux avec de nombreux membres d'équipage dans des positions clairement définies montrent probablement des canoës de guerre, mis en scène pour des évènements maritimes spéciaux. Les recherches montrent que les proportions visuelles des bateaux rupestres sont similaires à celles du canoë de guerre préhistorique de Hjortspring en Danemark. On soutient que la pratique de graver des bateaux aurait pu servir à manifester l'agentivité du monde social maritime et, dans une certaine mesure, confirmer cette idéologie. Translation by Isabelle Gerges.

Zusammenfassung

Zusammenfassung

Skandinavische Felszeichnungen sind grundsätzlich als idealisierte Abbildungen einer sozialen Welt, nicht als eine direkte Abbildung konkreter sozialer Inhalte zu betrachten. Dennoch transportiert Felsbildkunst bedeutende soziale Informationen, die nach eingehender Kommentierung verlangen. Die vorliegende Studie behandelt nahezu 1700 Schiffsdarstellungen mit Abbildungen von Menschen aus Westschweden. Allgemein werden die Schiffe mit einer Crew von sechs bis 13 Individuen dargestellt, dies ist als das damals vorherrschende Ideal einer Schiffsbesatzung anzunehmen. Bei den großen Schiffsdarstellungen mit verschiedenen Beatzungen in klar definierten Positionen wird es sich um Bilder von Kriegskanus handeln, die für besondere maritime Ereignisse inszeniert wurden. Die Studie zeigt, dass die visuellen Proportionen der Felsbild-Schiffe denen des prähistorischen Kriegskanus von Hjortspring (Dänemark) ähneln. Es wird erörtert, dass die Praxis des rituellen Einmeißelns von Schiffsdarstellungen dazu gedient haben könnte, die Einwirkung der maritimen sozialen Welt zu manifestieren und in gewissem Maße diese Ideologie zu bestärken. Translation by Heiner Schwarzberg.

Keywords

rock artshipsship depictionshuman representationwar canoessocial inequalitymaritime initiation ritesmaritime social worldart rupestrebateauxreprésentations de bateauxreprésentation humainecanoës de guerreinégalité socialerites d'initiation maritimesmonde social maritimefelszeichnungenschiffemenschliche darstellungkriegskanussoziale ungleichheitmaritime Initiationsritenmaritime soziale welt
Type
Articles
Information
European Journal of Archaeology , Volume 15 , Issue 3 , 2012 , pp. 465 - 485
Copyright
Copyright © European Association of Archaeologists 2012 

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