Comparative Perspectives on Colonisation, Maritime Interaction and Cultural Integration - Lene Melheim

Comparative Perspectives on Colonisation, Maritime Interaction and Cultural Integration - Lene Melheim

5. Past Mirrors: Thucydides, Sahlins and the Bronze and Viking Ages

Comparative Perspectives on Colonisation, Maritime Interaction and Cultural Integration - Lene Melheim

Zanette Tsigaridas Glørstad [+-]
University of Oslo
Zanette Tsigaridas Glørstad is Associate Professor in archaeology at the Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo. Her area of research and publications cover a number of topics in Early and Late Iron Age archaeology, in particular burial rituals, settlement patterns, identity formations and cross-cultural interaction. Address for correspondence: Department of Archaeology, Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway. Email: [email protected]
Lene Melheim [+-]
University of Gothenburg
Lene Melheim is an archaeologist and Section Manager at the Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo. Her background is at the Department of Archaeology, Conservation and History at the University of Oslo, where she undertook research and teaching 2001−2012. Melheim held a postdoctoral position at the University of Gothenburg 2012−2015. Her research covers a number of topics in Bronze Age archaeology, in particular systems of distribution, mobility, craft and technology, metal production, metal trade and cosmology. Address for correspondence: Department of Archaeology, Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway. Email [email protected]

Description

This article explores the potential of the archaeological analogy, by contrasting and comparing two formative periods in Nordic prehistory: the Early Bronze Age and the Viking Age. While admitting the historical differences between the two periods, an attempt is made to assess the structural basis for the apparent similarities in the material record, i.e. to identify whether there are universal parameters behind the particularities of the two historical trajectories. In other words, we approach the crux where history meets the model. Leaning on Thucydides’ report from the Peloponnesian War, Marshall Sahlins’ analysis of the Athenian sea empire and Kristiansen’s previous comparison of the Bronze and Viking Ages, we argue that the material similarities between the two ages were not based on equifinality, but reflect congruent cultural structures that arose as responses to comparable situations, yet with different degrees of social integration.

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Citation

Glørstad, Zanette ; Melheim, Lene . 5. Past Mirrors: Thucydides, Sahlins and the Bronze and Viking Ages. Comparative Perspectives on Colonisation, Maritime Interaction and Cultural Integration. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 87-108 Dec 2016. ISBN 9781781790489. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=24603. Date accessed: 26 Apr 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.24603. Dec 2016

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