Long houses and halls

Architecture in Scandinavia between 2300 BC and AD 1000 is largely a tale of the long house (Göthberg et al. Reference Göthberg, Kyhlberg and Vinberg1995; Artursson Reference Artursson2009). This was a single-storey wooden structure with roof frames supported by internal posts. In the earliest long houses, the posts formed a central line under the roof ridge; from the 1600s cal BC, the design altered and posts were paired in parallel lines, dividing the internal space into three aisles. The associated postholes for these roof supports were deep and consequently many survive beneath the reach of the plough.

For most of its history, the Scandinavian long house was multifunctional, often with one half used as a barn and the other for housing. From c. AD 150, however, we find long houses where the post pairs are irregularly spaced, creating an extra-large room: the hall. From c. AD 300, at some large farmsteads, the function of this enlarged space expands to fill a dedicated long house. This is the medu-heall, or mead hall, that Grendel haunts in Beowulf and that looms large in the world of Old Norse sagas and poems (Herschend Reference Herschend1993, Reference Herschend1998; Lönnroth Reference Lönnroth, Callmer and Rosengren1997; P.M. Sørensen Reference Sørensen, Munch, Johansen and Roesdahl2003; Carstens Reference Carstens and Eriksen2015; Sundqvist Reference Sundqvist2016). In Old Norse literature, hǫll is the standard word for the main building of a royal manor. These halls formed the main political and religious stage of the mid-first millennium AD, where kings, queens, heroes and poets played their roles.

Several very large halls have been investigated in Denmark, Sweden and Norway: Gudme, Old Lejre, Tissø, Uppåkra, Järrestad, Lunda, Old Uppsala, Borre and Borg in Lofoten (Petersen Reference Petersen, Nielsen, Randsborg and Thrane1994; P.Ø. Sørensen Reference Sørensen, Nielsen, Randsborg and Thrane1994; Jørgensen Reference Jørgensen, Pestell and Ulmschneider2003; Munch et al. Reference Munch, Johansen and Roesdahl2003; Larsson Reference Larsson2004; Söderberg Reference Söderberg2005; Skyllberg Reference Skyllberg, Andersson and Skyllberg2008; Christensen Reference Christensen2015; Ljungkvist & Frölund Reference Ljungkvist and Frölund2015; Tonning et al. Reference Tonning2020). Recently discovered halls yet to be published include Fuglebjerg on Zealand, Rødbyhavn on Lolland and Kongstubbe on Bornholm.

The first hall to be identified in Östergötland was discovered only in 2012 at Ströja in Kvillinge near Norrköping. The building measured approximately 44m in length, with two phases spanning c. AD 450–650, and was succeeded by a 38m-long hall nearby (Hjulström Reference Hjulström2012, Reference Hjulström2018; M. Karlsson Reference Karlsson2020).

The platform hall at Aska

The hamlet of Aska is located in Hagebyhöga parish near Vadstena in Östergötland (Figure 1). The locality is renowned for having the richest Viking Period burials in the province, one of which was unearthed in 1920 and yielded the ‘Aska Lady’ pendant (Arne Reference Arne1932). At the end of the hamlet's main street is an oblong platform mound 65 × 40m at its base and 3–4m in height. Such steep-sided and high platforms are known at sites including Old Uppsala (Ljungkvist & Frölund Reference Ljungkvist and Frölund2015), Fornsigtuna (Allerstav et al. Reference Allerstav1991; Edberg & Heimer Reference Edberg and Heimer2021) and Hovgården on Adelsö (Brunstedt Reference Brunstedt1996), all located around the east end of Lake Mälaren. Ground-penetrating radar survey directed by Andreas Viberg has documented the postholes of a 48 × 14m hall on the Aska platform (Figure 2; Rundkvist & Viberg Reference Rundkvist and Viberg2014). It is so like one of the platform halls at Old Uppsala, the main royal centre of the Swedes, that it is probable the architect travelled there and took measurements. Lines of widely spaced buttress posts outside the long walls at Aska, on the other hand, suggest contact with the Danish kingdom (cf. halls at Old Lejre and Tissø on Zealand, Rundkvist & Viberg Reference Rundkvist and Viberg2014).

Figure 1. Aerial view of Aska hamlet with building platform and ploughed-out cemeteries. The latter's dashed boundary lines are based on Middle Viking Period metalwork scatters in the plough soil (figure by Jon Lundin).

Figure 2. Features of the Aska long house and platform. Ground-penetrating radar anomalies, trenches excavated in 2020–21, first-millennium features. The three red features contained most of the gold-foil figures. The dashed grey line marks a probable interior wall (figure by Andreas Viberg and Jon Lundin).

Excavations on the platform in 2020–21 (Rundkvist Reference Rundkvist2021; Rundkvist & Lindgren Reference Rundkvist and Lindgren2022) revealed that the postholes had been robbed of their large packing stones and almost all cut features were backfilled with cobbles and what seemed to be the former floor layer of the hall. It produced a large assemblage of small bone fragments and artefacts (see online supplementary material (OSM)). The platform hall cannot have been the only building at this manorial settlement: future fieldwork will help to establish the full nature of the site.

Dating the hall

In 1985–86, trial trenching through the platform exposed a large stone cairn on the original ground surface beneath the platform's western end (Claréus & Fernholm Reference Claréus, Fernholm, Andersson, Lagerlöf and Åkerlund1999). Radiocarbon dating confirms that the cairn was not the core of an earlier burial mound that had been incorporated into the platform, as at Huseby in Tjølling (Skre Reference Skre and Skre2007: 227 f). Limited investigation by the excavators recovered well-preserved, articulated bones from the rear right leg of a large mammal, which appears to have been sacrificed and butchered during the building project. Osteologist Per Eriksson identified the bones as horse, a determination confirmed with ZooMS at the University of York in 2020 (Samantha Presslee, pers. comm.). The bones have been radiocarbon dated twice: in 1988 using the scintillation method and again in 2020 by AMS. The results are comparable, placing the death of the horse at cal AD 670–770 (>95% probability; Table 1).

Table 1. Radiocarbon analyses (calibration: OxCal 4.4, https://c14.arch.ox.ac.uk/oxcal/OxCal.html)

In 2020 and 2021, Jens Heimdahl identified charred grain in soil samples from cut features on top of the platform. Seven charred grains or mixed samples of grain fragments have been radiocarbon dated. Two samples have returned late Roman-period dates older than the horse, suggesting that they were residual material redeposited when the platform was built (Claréus & Fernholm Reference Claréus, Fernholm, Andersson, Lagerlöf and Åkerlund1999: 133). The remaining five samples place the start of activity within the building between cal AD 590–650 (95% probability). If the two dates for the horse and the oldest non-residual grain are modelled in OxCal as a single event—representing the erection of the platform and the start of activity in the hall—this gives a date range of cal AD 650–680 (>95% probability).

As well as the earliest activity, it would also be valuable to establish the date of the final fire lit in the hall. However, we have not yet located any hearth. The large, slightly off-centre feature identified by geophysical survey proved to be a modern refuse pit. The latest date for grain recovered from the hall is cal AD 880–990. This interval includes the likely date c. 975 for the last burials at the hamlet's cemeteries, one of which was the wealthy grave excavated in 1920. In sum, the hall likely stood between 650 and 990.

Gold-foil figures

Motifs

All the Aska foils are embossed rectangular images of an embracing, fully clothed couple (Figures 3–8). Axel Löfving has identified four die families—a group of similar designs from several production dies that were used to emboss the foils. The families are referred to here as Adam, Betty, Carl and Daisy; within each group, some figures are die-identical meaning that they were produced by the same die (Figure 3). Margrethe Watt of the Sorte Muld project has placed Löfving's Aska die families in relation to her forthcoming, informally disseminated, pan-Scandinavian classification scheme.

Figure 3. Aska's gold-foil figures: four die families including some die identities. Orphans are designs that cannot be assigned to families in the currently known material (photographs by Björn Falkevik; editing by Cheyenne Olander).

Figure 4. Foil-figure 306, shown from the reverse side, die-identical to the Husby in Glanshammar figure. Die family Adam (photograph by Björn Falkevik).

Figure 5. Foil figure 308. Die family Betty (photograph by Björn Falkevik).

Figure 6. Foil figure (in two fragments) 5+8, die-identical to Borg in Lofoten figure 8334. Die family Carl (photograph by Björn Falkevik).

Figure 7. Foil figure 303, die-identical to the Svintuna figure. Die family Daisy (photograph by Björn Falkevik).

Figure 8. Foil figure 12. Die family Daisy. Note the vertical crack to the right, from the embossing (photograph by Björn Falkevik).

At Aska, die family Adam has five members, including two that are die-identical to the foil figure from Husby in Glanshammar (Figure 4; Andersson et al. Reference Andersson, Ekman and Persson2000: 286; Ekman Reference Ekman and Olausson2000; Lamm Reference Lamm, Clarke and Lamm2004: 95). The man depicted wears a garment with decorated front-edge trim. This may be the first-discovered kaftan represented on a foil featuring the embracing couple motif. It is hard to be certain, however, because the kaftan is difficult to depict at this scale, and less visible when the man is depicted in profile and in the woman's embrace. Nonetheless, it would be the first indication that men shown on these embracing-couple foils held the same princely rank as the kaftan-wearing men on single-figure foils and Vendel helmets (Wamers Reference Wamers, Pesch and Helmbrecht2019). The kaftan wearers appear to be earthly rulers rather than deities, as suggested by the bird-horned Odinn who guides their spears in battle on helmets from Valsgärde and Sutton Hoo, as well as the Pliezhausen disc (Wamers Reference Wamers, Pesch and Helmbrecht2019). Die family Adam equals Watt's family 68.

Die family Betty has two members (Figure 5) and no known die identities. The woman cups the man's cheek in her hand. On his tunic is a long S or Z symbol that also appears on Helgö 603 (Lamm Reference Lamm, Clarke and Lamm2004: 79). The woman's long hair ends in a spiral echoing the symbol on the man's tunic. The alternating hatched pattern of the woman's cloak finds no parallels with other gold-foil figures, but it is known from Vendel helmet imagery such as the Torslunda dies (Helmbrecht Reference Helmbrecht, Pesch and Helmbrecht2019: 146). Die family Betty has no equivalent in Watt's classification.

Die family Carl has three members, including two die-identical foils and one that is die identical to Borg in Lofoten 8334 (Figure 6; Munch et al. Reference Munch, Johansen and Roesdahl2003: 247, 255). In this die family, the woman wears a cloak reversed with the train forward. This has been interpreted to suggest that the die maker did not fully understand the motif (Munch et al. Reference Munch, Johansen and Roesdahl2003: 247). On the other hand, the die maker has followed an animal art convention and interlaced the woman's lower arm with the front edge of the cloak in a way that would demand a slit in the fabric. This latter feature is also found at Slöinge and Helgö. Die family Carl equals Watt's family 66.

Die family Daisy has eight or nine members, including two that are die-identical to the Svintuna figure (Lamm Reference Lamm, Clarke and Lamm2004: 104; Figure 7). Here, the woman's hair style is reduced to a top knot. The man wears a collar with long triangles descending onto the front of his shoulders. This difference in decoration between the upper and lower parts of the garment is unusual and represents a fashion unattested elsewhere (Mannering Reference Mannering2017: 56). The Svintuna die demonstrates the influence of horror vacui, the figures filling out the entire surface of the foil as also found in contemporaneous animal art. The large identical group found at Aska is new: embracing couples have not previously been recognised in large die-identical assemblages at a single site within medieval Sweden. While die-identical sets are common among single-figure foils, a ratio of die-identical embracing figures comparable to that at Aska is not. Slöinge and the Norwegian sites of Hauge and Mære offer the closest parallels (Lamm Reference Lamm, Clarke and Lamm2004; Tangen Reference Tangen2010; Watt Reference Watt, Pesch and Helmbrecht2019). Die family Daisy equals Watt's family 67.

The 11 figures from Aska that have not yet been assigned to families are largely fragmented or poorly embossed, making classification difficult, though three orphans (guldgubbar GG3, GG4 and GG14) are well preserved and may eventually be allocated to families. Although the figures on the Aska foils embrace, many do not face each other eye to eye. Instead, they stand chin to chin, heads back, facing the sky. This imagery links back to Migration period depictions pre-dating AD 540, as seen, for example, on the Gummersmark relief brooch, the four identical type-B gold bracteates in the Söderby hoard and the Ålleberg gold filigree collar (Lamm et al. Reference Lamm, Hydman and Axboe1999; Lamm Reference Lamm, Clarke and Lamm2004: 48; Kristoffersen Reference Kristoffersen, Pesch and Helmbrecht2019: 96).

Other artefacts and ecofacts

Other artefacts from the hall include pieces of a decorative mount from a Vendel-Valsgärde or Sutton-Hoo-type shield and three domed gaming pieces made from right-whale bone. It is unusual for this type of site that no glass that can be morphologically dated to the first millennium has been found on the platform. Animal bones and charred grain indicate a high-status diet. See OSM for further details.

Demolition and closure

The great hall appears to have been dismantled no later than cal AD 990. This was a systematic event leaving no remains of posts or any large packing stones in the postholes. The planks were pulled out of the slots for the outer walls, leaving the packing stones undisturbed. All the cut features were then carefully filled using material from the hall's floor. Differences in the proportions of animal species among the bones across the excavated surfaces suggest that each cut feature was filled with the material from the floor area closest to it.

With the top surface of the platform carefully levelled, the internal footprint of the building was covered with a dense pavement of cobblestones. This event is undated, but there is no reason to believe that it occurred long after the demolition of the hall. Such sealing and closure of demolished buildings, or the construction of a monument on top, was a common Viking-period custom (Lindeblad & Nielsen Reference Lindeblad and Nielsen1997; Stenholm Reference Stenholm2012; Eriksen Reference Eriksen2016). Within the cobblestone pavement at Aska were human bones. Rudolf Gustavsson has identified 20 human fragments, all from crania, representing at least two adults and one child.

During trial trenching on the platform in 1985–86, fragmented artefacts and bone were collected, suggesting that the structure partly consists of material taken from an early first-millennium cremation cemetery (Claréus & Fernholm Reference Claréus, Fernholm, Andersson, Lagerlöf and Åkerlund1999: 133). As noted, this impression is now strengthened by two late Roman-period radiocarbon dates for charred grain (Table 1).

Whether this construction material was chosen intentionally is unclear. In the subsequent Viking Period we have ample evidence for the targeted re-use of earlier first-millennium monuments across Sweden, as was also the case at Aska (see below). It does not, however, seem likely that the cranial fragments in the platform's closing pavement were included unintentionally. All but one of them are unburnt suggesting they are not residual from the cremation cemetery; moreover, the predominance of crania indicates intentional selection. Radiocarbon dating of one of the cranial fragments from the pavement has returned a date in the first century cal AD (Table 1). This suggests that when the time came to procure human remains for inclusion in a closing pavement on the Aska platform, they were acquired from inhumation graves of the Roman period. When laying to rest the memory of this building, 300 years after it had first been erected, the remains of forebears who had died 800 years previously played an important role.